Quick facts
Campaign: The Wonders of Arlia (Campaign 1) · Where: the skies over Rice Town, Grimscale Tower · Previous: C1 Chapter 11 · Next: C1 Chapter 13
On the way to the sixth orb, Greene turned into a monster, the Rootbeer Float was knocked out of the sky, and the Cacklers crashed onto the ice of Rice Town. Under Grimscale Tower they found Dr. Gero’s lab and the truth about Greene. They also lost Terra Misu.
The Were-Cackler
Without Sophie, the Cacklers sailed the skies toward Rice Town. Under the full moon, Greene transformed into the Were-Cackler, a “were tiger wolf” born from the werewolf bite and the Collector’s curse mixing together. He killed Oolong and badly mauled Juliette, biting both of them, before the party knocked him out and tied him up.
Oolong was brought back and threw every cure he had at the curse. “Why are you being so difficult? It literally says remove curse.” To cure it they would have to kill every were-creature up the line to the original, and nobody knew who had bitten Captain Rootbeard.
The fall of the Rootbeer Float
They heard leathery flapping. An invisible black and green dragon, the one that had menaced North City, had latched onto the ship. A blast from it knocked out Terra and Oolong. Below deck, Greene found a Rose Ribbon Army soldier standing over the Brumestone core, which was shrinking. The soldier demanded the Star Orbs.
Oolong died again and Greene brought him back, only to find three more invisible soldiers. The core began to levitate and the ship went into freefall. A whisper in Juliette’s head said, “Surrender your star orbs.” She picked a soldier’s portable hole, which spilled Star Orbs and gold. Terra grabbed the core and steadied the ship for a moment before a psychic blow stunned her, and an Inquisitor named Harlequin pulled the core loose and teleported away. Oolong’s polymorph went wrong and turned a soldier into a rat that blew off the deck. When the spell shrinking the core wore off, it returned to full weight, and the Rootbeer Float plunged onto the ice and began to rip itself apart. Terra, Juliette, and Barqs floated down from the wreck.
Grimscale Tower
Rice Town was “stupid cold.” Greene had saved the core by using his Power Pole as a grappling line, and he set it on a pedestal inside the main structure, where it lit everything around it. Barqs mourned his crew, Harry, Marge, Rumti, and Satchel, who lay beaten and unresponsive. “This is all my fault.”
Following the Dragon Radar, they fought through a machine construct (Greene shoved his Power Pole down its throat), a guard who recognized Juliette (“You’re one of them cacklers, aren’t you?”), and a whirring saw-blade machine.
A hatch led far down below the ice, past two glass golems, into Dr. Gero’s office. In a false compartment they found his notes and diary. A stasis pod held a body labeled “17.” The notes said several color-coded operatives, among them Cyan, Scarlet, and Indigo, had been “unsuccessful donors for project Cyborg” and “refitted for other constructions.”
“So, Dr. Gero is your dad?” Terra asked Greene. The truth was worse. Greene was a genetically engineered test subject, grown from synthetic DNA. His memories of absent parents, kitchen work, and military training were fabricated. In the factory beyond, a dome-like automaton marked 13 cried “Intruders, intruders.” Elyon cut it down, and Greene felt an ominous sense of déjà vu.
Chandra the Chaotic
The moonstone dragon Chandra the Chaotic and its rider, the archmage High Sorcerer Cobalt, demanded the orbs for the Rose Ribbon Army and Commander Red. When Greene pointed out that the army’s “peace” meant cities being destroyed, the dragon’s dream breath knocked out everyone but Terra. Cobalt banished her and looted the sleeping Cacklers, taking Juliette’s portable hole, Elyon’s ring of elemental command and wand of wonder, Oolong’s wand of polymorph, and the Dragon Radar, but not the orbs.
In the fight that followed, Greene put his Power Pole through the mage’s temple, and Juliette was banished into the dream plane. Terra heard whispers from a rose-colored crystal in the dragon-control machine: “Reach out. Touch it. Touch it.” A bolt of purple energy hit her, and she was gone. Greene finally stabbed the dragon through the eye.
Juliette’s body had no pulse. Greene called on Kami and brought her back. In the dream plane she had seen her husband, Will, and their three-year-old daughter. “It’s okay. We’ll be here for you. We’ll be here when you get back.” She chose to return. “Where did Terra go?” “Terra touched some jewel and blew away.”
The siblings 17 and 18 then floated down. After trading insults (“You want a fuckin cookie?”), they told the party Dr. Gero had fled to Muscle Tower, took his journal, and warned them: “if we do cross paths again, and you smart off to me like that one more time, I’ll make sure you know your place.” Oolong ripped out the machine’s wires, and Greene took the crystal that had started this whole mess months ago. Barqs, who had partly repaired the ship, picked them up.
On the road again
Juliette told Greene that leaving Will and their daughter, Ruby, felt like “sacrificing them all over again.” When Juliette messaged Terra, a voice answered: “She cannot hear you. I have finally gained control. I am home. here to take my rightful place above all.”
An armored infernal tiger then walked onto the deck asking, “Are you the captain of this vessel?” When it wouldn’t answer questions, the Cacklers killed it. “We typically don’t ask questions. We just kill.” In the hold they found a portal to a realm of lava; Juliette scouted it on a rope, saw a fire giant, and came back, and they pulled the device’s crystal (“We got to get this shit to Bulma”). On the way to the Toasty Desert another dragon tried to rob them. “We have some rice. Do you want some rice?” Greene turned it to ash.
Previous: Chapter 11: The Sealing of King Piccolo · Next: Chapter 13: Cherudo Beach and the Sea Hag