Summer Scaries is the first episode of season 21, Fantasy High: Junior Year.
Intro[]
"We return now to the world of Spyre, a world of myth and legend where dragons roam the skies and foul necromancers plot within the dark hallways of the Nekronomikron, and all throughout, legend, adventure, magic, and myth reign supreme, with one little exception, which is the nation of Solace, a metropolitan, modernized, arcano-tech country full of happy people working together from all the different various nations of the world of Spyre coming together -- specific emphasis on a little town called Elmville. That's right, our heroes' hometown and the home of the Aguefort Adventuring Academy, Spyre's premier high school for heroes, a legendary adventuring academy that has set forth time and time again. Homes of our heroes, Mordred Manor, Strongtower Luxury Apartments, Thistlespring Tree, and perhaps even Seacaster Manor that we might see somewhere else. [...]"
"If you are tuning in, this is the beginning of the third season of Fantasy High, junior year for our high school heroes, and returning to none other than the Bad Kids! But... I don't see the Bad Kids on here anywhere. Oh! [...] And where are we? We are not in Elmville, nor in the nation of Solace at all, because last we left off, our Intrepid Heroes had just gotten word, I guess, that none other than the Night Yorb had exploded out of Riz's chest out of the tattoo he got that said "The Night Yorb" with all his clues, different kind of... "Memento"-style, had tattooed clues all over his body. And how can our Intrepid Heroes possibly defeat the Night Yorb that threatens to destroy your world?"
"The presence of the Night Yorb, casting all of Spyre into unending night, that over the course of weeks and months and maybe, you know, a year depending on the supply chain, will eventually erode the agricultural base. There's no sunlight, photosynthesis. A very slow apocalypse unfolds! So where are the Bad Kids? The Bad Kids are not in Elmville at all! They are in the heart of The Red Waste, chasing down the Night Yorb!"
"Here we see before us, racing down a highway deep in the thickness of The Red Waste, far beyond the borders of Solace: the Night Yorb. A giant manta ray made of inky blackness with protruding tube-shaped eyes that pop out of tendrils at the front of its head, made of pure night, an eldritch beast beyond dimensions of life and the material, that surges forward, plunging the entire world of Spyre into endless night. Plants dying, temperatures lowering, the mood of the population suffering with the lack of Vitamin D. A slow-rolling apocalypse that threatens all of the denizens of this world, and who can save them? That's right, the Bad Kids!"
Synopsis[]
Prelude[]
The episode begins in medias res as the Bad Kids and their allies and minions chase down the Night Yorb in the depths of the Red Waste. Harried by Night Yorb cultists called Yorbies both on foot and on insectoid mounts, the Bad Kids are riding in and on The Hangvan, which is topped with a solar lasso they've created with a sigil capable of capturing the Night Yorb, if they can weaken it enough and pull it within five feet of the sigil.
Atop the Hangvan's roof, Gorgug Thistlespring mans the solar lasso with the help of Squeem as Fig Faeth and Adaine Abernant work the sigil. With Adaine are Boggy the Froggy and her invisible dog, Moggy the Doggy, and she has also summoned four dust mephit elementals hanging onto the side of the van. The Hangman rides ahead, and inside the van are Wretchrot aka Baby riding in the lap of Fabian Seacaster, who's riding shotgun, as well as Ecaf the floating mirror and Kristen Applebees. In the driver's seat, Riz Gukgak is using a mage hand to steer while hanging out the window. "The Night Yorb stands no chance," Riz says, and the Hangvan reminds the Bad Kids not to say the name, which they promptly ignore.
Round One[]
As the episode begins in medias res, both the Bad Kids and their enemies are starting with lowered health, spell slots and abilities. First up is Riz, who stealthily hides down in the footwell to enable a sneak attack gunshot on one of the Yorbies, putting it on death's door. The radiant light from his Gukgak Gun (modified into a Sun Gun) pesters the Night Yorb, causing it to pull the solar lasso tight and cast darkness, shitting a blob of magical darkness onto the front of the Hangvan.
Fabian attempts to acrobatically leap out of the side window of the van onto the Hangman, intending to get in range to cast faerie fire on the Night Yorb. However, distracted by his flirtatious interaction with Ecaf, he misses the motorcycle and instead flies under the Hangvan, landing prone. He narrowly avoids taking significant damage being crushed under the van's wheels and barely manages to leap back onto the Hangman, who had sacrificed its movement to get in position to retrieve him. Astride and fallen behind, Fabian recovers health with second wind.
A Yorbie with a Solesian accent rallies his comrades, shouting support for the Night Yorb. Other Yorbies attack the Hangvan, with Fig and Riz both using silvery barbs to turn away critical hits that would overcome the van's damage threshold; Adaine considers using a portented "1" to stop another crit, but decides against it. The Yorbies' insectoid mounts then attack the Bad Kids and the Hangvan with blasts of acidic bile.
Next, the Bad Kids' solar lasso, sigil and driving are handled as lair actions. Using the sigil, Fig dispels the Night Yorb's magical darkness by breathing it in like a cloud of smoke. Riz opts to jump full-on on the gas pedal, causing it to surge forward and slam into the Yorbie leader and two other Yorbies in the middle of the path, killing them. As the van closes in on the Night Yorb, Gorgug reels in the resulting slack in the solar lasso with the help of Adaine's portented "1", bringing the van to within 45 feet of the Night Yorb. As Kristen takes position by a window of the van, her goddess, Cassandra, attempts to speak with her in excitement, but Kristen ignores her and puts in EarPods.
Looking closely at the Night Yorb, Fig notices that it heals a minor amount each time its followers say its name, and the Bad Kids realize that's why the Hangvan and Hangman have been urging them not to say "Night Yorb." With the help of a hex she had imposed on the Night Yorb before the episode began, Fig strikes it with several eldritch blasts that take the form of music notes from her bass guitar, one of which is a critical hit, and she also heals Fabian with a healing word. After this, Squeem puts his head to Gorgug's head, saying "Squeem" with emotional weight and crying a tiny tear from its mono-eye, and leaps off the van, faceplants, and tumbles into the dust in a failed attempt to grapple a Yorbie.
Adaine's dust mephit elementals each perform a blinding breath to blind nearby Yorbies and their mounts with blasts of dust. Adaine then uses her sword's true strike to give herself advantage on a chromatic orb spell against the Night Yorb, but misses it anyway. Recalling what the Bad Kids have discovered in their adventure thus far, Adaine recognizes that the Night Yorb is vulnerable to radiant damage. Next to her, Gorgug again works to reel in the solar lasso, bringing the distance down to 35 feet. In the back seat, Kristen reaches her hand up to touch Gorgug's foot, considers casting greater invisibility on him, but opts instead to heal herself with cure wounds and retain concentration on her circle of power protecting the van and all its inhabitants.
The Night Yorb lets out a breath weapon of psychic emanations and sonic energy behind it, enveloping everyone but Fabian and the Hangman. The Hangvan, Gorgug, Adaine, and all of her dust mephits fail their saves, taking significant damage and knocking out Adaine. For everyone else, Kristen's circle of power ensures that by succeeding their saves, they take no damage at all -- saving Boggy and Ecaf, who would otherwise have been destroyed even on a successful save thanks to their low HP. Afterward, Cassandra tries again to reach out to Kristen, who says she's "just doing [her] own thing now" and returns to her fitness podcast. With the damage from the Night Yorb's attack exceeding the Hangvan's mishap threshold, the brake line busts and the van will be forced to gas it every round.
Arriving from the distance, the Bad Kids' allies Balthazar, a grizzled veteran, and Duggan McCann, a centaur cowboy, rush in, the former positioning himself to grab onto the van as it passes him.
Round Two[]
The chase combat progresses to a new game board, leaving the blinded Yorbies and mounts behind as they are unable to follow. On the new board, the Night Yorb leads the Hangvan and Bad Kids up the highway to approach a steep ramp and a giant jump. Only two Yorbies and their mounts remain chasing the van, one of whom Riz blasts with a gunshot. As Balthazar banters with Fabian, the Night Yorb grabs the veteran with its tail, and Balthazar accidentally helps the beast heal by saying "Night Yorb".
Fabian uses the Hangman's full movement to catch up and pull up alongside with the van and attack the remaining Yorbie and its mount, killing the insect while its mount briefly clings to the side of the van before falling and being crushed to death under the wheel. Fabian leaps off the Hangman into the van to reunite with Ecaf, whom Kristen recognizes merely reflects whatever energy they're getting, so since Fabian is flirting, the mirror flirts back. The Night Yorb swings its tail to swallow Balthazar into its underbelly, causing him to vanish.
Everyone receives a notification on their crystal from the Aguefort admin celebrating the end of orientation week and alerting them that the new school year starts in three days. As all of the Bad Kids deem this a buzzkill, Fig throws her phone, which bounces back in the van's wake and is caught by Squeem, who turns it into a saber of light as he fights with Yorbies around him.
More Yorbies emerge from hiding places, some on insectoid mounts and others riding giant floating tentacled aberration heads called yathmags. One Yorbie stands high on a precarious pillar and readies an action as the others move in to attack, dealing damage to the Hangvan and shouting support for the Night Yorb, healing its HP to above the bloodied threshold that the Bad Kids need it at for the sigil to work. The yathmags target Riz with a disintegration magical effect, but with the help of the circle of power, he avoids taking massive force damage. Cassandra urges Kristen to suggest that her fellow Bad Kids come to her church, but Kristen ignores her and makes a mental note to have a really intense conversation when they get back.
During the Bad Kids' lair action, Riz uses his thieves' tools proficiency to tinker with the van and heal some of its damage. Gorgug reels in the lasso to bring the van within 30 feet of the Night Yorb. Fig uses the sigil to try to help Balthazar, causing the Night Yorb to burp a splat of inky darkness that forms into Balthazar's shadow (without Balthazar), which poses as if shrieking and flees into the desert.
Fig strikes the Night Yorb with another eldritch blast and brings Adaine back to consciousness with healing word. At the end of her turn, the Night Yorb surges forward, pulling the van behind it off the jump in the ramp and blasting the Bad Kids with a fear effect, sending Adaine into a panic attack. In the distance, the Bad Kids see a tall tower and hear chanting of "Night Yorb, Night Yorb". The Yorbie on the precarious pillar causes it to drop toward the van, then leaps down to land under the wheels, sending the van in a tilting trajectory off the ramp that threatens to land the van on its side, which would allow the Night Yorb to break the solar lasso free from the Hangvan's roof.
As the Bad Kids' exhausting summer vacation adventure threatens to fail, and on the cusp of their junior year, Fig feels a flicker of magic deep in her heart. "If you would take me, you know what you would save," says something within her that smells sour and curdled. Fig responds, "I come from Hell. We make deals with devils. I'm already fucking exhausted. I need this to be over. I'm yours." In a flash of lemony yellow, creamy light, the rock is blasted away and the Hangvan is righted to land onto its wheels as a sickening gurgle is heard from Fig's stomach.