# Guys He's my brother and he's so cool :( I would die for him: Not clickbait

[cryptidships]

Helping your brother figure with his hair after some bitch decides to blow up half his face. Will throw hands at anyone who hurts him since I see him as like... A year younger than me/my sona or smth.

[toasttz]

From the Tabletop #9

Welcome back. Let's talk about Exalted again! Last time, our new team had assembled and-- oh, right, I totally forgot we had a fifth Exalt. We have Zatch. Zatch is basically if you fused Albin and Rakis, I guess? But due to a change in work schedule, he's barely gotten to play with us. So, maybe we'll get to talk more about him later. He's Volkenstein's successor character, and it seems like his player has a good beat on him. Just real-life issues is all. Right, so, we were in need of some traveling funds, so we took on a job that was perfect for us - hunting a wild beast! No moral ambiguity or broken kneecaps required! So, we set out into the fields to find this dinosaur-like monster we needed to take down. En route, we discuss if there were any last-minute actions or supplies required. Doran: I could use a drink, frankly. Albin (OoC): I roll introduce fact. There are, in fact, large lizard creatures who naturally produce a form of booze in their stomach from the fermented fruit they eat. GM: Yeah. Okay. They're called Keggers. They are barrel-chested lizard creatures. You eat one, you're definitely getting drink. Doran: Glorious. Proceed the circle of three Solars and a Lunar all repeatedly failing their perception checks. GM: Guys, I think you're hunting an Indominus Rex, since its stealth rolls... well, let's just say you guys shouldn't be having this hard of a time of it. Suddenly, a big-ass dinosaur was upon us and we scattered around to combat it. Each of us defaulted to our usual combat tactics: Rakis mounted Wormsworth, Doran readied his sword, Albin prepped his Prayer Piece rifle, and Kharas... immediately mounted it. This created a little, brief, inter-party tension as Albin readied his flame-thrower rifle at the dinosaur. Kharas: Hey, wait a sec! You might hit me! Albin: I never miss. Kharas: I'M STILL UP HERE! GM: Roll attack. Albin: *Rolls freakishly well.* GM: Congrats, you don't hit Kharas. Kharas: You singed off my eyebrows! GM: You're in warform. You don't currently have those. Kharas: ... IF I DID, YOU'D HAVE BURNED MY EYEBROWS OFF! Ultimately, with a little coordination, the dino went down. We then proceeded to carve it up for its hide, meat, and a couple of us even took trophies. We even made "metric craptons" of dino-jerky, which we sold for a tidy profit, insofar as we couldn't bring it all back ALA Oregon Trail. But the dino hunt went well all-in-all. Afterwards, we realized we need to head towards Great Forks, but then had to find a way to cross a river. The ferry was our best bet, but money had gotten tight and we had to have a way to bring Wormsworth. Kharas attempted a rather clever gambit of disguising himself as a noble and forcing the issue, but the captain of the vessel was stern. Ultimately, we agreed to pay a price once we had arrived, which settled things, as Albin had done business previously with one Master of the Eternal Golden Paradise - a young philanthropist and patron of the arts and sciences. And Kharas, using Twin-Faced Hero, managed to "persuade" Master to paying their way, if you get my drift. Later, Kharas would use this as leverage against Albin, demanding a cool leather jacket. Albin and Doran worked together to make a badass leather coat for him, under the proviso it would have enough belts, pouches, and zippers to qualify him for a modern-day Squeenix character. Kharas happily agreed. Arrival at Great Forks more or less went off without a hitch (barring a gang of roving youths who attempted to sell Albin and Doran cutlery. I legit have no idea what to say on that and thus, will just move on). We even got to meet Teddy, one of the Giakell triplets (of which Albin is one member). Teddy is a huge, mountain of a man, quick to laugh, but became concerned when Albin mentioned that what they were doing was effectively hunting down serial killers. Teddy advised Albin to be careful in this pursuit, and Kharas, Rakis, and Doran played with the many, many nephews and nieces Albin had been blessed with due to his brother's undying love of his wife. Eventually, a lead with the guild took the circle down to the docks - whereupon I missed a good part of the conversation due to going to make popcorn and grab a soda. I return to hear Rakis explaining, at great length, how plan to BURN DOWN THE ENTIRE DOCK so we could investigate a ship belonging to a rich, now MIA, man who may well be tied to the mob of killers we've been after this whole time. Albin quickly shoots this plan down, insisting that there's no need to set fire to his hometown for something as straight-forward as this. Eventually, we also realize we could just have Kharas transform into a crane and inspect the ship anyway, as he did when he investigated the man's house as a cat. Let it be said - Rakis doesn't do things by halves. Eventually, clues began taking us north, so we bid farewell to Albin's hometown in order to cross the Yellow River. Albin then explains that there's an underground road they could use, leading to a trading town, partway across - called Yellow Shower - because I was really abusing "Introduce Fact" rolls this game and I am, in fact, 13 years old at heart. There, we even got to meet Albin's sister, Simone, who married a nobleman of the town, and we got to bum a free meal off them before we departed. We did fart around in Yellow Shower a while, but honestly, not much came of it. I also introduced facts about a local booze, Sewer Brue, a potent concoction sure to put you on the toilet for some time after drinking it, and that Yellow Shower was plagued by platypi, native to the region. Kharas took the chance to hunt one, in order to add it to his heart's blood. The platypus, not the drink. On the other side, however, all sorts of Hell broke loose, as Kharas, once more, became a bird and attempted to survey the above-ground scene, just in time to be fired upon by local hunters. He zipped back to the ground and transformed into a platypus in order to hide. Kharas: *SCARED PLATYPUS NOISES* We then asked the hunters for some advice as to where to go next, which ultimately sent us in the direction of a cave, which we spent... entirely too long standing outside of, debating if this was some "Cave of Wonders" shit and would slam down and kill us all if we ventured in. But ultimately, we headed in, and were immediately beset upon by a lesser fairy, who Albin and Rakis straight up merc'd without much hesitation. Afterward, we ventured further down, whereupon we found a cleft in the rock. And this happened: Doran: I guess I'll have a look and see what's down there. I have a merit where I naturally resist hot environments. GM: Yes, but if it's magma, you'll still suffer environmental damage. ... Hey, wait, didn't you write that Doran will die in boiling magma last time? Albin: Oh, crap. Doran: ... Okay, I'm going to have a look, but you're going to hold onto me and at the first sign of trouble, you're going to pull me back from it. Albin: Can do. Thankfully, Doran did NOT die in boiling magma and I was forced to sign a blood oath that I would not erroneously clickbait again. However, legit clickbaiting is A-OK! Moving on, eventually, we found a ways down, deeper into the cave. Rakis and Kharas both had ways of getting down, but the less-athletics-based Doran and Albin did not. And they also met a spirit flame serpent thing that apparently brews really good tea. Rakis then returned to try to help the others down, leaping up and easily getting Albin down safely. However, his return trip was a little less successful, as he ultimately dropped Doran on his face. On the upside, I finally got to roll those medicine dots I've had since I started this campaign. So there's that. Afterwards, we moved further in and found a colossal forge and its guardian - a four-armed giant creature who was quite talkative, but spoke in riddles. Doran and Albin questioned him for a while, and deduced he was no threat. He also helpfully proposed that Moonsilver could be used to bind the cursed aspects of Doran's artifact blade. We also disposed of the cursed Soulsteel garrot wire with help from the giant and his forge to completely destroy it. Doran: Well, I guess that's one cursed artifact down now. After tiring of bothering the giant (who was definitely talking about the Alchemicals and Autochthon, but I only knew that in the meta-sense and, thus, couldn't act on it in-character), we opted to try the last doorway available to us. Whereupon, all four of our circlemates throw lousy strength rolls, barely budging the door. Rakis then summoned Wormsworth, who easily threw the doors open on our behalf. Albin: I think it says something when a circle of Exalts failed to budge the door, but Wormsworth just did it no sweat. Kharas: Shut up. So, we went down into the mines whereupon we realized, Sol dammit, we HAD Moonsilver the entire time - the hammer Albin bought for Rakis back in session 2 was a Moonsilver weapon! So, we decide to do what you should never do in a party and split the party. Albin and Doran returned with the hammer to the giant's forge to ask for his assistance while Rakis and Kharas moved deeper into the mines in order to find what was down there. Albin and Doran use a crap-ton of craft charms and bond over their mutual tasks together over the last few sessions (moving each other up from Minor to Major intimacies as close friends), while Kharas and Rakis get ambushed by brigands deep in the mine and they proceed to kill the shit out of a lot of dudes. Kharas, at the end of the battle, began interrogating one of their number and the following happens. Kharas: Alright, you told me what I need to know. Get out of my sight. Random Baddie: *Gets up, flees* Rakis: By the way, Wormsworth just burrows out of the ground and eats the fleeing guy. Kharas: DUDE! I was actually going to let him live! Rakis: *SHRUG*. So, don't mess with Rakis, I suppose is the lesson here. Join me next time for D&D, because I currently have no more Exalted to talk about for a while! We're all caught up. Next time, in D&D: we meet dwarves! We meet demon cultists! We kill kobolds! See you there!