Episode 52: The Lighthouse on Ocean Skull Point

The Heroes of Bingle arrive back at the Isle of Rum and look to confront the Vicount Winger-Sticks Envoy for more information about the mysterious Old Ones. Now that they know the truth of his story, will this confrontation turn deadly? What new dangers await inside the Lighthouse on Ocean’s Gull Point?

#### **DM/GM Intro**

*It started as a simple dungeon run…*

*5 adventurers thrown together by fate - united by purpose, but haunted by secrets. Their quest, to find and free the legendary Wardens of Ain - the ancient protectors who have stood sentry over the Realms for generations. It is a quest that has forced them to brave some of the most formidable locations on the planet - including the home of an enormous Kraken, at the bottom of the deepest part of the ocean. There, they battled a mighty warrior known as Yan Mo - a half dragonborn Triton who commanded an army of amphibious creatures to defile and destroy Lily’s island home of Bingle.*

*But the team stood fast, defending the beach gnome community, forcing Yan Mo to retreat, and becoming The Heroes of Bingle in the process.*

*Now the Heroes of Bingle find themselves with a new challenge. They have been catapulted back through time by powerful magic, leaping into the bodies of 5 sellswords working for another old enemy - the pirate, Whitebeard. A ruthless mercenary captain, hoping to cash in on a bounty set by the Shaxen Gao Empire. A bounty for 3 fugitives on the run - Baozhai, the dragonborn princess, whose sister sits on the throne. Cho’Ran, the Triton, who became her beloved. And their son, Cho’Mel, a 5 year old boy, born in secret, who, by rights, should be heir to the Shaxen Gao dynasty. A 5 year old boy who is hunted by the Empire for his Triton heritage. A 5 year old boy who, the team knows, will grow to become the one calling himself Yan Mo, the Undrowned. Yan Mo the Leader. Yan Mo the Strong.*

*The Heroes rescued Baozhai and her son from inside a terrifying Castle on the Isle of Rum. A haunted manor infused with madness and tormented by its own memory of past sins. A family torn apart. A woman wronged. A son corrupted and transformed into the Wicker Boy, a creature of sticks - the burned husks of trees animated by an old evil.*

*The team sailed to the Castle Rum by using a substance called The Liquor of the Dead to protect them from a terrible psychic assault. An attack on their sanity causing paranoia, distrust, and violence. Once, not so long ago, The Castle itself rested on the very spot in the ocean that evoked such madness. It was said that the Quake Warden himself had reshaped the rock of the island to detach and isolate the Castle, to put open water between it and the rest of the Isle. But the anomaly remained, causing anyone who sailed over that spot to be vexed, their minds twisted and ravaged.*

*Lily and James had secured the Liquor of the Dead from a lighthouse keeper calling himself the Viscount Winger-Sticks Envoy. A strange, bedeviled man, clearly suffering effects from prolonged usage of the vile drink. He allowed them to dig up a jug of the beverage from inside corpses where it was being distilled, in exchange for a promise that they give him their own cadavers upon death.*

*But the team discovered that the lighthouse keeper had once worked at the Castle Rum under the name Jaspin, and murdered the noble family who lived there, setting fire to the property and burning them alive.*

*They rescued Baozhai and her son and lifted the Castle’s curse, escaping a horrible demon known as The Lord of Crows. As they returned to their ship, anchored off shore, they discovered it had been disabled, the sails shredded by the beaks and claws of countless birds. The Lord of Crows was still out there.*

*Repairing the ship, the team sailed once again for the Isle of Rum, this time avoiding the peculiar beam of light casting a pathway along the water from the lighthouse to the Castle. Along the way, they made some surprising discoveries. Fahima experimented with the Liquor of the Dead, learning from its magical properties how to harness the power of necromancy to use her own blood to heal others. Siv had a meeting with Whitebeard, discussing the possibility of selling the family of fugitives to the Shaxen Gao, which would no doubt ensure their deaths. During that conversation, Siv spied Whitebeard’s son Mervis listening in, hearing his own father say that he’d allow him to die for 15,000 gold. And Lily wrestled with the idea of doing something drastic to prevent young Yan Mo from growing up to devastate her childhood home.*

*But perhaps most shocking, James revealed to the team his biggest secret, putting an end to the lie that he derived his magic from an innocuous leprechaun of Oberon’s court. The truth, rocking the team to their very core, was that his patron was Shothragot, a Great Old One of darkness and mystery - and that he had made a pact with the being, allowing it access to his mind in exchange for power.*

*As we ended last week, the ship made landfall in the early part of the morning. There, in the distance, welcoming them back to the Isle of Rum, was the Lighthouse at Ocean’s Gull Point*