How I Met Your Mother

**"How I Met Your Mother"** is the eighth episode of *Mountain of Mystery*, airing on April 4, 2023.

The session was DMed by TanisJr93 and hosted on his channel on Twitch.

## Summary

*...continued from session seven*
Prints's Mother chastises her for getting involved with The Searchers, while Kahlan explains that the shadowy creatures only recently appeared; the group then sets up camp while Prints's Mother introduces herself as Sound of Bells and speaks with Trouble, who recounts the same events she described to Jean with a few variations. Bells admits that she doesn't know what The Searchers actually are, and surmises that the party was informed about the creatures by Cash's father; she then informs Sado that he will have to accompany her north to train with Grandmaster Qhore, and though Sado is hesitant, he agrees to temporarily leave the party.

As Grump makes dinner, Lazarus and Cash learn that the orc once owned a tavern, and the group describes their encounter with Qhore before Bells speaks with Prints about her ability to control her wild magic; Prints admits that she hasn't had any luck finding her Uncle Phil, and Bells suggests that locating him is more important now. Bells agrees to wait until morning to leave, and Prints admits that Jean explained that the egg that resurrected Trouble is one of five; Bells confesses that she was once part of an adventuring group that included Jean and Prints's father, New Moon, and she advises Prints to be cautious of Jean.

Prints then reveals the new black stripes in her fur, and Bells immediately cries, explaining that New Moon's fur had been "midnight black all over." During their conversation, Trouble plays I Spy with Clipp and Clopp, and learns about a game called Boulder/Parchment/Shears. Kahlan spars to a draw with Lazarus, and when Thorn demonstrates how to throw a more powerful punch, Kahlan strikes Lazarus with a punch infused with Telekinetic Movement that knocks him ten feet back into a tree; Thorn gives Lazarus a shot of firewhisky that renders the Aasimar almost immediately inebriated, after which the gnome manages to nimbly flip the Rogue onto his back. Prints and Trouble take first watch, during which Bells goes on patrol, and Prints explains that she left her tribe six years prior after her wild magic caused an accident that injured several of her fellow Tabaxi; Trouble assures her that she is making progress, albeit slowly, and discusses some of her past in the Savalirwood prior to being summoned by Prints's wild magic.

The next morning, the party bids farewell to Sado and Prints, and Trouble *druidcrafts* a snapdragon into the Goliath's beard before he heads north. The remainder of the group proceeds eastward toward Nogvurot, and Kahlan checks up on Lazarus, who explains that he once again had some of the best sleep he's had in years, and the group spends an hour explaining to Trouble what a "kink" is. As they continue along the Glory Run Road, Lazarus suggests that sticking to the roads is making the party moving targets, and that once they reach Nogvurot, they should consider not continuing with Grump and Thorn; as they travel, he also hears the sounds of wings and a roar, and spots a pair of manticore descending toward the group. The group fights off the monstrosities while taking limited damage due to a devastating casting of *Inflict Wounds* by Cash, collecting a tooth and three tail spikes from the corpses.

They then continue east, and for the next several hours, Kahlan cannot shake the feeling that they are being watched and followed by something that is aware of the group's presence. As night falls, the party arrives at another site where they set up camp and have reheated stew for dinner; while eating, Prints spots a pair of glowing red eyes near the edge of the firelight and alerts Lazarus, who uses his Psychic Whispers to look into the sorcerer's mind and see the faint image of the a figure cloaked in darkness. He then thinks to Prints: "I'm not going anywhere" before shifting his telepathic connection away from her to the entity in an attempt to communicate with it, and immediately falls unconscious; Trouble and Kahlan discover that his breathing and heartbeat are irregular, and Kahlan casts *Spare the Dying* while Cash casts *Cure Wounds*, neither of which have any effect. Prints then casts *Comprehend Languages* and demands to know what the entity wants, falling unconscious herself after it responds: "Are you ready then?"

Lazarus finds himself in an office with a man stamping paperwork at a desk, interrupting him to introduce himself, and the man opens a separate drawer and finds Lazarus's paperwork before telling him: "You are not the one that was supposed to be here. Not who I was expecting anyway. How did you get here?" Lazarus explains: "There's this weird thing: my brain's a little twitchy, and it's starting to do things it hasn't done before, and a friend of mine was having some trouble, and, uh, I was trying to help out."

Before the man can respond, Lazarus hears a voice behind him: "He decided to be a dumbass again, is what happened." He then turns to find the man he had prevented from assassinating Prince Eidys two years earlier, and the two trade words until the man at the desk interrupts them: "That's enough. This is disturbing. You have messed with things that should not be able to be messed with. The two of you aren't scheduled to be here for some time. You will leave now. Do not try to come here again the way you have before. If you do, consequences will be made. Am I understood?" Lazarus promises to "take the long way `round," while the assassin tells the man to "go fuck [him]self."

The man snaps his fingers, and Lazarus regains consciousness, his eyes at first flooded with black that fades back to their normal color.

*...continued in session nine*
## Notes

* Sado was played by DM TanisJr93 for the session due to FloodedBasement being unable to play, and the character parted ways with the party to pursue further training with Grandmaster Qhore.
* The events of the session occurred on 19-20 Cuersaar 839 PD.
* The episode borrows its title from the 2005-2014 CBS sitcom *How I Met Your Mother*.
* The session featured a roll of **0** when Prints rolled a natural 2 on an Insight check with a -2 Wisdom modifier.
* Alternate titles for the episode include, but are not limited to:
	+ "Mother's Intuition"
	+ "Whatever You Need to Do"
	+ "The Control You Need"
	+ "The Voice of Reason"
	+ "Constant State of Being"
	+ "Closest Thing to Family"

## Quotes

* "I'm not concerned about being *in* trouble; I *am* the trouble." – Trouble
* "Before I was with the tribe, I was part of an adventurer party, and that party is where I met Jean, and it's where I met your father." – Sound of Bells
* "Are we just running into your old party at this point?" – Fresh Prints
* "My party is... no longer together. We... split up not long after what happened. I never was able to tell you much about that time, because that time holds a lot of very happy, and very painful, memories. I understand that that leaves a lot of questions for you that I haven't answered, especially about, as I said, your father. Um, you may remember, but his name was New Moon. He was a sorcerer, like yourself; he's where you get your powers from, I do believe, and he was a very good man and an even better friend. Somehow, someway, he was the voice of reason in our group, even with as wild as he and his own magic could be. I– I know I've done you a disservice, and I've done him a disservice, not telling you, but maybe sometime in the near future, next time we're able to meet up, I will answer whatever questions you have. Just... just no more tonight, please. If you see Goldcrest again... I'm not gonna say he's not a trustworthy man, because there was a time where I trusted him with my life, and though I don't believe he would bring any harm to you or your friends, just... be careful with him." – Sound of Bells
* "I'm from the Savalirwood, and it took me years to learn the name of it. It was just The Forest By The House for so long, uh, until there was no house and only forest, and, um, you did me a favor summoning me away. I was alone and cold under a tree. Um, quite literally– okay, but that spot under the tree is *quite* nice, and I kind of made a little burrow for myself, and it was, you know, not everything, but it was mine." – Trouble
* ""See, this is something I am learning. Well, I– I've learned two things. One: it's very hard to, like, facially emote with a beak, and so, like, having to keep *this* under control? What is this? There's too many muscles! They do different things! And then, like: how do you just not... keep... talking? I don't– I don't get it. Because, like, before, I would say anything that came to my mind, and it would come out as, like, one of the pre-approved phrases that my brain would allow me to speak. Well, it's not so much my brain as, like, a curse on all of my kind, but that's totally different. But, I mean, fundamentally, I'm only allowed to say a handful of things, so if I say whatever I want, it just comes out as *ne'er-do-wells*! You know? Like, I can– I– and then I spend so long trying to explain anything. It's exhausting." – Trouble
* "Just try not to die again." – Sound of Bells
* "As fine as we might or might not be, you do whatever you need to do to take care of yourself." – Lazarus Oldman
* "I'll see y'all later." – Sado Thuliaga
* "So, like I was saying about *not* traveling for twelve days on the open road..." – Lazarus

## Episode

* Twitch
* YouTube