Episode 27 Recap Here

In this episode, the party continued their pursuit of Pyotr’s daughter, Sasha. She had been abducted during the party’s fight against the world-ending summoning of the Blood Mother[1], and the party only barely managed to catch the boat she was being transported on as it left the bay - using Lysta’s leshy to keep track of where she was heading.

The party eventually arrived at the boat’s final destination - cliff side ruins known as the The Temple of Folley’s Respite. When they arrived, they faced down a challenge - some Ash’kin[2] sentries watched the stairs at the top of the cliff face, threatening to drop rocks on the party.

Lysta and Rhea quickly hatched a plan - they’d run up the cliff face stairs, dodging between overhangs to avoid the rocks. The rest of the party would follow up after them. And, after a moment’s deliberation, they were off!

Fortunately, with fleet feet and deft reflexes, both managed to make it to the top of the stairs unscathed, and crested them to find themselves face to face with the enemy: two deer-like creatures with hollowed out chest containing exposed black hearts. And with that: Initiative was rolled!

The fight started off well enough - Rhea got in some good punches while Lysta used her now-signature lightning based druid magic. Things quickly turned, however, after an ambush from… well, the bushes. Another deer monster popped out with a Catch Pole, which they quickly slung around Lysta - just as the rest of the party crested the stairs.

The party scrambled to rescue Lysta while still holding off the other two beasts, but failed as the creature dragged Lysta off into the bushes. Fortunately, though - Lysta managed to free herself and get away back to the main fight shortly after. Likewise, with one of the deer beasts going down, the party managed to corral the remaining enemies to the side of the cliffs - and quickly began trying to shove them over!

It took a bit of trying, but after several attempts, the party managed to send both of the creatures over the cliff’s edge and to their doom (clip)

The party reigned triumphant over those enemies - but still had a problem. Lysta already identified Calix[3] as the abductor of Sasha and sent her leshy Almïr to to see where she ended up, but the party now had to confront Calix directly. They knew Sasha had been taken underground through a secret trap door, and Calix was on his way out of the Temple with two more of the deer beasts, even as they left Sasha behind for transfer to other Ash’kin allies.

The party spent some time thinking about how to proceed, then headed onward to the final confrontation. They walked into the ruined temple and confronted Calix, initiating combat! Sword and fists began flying almost immediately. Calix rushed the back lines, dealing near-lethal blows to Ymitri - pulling back *just* enough to keep Ymitri from death’s door even as Calix warned the party to leave.

But, although Calix quickly began overpowering the party, something seemed wrong. First, on stabbing Pyotr, Calix realized that the figure he attacked was merely an illusion - and the real Pyotr remained unaccounted for. Second, the party seemed strangely eager to disengage after just a dozen seconds of combat…

Still, Calix decided not to over-examine this turn of events, and let the party go. Only later, after the party had safely began sailing away, did Calix find out what plot the party had hatched. When he went back underground, he found Sasha gone - abducted by the real Pyotr, who had snuck underground through the Shadow Realm[4], reappeared in an instant, grabbed Sasha, and teleported away using Malliman’s amulet[5] before her wards could even react.

Calix’s rage could be heard through the ground as the party sailed away, making it clear they would find no quarter in Aquilla[6] if they decided to stay there once Calix returned. As a result, they purchased tickets on the first boat out, and set sail for Irretai[7].

A number of things happened in the ensuing scenes and epilogues: tying up loose plot threads, giving one final eff-you to old enemies and rivals, and so on.

• Milo decided to open up a new practice in Irretai

• Satina[8] explained that she, too, was leaving - just in the opposite direction. She made it clear that Ymitri was to cut all contact with her, lest the Ordemists[8] sink their claws into him through her again

• Rhea and Lysta delivered a message to Rhea’s old rival Lewsive[9], making him turn white as a sheet in fear (clip)

• Ymitri visited DJ[10] at the Boozy Ewer[11] to “bring him for a swim”, so to speak. in the proccess, Ymitri made his loathing of DJ plain, after years of DJ ditching out on his job so he could go drinking while leaving all the dirty work to Ymitri. It became clear Ymitri also wasn’t too happy that DJ seemed suspiciously close to much of the badness befalling the party this season(clip)

And more - too much to go over entirely here. Suffice to say, while there are a few ominous threads hanging - still undone - the party can look forward to a period of rest and tranquility now that they’ve successfully thwarted the plans of the Twisted Fang.

Anyway, that’s a wrap on Season 1 on How Not to End the World. I’m really looking forward to seeing what crazy stuff happens next season - and to dropping the long, long list of context we’ve been building as we transition to the new continent. Hope you enjoyed Season 1, and looking forward to seeing you all for Season 2 which starts on August 5th!

Glossary

[1] Blood Mother: The evil deity being summoned by the Twisted Fang[12], who had been trapped in a prison dimension until being transferred, piece by piece, back into Unatowa by the Fang.

[2] Ash’kin: Evil creatures born of Achnikor - an evil dragon deity. They aim to bring about the Eternal Night - removing the dragon god Ur’Goth as the source of power for the world and replacing them with Achnikor.

[3] Calix: The long-time enemy of the Pyotr, and perennial thorn in the side of the party. Recently, it’s become clear that Calix, in addition to being a higher up of the Clipped Wing branch of the Tarinous[13], held a lot of influence in the Twisted Fang.

[4] Shadow Realm: The name of the dimension entered when using Ymitri’s amulet. It appears to be tied heavily to the Ordemists

[5] Malliman’s Amulet: Malliman, of Malliman’s Magnificent Merchandise, had been using an amulet given to him by the Ordemists to move between his various stores. Using the amulet teleported you instantly to any one of a dozen or so spots in Aquilla, most of which have Malliman stores built on top of them.

[6] Aquilla: The party’s starting city, and the so called Perl of the country of Marros - although as the party discovered, corruption and decay are deeply woven into the city’s fabric.

[7] Irretai: A continent across the ocean (map)

[8] Ordemists: Dreamscape monsters. They operate by controlling other people for brief periods of time - although the party doesn’t know their true ends yet. They appear to be behind the killing of Anananke, which kicked off Episode 27 (summary) as well as the abduction of Sasha.

[9] Lewsive: A peer of Rhea, who was behind some of the accusations against her in Episode 23 (recap, video)

[10] DJ: AKA Dirty Joe, a longtime side-character. He is both a former coworker of Ymitri and former patron of the Boozy Ewer, at which Pyotr used to work. It also came to light that DJ had unintentional ties to the Twisted Fang and Morahhk[14], although I don’t remember which episode (lmk in the comments if you do)

[11] Boozy Ewer: A bar at which Pyotr used to work, and which served as a sort of hang-out slash headquarters for the first part of the series - at least until the party really kicked the hornets nest and had to begin staying at the warehouse out of fear for their safety.

[12] Twisted fang: A Towan cult of Ash’kin supporters and sympathizers

[13] Tarinous: The privatized police forces of Aquilla. Consists of several different companies, each of which have their own structure and areas of operations.

[14] Morahhk: Former druid ally of Lysta, who flipped sides to the Fang after becoming convinced that the end of the world was inevitable.