S06E06: Looks Like Time Travel's Back on the Menu, Gang!

== Aside ==
Kanye had a great mushroom hunting session and Um is teaching everyone how to properly add infobox to the episode pages on the wiki.
== Background ==
The group beat the emocorn a LOT faster than the DM had prepared for, then discovered we had all totally been bamboozled by completely suspicious not-dryads that we didn’t question once.
So then we went back and nuked the hag’s house twice. In the ensuing battle, Kanye dragged one away from the others (which significantly decreased their powers), we turned one into a pony to bridle and interrogate, and now they’re all dead.
Banrean now wants our help to cleanse the woods, and will need us to use the gems in her tiara for it.
== Session ==
We’re standing by the smoking ruins of a witch’s hut and we just punched the last hag to death.
Banrean turns towards us and asks for our assistance to undo the damage before she gives us the gems in her tiara. She tells us about a clocktower in the town that had fallen over, the gems have something to do with it. The gem magic is creepy and not compatible with her, but she thinks we could figure it out for her, to figure out how to combine her magic with the magic of the gems.
The group agrees, and Banrean leads us back the path.
The sunbeams have totally cleared up. The mushrooms are still on trees, ground is still sickly, but the sky has cleared, the sunlight no longer moves in unnatural ways. The environment is healthy even if the forest is not anymore.
We move back down the path to the clearing in the old ruins, where there were previously large blocks with carvings on them that Nissa believes represents the machine of Lum the mad.
The fallen clock tower is still where it is - basically sheared off at the base, leaving the first floor open and exposed, but all the rest of it lying on it’s side across the chasm, where we used it as a bridge.
Banrean stops short of the building and says she might not be much help in here, but will follow us. Averlyth confirms that she means for us to go in - she only knows it’s connected.
It looks like a natural built stone tower, maybe 5 stories? Kanye tells us that the tower is not structurally sound.
Averlyth is absolutely unable to sense where the magic is coming from - the unicorn is magic, the hags were magic, Averlyth and Nissa are both magic, it’s basically a magic headache.Um: Detect Magic returns true!Sorith can’t tell much historically other than that the tower is pretty old, though it does seem like this was once a thriving city from the depictions on the stone.
The group approaches the ground floor of the tower - most walls have sheared off and are tumbling - but we walk around and find what would have been the front door. It appears the whole bottom floor used to be one open room. Ther’es rubble, spots on the wall where there would’ve been windows, etc, but most of it’s gone and looks like a lots being taken out of the room.
Like the imprint made by a painting off the wall, it seems like this room used to be filled with equipment. There’s one remaining instrument panel - old, clearly decaying, with lots of silver wires coming out of it.
It’s clearly related to the floating island’s planar technology. There are also a series of knobs and dials, also 2 recessed spots that look like they could accept some sort of object.Sorith: Are the two gems the same shape? (red circle, blue square)DM: No, one’s kinda an oval and ones a squareSorith: Is one of the recessed spot an oval and the other a square?DM: It ‘s amazing how you guessed that!Kanye looks for inscriptions on the control panel, having realized that his power armor is able to translate anything. Kanye happily uses a charge (there’s a seemingly excited needle)
There’s very very faint writing on this panel, like a mixer panel on a console; there’s all knobs and dials and they’re all labeled in ways that don’t make sense if you’re not an audiophile. But also this machine has been left out in the rain for hundreds of years.
There doesn’t seem to be anything as clear as “this is the machine that does X and this is how you use it”, but there are fragments of words that all seem to be related to time (and like latin roots of a language we’re actually familiar with)
Um doesn’t find anything like an access panel, but it’s also not exactly human technology. It’s weird and alien, like a feudal serf finding a tower pc. There’s a panel that’s a little pried off that lets you see inside, but it’s not like anything makes sense either.
Um asks the group if this is the time for Mizz Computer, since she’s from a future with confirmed time travel, and we haven’t used a single one of her 5 charges.
Everyone except for distracted Nissa recognizes the silver wires in Qualish’s office, and the ways the wires are laid out remind us of how the carvings depicted people connected to the machine.
We notice that the silver that the tiara was made from seems to be the same silver as the wire.
Um agrees to check out the clock tower on the condition that when he comes back, someone else does “the gem thing”. Kanye volunteers to put the shapes in.
He follows some of the silver wires that snake up the walls to what would have been higher in the tower, into the sideways tower. After one story in, he missteps, and pieces of the tower crumble and fall to the bottom of the chasm - Um is unharmed, though maybe given a good scare.
Um makes it all the way to the top of the clock tower with more caution. He doesn’t find anything unusual other than that the silver wires are going all the way to the top. The clock tower mechanisms appear smashed and destroyed, probably from when it fell over, there’s nothing to loot or of any particular interest. Best guess is this tower was already a clock tower before the machine was installed. It’s totally recognizable technology from this plane.
Averlyth: Kanye, are you still okay with putting the shapes in?Kanye: Yes! I am readyAverlyth: IS everyone else okay with Kanye putting the shapes in?Nissa is going to stick with Kanye because she’s ride or die. Everyone else decides to step back as he gets the gems from Banrean’s tiara. Miraculously, he puts the correct shaped gem in the corresponding shaped receptacle, right after a required “one” liner.Kanye: Here’s.. To time.Kanye: We hardly knew you.Kanye: We’re going back to the future, Marty!Nothing dramatic happens. A few lights turn on in the control panels, but none of the knobs or levers changes positions, nothing happens in the surroundings.
The rest of the group goes back into the room after Kanye tells us it’s all safe. He translates everything for us, then while everyone’s discussing how to do this, he reaches over and turns one of the knobs by the red, circular gem.
[apparently Sorith's beer slogan is “Our brews will shatter your minds til you’re dumb as a dwarf”]
Immediately, the tower collapses into the chasm below with a resounding crash. However, in addition to that, the bits of the tower around us rapidly age - a sprout turns into a sapling, into a tree, the metal ceramic surfaces gets dingier and the labels get harder to read.
As far as we can tell, the whole tower moved forward rapidly in time. However, none of us aged, and nothing outside the tower appears to have changed. The sun didn’t change, the trees haven’t changed, etc.
Nissa reaches over and manipulates the same control that Kanye did on the red component, and we see the tower uncollapse back to its original state. Everything looks exactly as it did when we walked in.Kanye: I think I found out how to make that beer faster. Sorith! I know where we should put that orchard.Um maps out on the ground where the other bits of the machinery were in the past and carefully stands where one totally isn’t is. Averlyth is standing in the middle of one, and he repositions her.
The group questions whether the blue gem will affect us or the environment. Averlyth suddenly remembers that Kanye was aged 20 years older from dungeon AGES ago, and we could totally reverse that.
Nissa goes and moves a dial near the blue one - we see the tower go back in time. Sorith even sees it from the outside. Some of the tarnishing on the machine has receded a little bit, some of the labels become easier to read, the little sprout fully disappeared into the ground, the lichen has receded.
Banrean speaks up, stating this is fascinating, the magic is foreign to her and makes her head itch, it’s not something she can manipulate directly, but she might be able to combine it with her own magic to extend the tower reversal magic to affect the entire surrounding areas to undo the corruption.
Um asks Kanye what would happen if he sticks his hand in the machine innards where there was a squirrel.Averlyth: Was there actually a dead squirrel? I’ll have to write that downDM: Yes, there was actually a squirrelKanye: There might be a live squirrel in the moment!Apparently there’s a dead squirrel in the machine.
Kanye asks Um if he looks safe (Um: “.. Sure!”) and Nissa starts slowly scrubbing the dial back.
The first thing we notice is that the rest of the tower is obviously strengthening. Bits of rubble and detritus fly up and restore themselves into the wall. It’s still cracked and fallen over, but it’s way more structurally sound. Rewinding further, and all the moss and lichen recede and disappear. The patina on the surface of the machine disappears, andt eh m machine is shinier now.
Further back, and the tower flies back up and is upright over the top of us. We eventually bottom out the knob, and we are now standing in a fully restored clock tower. We can even hear the mechanism of the clock ticking above us.
However - none of the other machines reappeared. There’s still only a control panel in front of us, even though the marks on the ground are gone. The wires still go out to spots where machines will …. Would have been? Outside everything looks the same, the floor is in good condition, the labels are clear to read, the tower and the control panel in front of us have moved but we and our surroundings haven’t.
We hear Banrean say “fascinating”.
Nissa tries to read the cleaned up control panel, though it’s still super technical. It appears that this panel was able to manipulate time for the things it’s connected to. Banrean is looking excited.
Averlyth asks how we combine the magics. Banrean requests that we go back to the time when the tower bridge seemed strong, and then she can try to cast magic on the woods to match.
Kanye muses what happens if he takes a chunk of the tower and buries it. Then he considers what happens if someone eats a chunk of the tower.
Nissa carefully turns the dial back to the present time. Banrean says “when she says 3, move the slider back to the time we agreed upon”. An intense glow starts coming from her horn, and her presence in the room feels more weighty - like an increased saturation of her presence. Her magic impresses itself upon us, and we can feel her reaching out to the woods around us.
1, 2, 3. Nissa slowly moves the dial.
We hear the rumbling as the stones go back and stabilize the bridge, the sapling disappears back under the ground, the control panel restores itselves a little bit. When we remove her hand from the panel, we hear Banrean gasp and the woods outside are transformed.
They were weak and sickly before, there was algae and moss hanging from the branches, mushrooms on all the trunks, all of that is gone. We’re looking at a pristine healthy forest, ferns everywhere, we can see deer jumping around in the background. We can hear the excited chatter of woodland pixies and sprites as the corruption from the sprites. Some dryds uncurl themselves from the knotted tangled forms they had taken.
Banrean, who looks exhausted but eternally grateful, turns and thanks us for driving the hags from her home and for helping her restore the woods.Kanye: Can I have some… blood?Banrean: … Not that.She clarifies unicorn magic or healing. Sorith apologies for stunning her in the fight, she doesn’t take it hard. She encourages us to take the gems with us, and says she will destroy the terminal so it can never be abused.
Nissa questions if Banrean wants the tower up - she prefers it down and stable, as a refuge and safe bridge.
Kanye wants to gather a lot of the wire, but it’s surprisingly well-attached. Banrean gives him the loose wire that was made from her tiara, all told he now has 6 feet of weird silver wire. Kanye is ready to add an asset tag (“Property of Drakeguard”) to the whole spool.
Also Kanye takes a piece of the tower rubble as a souvenir and a strategy.
Kanye: I want to put it on my desk, so if it ever flies away, we know someone’s messing with time.Um: Do we have a desk?
We teleport back to the Firehouse 99, with the intent to go back to Qualish. Apparently Kanye is now wearing the tiara, with the gems back in it. It looks dashing as fuck, with the red and blue complementing his green skin.
Kanye considers a long rest. Averlyth is nervous about wearing such a powerful magical item around the island, like it’s a glaring beacon.DM: Like it’s giving him magical radiation poisoning.Kanye: yeah, do you guys hear that whispering?Dm: Averlyth is like, “yeah that’s BAne, let him in”
We get back to Qualish’s office. He’s puttering around, there are some notes on his desk that seem to still about Lum the internal machine. The mindflayer’s pod is see through again, and he’s staring straight at Kanye. Kanye puts a plaque “Susan” and puts it on the mindflayer’s case on eye-level, but he can’t look down and read the name tag.
Susan is trying to probe Kanye’s brain but there’s nothing in there. Qualish slaps Kanye off the case but doesn’t remoe the plaque.
Averlyth tells Qualish that the tiara contains pieces from the machine. He pulls out jeweler’s glasses, he’s climbed up on the desk and he’s uncomfortably close to Kanye’s face to look at the gems on his forehead. Grabs him by the ears, moves them around like he’s just a platform for hte gems.
Kanye empties his pockets to show the silver wires.
Qualish asks if there was a clocktower. Sorith tells a whole story about the hags and the unicorn and Qualish is visibly uninterested. As soon as we talk about the machine, he starts taking notes, something about localized temporal machine, etc. He tells us what we have confirmed some recent findings of his.
While we were all gone, he did some more research. He told us already about his suspicion that they’re trying to reassemble the machine of Lum the mad. The 2 gems are components of the machine. When the machine is destroyed, the parts are scattered across time itself. Qualish believes he’s found some additional components, though he assumes the horsemen will make the same conclusion if they haven’t already.
Qualish asks what we know about the tomb of horrors. Nissa dramatically gasps.Nissa: The tomb of horrors? That place is death.Qualish: Yes, it’s in the name.We’ve all heard of it - at the very least, we know it’s arguably the most famous dungeon in the entire world, and it’s phenomenally deadly.Um: Oh that tomb of horrors.Nissa and Sorith are also aware that the tomb was made by a legendary arch lich named Asaract, as a testing ground to trick and trap adventurers who might be trying to kill him. Nissa also tells us the tomb can steal souls, and has taken countless lives over a millenia.
Qualish tells us he believes the tomb was built using some components from the infernal machine. However, it’s still super dangerous - so he proposes sending us back to when the tomb was being constructed. Apprenty the tomb was made by a famous artificer named mog-hadan - he eventually becomes a lich itself, but “the whole story is complicated, it doesn’t really matter” - but he’s a big deal when talking about people who make terrible dungeons and trap people. He built the dungeon for Asaract.
We are told to never fuck around with Asaract - he’s not a lich yet, but he’s one fo the most powerful arch-mages ever, and mildly dangerous. Mog-hadan is no slouch himself, don’t pick fights when we go back.
Averlyth asks if there’s a risk of paradox. Qualish shrugs it off, says don’t worry about it if we succeed, time’s like a river, hard to divert.
The whole group can tell Qualish has no idea, this is his best guess. But we do also know that the History channel went back in time and abducted us, and they probably wouldn’t do that if it risked their own future.
Qualish informs us that the gems appear to have weird localized effect. He’s planning on installing the gems into Gearbox and altering him to support taking us through time. He’ll program in the time when we know the tomb was under construction and the time to bring us back home.
In addition, we can use the gems to affect a localized field, wherever we are. We only have 6 charges, then will need to take a long rest. The group is having flashbacks to the History channel and Kanye is overthinking what and who is and isn’t affected by time changes.Kanye: So, I guess we can use this for gambling?Neither us nor Gearbox know in advance what areas are capable of being affected by localized time, or what the effects are going to be.
Kanye asks Qualish about whether or not Modroons are sentient. Qualish starts lecturing about the interesting part about sentience and gets ready to pull out books before Nissa gestures it’s not worth it.Kanye: I would like to… I gotta think about this a little bit.Qualish tells us it’ll take some weeks to get the coordinates, which is a great time for us to prepare since we shouldn’t fly in blind, even if the tomb of terrors isn’t quite done being constructed. That being said, we don’t know we have to fight when we get there - maybe could even just buy the parts? We’ll be an unknown in that time period.
Sorith asks if Woodhouse carries a keg to convince/bribe any guards we see. Kanye suddenly wants to modify the power armor to create a high velocity drink dispenser. Qualish puts a hard stop on it and says it voids the warranty.Kanye; Was that what you were thinking, Sorith?Sorith: No, I was going to drug someone with it.Kanye: Oh, I thought you meant it should’ve been like a weapon.Averlyth: Really, how did your brain go in that direction?Kanye: I thought it was “negotiate” with the air quotes.Kanye has a whim to talk to Gearbox, so we wander up to the control room where he’s still plugged into the command console in the back of the room. He’s no longer running things, 
Kanye offers him a beer because he’s “people”, and then asks his combat potential. We are told he is not hard to punch. Kanye reveals he’s pretty worried about Gearbox being endangered when he’s our only way in and out of time.
We learn Gearbox has no carrying capacity, but can fly.
Kanye has a whim to go see the quartermaster; Averlyth asks if we’re thinking about dressing up in ancient clothes to “match the times”. The group gets into a conversation around how D&D is like in an eternal feudal time period, a la post bubonic plague Europe.
Everyone will take a long rest, spend some downtime, and then come back and see Qualish after a bit.
Kanye apparently has thinking pliers. The group is suddenly looking at the Band Fund and wondering if we should be using things more. Sorith looks at striding boots, but he’s already fast, Um already has boots, Nissa has worked hard to not walk ever again, Averlyth has 4 pairs of the same gothy boots.
The new quartermaster is horrified at this half orc that keeps asking for glaives to b set on fire, but not on, like, a temporary way?
AFter some time, Qualish tells us he’s successfully programmed Gearbox with the space-time coordinates for here and now and there (tomb of horrors) and then (when it was under construction).
The timeline may not be totally accurate - we know it was before Asaract is a lich, and after they started construction.
Averlyth confirms if we know how many components will be there - we don’t know, but will have to find out. Presumably people using them will understand their value, so they won’t just be lying around.Kanye: How are we going to get them back?Qualish: Don’t you guys all have bags?Um: I think he’s implying...Sorith: ...Woodhouse is a bag of holding?We don’t actually know what the components will look like - there isn’t a guarantee that they will be gems or blocks or anything. That being said, if anything terrible happens, we can always go back into the future. 
Kanye hits Gearbox in an attempt to go back in time. Gearbox tells Nissa that Kanye was mean to him and receives a sticker and is very proud.Nissa: Are we teleporting?Gearbox: Did you want to?Averlyth: Yes pleaseGearbox: Oh ok, he just hit me, so I wasn’t sureAverlyth: that’s fairWe go into the distant path and arrive to see construction well underway. 3 tunnels being dug into the north end of a flat topped hill, covered in ugly weeds, thorns and briars. There’s an active workers camp at top of the hill, we see tents, storage, equipment depots, latrines, etc. The workers moving around the hill include about 2 dozen dwarves split into two different gangs.
There are also 3 dwarves wearing insective style leather armor, carrying long hooked poles, prodding around some umber hulks - essentially gigantic insectoid creatures that can tunnel through rock and stone easily. The impression we get here is they are getting the hulks as tunnel machines. These 3 dwarves with the hooks have some mechanism for controlling them.
We’re on another hill, looking down at the construction site, and the worker’s camp up above them.
The group discusses how to best get information from the scene, and the workers.Kanye: I’m not great for getting intel, I”m mostly here for when the killing starts.As everyone is observing the hill, Kanye is talking Averlyth’s ear off about how to do tricky things with Clairvoyance, but everyone else notices the bulk of the works are moving to and from the middle tunnel - it looks like the main entrance, most workers are moving in and out of there. The umbral hulks and their handlers are walking in and out of the tunnel on the far left, and the third tunnel doesn’t seem to have had anyone in or out of it.
Averlyth summons her Clairvoyance security camera up above the worker’s camp. First in seeing mode, she sees still the bulk of the workers in and out of the main tunnel. It’s clear that these are your standard workers. They appear to be grousing, commiserating. There are 2 different groups of dwarves - after awhile, it becomes clear that they can be identified by the color of their uniforms. It’s not clear what the affiliation is. Whenever workers from the different groups come into contact, they don’t look to be very friendly interactions.
Right before swapping to hearing, she sees several workers hauling an unusually shaped large black rock, past of the worker’s camp, to a large pile of these types of black rocks, and they abandon it on the pile and go back down the hill.
After swapping to hearing, she hears mostly Dwarven, which she doesn’t understand. However, some are speaking Common - grumbling about poor food, not being paid. They don’t seem to be slaves, just workers who don’t particularly like their job.
Kanye is thinking about starting a revolt. Averlyth considers if we want to pretend we’re representing a union.