Maus Yi Yos!

"Maus yi yos!" was, of course, the traditional Driftmas greeting, in Ilya of old, before Archbishop Usla of Banor waged the War for Driftmas and commandeered the holiday for Numiel's glory, followed by the Inundation erasing all trace of Ilya from the world (...or did it? DUN DUN DUN).

Some Numielites have kept the words as a generic Driftmas greeting, though the common people have no idea what they might have once meant in the Ilyan language (like how a person might sing along to "Feliz Navidad" with at best the barest understanding that it's just Spanish for "happy Christmas", without any understanding that in Spanish they call the holiday "Navidad" which is cognate with "Nativity" (any -ty word tending to turn out to be -dad in Spanish -- eg, "gravity" is cognate with "gravedad", and also I have an idea what the next necromancer I wind up using calls himself), and "nativity" really just means "the process or circumstances of being born", though of course nobody anymore frequently refers to any nativities but Jesus's).

ANYHOW, "Maus Yi Yos" is of course just a generic placeholder name for a Driftmas session... or is it? DUN DUN DUN

On Driftmas Day, the 25th of Ices. The good ship Lollipop has arrived in port. Disembarking, five crew members (Roger, Patty "Doc", Helko "the Axe", Raine, and Rylen) are met by a courier.

"I've been looking for you. Got something I'm supposed to deliver - your hands only." Mumbling, "Let's see here... A letter... not sure who from. She wouldn't say. Just that she was a friend of yours. Looks like that's it. Got to go."

The letter turned out to be a magic scroll. They read the scroll, and it turned out to be a scroll of plane shift, which brought them to what turned out to be the Driftmas Demiplane, all snow and pleasant chill.

The party ended up outside  a cave. The cave is surrounded by inactive (variously permanently disabled, bugged out, and/or entirely dispelled) clay golems.

They saw a peryton flying high above, scared it off, and set off for the source of puffs of smoke on the horizon.

They found Driftmastown, where the Driftmas Fey (drunkenly distracted, as it is their day of celebration, all their work for the year has concluded and they have not yet begun next year's work of crafting toys) greet them with curiosity -- not often they have visitors. Donner, one of Saint Usla's sleigh-pulling perytons, was also there. A chat occurred.

The cave isn't anything any of Saint Usla's minions are allowed to talk about. It may, information wheedled from the Driftmas Fey, have to do with the folks that owned Driftmas before Usla conquered it away from the Ilyans.

Returning to the cave!

It turned out to be the dwelling of Dujha the yeti (?), one of the Argles Get, where she has dwelt since the War for Driftmas -- her 5 siblings, uncle, and grandmother (the previous Embodiments of Driftmas) were all slain by Usla in the War; Dujha managed to escape unnoticed.

As it transpires, Dujha has spent the last many centuries inventing, tinkering, and divining. She is not really a proper spellcaster, is why it took so long.

She got her hands on one or more Golem Manuals and cobbled together invention of a new spell (which she calls disable construct), of which she has one scroll.

She did many divinations, which eventually narrowed down the who, where, and when of recruitment to help with her task. (The specific time of year was always obvious: Saint Usla uses all her store of power on Driftmas Eve, leaving her depleted; the Driftmas Fey have the last 6 days of the year off, as vacation, before working the rest of the year -- an obvious time to do something Usla might not like. But which year, specifically, was harder to pin down.)

Dujha was cagey, but eventually, she revealed that she wanted to retake Temple Zamet, a temple that had been taken by Archbishop Usla in the War for Driftmas, the most sacred Driftmas-related temple on the continent of Kryia, which Usla's Banorite army had seized, put a fortress around, and guarded with various golems and constructs.

She wants to use disable construct to temporarily disable a golem, hack it, and use its help to retake the temple.

She has knowledge of a secret back tunnel into the temple/fortress, which could take them nearly straight to the boss golem: a platinum golem. (The other four golems are gold.) So the party decided to go in that way, not in the front, try to seize the platinum golem and use it on the gold ones.

So Dujha plane shifted them back to the Material Plane, to a ravine on continent Kryia near temple Zamet, and they went up a tunnel to the temple. There was a broken and defiled altar discarded amongst rubble on the way, but the party was in a hurry because there was a gold golem (embossed with the name Rincona) coming, and didn't notice the altar until later.

Into the main temple chamber, where there was a platinum golem embossed with the name Phensipicho, and a gold golem embossed with Sorgiga! Raine cast the disable construct spell successfully on Phensipicho, and Dujha headed over to pop its carapace with a hammer and start hacking! The rest of the party attacks Sorgiga.

Raine notices that the scroll, unlike a normal scroll, has not faded away into illegibility after use.

With the help of Phensipicho, the party took down Sorgiga! Just as Rincona arrived!

But the scroll was successfully was used, and now Rincona was on the party's side, too!

The scroll, ultimately, worked 6 times before fading (6 being a number sacred to Morozz).

(Speaking of sacred numbers: there was 1 platinum golem, 4 gold golems, 9 sunlight-lazer-blasty turrets on the walls, and 16 animated objects that mostly just do upkeep -- any perfect square number is sacred to Numiel. The upkeep constructs weren't doing so hot, after a few hundred years plus 600 underwater. There were shovels, dusters, one was a salt-scatterer construct, diligently trying to scatter salt, its salt store long since depleted.)

Anyway, the party took away the Numielite altar and accoutrements, restored the Morozzite altar. They ended up selling the Numielite iconography to churches of Numiel back north. "Doc" was allowed to peruse Dujha's book collection in detail. Dujha took up new residence in Temple Zamet, to maintain the golems and other constructs, trying to keep it under Morozzite control this time.

Maus Yi Yos!

The Year Hoobynoob Unaccountably Contrived to Come on Freday the 13th of Octember

Through some celestial mishap or accounting error, for some reason, Hoobynoob falls on Freday the 13th of Octember, in this, the 47th year of the Subsidence. Normally, of course, Hoobynoob falls on the 30th, the last day of Octember. The 13th of Octember doesn't normally even fall on a Freday -- it is typically a Munday.

This calendrical irregularity is known for certain: all the experts agree on this unusual occurrence -- the astrologers; the astronomers; the druids and rangers of Sequoia (who counts the months and weeks, the planets and stars, under her purview); the calendricians and calendrometers; we even asked the janitor, as they know of these things.

Amongst the populace, once the confusion is overcome -- or at least set aside -- the yearly observance of Hoobynoob proceeds as usual, albeit on the 13th. In Endeesy, capital of Gus: gourds are carved; nuts are harvested; costumes are prepared; candies and sweets are purchased or crafted in bulk in preparation for the traditional mass extortion, on threat of prankery, by children.

When the 13th of Octember arrives -- on a Freday, just as (unusually) ordained -- the morning sneaks into Endeesy foggily. The day slugs by: children growing increasingly excited, adults growing increasingly wary of danger, the weather growing increasingly foggy and moist-smelling.

When treat-or-tricking time arrives, it is nigh impossible to find one's way in the fog. But, through some divine Dalyan providence, unusually alert priests of Dalya, and widespread use of the Buddy System, no children are separated from their guardians for long.

The children return to their homes, feast on junk food, and repair engorgedly to their beds. After the foggy day and foggier evening, it looks like it has been another successful Hoobynoob, profitable for the children and fun for all ages! Parents go to bed. Bar crawlers begin the process of acquiring their holiday drunkenness.

Midnight approaches.

The clock tower in the Cathedral of Quasxthe in the Crown District of Endeesy ticks over from 11:59, and the mighty bell begins its twelvefold tolling: BO-o-...

The bell, having tolled half of once, trails off, as if it has forgotten how to bell.

Mournful moans are heard through the increasingly farty-smelling fog.

Zombies! Some of whom are fresh, some of whom are decaying and dirt-encrusted.

Following the trail of zombies leads the party north, to a graveyard in the Resentment Ward. The zombies are discovered to be animated by worms squirming under their skin (a miniboss zombie acts as Spawn of Kyuss).

A 400-year-old mausoleum, dating to the early centuries of the Inundation, proves to be the resting place of the Mermaid Queen Riefya I Arielid "the Black".

A party member recollects a fact about Riefya "the Black": that she was found, after her death, to have secretly been a cultist of Asya, goddess of all that is disgusting.

The lock on the door, being 400 years old and having been underwater most of that time, has become more of a jam. But somebody has already broken the jam. But somebody subsequently cast an arcane lock on the door. But the rogue breaks the arcane lock.

Within the tomb, reality is distorted. The air is fetid and moist. The stairs down are greasy. The walls are fleshy and moist. It is not a throat, but it desperately wants to be a throat.

At the bottom of the stairs, the tomb of Riefya has expanded from a small room to a large acid-lake cavern, as if it wants to be a stomach.

A sarcophagus stands on a raised dais in the middle of the acid lake. A mage stands by the sarcophagus, incanting a ritual.

He is Vyndoc Hogkt, a descendant of the Hogkt family that ruled the Asya-worshipping Plaguelord nation while it existed in the first century before the Inundation. (He is a Mage, with spells swapped out for poison- and acid-related spells.)

His ritual concludes, and an oozely incarnation of Asya possessing the corpse of Queen Riefya joins combat. (She uses the stat of a Black Pudding, except she can throw acid gobbets -- her Pseudopod has a 60' range.)

If the party kills Riefya!Asya first, Vyndoc sacrifices himself to regenerate and empower her. If the party kills Vyndoc first, Riefya!Asya eats his corpse and is regenerated and empowered. Either way, it is a two-stage boss fight. (The amalgamation boss has a combination of the abilities of its components, and then some.)

The party defeats Vyndoc, Riefya, and Asya, and prevents Bad Things from happening.

Time progresses from midnight once they emerge from the tomb.

Hoobynoob did not come on Freday the 13th because of Vyndoc (that's an unsolved mystery), but since it did, and both 13 and Hoobynoob are sacred to Asya, he took it as auspicious to enact his plan.

How the Bonelord Stole Driftmas

On the last day of the year, three Guildmasters of the Endeesy Adventurer's Guild -- Ruthmin Tern the Assassin Rogue, Christopher the Paladin, and Lyra the Stars Druid -- were chilling in the Guildmasters' Lounge when seven driftmas fey popped through a portal, begging for their assistance. It turned out that Saint Usla, in charge of Driftmas, had been kidnapped by fire creatures.

The Guildmasters tracked the scorch-trail from the Driftmas Demiplane, to the Transitory Holiday Demiplane, to the Hoobynoob Demiplane.

They found (and broke into) a laboratory guarded by salamanders, where Saint Usla had recently been, but she (and the Professor, one of Hoobynoob's people) had already been stolen by disgusting creatures.

In the laboratory greenhouse, they found a construct named Sam, who was very concerned that Jaq the Gourd Duke, in charge of Hoobynoob, had been acting very strangely, including with this peculiar plan for Saint Usla.

They went to Jaq's mansion, where they were hired by Jaq to recover the Professor. Jaq's theory was that Neepkag the Bogeyperson, who had been in charge of Hangadh-Buain-Noiche before the Burning Hate took it from Asya and put Jaq in charge as the Incandescent Bonelord of Heckbound Night (long before Dalya took over, renamed it to Hoobynoob, and made Jaq the Gourd Duke), wanted to carry out Jaq's own plan, but to their own benefit.

(Jaq's plan was to split his two personalities -- the Incandescent Bonelord following the Burning Hate, and the Gourd Duke following Dalya -- putting one into Saint Usla, so that each could be in charge of their own holiday. The Professor had all the details, it involved a plant that had been grafted with black dahlias and orange lilies, which through the laws of similarity could split the two personalities if ungrafted, and then graft the orange lilies onto a sunflower, representing Saint Usla's Numiel.)

The Guildmasters went to the Bogeyperson's cave, defeated them, rescued Usla, and were declared Nice and deserving of many presents by Usla. They returned the Professor to Jaq, who now owes them an unspecified favor.

Arossiel and Lily

In the long ago, in time that was, before the quarrels of today’s centuries: there was a human woman. Her hair was black and short and her skin was pale as teeth, and the name that she was called by her friends, and that we shall call her today, was Lily – the overseers had a different name for her, or more precisely an alphanumeric code, the specifics of which are of little importance and have been lost to us.

The Archbishop of Banor at the time had been raised to her position through promising a tremendous plan to defeat Calabia. Seven times Banor had tried to conquer Calabia, seven times the bloodlords’ military superiority and judicious political alliances had rebuffed the holy wars. Eight is not an auspicious number to the Numielites of Banor, but the Archbishop made grand promises, much grander than the portents allowed for. Her plan was thus: she prayed to Numiel to send angels to free all the food from the stockpens, so that the food might rise in revolt and Banor might sweep in as conquering heroes.

So it was that, as Lily was getting ready for sleep in the stockpen, the celestial angel Arossiel came to her, a frightful whirlwind of wings and eyes, intoning in a terrible and awful voice, “FEAR NOT”.

Utterly disregarding Arossiel’s perfectly clear instruction, Lily gave a terrified squeak and dropped her hairbrush.

The angel did his best to tone down his terrifying affect somewhat, apologizing and begging Lily’s forgiveness. He was between Lily and the door, and there were no windows in the stockpens that one might dive out of, so she could not flee; she could only cower in terror.

Arossiel sensed that his holy mission to free the food and raise them up in revolt was already going poorly, barely having started at all. He shrunk down further, modulated his voice and his apologies, trying to calm Lily.

Eventually, Lily grew less terrified and more curious, just while Arossiel grew more distraught and panicked about how far behind he was already running on his mission. The armies of Banor were thundering towards Calabia, and he hadn’t even freed a single food.

In a few hours, Lily calmed Arossiel with soothing words and gentle touch; in that same time, the angel fell in love with the human, and grew distracted from his mission. If one food needed this much attention before she might act, how much time would myriads of them take? Arossiel decided it could not be done, and stayed with Lily instead. It took some days before Lily returned Arossiel’s feelings, but in time she did.

Battle was soon joined in the fields of Calabia, and the Archbishop’s armies soon lay derelict and ruined. The fate of the eighth Banor invasion of Calabia was decided before it began.

Arossiel the angel fled Calabia with Lily, fled from his duties and from Numiel’s service, fell from grace and lost his wings, and the two wandered the world for at least some decades before falling from the pages of history.

How The Dragon Stole Driftmas

 Last year, I had an idea for a holiday-themed one-shot that I would run in late December. I didn't wind up getting it off the ground before getting hit by a car on Christmas. But then I still had the idea from last year this year; it had not gone away! So I set up a one-shot.

The Night Before Driftmas

It’s the night before Driftmas and in the Great Hall All the students are dancing at the Driftmas Eve Ball. The hall is decorated with garlands and trees, Through all the dancers blows a pepperminty breeze. Though it’s winter, for one day goldfinches wear yellows, While students waltz and twirl with merry schoolfellows. The pine trees are festooned with platinum and gold orbs, Dancing through them: the sons and daughters of lords. Peacocks show off tails and Numiel-given eyes, And someone’s rustled up a flock of gold butterflies. A rich human guy drunkly ‘splains, “Actually,” To some girls who don’t much like his loquacity, “Morozz’s cultists had Driftmas as their holy day Before Numiel took it over as the world’s birthday.” Everyone shows off their gymnastics and dance moves, For the coronation in five days calls for the youths To wage ritual dance-off in hope to bless Unity For the world to be brought into one great community. But tonight, the Academy celebrates winter, And the band plays carols with a most festive timbre. But this is a story of adventure and strife, And dangerous potential of loss of life, There will be dragons and villains and some excitement, A festive and joyful and maybe violent event.

Some 550-600 years ago, the world was completely flooded, and all land-dwelling nations survived in various ways, or perished. From 50 years ago til now, the flood was reversed -- scholars reckon this as the first year the world has seen a complete return to its pre-Inundation ocean levels. A member of the adventuring party that completed the end of the Inundation, Aeyssa the Nymph, parlayed her prestige and diplomatic skill into more or less uniting all nations into a metanation called Unity. The Academy in the Capital draws students from worldwide, the nation's various lords and luminaries sending their children to be educated at this boarding school.

It is the 24th of Ices of the 50th year of the Subsidence, Inter Desidentem -- tomorrow is the holiday of Driftmas. The students are dancing at the Driftmas Eve Ball in the Academy's Great Hall. Fir trees decorated with platinum and gold orbs, a pepperminty smell, peacocks wandering around, goldfinches perch in unseasonable summer yellow, the Trans-Kryian Orchestra (named after the southern continent of Kryia) plays festive-rock music from the stage.

Our (level 4) PCs: Federiga Moonblight, tiefling wizard; Throm, half-orc barbarian; Welby Dovesky, halfling rogue/artificer; his twin sister Velma Dovesky, halfling bard/rogue. Velma gets a conga line going.

Ebby Navsau, the son of a rich Shell merchant family, tries to fish girls out of the conga line to splain to them that Driftmas was originally a celebration holy to the ice god Morozz, before Usla, Archbishop of Banor, claimed it for Numiel as the birthday of the world ("now most of the Archbishops of Banor were human, because it was a human nation, but several of them were actually celestials, so it's not that weird that Usla was an elf"). Welby slips a periodically quacking stone in his pocket, and its quacks eventually driving Ebby from the hall.

Everyone is showing off their acrobatic dance moves, because in one week there is to be a coronation on the inaugural Day of Unity as Aeyssa takes her crown as Unity of the new metanation of Unity and usher in the Epocha Unitatis, and as part of the coronation there is to be a ritual ceremonial dance-off.

Gradually, the party becomes aware that something is off about the Trans-Kryian Orchestra. Something is unplaceably weird about their playing; they're playing, and have been for several minutes, something unrecognizable, not like any modern Driftmas music you're familiar with; they seem like they're playing in a trance; one of them is not in a trance, and is legit playing an old-fashioned Ilyan 7-string guitar; literally everyone in the hall who isn't playing an instrument is dancing (many of them in the conga line), or at least tapping their feet and swaying. Federiga deduces that three spells are going on: the lead performer has the rest of the Trans-Kyrian Orchestra entranced; the band has everybody in the hall ensorcelled with some sort of irresistible dance; the lead performer is doing something probably nefarious to everyone dancing.

Welby and Velma try to distract from the band with a fiddle-off, but the ritual completes with a flash of bluish-white! Everyone starts stumbling over their own feet and no longer dancing successfully -- the band leader's ritual stole everybody's dance mojo! The band leader throws off her white cloak, holds up her guitar, and cackles maniacally!

Velma uses vicious mockery on the band leader, who transforms into a Huge white dragon! Battle ensues, during which the dragon ice-bricks everybody's feet to the floor but is careful not to hurt anybody, and a handful of waiters dispensing hors d'ouvres reveal themselves to be cultists working for her. The party (mostly Throm) does great harm to her, but eventually she makes a hole in the roof and escapes, flying south.

The cultists have holy symbols of Morozz, and tattoos indicating grayseal or blackpenguin moiety. They do not speak Common, but local NPC half-dragon Aurum helpfully translates because two of them speak Draconic (Aurum is a bard who specializes in dance, and is heartbroken to have lost their mojo).

It is very important to the students for everybody's dance mojo to be returned, because of the ritual dance-off in a week. The dragon (Xarzith of the Aussir'orn bloodline, white Dragon who inherited the ability to Change Shape from one silver dragon grandparent) and her allies were careful not to kill anybody, because any mojo in the instrument belonging to a dead person loses its power. The cultists were members of old Ilya, the Morozz-worshipping civilization that dwelt on Kryia before the Inundation. Ilya survived the Inundation by freezing the whole civilization beneath miles of ice. Xarzith had unfrozen these cultists to help her with her plot to unfreeze the whole civilization, which depended on the stolen dance mojo. There is a ritual which must be completed before the end of Driftmas day which will consume the mojo and unfreeze Ilya.


How The Academy Got Its Mojo Back

An elven woman dressed in red and furs, driving a sleigh pulled by 8 perytons, locates the party on the roof. It transpires that she is Saint Usla, possessed of tremendous power for one night a year, luckily this night. With her blessing, the hors d'ouvres at the ball count retroactively as a heroes' feast, and she has gifts for the party from her sack: Boots of the Winterlands for everyone, a Staff of Fire for Federiga, a Flametongue Greatsword for Throm, a Nolzur's Marvelous Pigments for Welby, and a Necklace of Fireballs and a Claw of the Wyrm Rune for Velma. (If there had been an archer, 9 Arrows of Chromatic Dragon Slaying would have been given; if there had been a fighter or paladin, a White Dragon Scale Mail.) Then she conveys the party in her sleigh, with unnerving alacrity, to the south pole!

(If time had been generous, we may have seen a young remorhaz want to eat the party but be very willing to run away if it met resistance or pain, and/or a winter wolf and several worgs want to eat the party but the worgs flee if the winter wolf dies or flees.)

The ritual is taking place in an ancient crystal ice palace at the magnetic south pole. Xarzith is busy casting a 24-hour ritual at a massive ice altar with the 7-string guitar on it. To keep the ritual going, the altar and guitar must be cold breath'd every time her cold breath recharges. Three undead ice priest mummies are there.

Xarzith has access to white dragon lair actions here, but the party is now immune to her fear effect, and to that of the mummies, because of the heroes' feast. Because of reasons, she, like the mummies, is vulnerable to fire. So the party, using Usla's gifts, makes quick work of the dragon and the mummies, despite a massive CR imbalance. They smash the guitar, free the mojo, and are conveyed back to the Academy by Usla and her sleigh.

(This was the standard D&D way of solving the problem. The standard holiday movie way would have been to warm the heart of the dragon with kindness and holiday spirit, which would have allowed her to melt Ilya's entombment without using up the stolen mojo (and thereby being free to release it).)