[Gardens of Ynn] Session 4 – Return to Purp U.

The Ultraviolet Grasslands-isms here are because I ran Gardens of Ynn as an intro to a UVG campaign, as well as to introduce the players to the system we'd be using: Knave with GLOG classes and some house rules for good measure. It's a messy work in progress.

Dramatis Personae

• Limon Field. Lime nomad Steppelander climate migrant. Unflappably nonchalant 15-year-old now bound in service to a demigod in the form of a Bonsai Turtle.
• Gelato "O.G." Kush. Mutant Quarter-Ling Hexad Enforcer Militant. Storied climber of upside-down cogs and gears. Turns into a cyclopic were-swan under the light of the full moon.
• Astia Rudeni. Dwarf Decapolitan Ambassador Biomancer. Learned Flesh-crafting at the Cobalt Ziggu-Rot. Arms and legs growing thinner by the day ever since he swallowed an unlabeled jar of pills.
• Marceline Chaiya Grove. Grapefruit nomad Steppelander Coffee-maker. Teenage girl formerly impersonating her father.

Astia in the Tower of the Peahawks

Blinking in the darkness, Astia Rudeni had no recollection of how or why he was currently rooting around in the pitch black 3rd floor of a frozen tower. (Ynn's weird like that sometimes!) As he threw open a window to get a better look at his surroundings, a great crash from the floor below shook the building. He heard shouts about birds coming from familiar voices outside the tower and acted quickly, pushing a musty old four poster bed over the trapdoor leading downward. Not a moment later the bed jumped, lifted by the weight of an ornery creature slamming the trapdoor into it from below.

With a newfound urgency, Astia sprung into action collecting cloth covers from the dusty repository of old furniture in which he found himself. He fashioned them into a knotted rope and rappelled down the outside of the building to safety.

Astia reunited with Limon, Marceline, and Gelato outside of the tower's hoary demesne. Little did he know, this would not be his only reunion this expedition.

Golem Assault

Following the ladybug parade deeper into the gardens, our heroes came across a burial mound topped with a megalithic structure. Two standing stones supported a third laying atop them, its faces inscribed with stars in formation. Marceline and Astia climbed to the top of the structure, but as they scrambled to their feet, a familiar face emerged from the shrubs circling the clearing. It was 8 feet tall, made of interlocking wooden parts, and wielded a giant, sharpened gardening spade as a battleaxe. The Gardener Golem had returned, and its sights were set on Astia.

The force of the Golem's blow was so powerful that it drove Astia's shield into his ribs, cracking a few. Noticing the plucked flower behind Marceline's ear, it swung its great spade at her as well, slamming her into the stone. Things were looking grim until Gelato took the potted orchid given to him by the Rose Maidens and threatened to drop it off the standing stone. Unable to resist helping a flower in need, the Gardener Golem moved to catch it like an old-timey firefighter. Marceline whipped out a chunk of crystal and began incanting; after a moment, her eyes flung open as napalm began erupting from the focus, engulfing the construct. When the smoke cleared there was nothing left of the Gardener Golem besides a heap of ash and a pulsating ruby the size of a football.

Bruised but not beaten, the party rested.

Mystery a'Mounds

The group made dinner, spread out on top of the standing stones, and slept for the rest of the daylight. (In Ynn, a day is 48 hours; 24 of light, 24 of darkness.) Gelato sprinkled some golem ash into a blunt he was rolling and offered it to Astia; smoking it caused a pair of man-sized butterfly wings to sprout from the Dwarf's back. A bit of experimenting and Astia discovered he could now fly. The group gathered a bunch of golem ash to smoke later, but for the time being something more pressing had arisen: nighttime had come, and there was a full moon in Ynn.

Gelato's grotesque transformation began. He fell to his knees, screaming instructions in desperation as his neck elongated and white feathers erupted from his skin. His two eyes converged while his lips hardened and protruded from his face, becoming a horrifically distended beak. Aghast, the party found themselves in the presence of a berserk, cyclopian were-swan. It shook off its loose-fitting clothes and began squawking and flapping its wings menacingly.

And as if this weren't enough of a curveball, in the light of the full moon, a hallway could now be seen through the standing stones, but only from one direction. The swan-beast formerly known as Gelato bolted in, webbed feet slapping softly against the flagstones. It ran further in than the moonlight revealed, followed by a loud "WHUMPH" ringing out from the darkness. Lighting a lantern, the group entered this extra-dimensional space to find a dazed, but unharmed, were-swan sitting by a closed door.

The Gang Tries Dungeon Delving

Opening the door which dead-ended the mysterious hallway, Limon, Marceline, and Astia faced four statues holding spears in throwing positions. They observed the figures safely from the hallway until their were-swan compatriot ran honking into the room, triggering a trap: the statues hurled their spears at the doorway... sailing harmlessly over the swan's head and directly into its unsuspecting friends. Marceline took the brunt of the blow and nearly bled out on the stone; Astia and Limon helped stabilize her, but where her left ear once was, now only a bloody mess remained.

Opening the next door, which sat between the now-spearless statues, Limon and Astia peered into a cavernously large room; their lantern-light didn't even reach the back walls. Astia decided to carefully scout the room by fluttering around with the lantern (taking care not to step on the ground). Clumsily circling the room while acclimating to his new appendages, Astia observed a door on each wall, and a gargantuan statue with two fingers outstretched from a hand on its extended arm. It stood on a circular base set into the floor slightly. Not wanting to explore further without the rest of the party, Astia returned to the antechamber and was blasted in the back with a bolt of searing flame from the statue's fingertips.

Limon did his best to treat Astia's smoldering arm to no avail. In the end, all Astia's companions could do was pray he'd survive the injury. Against all odds, he pulled through. Everyone agreed it was time to leave the Gardens.

Back to the Copse

Searching for an exit brought the party to a burbling fountain. The Gelato-swan flew in and preened itself while the others debated the risks and rewards of stealing some of the coins they saw glinting in the crystal-clear water. In the end, Limon took one. Nothing happened.

They traveled along a path between a low hedge which eventually brought them under an impossibly wide glass canopy (with no visible walls or supports, at that). Under this glass ceiling grew every kind of rose imaginable. Marceline replaced the bloodsoaked orchid in her hair with a neat polka-dotted rose blossom. Another was plucked that shared an uncanny likeness with Gary Busey. But the big kahuna crowned a house-sized tangle of thorns and bushes and vines: a rose with petals black as the night's sky. It was going to be a dangerous and painful climb through the tangled of thorns to get there, so Astia instead fluttered up to the top and plucked it. It smelled sweet—good enough to eat, even. So he did! (It permanently increased his HP by 1.)

Through the other end of this rose garden, the hedges continued until all but Astia saw a familiar sight. They arrived behind the mausoleum that had awaited them upon first entering the Gardens. Sure enough, in front of the white marble building was a wrought iron lamppost, candle lit within. A quick trip along a game path brought them back to the vine-covered brick wall with an iron-banded door still slightly ajar. One by one they exited the gardens, returning to the Purple University's Astrobiology Department Greenhouse.

But What About Our Stuff?

Gelato reverted immediately, and, lying naked on the floor of the greenhouse, was offered a labcoat. He graciously accepted, politely declining all requests to button up the front afterwards.

A beetle was sent for Doktor Leifbrauer, who was currently holding office hours. In the meantime our heroes huddled, brainstorming ways to keep what contraband they had smuggled out of the Ynnian anomaly. They would have until Leifbrauer's debriefing to come up with a way to maintain their hard-earned gains.