Dianthus: Spice of Flowers

Run 1: SOS #

Spirelings Jeremiah, Ravaxas, The Inspector, Thimble, and Wren embarked on the airship Enree to investigate a mysterious SOS signal received from a dense area of Green. As they approached, they sighted a strangely clear area and landed at a dock with odd, outdated-looking airships. Continuing on, they discovered the town of Dianthus, the Spire of Flowers.

After speaking with local cabbage merchant Melody, they learn that the people of Dianthus appear to be stuck in time, a time over 400 years gone. They visit the sanctum of the local sect, the secretive Chronophidian Weavers, and are told that their leader, Ouroboros Anthera, is not available to speak with them but that an upper member, Serpent Alaion, will be speaking at a public meeting in the afternoon. At that meeting, they also meet the Lord Arryn Dianthus, his daughter Lady Ava Dianthus. Lord Arryn attempts to calm the townspeople, who have been under a lockdown and unable to leave the Spire, with Serpent Alaion explaining that the Green is surging and it is too dangerous to venture out. After a... memorable bagpipe performance from the Inspector to disguise some quick spellwork from Jeremiah and Ravaxas (as Thimble and Wren do their best to temper a horrendous first social contact), our heroes discover that Alaion may not be all that he seems. As the townsfolk disperse, the Spirelings secure a meeting with him in a private part of the sanctum.

Behind closed doors, "Serpent" Alaion corrects the Spirelings to accurately address him as Ouroboros Alaion and confirms their discovery that the Spire is stuck in time. When pressed for more details, he explains that it would be easier to show them, and invites them to meet him at midnight by the fountain in the center of town square. In the intervening hours, the Spirelings use an invitation to community music night to speak to the townsfolk and Lady Ava, who expresses her own frustrations with the lockdown and a lack of transparency from the Chronophidians.

After nightfall, the Spirelings converge on the fountain and the promised meeting with Alaion. As the moon reaches its peak above them, a small vine creeping up the side of the fountain suddenly explodes outward in a tsunami of Green, knocking the Spirelings flat and consuming them entirely... before suddenly retreating, as time resets 24 hours. Alaion reveals that for the past 404 years, Dianthus has been bound by a time loop, repeating its last day before being overtaken by the Green, with only the Chronophidian Weavers retaining their memory of loops past. However, the loop cannot go on forever, requiring the life force of the Ouroboros to sustain itself - Alaion is in fact the 4th person to replace the long-gone Ouroboros Anthera - and Alaion explains that another faction appear to have figured out a way to retain their memories and seem determined to break the loop and let in the Green. He suspects that one of that faction sent the distress signal, and asks the players to search them out.

Not fully trusting Alaion's words, the Spirelings use a signal whistle of their own, asking the unknown sender of the SOS for a meeting place and receiving only two cryptic words in reply: "blinded eyes."

(Off screen, the airship crew member Mercu Gong, accompanying our heroes into town, meets his ancestor, Han Gong, who passes him a tattered scroll and a tantalizing hint into his family's history...)

Run 2: Remember Me #

Players once again sense the time loop magic boundary as they cross into Dianthus, and pick some flowers around the docks. They encounter multiple townsfolk who are experiencing meltdowns over conflicting sets of memories. A baker, Yarros Thumari, has memories of her uncle never showing up to see her new pastry named after him, a stranger coming into trash the shop, and a customer telling her that her uncle had died. But these memories are set later in the day and haven’t happened yet. The party agrees to look for Yarros’ uncle, who worked at the Chronophidian Sanctum.

On the way, they detect a Green plant near the town square fountain and try to speak with it. The plant is unhelpful. Once they reach Sanctum, they intimidate and pressure the lower ranking members into questioning the ethics of wiping townspeople’s memories and forcing them to participate in a time loop. After having some tense conversation with the leader of the sect, Ouroborus Alaion, they learn that Yarros’ uncle, Erven, was a previous Ouroborus who had sacrified his life force to maintain the loop. They also learn that the loop is breaking and causing memory slips and meltdowns of the townsfolk due to the meddling of a resistance group that wants to destroy the time loop and let the Green into the spire. However, they dislike Alaion’s vibes and sympathize heavily with the resistance group.

Feeling a duty to tell Yarros her uncle is dead, they absolutely devastated her. In return, they verbally bully and intimidate the new Asclepius, Orion LoRusso, as they realize he was the stranger who trashed her bakery during a previous loop. Orion reveals he acted out of anger after the sacrifice of the first Ouroboros, Ouroboros Anthera.

Alaion tasks them with finding and dealing with the resistance group, and they start to find letters the resistance group has hidden around, like “Remember me,” and “Flowers are supposed to wilt,” and write response letters in hopes of being contacted by the resistance group. They find a rendezvous note and stalk out a warehouse in the shipyard, eventually running into the resistance—a group of teenagers who are aware of the loop and have been stuck as teenagers for 400 years.

But the sect has been tailing them! A party of 4 raids the warehouse, and the players kill 3 sect members, one of which they let die in the surrounding Green. The 4th sect member, Ebbie, is a lower member of the sect and physically stuck as a teenager. After unleashing wolves on him, they feel bad and heal him, trying to convince him to leave the sect, and when he refuses, they knock him out. They manage to hide the rebels’ identities by neutralizing the sect raid members and find some clues as to the missing resistance leader and previous Asclepius, Sujing Bai’s whereabouts—a ruin outside the time loop in the surrounding Green called “Gaia’s Eye.” They also find a love letter. The rebels return home.

Then the players burn the warehouse down with lightning to hide any evidence of the resistance from the sect, and decide to leave without meeting Alaion again, as they have just killed 3 sect members. They leave Ebbie tied up near the town square fountain, unconscious.

Run 3: Beat the Grass, Frighten the Snake #

Spirelings Whipple, Silq, Zara, Lady Killigrew, Shaper Bellows, Talzan, and Grumdrig flew to Dianthus' aid, carrying a map to somewhere called "The Eyes of Gaia" deep in the Green, as well as a love note addressed from "SB" to "AD." Upon their arrival, the townsfolk suddenly appear wary to outsiders, shutting their doors and pulling cloth coverings over their mouths and noses as the Spirelings approach.

Seeking "AD," our heroes enter the Lord's manor, but the Lord Arryn Dianthus shows no signs of recognition of either "SB" or the handwriting, and instead pulls a cloth over his own face and says that the Chronophidians have placed the town under a quarantine against a "Green toxin carried by outsiders." He asks the Spirelings to depart, but secretly they instead secure a meeting with the Lady Ava Dianthus. Upon seeing the note, Ava reveals herself to be a member of the Resistance faction and explains that the "toxin" is a ruse by the Chronophidian Weavers to maintain control over the town and inhibit the Spirelings in their efforts. She urges the party to go to The Eyes of Gaia to find her paramour, the Chronophidian defector and Resistance founder Sujing Bai.

The party venture into the Green, handily defeating a bee-shaped swarm of bees on the way, and find that "The Eyes of Gaia" is a temple ruin dating back to before the time of the Spires. Our valiant Spirelings solved the temple's puzzles (thanks to the quick wits of Whipple, Talzan, and Shaper), defeated and befriended(?) its orchid monster guardian (with the help of Thealians Zara and Lady... earning them distrust from the perceptive Silq), and proved themselves worthy in the Trials of Gaia's Champion (with the courageous Grumdrig risking his life on a trial of potions and poisons). They were rewarded with a mysterious scroll bearing an emblem of Gaia, though they could not decipher it. Unfortunately, they were too late to save Sujing - she had already reached and failed the final trial, becoming infected by the Green and fleeing the temple before they arrived. She left behind only a carnation hairpin and a note: "I'm sorry, my love. We're out of time."

Run 4: Untangled, Unraveled #

Players return to a Dianthus with a very weak time loop presence. They try to find Ava but are immediately caught trespassing on the Dianthus Manor, and townsfolk have been told that the outsiders (party) are transmitting an illness and act cold toward them.

They cast invisibility and sneak around the back to talk to Ava, delivering news about Sujing that they found in the Gaia temple ruins. Ava realizes Sujing is likely at their secret cottage in the woods, and gives directions to that. Players pick up some OLD GREEN from a vine by the fountain. Players get tailed by a sect member on the way out, but manage to lose him.

Players find Sujing, ask her to translate the Gaia tome, and give her morphine to deal with the Green Corruption pain. They relay news to Ava about Sujing being found, and set up a rendezvous at high moon for the two lovers to reunite. As there is still some time before high moon, they explore the docks again, and encounter the Green-corrupted sect member Run 2 players left to die in the Green by a burned building, and find the decaying bodies of the sect members the previous run killed.

Once they make it back to town, they go to the meeting point, but are met with a taunting illusion message Alaion set up, mandating they bring Sujing to him in exchange for not harming Ava. They follow his directions and travel through the sewers, bringing them to a Green-infested area underneath the town square fountain where the heart of the time loop is: a giant pink carnation with golden snake spirits circling it counterclockwise.

Players convince Sujing to eat the OLD GREEN to combat her infection from the NEW GREEN during the confrontation after discussing the Gaia tome contents of a strain of Green separated by time gap having combative and competitive effects against each other. They try to diplomatically resolve tensions with Alaion, who is keeping the entire Dianthus family hostage. The teen rebels also show up to the standoff. Three solutions are presented before the sect actually agrees to work together with the rebels to hold off the Green, when Sujing suddenly transforms into a Green Monster, who they manage to take down, but not before she destroys the heart of the time loop as players race to get everyone out.

The heart of the time loop uses the last of its magic to repair the broken debris above it (including the fountain) before fizzling out. Unbeknownst to the players, this also revives Green Corrupted Sujing, who regains her strength by being in contact with the Green.

Players try to calm the townsfolk and evacuate as many willing people as they can off the spire in their traveling airship to Spireling Hall. But more who want to leave are left on the Dianthus.

Run 5: Calamity #

Spirelings Yurgol, Corvo, Nisa, Shaemus, Tierney, and Wren set forth one final time to Dianthus, as the stage is set for a confrontation between the Green forces of a corrupted Sujing and a reluctant alliance between what remains of the Chronophidian Weavers and the Resistance. Our heroes arrive to a battle in progress, as Ouroboros Alaion, Asclepius Orion, a precious few other Chronophidian Weavers, and Resistance members Han, Nosa, and Ebbie desperately attempt to hold on. Meanwhile, Ava is caught between the need to save her people and her last hopes of saving her love.

Through the mighty efforts of the Spirelings, especially the nimble Yurgol, the clever Corvo, and the sly Shaemus, many Green monsters were defeated and Sujing was brought low, kept up only by the healing effects of encroaching Green. With a powerful Banishment from Wren, Sujing is kept from the field for long enough that a Fire Elemental - conjured by Nisa with the help of Tierney - is able to clear the town of Green and leave Sujing vulnerable. The corrupted Sujing returns from Banishment to a ring of Spirelings with readied actions, going down in a rain of fire, ice, and lightning that obliterates her utterly... leaving behind only a red carnation, and the endless grief of Ava Dianthus.

The battle is won, but at a heavy cost - of the Resistance, only Ebbie and Ava survive, and Ouroboros Alaion and Asclepius Orion have only a handful of senior members of their sect. With Sujing dead and the surviving civilians of her Spire previously evacuated, Ava joins the Chronophidians in refusing to leave, wishing to preserve her home and with it, all that is left of her love.

The Spirelings help the Dianthians to combine the knowledge from the ancient Gaian temple - the ability to combat Green using older strains of itself - with the technique of Chronophidian weaving to restore a miniature time loop: constrained to the reservoir of Old Green running from the fountain, the loop grants the Dianthians an effectively infinite supply of stabilized Old Green, with magic at a scale the Chronophidians can sustain without draining their own lives. The Dianthians connect the corrupted sewer network to the edge of town, creating a moat of Old Green that will keep the Green at bay until a permanent solution can be found.

Epilogue #

The survivors left on Dianthus slowly start to rebuild their town within the confines of their new moat system, thanks to the help of the Spirelings, using their time-loop stasis Green from the town square fountain to prevent further encroachment from the more evolved Green on the outside.

Ouroboros Alaion and Lady Ava Dianthus often clash over how to best nurture their grieving community as the townsfolk hold out hope that Spirelings will return one day with a way to clear the Green for good, and restore the floral meadows that once covered Dianthus.

During sunset one day, Ava returns to her secret cottage she once shared with Sujing and sits by her grave near the garden. She rests her head on the tombstone as if it were Sujing’s shoulder.

“Do you think we’d have been together in every universe?”

A series of images flash by:

“I’d like to think I could still hold your hand in one of them.”

From the garden, Ava plucks another red carnation, and leaves it on Sujing’s grave, then heads back to town.

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