Fracas at the Frostyfaire Folk Festival is the eighth episode of Fantasy High: Junior Year.
Intro[]
"Last we left off, our Intrepid Heroes were grinding through the fall semester at the Aguefort Adventuring Academy. We had some high highs, some low lows. We discovered some interesting information, with Lydia Barkrock returning with data about Bakur the demon and a sort of ritual that had occurred, tagged onto the end of a mystery that Riz had noted and that had been followed up on by Kristen around the disappearance of Lucy Frostblade, who seemed to have submitted paperwork to change her deity at the end of last school year and then suddenly withdrew it. Riz also found the last place that she was observed before she went missing, although she had been confirmed by magic to be dead. We also discovered that Kipperlilly Copperkettle was getting food trucks with some little subliminal ads in the wax paper, and there was a sort of fraught confrontation between Kristen and the other presidential candidate. ..."
"We had some incredibly high academic achievements. Actually, A+s across the board, save for our party cleric. Also, a C in barbarian, but huge achievements in your artificer classes, and we also had huge achievements in warlock classes as Fig actually went on a quick impromptu field trip to Hell with her warlock class. ..."
"We also saw a new sort of, the coolest kid on campus, Fabian Seacaster, double A+, captain of the Owlbears, running study hall at Seacaster Manor. Never mind the rapidly piling boxes of takeout stinking it up in the kitchen. As well as our Elven Oracle having to fend off ancient high elves in search of arcane wisdom at her job at Basrar's, working as a waitress, helping to serve that ice cream. ..."
"We return back to Mordred Manor. And actually, I want to confirm with all of you, as we come back here and find you, on the day of the Frostyfaire Folk Festival, a little sort of loose thread of a connection between something that is occurring at Gorgug's house, occurring at the Thistlespring Tree, that you had seen some information that your mom was working on connected to, but got away from you. Junior year, pretty fucking busy, gang."
"And speaking of how busy it is, we also introduced last episode, our system for academic stress here in junior year. Some of our students barely scathed by the monster that is cortisol as Fig began some paladin classes, both with the paladin teacher Halo St. Croix and also some tutoring with Porter Cliffbreaker, who, due to your incredible attunement with the principles of barbarianism, if not any of the actual class features, Porter signed your MCAT when your actual bard teacher flew into the sky, weeping. ... However, the stress only continued to compile, with Adaine and Riz each taking on two stress tokens in the last downtime, and Kristen, Gorgug, and Fabian each taking on three."
Synopsis[]
Stress token allocation[]
The Bad Kids begin by assigning last episode's stress tokens, which will give them disadvantage on certain rolls; each token assigned to skill rolls corresponds to disadvantage on one proficient skill or two non-proficient skills.
Fig Faeth's one token goes to insight and religion. Gorgug Thistlespring's three tokens go to initiative, insight, deception, and charisma saving throws. Adaine Abernant's two tokens go to initiative, intimidation and persuasion. Fabian Seacaster's three tokens go to his tool proficiencies, history, investigation, and perception. Kristen Applebees' three tokens go to initiative, wisdom saving throws, and medicine. Finally, Riz Gukgak's two tokens go to perception, survival, athletics, and deception.
Before the festival[]
At Mordred Manor on the morning of the Frostyfaire Folk Festival, Lydia Barkrock drops a pile of arcane tomes and other documents saved by Lydia's old adventuring party related to the Bakur case. The Bad Kids immediately notice they are written in Giant. Adaine casts comprehend languages and starts flipping through the papers. Meanwhile, Kristen asks Lydia about the name Ruvina, who had been Lucy's god. Lydia says the name is familiar, that it came up briefly during the Bakur adventure, from the same region as where Bakur's deity was from.
As Adaine studies upstairs with the help of Fig's bardic inspiration, she feels her stomach gurgle weirdly, and accidentally blows a bunch of dust mites into her eyes, then stumbles back and knocks herself unconscious on the railing of the bunk bed. As Kristen stabilizes her, Kristen's stomach gurgles as well, and for a split second she sees a vision from back at the food court, where she hears a scream and sees a flash of blood. Fig decides she and her bardic powers are cursed. Riz uses his necktie to detect a fiendish aura around Fig other than her own innate one. Fig says she thinks the culprit may be the original owner of the Armor of Pride, and that she may be paying a debt that Gilear owes.
Across town at the Thistlespring Tree, Gorgug wakes up to the setup for the Frostyfaire Folk Festival. Wilma and Digby greet him, full of glee at hosting the festival. They mention that Ruben Hopclap's emo band will be performing, courtesy of Lola Embers. Gorgug's biological parents, Roz and Gorbag, arrive, the latter planning to jam in a drum circle that's been ongoing for 40 years. Gorbag bonds with Gorgug over the C he got from Porter. As Gorgug heads out to Mordred Manor, Wilma and Digby evasively mention putting away some projects they worked on with friends over the summer that shouldn't be out for the festival, which Gorgug surmises may be related to swinging. The topic shifts to the festival's nudity tent, which Gorgug expresses slight discomfort with. On his way out, Gorgug gets a brief flash of inspiration from looking at the junk projects that may provide some insight into his trouble with reconciling rage and artificing.
Back at Mordred Manor, the party continues studying the Bakur documents. Adaine finds a record of Ruvina having given a wedding gift to Cassandra: a bridle of frost to command a team of fiery horses. It's unclear whom Cassandra was marrying, but she was on a trip to the great mountains of the giants alongside her siblings Sol and Galicaea. Riz finds a text that notates a dually arcane and religious axiom of magical law of Spyre: "Obliviati Mori", or the Law of Theothanatic Silence: deities are not permitted to speak of fallen, forgotten gods to mortals, so in other words deities cannot intervene to revive dead gods by reminding mortals of their existence. The Bad Kids surmise this means gods can remember dead gods even though mortals typically cannot.
After a couple of hours of study, Adaine considers popping into the Compass Points Library in Leviathan, but Gorgug reminds the group that Ruben's band will be at the Frostyfaire Folk Festival and the other Rat Grinders may be up to something there. Kristen texts Tracker to ask about Galicaea in relation to the newly uncovered information, but Tracker says she's busy and they'll have to talk the next week. Kristen also reaches out to her parents, and Bucky texts to tell her he thinks they do want to talk to her. After this, Kristen glances down at a page and notices a hagiographic illustration of an empty arch decorated with sharp, pointed-stars that remind her of the rage-stars that came out of Cassandra at the Synod Mall. Drawing connections, Kristen wonders whether Cassandra's spouse had been Bakur's dead god, and hence whether Bakur being trapped in Lydia's chest may be why Kalina had said "Ragh Barkrock".
Meanwhile, Gorthalax texts Fig to ask about whether the festival will interfere with Gorgug's football practice, and she uses a minor illusion to convince him Gorgug is running drills right now. Finally, before the Bad Kids leave for the festival, Fig prays to Cassandra, thinking of the moment of doubt from when her horns first came in and she discovered Gilear wasn't her birth father, and how on the other side of that uncertainty, they were closer than ever. The room fills with indigo light from Kristen's shards. Kristen joins in the prayer, thinking of the uncertainty of reaching out to her parents, and regains a sixth-level spell slot.
At the festival[]
The Bad Kids head over to the Thistlespring Tree for the Frostyfaire Folk Festival. It's full of rangers and druids, animals, vegan food stalls, dancing, and other such hippie vibes. The opening band, Ashling, is playing as they arrive. Fig disguises herself as Wanda Childa. Seeing plenty of Aguefort students around, Kristen goes into campaign mode.
An ancient druid with a 4 1/2-foot long pipe offers to Kristen to go out into the woods and get high, but Adaine recognizes this as an illusion and dispels it, revealing Ruben Hopclap. He passes it off as him being too famous to blend in undisgused, and as he leaves, Fig casts hex to reduce his intelligence checks so he won't see through her disguise. Ruben gets up on stage with his band, My Clerical Gnomance, and introduces their first song, "Doomed to Wanda".
The wind picks up and a pulse of static passes through the festival as Interim Emergency Backup Principal Arcturus Grix appears in a clap of lightning, hovering above the festival. He denounces the lack of "perfect order" and casts disintegrate on Ruben, which is counterspelled by Adaine.
Battle, Round One[]
Grix says his duty to optimize the school experience means he must maintain order even outside school in his students' personal lives, and uses a lair action to take control of the junk machinery the Thistlesprings had hidden under tarps, including a lawnmower retrofitted into a sex machine, as well as many other bots. Digby and Wilma are respectively sucked into an old dryer and washing machine. Grix is alarmed at the sexual nature of the machines that responded to his call. Nevertheless, the lawnmower and other bots deal damage to Kristen, Adaine, and Fabian, but Riz and Gorgug avoid the attacks.
Fabian uses kinetic jaunt on himself and attacks the dryer Digby is trapped in. With two strikes, including a defensive flourish and goading attack on the first, Fabian dismantles the dryer and frees Digby. At the end of his turn, Grix hits Adaine with a frost cantrip for significant damage.
Riz casts remote access to hack into the washing machine to eject Wilma and take control of it for himself, then hides. Digby and Wilma ask Gorgug what to do, he asks if they have a way to disable more machines, and they go for the lawnmower and a hovering Sybian-bot, respectively.
Kristen disengages and seeks help inside the nudist tent. Two naked gnomes follow her out, and she leaves them in the direction of a suspicious vulture roosting on the scaffolding of the stage. Grix kicks up a wind to knock away the nudist tent and reveal two more naked gnomes. A massive forklift under Grix's command attacks Kristen, but Riz's silvery barbs turns a crit to a miss and Kristen is able to dodge it.
Ruben sees Fig as Wanda Childa in the crowd and plays a little song to give her bardic inspiration. Fig uses hexblade's curse on Grix and dimension door to teleport with Gorgug up to the floating principal, then lets herself fall as not to interfere with a potential grapple. Fabian casts feather fall to rescue both Fig and Gorgug with his battle sheet.
Gorgug takes out his steel defender, a gecko named Clobica, which makes a force-empowered rend attack on Grix. With branding smite, Gorgug strikes Grix twice, whose shield is counterspelled by Fig. As Gorgug falls, Grix attacks him with a lightning attack that stuns him.
Adaine uses her sword to cast true strike, then casts summon elemental to create a flying air elemental, which tries and fails to grapple Grix.
Grix flies even higher, outside the range of Adaine's counterspell, and casts a psychic scream spell that deals significant damage to everyone, destroys Clobica and Adaine's air elemental, and stuns Fabian, Fig and again Gorgug, ending all of their concentration spells.
Round Two[]
Grix uses a lair action to sacrifice some of his life force to resurrect the dryer. The lawnmower attacks Digby, and other bots knock Adaine unconscious and damage Gorgug. Fabian loses his turn to the stun, and fails the saving throw to shake out of it.
Riz pops out of hiding to shoot Grix, bypassing his shield to do heavy damage. However, Grix notices as Riz tries to return to hiding, and strikes him with a frost spell. Digby and Wilma use teleporter wristwatches to misty step to Gorgug and Fig, respectively, to give them the help action on their stun effects.
Kristen uses her only spell slot to cast mass cure wounds to restore significant health to everyone in the party. The forklift misses its attack of opportunity as she retreats from it, and Grix sends another spell down at Riz, who dodges it again. The dryer belches fire at the stunned Fabian. The forklift turns to attack Roz and Gorbag but misses, and another bot misses an attack on Wilma.
Ruben gives an uplifting speech to the crowd, with him and the rest of his band giving bardic inspiration to all the Bad Kids. Kristen looks up at the vulture and it makes direct eye contact with her; she also tries to see if there's more subliminal packaging here but does not see any. Roz and Gorbag attack the forklift.
Even with advantage from the Thistlesprings, both Fig and Gorgug are unable to break out of their stunned conditions. Adaine summons another air elemental, which fails both its attempts to attack Grix. Adaine also again casts true strike. Grix misses another shot against Riz.
Grix looks down at Riz and casts dominate monster to put a vision of Lord Salazar Edge's Academy for Solo Adventurers into his head, taking control of Riz's mind. Adaine attempts to counterspell this, but narrowly fails, and Riz falls under the sway of perfect order.
Round Three[]
Grix uses a lair action to attempt, unsuccessfully, to restore a spell slot. The lawnmower attacks Riz, hitting once, which nearly knocks him out of being charmed. More bots attack Adaine as well. Fabian again cannot shake off the stun condition.
Grix commands Riz to shoot Kristen, but he misses the shot. As a bonus action, Kristen tosses a rock at Riz to try to shake him out of the mind control, but doesn't hit. Kristen runs up to hide next to the stage. Above her, she looks to see the vulture, pulls a crust of bread out of her pocket, climbs up the scaffolding, and mentally reaches out to Cassandra for help communicating with the vulture.
Kristen extends the bread with a "Hey, girlie", and the vulture screeches, "What did you call me?! You have trifled with me for the last time! You are entering the Vulture Dimension!" All the Bad Kids are magically transported away from the Thistlespring Tree and into the Vulture Dimension.
Locations[]
Characters[]
The Bad Kids[]
New[]
Returning[]
- Lydia Barkrock
- Wilma and Digby Thistlespring
- Ruben Hopclap
- Gorbag
- Principal Arcturus Grix
- Ficus
- Cody
- The Suspicious Vulture
Mentioned[]
- Lucy Frostblade
- Ayda Aguefort
- Gilear Faeth
- Gorthalax the Insatiable
- Bucky Applebees
- Tracker O'Shaughnessey
- Porter Cliffbreaker
- Telmaine Lomenelda
- The Cubbys
- Mac and Donna Applebees
- Bakur
- Cormyr
- Rana