Last night we (finally) played Epyllion. Here's last time!
The clutch wakes up in the morning, a little damp, and Toverinn asks Sprinkles, dris new shadow owlllama friend, if she knows where the strange singing was coming from. Sprinkles does, and leads the clutch through the swamp to and area where the trees are few and far between and the water comes up to their shoulders.
OB sticks dris head into the water to search for anything useful, and finds something solid, even petrified. Dre fees around and discovers that it has legs - in fact, it seems to be an immense stone dragon, with the same sinewy and snakey body that Zeblek has, but much, much bigger. All of the drakes know that when an elder dragon decides to retire from the living world, dre either becomes an Ancient (a spiritual presence in service to one of the five moons) or a Mystic (turning to stone and becoming a spiritual or holy place in itself). This, apparently, is a Mystic. But is it singing, somehow?
Stars calls on the liberty moon and turns the water transparent, allowing the drakes to see the Mystic clearly. It's clutching a huge opal (all Mystics turn to stone clutching a gem or stone of some kind). Figuring that this dragon must be connected to the storm moon somehow, OB tries to channel the magic of the storm moon to just get its attention. Dre immediately feels the spiritual equivalent of an elder dragon giving them a dismissive boop on the head. Zeblek tries the same thing, but fashions a pan-pipe out of reeds and plays a melody while trying to call up the storm moon (in effect, standing up to this unseen dragon).
The effect is immediate and more pronounced. Zeblek immediately feels the sensation that all troublemakers know, when the authority figures stop indulging you and shit, as they say, gets real. The pipe bursts and the reeds fly off and stick into trees. Zeblek, overcome with shame, summons a bunch of illusory duplicates and they all run off in different directions.
Obviously calling on the storm moon isn't working very well. Stars tries to get under the opal, lifting it up, maybe that will have an effect? It does. Something hurls Stars up into the air. Stars, recall, does not have wings.
Zeblek sees this and calls on the void moon, creating portals to get up to Stars quickly. Dre loses control of the magic, however, and opens a portal behind them, pushing dremself and Stars through...and they wind up someplace desolate and gray, dusty, and cold. They look around and see four moons in the sky (not unusual), but then a fifth moon that is colorful - blue and green and white. Zeblek opines that they might be in the In-Between, the liminal space that portals take you through. Dre has never gotten stuck here before, however.
Back in the swamp, Toverinn and OB try to convince the otherworldly dragon presence to talk with them. OB pulls a small chunk of opal out of dris bag and they make a little cairn. Toverinn asks for guidance, and sees a vision - five elder dragons, bigger than life, flying together as a clutch. This is unusual; elders are usually solitary. But they fly together and land in the ocean, and talk with each other.
A couple of them agree that "it's time," and they all five agree on an unspoken course of action. But as they fly off, one lags behind - long, sinewy, snake-like, clearly the dragon who now lies petrified in the swamp. The drakes figure that four of the five clutch members became Ancients, but the last became a Mystic, and that's causing some friction. But what to do about it?
Meanwhile, Zeblek and Stars focus on the void moon and realize that that's all they can feel, and they realize with sinking dread that somehow they're on the void moon. Zeblek opens another portal, but it's black; dre can't see where it leads. They both hold their breath and jump in, and wind up in a dark, dense forest, teeming with life, everything kind of animal they've ever heard of and lots they haven't (Stars immediately starts sketching). They cast about magically, and realize that instead of getting back to Dragonia, they are now on the spirit moon.
OB and Toverinn decide to try and revive the Mystic. Is that possible? They've never heard it done, but maybe! OB carefully chisels the opal away from the Mystic's petrified hand, but then drops it toward the water. Toverinn, fortunately, is quick to catch it. But then the storm starts.
Lightning, thunder, gale force winds! Patches of water boil, while others freeze! The drakes look around in horror as the weather gets worse, and the petrified dragon starts to move with a hideous crackling sound.
Up on the spirit moon, Zeblek and Stars see one of the other moons start to move towards Dragonia. They can see tornadoes and storms. "Is...this the apocalypse?" muses Zeblek. Dre looks to Stars: "Can you heal it?"
"Heal a moon?" Stars gulps. Dre has never tried anything like that, but calls on the spirit moon and reaches out with all dris might.
Back on Dragonia, OB and Toverinn watch as a dragon made of blowing wind, pine needles, and water descends, carrying Zeblek and Stars. Dre takes the petrified dragon's head in dris hand, and whispers, "It's all right, Pearl. It's not your fault. We should have listened. We should have respected your decision."
The petrified dragon (Pearl) takes the opal, clutches it tight, and wraps dremself up in the water, returning to stone. The nature-dragon leans down to Toverinn, and hums a melody, and then vanishes. A dragon made of earth and stone rolls up out of the swamp, leans down to OB and hums a tune to them, and then crumbles. All of the water goes completely clear, and a dragon made of light and purity appears and hums a tune to Stars. And finally, the sky goes black, and that blackness becomes a dragon, which hums a tune to Zeblek.
"Take the song with you," dre rumbles. "Take it away from here, spread it, let us move on." And then day returns, and the clutch sits there in the swamp, stunned.
After recovering their breath, the clutch talk about their next move. Stars says that dre would like to find another book, so perhaps they could head for someplace with more dragons?
To the Capital, then!
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