Heart of Tyre: Episode 18

### Reddit Thread

***Heart of Tyre* Episode 18** was streamed on Arcadum's Twitch channel on November 30, 2020, and premiered on Arcadum's YouTube channel on December 2, 2020.

## Summary

Summary by av5hadow, copied from Verum Weekly:
The fight on the Scar continues. Seren dispels the haze. The spindles on Morc go off and hit Derok, who loses his concentration on his donuts. Morc tries to hit the Rose with his Iass powers but every attack misses. The Rose nonchalantly leaves Morc’s and Derok's threat ranges and moves right next to Neve.

Neve smells rotten wood as another Blinding Haze goes up. Seren attempts to dispel the fog again but she fails to do so. She cries, as she is now out of mostly out magical power to Dispel Magic. To Dispel Magic one more time would prevent her from using her strong Heal. Ives attempts to lasso the Rose, but the haze doesn’t give him a clear sight. However, Morc rushes in, picking up the rope, and he wraps the Rose with it. As his Iass powers fade, Morc leaps out of the fog and slams into the ground with Falling Justice. The Rose uses a Light Thorn on Morc, but he shares the pain with Derok. Derok however can’t handle the damage and goes down. But as quickly as he falls, Derek gets back up (Morc’s player tells Derok's player to “doa20rightnowb\*tch” on a death save and, surprisingly, he got a nat 20).

The Rose retreats into the fog, but one end of the rope is exposed, and Morc pulls her out. While Ives passes another Test, Morc moves the Rose closer to his friends and further away from the Haze. The Tops are healed by Overabundance, and the Rose uses the leftover healing to use Wailing Strength, granting herself some temporary health. The ability would have allowed her to summon more flowers if it wasn’t for Derok's Blight taking that health away. As Neve notices the desperation in the Rose’s movements, it becomes clear that, from now on, the fight will be one of attrition.

The Rose summons Thorns around herself which allows her to both negate attacks and perform counter attacks. The party does their best to survive the rest of the struggle. There were many times where some fall from Thorns and poison. However with the help of consumables and luck, they manage to slowly whittle down the Rose’s health and Ives passes Koga’s third Test. In the final moments of the battle (with the party’s 3rd Nat 20 on a death save), an unconscious Neve miraculously stands back up, her Mask of Shades growing to cover her entire face. She takes a swing at the dying Rose, a finishing blow. However, Thorns protect their user, and Neve goes down again.

The Rose retreats, summoning yet another Haze. As an Ice Knife from Seren fails to kill the Rose, Derok speaks to Ives: “You need to hurt Neve as little as you can.” After some confusion and confirming that Morc can bring Neve back up, Ives goes along with the plan and stabs the incapcitated Neve. The Binding Blood between her and Derok harms the dark princeling, who uses his powers to light the Requiem Rose ablaze with a Hellish Rebuke. She silently screams as she burns to death. The third battle is won.

Koga starts to summon the power of The Indigo to give a boon to the Tops, but the Neverend holds up her hand, detecting a wrongness. A scythe carves a hole in reality, and a servant unleashes its strength towards the trial’s spectators. The Neverend is split into two, but Koga is able to protect himself. The Dilating One is far too strong for the unawakened Koga to prevent all damage, so as the Violet Speaker leaves the rules of the Indigo fight have changed.

The Indigo restores the Tops back to their full strength, however, aside from arrows, the many consumables they used during this fight are forever lost. As the Indigo has spent what power it has, Koga may no longer Observe or Test in the fights, and the last three fights of the Trial will be on the challengers alone. We leave the challengers as they decide on the parameters on their next fight and Ives donning the outfit he and Neve found in the Labyrinth.

(The players will send the parameters between sessions. Since Ives passed three fights in this fight, he gains the ability, Indigo Torrent. Once per combat, he is able to continuously shoot arrows until he misses once or he shoots a number of arrows equal to his character level. The Tops are now level 11.)

## Featured Characters

### Main Characters

* Lord Antonius Volnaris
* Ives
* Neve
* Madd Morc
* Seren

### Returning

* The Requiem Rose
* The Neverend
* Koga the Thief

## References

1. ↑ Tweet by @gloriousArcadum. *Heart of Tyre Ep. 18 ft. @Russ\_Money @NaomiOop @ScottJund @msf\_actual @SummersSalt Special Guest @Koga\_the\_Thief at twitch.tv/arcadum*