Aerois - Episode 177: The Seed of Rage

Katie Morrison as Aila

Kim Richards as Nova V'ger

Rhiannon Frost as Sentry

Tom Hazell as Qillek Ad Khollar

**The Seed of Rage** is the 177th episode of the Aerois Campaign. It was broadcast live on both the Yogscast Twitch channel and highrollersdnd Twitch channel on 12th March 2023 from 5PM to 8PM GMT.

*The epic Kaiju fight continues as the team desperately try to remove the rage-inducing Seed of Hadar from a 500ft tall Atelicus!*

## **Summary**

### **Announcements**

* Mark welcomes everyone and introduces the players. Kim is away this week with illness.
* This week’s episode was pre-recorded because Mark was away in the USA.

### **Recap**

*"The champions of Aerois fought and defeated Stonemaw, one of the great beasts of Atelicus, only to discover that the beast titan of survival had been waiting for them to do so. Learning and evolving himself based on their battle, Atelicus emerged from his demi-plane near the Halls of Infinite Resplendence and showed his true form, a giant, 500-foot-tall monstrosity of incredible power. Realising this, the party began to debate what their plans should be, if anything, to attack this creature when they were approached by the titan, Sayanna, and the Eterna, Tassadar, who had sought information about Atelicus and learned that Hadar may have infected his mind and be responsible for the titan’s mad plan to consume Siaska and Sayanna to become stronger.*

*With no magic or weapon on Aerois able to fight the evolved titan, the Champions called for The Astoria to come and aid them with Magitek but needed to buy time, so Nova V’ger contacted Kalus Valkyrian and requested his aid in defeating the titan. Kalus agreed on the condition that they meet with him alone before they awoke Siaska. With their agreement, Kalus prepared to come and aid them directly but also sent aid in another way as the sky city of Kassatoris appeared above the ocean and created a teleportation gate beneath the city, from which a 300-foot-tall magical construct, Vanguard Alpha, appeared. Splashing down in the ocean, Nova was given full administrative control over the program and the group of you flew out and boarded Vanguard Alpha, where you began to become familiar with its controls and now you have begun an attack against Atelicus himself."*
### **Part 1**

*The epic Kaiju fight continues between the 500ft tall Atelicus and the much smaller, but still heckin' huge Stormchaser piloted Project Vanguard!*

The party has only really scratched Atelicus’ carapace, dealing mainly minor blows, and even those seem to be healing swiftly. Vanguard Alpha, on the other hand, has taken some significant damage with the whole mech being damaged and one of arms almost being at breaking point. Atelicus is now clearly sick of the game that he has been playing with them, picks up Vanguard Alpha by the leg and hurls it some distance away only for it to splash down into the ocean. Atelicus begins to make his way slowly towards the Halls of Infinite Resplendence.

With Vanguard Alpha’s systems on low power and some at breaking point, all seems hopeless until they hear the voice of an elderly Halfling, “I don’t have much time left and I was planning on giving myself over to Siaska when Atelicus was defeated anyway, but I think you might need a bit of a lift up, my dears. I’m going to give you what I can and then I will release my spirit to Siaska. Maybe this will give you enough to buy us the time we need.” They begin to hear a soft song carried over the waves and on the wind – a lament coming from the Halls of Infinite Resplendence – the song is of Aerois, about its stories and people, the everyday life of Aerois. It speaks of the cooking at home, the birth of a child, the festival celebrating the harvest, a first date, building a home, and all the simple pleasures that matter to ordinary people. It is possible that Sayanna’s last song extends across Aerois.

As the song coalesces in the core of Vanguard Alpha, the power levels shift and escalate beyond what was originally thought possible. The giant mech is suddenly taken from a low power level of 2 to a new maximum of 25 as Sayanna gives the last of her divine power to them in the hope that this will buy them enough time to bring out and destroy the infestation of Hadar that lives within Atelicus.

As they prepare to battle Atelicus once more, Lucius implores them not to waste Sayanna’s gift to them and to show Atelicus what Aerois is capable of before moving Vanguard Alpha towards the colossal enemy once more. Lucius uses Propulsion Fist which shoots the clenched fist off the mech into Atelicus’ head, it staggers Atelicus before returning to the mech and re-attaching to the arm. Atelicus retaliates by swinging a clawed hand at them but swipes over the mech’s head, Aila counters with a savage uppercut to Atelicus’ jaw. Atelicus attempts to bite down on the shoulder of the mech but Lucius and Aila manage to grab the jaws and hold them open, preventing this attack. Nova uses this opportunity to lean the Vanguard into the mouth and shoot the mech’s missiles into Atelicus’ head and torso. Atelicus slams into the mech’s left arm, attempting to rip it off but failing to do so. Quill raises Gideon’s Shield, and a prismatic barrier suddenly surrounds the Vanguard Alpha before Atelicus turns and tries to tail slam the mech which connects with the shield and fails to do any damage. Sentry kicks up into the air, shooting golden energy from the bottom of the mech’s feet and gliding backwards to land in the water.

Atelicus looks in their direction, still not particularly injured, but now more annoyed than before. Nova uses Inspire Leader before the Vanguard begins to charge Atelicus while Quill and Sentry charge up Propulsion Wing – Atelicus starts to suck in a breath of primordial magic, his body begins to ripple, and an energy beam begins to build up and charge in his mouth. Quill and Sentry activate Propulsion Wing and their crystalline slates each show a gauge, Quill’s filling with white feathers and Sentry’s filling with golden energy – at the back of the mech grow two large wings, one golden wing made of light, the other a glorious feathered white wing of H’esper. Aila hits Atelicus in the face with her Radiant Sabre attack and she breaks one of his horns, tusks and several teeth are broken and fall into the ocean. Aila is delighted until he turns on her and blasts the mech with his Primal Breath, causing damage to all of the mech and breaking the arm that Lucius is in. The massive damage causes a power surge that threatens to keep causing damage to the mech until it is fixed. Atelicus tries to grab Aila’s broken arm, but she fends, him off and breaks out of his grip – Lucius is not so lucky, however, as Atelicus grapples his disabled arm. Two brilliant wings finish forming behind the mech, one Guardian, construct-like and made of golden light, the other white-feathered and angelic, allowing the mech to fly.

The wings begin to lift the mech off the ground, creating a squall of mist and fog underneath it. Unfortunately, Atelicus still clutches one of the mech’s arms in a vise-like grip and pulls back a fist, ready to slash at it. Aila uses her weapon to break Atelicus’ grasp and injures him – Atelicus retaliates by punching the torso with a mighty fist which also manages to damage and break the head. Nova immediately starts to fix the head, giving Atelicus the opportunity to lunge in and bite at the mech – Sentry tries to pull the mech away but fails and he manages to tear away armour plating from the giant machine. Lucius summons his mech weapon, an icy blue cutlass, aiming for Atelicus’ wounded left arm, leaving it hanging limp and bleeding. Atelicus turns his gaze upon the mech and fires two eye beams towards one of the mech’s legs, damaging it through the Gideon’s Shield.

The mech flies into the air, coming face-to-face with Atelicus for the first time, before he uses Enhanced Evolution – he flexes his broken arm, it grows in size, grows more spikes, tentacles and armour plating, and heals its wounds. Quill sends the mech in a flying kick into Atelicus’ head.

Aila and Lucius begin to power up their signature move, Starfury Slash – they slam their two mech weapons together, morphing the hammer and cutlass into a pseudo polearm. Nova readies the mech to dodge one of Atelicus’ attacks as he leaps backwards and away from them. Quill and Sentry both activate their jet boosts, causing the mech to dash in close to Atelicus again, and kicking up steam. Atelicus attacks them on the way in with eyebeams from the one eye that he has left - they manage to dodge both – and attempts to swipe at them with his tail. Because of his blindness and the mist that has been thrown up, Atelicus misses with his tail, and he is suddenly hit with a Starfury Slash in the regenerated arm – it is severed from Atelicus’ body, he throws his head back and roars. The blinded eye is white but they notice that the other, clear eye, turns blood red.

In the middle of an angry tirade, Atelicus suddenly goes silent as his head drops. They see the ridges of his back and his armour there begin to warp – the armour seems to stretch as if it is made of rubber or tissue. Sentry and Lucius recognise what emerges from the back of Atelicus – it is an amorphous, humanoid figure, made of red muscle and tissue. It has a rounded head with a distended jaw and a single red eye. Its humanoid limbs are far too long. It has a large, wide, grinning mouth. “It seems my little pet has lost his temper,” the thing says. “I’ll take things from here.” It plunges its hands into the back of Atelicus and, almost echoing how the party has been controlling Vanguard, the Seed of Hadar begins to become the puppet master for Atelicus.

### **Part 2**

*The seed of Atelicus' rage has been unleashed... the team must now take down a figment of Hadar!*

The Seed of Hadar, a tiny red, fleshy, amorphous but vaguely humanoid shape, plunges its long tendril-like arms into Atelicus’ back. It is only through the sensor systems of Project Vanguard and Quill’s superior perception that they have noticed the being as it stares at them through a single red eye and grins with its uncomfortably large, fleshy and distended mouth. Despite their attempt to keep Atelicus at bay, the party can now see the purple, triangular platform that Valla had created – Atelicus has managed to move closer to the Halls despite their best efforts. Quill sees the Seed of Hadar look towards the Halls and say, “Delicious…”.

Quill wonders if they can leave the mech and have it run on auto pilot but Nova indicates that it cannot work without pilots. Atelicus’ missing arm is starting to regenerate, now seeming to be made of black obsidian with lines of red magic throughout it – it appears to be growing back larger than before with more spikes and tentacles. They fly the mech up above Atelicus and launch the Magicite Missiles at the Seed of Hadar. The missiles head straight for the evil creature which opens its mouth and sucks in the missiles, consuming their power, “You should know that Kalus’ little toys are very vulnerable to entropy,” it says to them in a deep, hollow voice. They watch as the power that it absorbed now forks out of it as black, chaotic lightning, some of which hits the mech and where it is struck, the metal and crystal begins to corrode and break down at a rapid rate. They feel Vanguard breaking apart around them. Sentry finds that her leg begins to lose power rapidly, then suddenly the metal around her falls away as the leg disintegrates almost entirely, exposing her to the open sky. She notices that the black rust, some sort of entropic magic, is eating the Magitek around her and heading towards where she sits. They call on Nova to land the mech as Sentry begins to climb out of her section, feeling the entropic magic getting closer and faster, almost as if it is chasing her, hungering for her power. The black lightning the lunges after her looking like hands, grasping for her – it curls around the ladder she is climbing and begins to look like a laughing face before melting away as she finally gets away from it.

Nova tries to land Vanguard on Atelicus’ back, but he grabs the mech mid-plunge: they jump out onto Atelicus’ back as he bites into it and rips it apart. They watch as the remaining shattered pieces of the mech are gradually destroyed by the entropic magic. In front of them, they see the Seed of Hadar – around it is a sort of protective shell like a large, open mouth which holds it in place, and around that are many flailing tentacles. It sits between the spines and ridges on Atelicus’ back almost like it sits in a valley between mountains. They feel Atelicus start to move again and they realise that he is being directed towards the Halls of Infinite Resplendence.

Quill receives a *Sending* spell from D1 aboard the Astoria, *“Contacting Mr Qillek Ad Khollar of the Stormchasers! This is Diamond One. Astoria nearby, inbound now. Have you on sensors. Goodbye!”*

The Seed of Hadar asks the party if it has come to surrender – when they reply in the negative, the Seed responds with, “Good, it is better that life struggles against its undoubtable end.”

Lucius and Sentry recognise this as a powerful being, but recognise that it is a replica of Hadar, feeding off Atelicus’ power. They think that it may have begun as a tiny thing, a splinter of a thought or an idea, that has fed (possibly on fear) like a symbiote or a virus that has infected Atelicus. Lucius notices that the Seed’s legs blend into the carapace – he realises that it is an individual creature and believes that if it is destroyed, that Atelicus will be freed from its control. They realise that they only have a certain amount of time before this thing, using Atelicus as its vehicle, reaches the Halls of Infinite Resplendence and puts Valla and Siaska at risk.

Sentry casts *Enlarge* and activates Starbreaker, moving towards the Seed of Hadar in a menacing fashion.

The Seed of Hadar creates a 10-foot radius of black tentacles that flail around, hitting them and causing cold damage (as if from the depths of space) and burning acid damage. Quill casts *Beacon of Hope* but the Seed absorbs the spell energy, making Quill lose concentration on his spell. Lucius believes that because it had time to deal with Quill’s spell, it was able to absorb its energy to end the spell (although it did not look like this gave the Seed additional power) – he does not think that it would be able to stop an instantaneous spell such as *Chromatic Orb.*

Nova moves up to take cover behind some of the back spines, casts *Hexblade Curse* on the Seed, and manifests her echo as the Tiangong version that they are used to. The Seed of Hadar calls on Atelicus to use his magic – they watch as the cracks between Atelicus’ carapace begin to glow and vent primordial magic. It starts further from the seed and appears to be moving slowly towards the Seed. Aila and Lucius take damage from the acidic magic before Aila runs forward and hurls the Howling Tempest at the Seed, slamming into the fleshy body and causing lightning to course through its flesh. The Seed creates another pool of tentacles, attacking Sentry, Quill, and Aila before it attacks her with a spell, its eye pulsing red, and it tells her, “Just let your mind break with reality…” To Aila, the barriers between timelines, realities and universes collapses and she feels like her mind is beginning to unravel – the rest of them see Aila’s eyes roll back and a heat haze surround her body. With Aila effectively disabled, the Seed fires its *Entropic Blast* at Sentry, hitting her with the first necrotic beam.

A second wall of magic vents from the next gap in Atelicus’ carapace, this time doing lightning damage to Aila, Sentry, and Nova. They notice that there is another crack in the carapace another 30 feet in front of them and expect that the next magical burst will occur there.

Lucius moves through the wall of acid towards the eye and into a safe position between the walls. He casts a quickened icy *Chromatic Orb*, hitting the creature – it tries to consume the energy but the magic is too fast. Lucius follows up with a *Firebolt* but misses. Sentry takes more lightning damage before moving up to the Seed with *Misty Step*. The Seed taunts Sentry, telling her that it has been too long since it has consumed Guardian energy – she swings twice but is deflected by the hard armour around it. One of the tentacles surrounding the Seed lashes out at Sentry, bludgeoning her.

Quill tries to determine how powerful the spell is that is affecting Aila but it is not a spell with which he is familiar. He casts *Mass Cure Wounds,* healing those around him and hoping that this might break the spell on Aila, but it does not.

A third wall of magic appears from between the armoured plates of Atelicus’ carapace, but this time only Nova’s echo is hit, and it disappears.

The Seed attacks Nova, Aila, and Quill with a set of tentacles, causing them to take magical cold and acid damage. Aila sees a vision of the Far Realm... Aila suddenly sees herself being flung through Astral Space, far beyond the realms of Aerois. She is moving so fast that she cannot process exactly where she is, but she knows that she is heading for the utter darkness on the far edge of space where there are no stars. As she flies towards the darkness, Aila begins to slow down and sees a trail of broken planets – husks of worlds that have been broken open, the energy having been sucked out of them. She comes to a tear in space and goes through into the realm on the other side – a realm of endless mouths, eyes, and twisted helices of unknowable energy. Her mind breaks (taking psychic damage) and she is stunned, failing to break out of the spell effect. A tentacle around the Seed smacks Sentry before the carapace around the Seed turns black – it bites Sentry, engulfing her, and when the carapace opens again, Sentry is gone.

For Sentry, the world turns black, and she feels a force strike her. When she can see again, she is in some sort of domed red room, like a cathedral, about 30-feet across. She soon realises that it is red, not because it is painted red, but because the structure is made of muscle tissue and bone – there are mouths and eyes on the wall. She is in Hadar’s realm once more. There are no exits, no windows or doors, and floating in the middle of the room is a floating lidless eye that sits atop tentacles that fall to the floor. The eye speaks to Sentry in an unknown, maddening language. Sentry realises that she has been transported to some sort of demi-plane and that this is its keeper or warden. Quill, having seen Valla’s magic used to open demi-planes, also realises that this is what must have happened to Sentry and thinks that this is the Seed’s magic, that damaging it enough may bring Sentry back.

Lucius casts a quickened *Chromatic Orb* once more but this time, the Seed is ready and swats it away. Lucius follows up with a panicked *Firebolt* but misses. Sentry shouts at the warden to send her back but there is no human intelligence in the creature – it is insane and her words are meaningless to it, it sees Sentry as life to be consumed. Sentry uses *Lay on Hands* to heal herself. Sentry does not know what this creature is but Root speaks to her, *“Sentry, that is a Mind Witness, one of Hadar’s minions. You will not be able to leave this place while it still lives. Many Guardians have been sent to these prison realms before.”* Nova casts *Eldritch Blast* at the Seed of Hadar, hitting with three of the beams – Sentry, inside the demi-plane, sees the Mind Witness shudder as if it has been struck by something that Sentry cannot see.

Quill casts *Greater Restoration* on Aila, trying to break her out of the spell that is affecting her, but nothing happens. Nova has worked out that the spell that is affecting Aila is likely from the 8th circle of magic and that if Quill can break the effect, that Aila will likely be immune to its effects. She tells Quill this information before launching more *Eldritch Blasts* at the Seed, hitting three times again. Sentry once again sees the Mind Witness undulating as if being hit by three invisible blows.

The Seed looks at Nova, “Yes. Kalus’ little whelp. You’re all very capable. Let’s see how we fare in a different environment. Dive, Atelicus!” Atelicus immediately plunges into the ocean, rolling to one side and knocking Nova, Lucius and Quill violently to the edge of his back. They have just enough time to grab a breath of air before they are plunged underwater.

Aila, stuck in the vision of the Far Realm, with her mind breaking, in agonising pain, and unable to comprehend what she sees, suddenly becomes aware of a portal that opens in front of her – something pulls her through it. While it breaks the spell on her, she also takes a lot of force damage in the process and pulled closer to the Seed of Hadar. The Seed asks if she enjoyed a visit to its realm. Aila, now beyond angry, swims to the Seed and hits with one mighty blow of the hammer, and followed up with a zap of lightning – the Seed seems to wince at the hammer blow (Sentry sees the Mind Witness being electrocuted). The Seed retaliates with two tentacle attacks on Aila before attempting to *Mind Break* Quill – its one eye glows and Quill’s eyes begin to roll back. Lucius, with his prismatic vision, sees black lightning starting to envelop Quill in a dark embrace – he casts *Counterspell* to rip the lightning away from Quill and save him.

The Mind Witness shoots three eye rays at Sentry, the first attempting to cause some sort of fear effect, the second missing Sentry and blasting the wall behind her, and the third purple beam hits her in the forehead but has no effect. It then floats into the air and tries to move away from her. Lucius casts *Slow* on the Seed – Quill uses a portent to ensure that it is affected, but the creature uses a resistance ability and remains unaffected (except that it appears that it may be temporarily easier to hit). To the party, it appears that the Seed is initially affected, moving sluggishly, but then they see glass shatter around it, and it appears that the Seed has taken another version of itself from another reality – one where the spell did not take effect – and placed it in this reality.

The Spawn of Hadar shoots an *Entropic Beam*  at Lucius, hitting him with necrotic magic. ***(Note: he is now unable to regain HPs until the start of his next turn, he has also cast a verbal spell (slow), and remembered that he has the trident!)***

## **YouTube Timestamps**

0:00:00 - Intro
0:02:58 - Dun Duns
0:03:56 - Part 1
1:30:10 - Part 2

## **Featured Characters**

#### **The Stormchasers (Player Characters)**

* Aila
* Lucius Virion-Elluin Elenasto
* Qillek Ad Khollar
* Sentry
* Nova V'ger

#### **New NPCs**

* Seed of Hadar
* Mind Witness

#### **Returning NPCs**

* Sayanna
* Atelicus
* Diamond One (D1)

#### **Mentioned NPCs**

* Siaska
* Hadar
* Kalus Valkyrian

## **Featured Locations**

* Starfall Archipelago
	+ Open ocean

## **Trivia**

* Mark asked for a pogHorn emote – Viztee made him one.
* Mark changed some of the rules with Project Vanguard/Vanguard Alpha from last session because he felt that there were issues that came about, partly because of the terrible rolls that the players continually made, but also because he felt that the numbers just “weren’t quite right”. He increased the power maximum to 25 (although later in the episode, it would be possible to exceed this new maximum), he made it easier to do teamwork actions although this would be offset by them losing out on potential attacks/abilities/manoeuvrability/ability to dodge, etc. There was also an increase to how much energy was regained at the end of the players’ turns. The players always go first, followed by Atelicus – they have 5 actions, he has 4. Mark also rolled for Atelicus’ attacks this week, just to speed up the combat.
* The “staggered” condition for Atelicus means that he has disadvantage to attacks, and a maximum number of actions.
* Mark allowed Aila to add her strength modifier to Vanguard Alpha’s punch attacks. The other players were told to add their appropriate modifiers to attacks subsequently.
* Missiles: On a success, the missiles deal 1d6+10 points of damage to 1d3 locations and ignores armour.
* A success on the attempt to re-energise Vanguard Alpha gives 1d4+1 energy, on a fail, 1 energy is returned (meaning that if all fail, a minimum of 5 energy is returned).
* Breaking or destroying a certain number of body parts on Atelicus triggers his “rage” effect.
* The mech does an extra 20 damage when flying and can dodge an attack.
* Mark increased Rhi’s Driven to Purpose roll from a 1d4 to a 1d6 mid-combat, stating that he should have made it a d6 the whole time because “a d4 when you’re level 15 is kind of garbage”.
* Lucius’ mini broke before this week’s session, so Mark replaced him with a shirtless man.
* Initiatives for the battle against the Seed of Hadar: Sentry 25, Lucius 3, Quill 22, Aila 22, Nova 21, Seed unknown.
* This is the first time that Sentry and Lucius have seen anything like this since they fought the Dominators in Horizon.
* Starbreaker has the additional property that when it is used to attack an aberration, it deals extra d8 of damage. Hadar, Hadar Spawn, and anything related to Hadar count as aberrations. Starbreaker was forged to fight Hadar and aberrations of Hadar. Tom was very smug on hearing this information and intimated that he was right to go and search for treasure (that turned out to be the lance) despite being in the middle of a war with Gisella.
* The Seed can create a 10-foot radius patch of black tentacles that do cold and acid damage (full damage (2d6? for both cold and acid) on a failed strength saving throw – a success results in half damage). It is based on (and essentially is) the *Arms of Hadar* spell. From Hadar or a visage of Hadar, this does not count as a spell but a magical effect.
* Because the Seed of Hadar is infused into a titan, it cannot be banished (because titans cannot be banished).
* Tom confused “aberration” with “abjuration”.
* As a legendary action, the Seed of Hadar can make a caster make a Con saving throw (unknown DC). A failed roll results in the caster losing concentration.
* When Nova manifested her echo, Mark had Trott roll a d10 (because Kim was away this week). He rolled a 2. The echo that manifested was the Tiangong that they recognised as her usual echo form.
* Rhi sent a picture to Tom that said “Use PP” – this set them both to giggling and they kept setting each other off. It lasted for almost 5 minutes.
* The Seed of Hadar can cast the spell *Reality Break* – this requires a Wis saving throw. Failure results in the affected person being unable to take reactions until the spell ends. At the start of the person’s turn they must roll a d10 to determine what vision they see. Aila rolls a 2 (seeing the Far Realm) and a 6 (wormhole).
* Entropic Blast does necrotic damage and if a person is hit, they cannot regain HPs until the start of their next turn.
* The carapace bite does significant damage (81 points to Sentry) and requires a Chr saving throw – a fail results in the affected person being taken into a demi-plane.
* When Atelicus dives, all the rules for underwater combat apply:
	+ Everyone can grab a minute’s worth of air
	+ Casting spells with a verbal component causes the caster to start to suffocate or choke
	+ Creatures with a swimming speed do not need to worry about disadvantage on attacks
	+ It is considered difficult terrain to swim without a swimming speed
	+ Anyone unable to anchor themselves will be pushed towards the starspawn
	+ Using certain weapons will give disadvantage on attacks (without a swim speed)
	+ Ranged weapons (physical) have disadvantage on attacks beyond a certain range
	+ Everyone has fire resistance while underwater
* Mark compared the underwater combat to FFX – on the back of Sin and being dragged underwater.
* The Mind Witness’ eye rays are randomised.
* Because Mark hates spells that are entirely negated by a save, he allowed Lucius’ slow spell (that was portended and saved by a legendary resistance) to decrease the Seed’s AC by 1 until the end of its next round, but it still has its full complement of abilities.

## **Quotes**

* Quote 1

* Quote 2