The Gormogons gathered for another session of the Daggerheart campaign, below is a summary of how it unfolded…<\/p>\n
The festival at Elaro\u2019s Grasp was loud, crowded, and begging to be mocked. From their balcony table, the Gormogons obliged. \u2019Puter pointed at fishmongers and declared he could shout \u201cObjection!\u201d<\/em> loud enough to make them confess to crimes they hadn\u2019t committed. Volgi, pen already scratching notes, sniffed about augurs collapsing under their own bad grammar. Czar looked down at mask-painting children and, in all seriousness, called it \u201ccamouflage training.\u201d<\/em> Dr. J. puffed spores into his mug and insisted life was meaningless without fungus in the bloodstream. Mandarin tapped his boot ominously, promising that lanterns would die. GorT tied knots under the table like a child scribbling math problems for fun. Six voices, six egos, and one harbor about to implode.<\/p>\n The eclipse arrived right on cue. Lanterns sputtered, augurs blinked out of existence, and shadows peeled themselves loose from revelers like reflections deciding to walk off the glass. The crowd panicked. The Gormogons did the only reasonable thing: scatter.<\/p>\n Czar descended into the mob, staff raised like a baton, barking orders with all the finesse of a half-soused warlord. \u201cLEFT FLANK TO THE DOCKS! PANIC IS TREASON!\u201d<\/em> Civilians did obey, clustering together in shaky formations \u2014 but they trampled as many neighbors as they saved. He hurled bursts of codex fire into the shadows, blasting them back in spectacular, terrifying sprays of violet. Unfortunately, his show of force only made the crowd scream louder. His result: impressive pyrotechnics, civilian casualties, and a rising Stress headache.<\/p>\n Right beside him, \u2019Puter turned a barrel into his stage. He bellowed insults so cruel they cracked griefglass masks. \u201cYour mother was a lantern and your father smelled of violet tidewater!\u201d<\/em> The Shadows actually staggered, covering their faces as if wounded by the sheer force of satire. For one shining moment, the bard was at his most dangerous \u2014 an open-mic tyrant whose weapon was mockery. Civilians stopped panicking just long enough to gape. He earned Hope, shed Stress, and basked in the spotlight he insists was his all along.<\/p>\n While the others wrestled chaos in the streets, Volgi slunk down into the catacombs, following the augurs\u2019 vanished trail. Violet water lapped at his ankles, reflections muttered his name, and one Echo-Shade crawled together from shards of griefglass. It hissed back his own words at him: \u201cStill right\u2026 still wrong\u2026 still forgotten\u2026\u201d<\/em> Volgi sneered, calling it a \u201ccitation in the margins of reality,\u201d and unleashed primal resonance. His first strike fizzled, his mind clawed by contradictions, but he rallied and reduced the specter to dust. Exhausted, dripping, but smug, he declared, \u201cConsensus at last: I win.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Mandarin took the fight straight to the tidefront docks. Shadows lunged at him, and he met one with a savage gut-boot that cracked its ribs into shards. \u201cAnother tithe collected,\u201d<\/em> he growled. But the tide was no ordinary water \u2014 it surged upward, dragging sailors screaming into its violet depths. When Mandarin tried to kick through it, the sea clung to him, whispering his patron\u2019s laughter. Snarling, he poured Wrath into the waves, blasting them back in a shuddering recoil. For a moment, the ocean itself flinched. His boot had made its mark, but at the cost of Stress and the gnawing awareness that his patron was enjoying the humiliation.<\/p>\n Dr. J. stormed into side-streets where civilians were cornered by shadows. He spread his arms, spores billowing. \u201cFear not, patients! Lightning or fungus? Choose your cure!\u201d<\/em> Their choice was to choke and scatter. His bedside manner terrified more than it comforted, but when he raised his hands in frustration, lightning arced out, blasting a shadow into fragments. Civilians stood frozen in awe and horror, unsure if they had been saved or experimented upon. Dr. J. cackled regardless, shouting, \u201cYES! Lightning cures cowardice AND shadows!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Swinging in like a pendulum, GorT landed with mechanical precision. Rope in hand, he lashed shadows into walls, dragged civilians out of the tide, and muttered observations like a field analyst. \u201cTarget restrained. Efficiency rating: optimal.\u201d<\/em> His rope mastery became indispensable \u2014 until his own shadow double emerged, knots tied in perfect mirror image. Both GorTs grappled, rope around rope, an endless stalemate of strangling efficiency. \u201cDuplicate rope protocol detected,\u201d<\/em> GorT snarled. \u201cError. ERROR.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n As the GM\u2019s Fear pool spilled over, the harbor gave birth to something far worse than a tide of strangers: shadow-doubles of the Gormogons themselves. They peeled free from broken masks, griefglass shards welding into parodies with uncanny precision. Each wore a warped mask that cracked and shimmered like glass catching violet flame, and each spoke in the voice of the original \u2014 crueler, louder, and all too accurate.<\/p>\n Czar met his double first: a towering silhouette in Highborne regalia, bellowing decrees that even he would have called excessive. \u201cPANIC IS TREASON! TREASON IS DEATH! ALL OBEY CZAR!\u201d<\/em> it howled. The real Czar bristled, staff blazing. \u201cTREASON!\u201d<\/em> he roared back, hurling codex fire into its chest. The blast split the mask in half, but in doing so sent terrified civilians scuttling under the pier shrieking louder than ever. His power worked, but his double\u2019s voice still echoed: \u201cCampaign already lost\u2026\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u2019Puter\u2019s parody staggered into view next, louder, crueler, and twice as smug. Where \u2019Puter\u2019s wit cut like a knife, Shadow-\u2019Puter wielded a sledgehammer of insult. \u201cYou\u2019re not half the bard you think you are \u2014 and that\u2019s still too much!\u201d<\/em> The real bard rolled his eyes, puffed up his chest, and let fly with a limerick so venomous it cracked his double\u2019s griefglass jaw: \u201cRhyming couplets beat griefglass every time, you pompous fraud!\u201d<\/em> The crowd of shadows even winced, as if embarrassed on behalf of the double. \u2019Puter preened, bowing to his own wit.<\/p>\n Volgi\u2019s encounter was quieter, but crueler. His shadow hissed contradictions with every breath: \u201cStill right\u2026 still wrong\u2026 still forgotten\u2026\u201d<\/em> It clawed not at his body but at his mind, replaying his own pompous lectures back at him in mocking chorus. Volgi staggered, clutching his skull, muttering, \u201cAh yes, delightful \u2014 gaslighting myself, what every scholar dreams of.\u201d<\/em> But when his primal resonance finally flared, the entire brood of reflections shattered into violet dust. He wiped his quill, sneering: \u201cConsensus at last: I win.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Mandarin faced a nightmare of his own making: a perfect copy, boot raised in unison with his own. The tide lapped higher as both Mandarins kicked simultaneously, wrath colliding in a crack of griefglass shards. His patron\u2019s laughter hissed in the back of his mind, enjoying the duel far too much. The real Mandarin snarled, voice low and venomous: \u201cOnly one Mandarin boots. The other must die.\u201d<\/em> His double sneered back, \u201cPatron whispers louder through me.\u201d<\/em> It was no longer combat \u2014 it was blasphemy. Every kick was a prayer of defiance against his own shadow.<\/p>\n Dr. J.\u2019s double erupted in a cloud of spores, giggling with the same manic delight. \u201cPoultices! Lightning! Bedside manner!\u201d<\/em> it cackled, hurling violet spores in wide arcs. The real Dr. J. answered with his own fungal storm, eyes wild. \u201cSpores against spores! SCIENCE WINS!\u201d<\/em> His lightning seared through the mists, the spores igniting in bursts of phosphorescent flame until his double burst apart like a mushroom stomped underfoot. He crowed, arms wide: \u201cYes! Therapy delivered! Who\u2019s next?!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n And then there was GorT. Of course his shadow-double arrived with ropes in hand, perfectly coiled, knots identical down to the last hitch. The two Clanks circled like wrestlers, ropes snapping out in perfect synchronicity. Every knot tied by GorT was tied back at him; every loop thrown was countered. Within moments, both were entangled, wires and ropes pulling them toward the violet tide. GorT\u2019s mechanical voice cracked with irritation: \u201cDuplicate rope protocol detected. Error. ERROR.\u201d<\/em> The shadow tugged harder. The real GorT dug in his heels. Neither would yield.<\/p>\n The pier beneath them groaned and cracked, griefglass fissures glowing faintly as if the very city were splintering. Lantern shards gave off dying light, shadows swarmed at the edges, and the violet tide surged higher with every breath. Civilians had fled, masks scattered like dead leaves. The augurs remained conspicuously absent, their chants replaced with the echo of glass on glass.<\/p>\n And so the six Gormogons stood back-to-back, the flood rising around their knees, their doubles circling like vultures. Ego fought ego, Wrath fought Wrath, spores collided in phosphorescent storms, and rope tangled into maddening knots. Above them, Tassaryn and Cyressel locked deeper into eclipse, draping the world in doubled night. The harbor was no longer a festival \u2014 it was a mirror, and the only thing worse than the darkness pressing in was the reflection staring back.<\/p>\n The pier shudders beneath their boots, every plank trembling as griefglass fissures split the wood like veins of fire. Around them, their shadows circle \u2014 cracked masks glinting, voices needling, every strike and sneer their own, thrown back at them with cruel precision. The violet tide slaps higher, swirling with shapes that writhe just below the surface, waiting to drag them down.<\/p>\n All around, Elaro\u2019s Grasp is broken. Lantern shards glow faintly, scattered like dying stars across the harbor. The music is gone. The laughter is gone. Only the echoes remain: augur chants cut mid-syllable, civilian screams already swallowed, and the hollow mockery of their own doubles.<\/p>\n The Gormogons stand back-to-back, six Gormogons in the rising dark, surrounded not just by shadows but by themselves. The Sister\u2019s Embrace holds firm above \u2014 Tassaryn and Cyressel locked in eclipse, drowning the world in doubled night. The festival is over. The augurs are gone. The tide keeps climbing.<\/p>\n The camera pulls back. From the pier, to the lagoon, to the whole city of Elaro\u2019s Grasp \u2014 its canals black with violet flood, its terraces glowing faintly as the tide hisses against the coral stone. Further still, until the entire coast lies under the eclipse\u2019s pall, twin moons veiling the world in shadow. The last light sputters out, swallowed by the tide.<\/p>\n And somewhere beneath the water\u2026 the augurs whisper.<\/p>\n