%% date:: [[2025-02-16]] %% # [[038_20250216 Agent of the Gatekeeper]] ![[038_20250216.svg]] ## Session Summary > [!tldr] [[038_20250216 Agent of the Gatekeeper]] > ^summary %% ## Video [Video](https://youtu.be/2meR7C2u4hQ) %% --- ## Recap ![[ttrpgs/The Great Dark/037_20250209#^summary]] --- ## Log Jared decided we'd climb on top of the hedge to circumvent the maze. Adam stabbed the red-eyed creature with a spear. It was coming towards us like a zombie. We went to the alchemist's greenhouse but we didn't touch anything. We got to the centre of the labyrinth (Tarrin solved it). The entranceway seemed to be covered with plants that were much more unruly (unlike the hedge, which was better kept). We heard [[Avery Choi]], with whom we had a shouted conversation. The plant growth closed in on her until she started talking. She had been telling the garden about some ancient city where she was besieged by ghostly creatures with red eyes. She just told the garden about the fire drakes of the Lonely Isle. Tarrin suggests that Avery amend that so that the drakes only attack the red-eyed creatures. That works! We try to talk to the plants. I convince it that we mean well and I try to ascertain what the plants want. - They're kind of like cats that want attention but only in a particular way. They like for people to look but not touch. - It wants information about the outside world. It's starving for that. It can't leave. Or... it *couldn't* leave. - It's looking for more information. Adam talks it into opening an arched door... towards the centre! - There is a bench and a figure sitting on it, facing away from us. Adam walks in... and I follow. 😅 We walk around the bench. The figure is a young woman. Her hand is in her lap. her hands are empty. Her face is down. - Adam does *Occult Researcher:* We are not looking at a person. We are looking at a plant. But just as Adam realises that, Avery looks up at us and says "Thank god you're here." BREAK, WTF OMG What if we tell it/Avery that we/Candela Obscura discovered that the pillars are actually holding it *back*? That the pillars - the only human-made thing in this place - are to hold it in check? The alchemical writings on the walls describe the ritual created to imprison and prune this magickal garden. BACK TO THE GAME Her eyes are expressive, but Adam still knows that it's a plant creature. She has trouble with complex movement but we don't touch her to help her up. Adam tries to be subtle, asking her if she feels different, but she doesn't get it. Then he just flat out says that she's a plant... she is shocked. There is a moment when her veneer slips a bit more and we really see the plant-like core undulating beneath the surface. It's almost struggling to settle on an identity. Then we see the place around us also go through the same transformation. There are two things I notice from inside the room. - To the edge of the circle in the centre is ground that seems to have been disturbed in a way that a grave site might be disturbed. Something has been buried there. - In the middle of the circular bench, in the very centre of [[Garden of the Gods]] and [[Lilyspire Labyrinth]], is a glint of metal. I try to talk to Avery to take her attention away from Adam while I point out the metal bit to Adam. I tell her that sometimes the truth we seek isn't what we wanted to find. I ask her to let us go. Adam sees it's a compact mirror. It's a bit embedded into the ground. It's circular. There's a dimple in the middle of it. It's concave. It's like a very shallow dish. He'd have to dig it out a bit. Adam does so, taking 1 Bleed (it would be 2 but he's wearing his Bleed Armour). And suddenly the seething gets worse. Adam sees an arcane rune in the dish thing but he stumbles a little as he's trying to decipher the rune and he steps down on a thorn. He takes 2 Body. But he realises that the symbol is like an astrological symbol. These symbols represent the pantheon of gods that were pruned to: The Mother, The Father, The Child. ![[cosm-solar-system.png]] This rune was The Gatekeeper. This was the Gate between life and death, like Pluto or Hades. Adam brings the spear down on the dish. But he makes no impression on it. He just drives it back down to the ground to where it was. It almost hits back - there's a concussive effect. He gets knocked out. 😬 What I see is that all the roiling and seething suddenly stops. It's no longer trying to be Avery Choi anymore. It offers me a flower. I ask if it will let the others go if I do take it. It says yes. I take the flower. And it says "Go." The plants close in, enclosing the bench, the little lens, the body of Avery Choi. We turn and run. We don't get out the same way, but we really did %% # Excalidraw Data ## Text Elements ## Drawing ```json {"type":"excalidraw","version":2,"source":"https://github.com/zsviczian/obsidian-excalidraw-plugin/releases/tag/2.0.25","elements":[],"appState":{"theme":"dark","gridSize":null,"viewBackgroundColor":"#ffffff"}} ``` %%