S3E1 — Kill em with Kindness — Lumos the Spark v Ferndell Ironwind

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Season 3 opened with a murder over yogurt. Lumos the Spark, a corgi-obsessed high elf, was pulled into The Void to settle a score with Ferndell Ironwind, the dwarf wizard who kept stealing her yogurt from the office fridge in another dimension. They fought over an endless abyss, then in a lava hellscape. Along the way she healed him, he accidentally cured her eyesight, and they both played tag with the Grandmaster. The match lived up to its title: they really did try to kill each other with kindness, right up until Ferndell’s mom showed up.

The Story

Chinchillas and Taxes

The season began in the damp, steamy halls of The Dread Fortress, where pictures of the Grandmaster hung on every wall. In her throne room sat only The Arbiter, hunched over a desk piled with paperwork. He was chained at the wrists and ankles, still paying for his failed attempt to overthrow the Grandmaster. Instead of his usual black robes he wore plain cloth clothes and a pair of spectacles. He was not enjoying himself. “This makes no fucking sense,” he muttered. “Who needs this many chinchillas?”

The Grandmaster had slept in until 9 PM on a Sunday. She burst through the doors with such a flourish that the gust blew every paper off his desk. The receipts were tax deductible, she reminded him, and they had to be documented properly this time. They had already filed for an extension three times and could not afford another visit from the IRS. As for the Chinchillas, she had bought 203 of them for a good reason: “if you want to keep goblins happy, you have to have chinchillas.” Each of the Goblins gets exactly one. If anyone got two, the rest would get jealous, and then everyone would need two, and then there would be an uprising.

Paying for all those chinchillas would take a Deathmatch. Arranging one was, the Grandmaster noted, “one of the responsibilities I gave you.” The Arbiter fumbled through his papers (“You remembered, right?” “Yeah, of course I did”), clapped, and tore open a portal in time and space.

The Yogurt Feud

Out stepped Lumos the Spark. She was a high elf who had spent so much time with the fae folk, who ride corgis, that she had become “questionably way too much into corgis.” She admitted there wasn’t much else to her personality, and she was here for revenge. In another dimension, she explained, she and her opponent were office workers, and he kept stealing the yogurt she brought in. “I think it’d be better if he was just dead.” The Arbiter approved: “A true villain after my own heart.”

Ferndell Ironwind, a dwarf wizard, confirmed it. They worked in an office of bounty hunters, and he wanted to be its highest earner. Lumos was his only competition. Lumos, who is lactose intolerant, special-ordered her yogurt: strawberry, Greek, expensive and high in protein, “because, you know, bounty hunting, murdering people.” Then came the twist. Ferndell had never eaten any of it. “I opened it and I took the spoon, just threw everything in the trash can.” His reason: “I’m not supporting big yogurt here.”

The Grandmaster was delighted by “the pettiness that I am loving.” She made her choice of arena: “Take them… To nowhere.”

Into Nowhere

The arena of nowhere was one of the Grandmaster’s “favorite little getaways.” It was a set of safe pathways over a bottomless abyss, with a roaring fire in the middle because “the void out here is rather chilly.” Three runes served as teleporters to unknown and possibly unsafe places. Anyone who stepped on one would take everyone else along. High above, the Acolytes rained down confetti, hot dogs and slushies on the champions’ arena, and the mess poured into the void in waterfalls of goop and trash. “I give you an arena of nowhere,” the Grandmaster declared, “but an audience of everyone.”

Before the first blow, the Acolytes demanded chaos. A rumble sent rats fleeing from the walls, and a giant hamster ball dropped from nowhere. The Grandmaster revised it on the spot, and it became all 203 chinchillas stampeding at the champions like wildebeest. Lumos struggled to find the right part of her character sheet (“If you had told me I had to read, I would have just been like, you know what? He could take the yogurt”). Both champions were trampled anyway, because they were too busy glaring at each other to notice. First blood went to the chinchillas.

Kindness as a Weapon

Lumos’s flying corgi, Maximus, was too friendly to chase chinchillas, so he gently herded the stampede away from her and toward Ferndell. Ferndell crouched down to give the herd “a TED Talk, but for chinchillas” and turn them on Lumos. The lead chinchilla, smoking a cigarette, wasn’t moved: “Sorry, there’s nothing I can do about it. You know, union rules.” The herd trampled him once more and ran off to rejoin their goblin owners.

Ferndell shielded himself and tried to blind and deafen Lumos. She shrugged it off, and the Arbiter ruled her immune to both for the rest of the match. “I got LASIK through your action,” she said, thrilled about the savings on contacts. It was, the Grandmaster observed, “incredibly kind, incredibly unexpected.”

At the end of the round, the Arbiter’s roll came up a 2. “It’s these chains, Grandmaster… I just don’t have the wrist action I used to.” As if on cue, Doug the Pug appeared on his fancy cushion beside the throne. He gave Maximus a nod of respect from one dog to another, rolled his plushie d20, and got a 13. The Arbiter complained that Doug wasn’t in chains. The Grandmaster pointed out that Doug wore a collar and didn’t even have thumbs.

Next the Arbiter snapped, and the Box of Chaos dropped into the middle of the map. Its lid flipped open on a column of yellow, purple and pink flame, and a ring of fire made it dangerous to reach. The Acolytes chanted both names, and each champion received a hero point (“Think of them as your Red Bull”). Lumos then hatched a plot. She would heal Ferndell, mostly so everyone would say how nice she was. “You’re lifting him up so you can tear him down,” the Grandmaster noted. Ferndell took the healing gratefully: “Now it’s an even playing field. And I’m ready to murder you.” She promptly burned him with radiant light, “kind of like a bad sunburn,” and offered him some aloe.

Ferndell slowed Lumos, Maximus and four stray chinchillas to a crawl, because “This is my box.” Lumos warned that if he messed with the dog, “I am gonna John Wick your ass so bad.” The Grandmaster mostly noticed that fluffy creatures running in slow motion were very cute. Then Ferndell teleported straight past the ring of fire and into the box.

Gerald’s Deal

Shadowy hands crept from the lid, followed by a head with glowing yellow eyes. “Who the fuck are you?” asked Gerald. “I am Ferndale, the Yogurt Stealer,” Ferndell answered. Gerald wanted to know whether that was a real title or whether he was just making that shit up. Ferndell offered his precious hero point in trade. The Grandmaster rose from her throne and insisted Gerald give him two items for it. Gerald snapped back, “Don’t tell me how to be a box of chaos,” but he coughed up two anyway, things he “had laying around.”

The first was the Fulminating Treatise, a crackling spellbook stocked with Fireball, Wall of Force and more. The second was a sentient greatsword with a mind of its own, which Ferndell recognized as “Hazuron.” The Arbiter called it “a very good use of a hero point… Might be one of the better ones I’ve ever seen.” He then rolled an 8 for the round, and Doug answered with a 10, curly tail held high. “Fuck, Doug.”

Into the Hellscape

Lumos considered sending Maximus flying across the abyss to the box with one of her cute, cracked-heeled boots as an offering. She thought better of it. Between turns she told the full story: she had caught Ferndell in the break room holding the spoon and told a coworker, “oh my god i’m so mad i could kill him.” She hadn’t expected him to be quite so willing to be killed. She shook off the slow and celebrated with some downward dog with her dog. Ferndell hit her with a Fireball from his new book, but she was unbothered: “Global warming is still happening in our dimension. I was plenty warm.”

Then Ferndell teleported onto the top rune. The whole room warped and stretched, and both champions were flung into a hellscape of lava rivers meeting at a molten pool, with a flaming altar raised above it. “I don’t know if you all know this,” the Grandmaster offered, “lava is hot.” There was a brief pause while the Arbiter went to the bathroom, which takes a while in chains.

Tag, You’re It

Ferndell wanted to charm Maximus. The spell only works on people, so the Grandmaster asked whether the dog sleeps in the bed with his head on the pillow. He does. “I would argue that’s humanoid enough.” The charm took hold, and Ferndell sealed it with a bribe: a bag of the best cheese in all dimensions. Maximus bit his owner. “It’s really not the teeth that hurt,” said the Arbiter. “It’s the betrayal.” To twist the knife, Ferndell ate another of Lumos’s stolen yogurts in front of her, hated it, and spat it out.

Chaos struck twice in a row. First a brightly colored donkey piñata appeared, hovering above the meeting of the lava rivers. Then the Grandmaster spread her wings, floated down between the champions and opened her arms. “Can we just hug?” Lumos asked, because it had been a long day. Ferndell reached the Grandmaster first. She wrapped him up, whispered “You’re it,” and flew away, leaving a burning number 4 on his chest. Ferndell apologized and tagged Lumos. She hugged him back, smiling, and whispered, “you just lost the game.” A 3 seared into her skin. Whatever the countdown was meant to do, it never got the chance.

Lumos had had enough of anyone who “touches my dog and casts a spell against me.” She raised a Wall of Fire straight through Ferndell and the piñata, scorching him badly and turning the ceiling and ground red with heat. The piñata cracked open and spilled melting Twinkies, two Tootsie Rolls and a Werther’s. Lumos pocketed the Werther’s and hurled a Tootsie Roll at Ferndell’s charred face, but she fumbled it completely. The candy was still on fire, stuck to her hand and burned her. It was, the Grandmaster said, like trying to storm out angrily and catching your belt on the door.

Mom

Lumos stomped around in the ash and accidentally kicked a perfect Twinkie straight to Ferndell, who ate it. He moonwalked back thirty feet with style and cast Phantasmal Killer. Lumos’s deepest fear took shape as Ferndell’s mom: a sweet grandmotherly lady in a white and pink apron with cookies fresh from the oven, now deadly and murderous. Her opening move was a cookie so burnt “it’s honestly a shuriken at this point.” Lumos sank down clutching her chest, wondering whether she had left a good legacy.

The Grandmaster stood to rally her: “You show mom who’s boss.” Lumos spent her hero point to act twice. She healed herself (“Finally, I stopped bleeding when I cough”) and ate the Werther’s. Ferndell offered to look after her dog when she died. “Never talk to me or my son,” she replied. With the last of her strength she summoned a Fireball, and Ferndell took half, leaving both of them badly hurt: “All for yogurt.” With her final bit of magic she tried to make them friends, “I just, I want us to die friends,” and Ferndell refused. “You support big yogurt and I don’t support big yogurt.”

Mom appeared one last time, and Lumos fell to her knees, dying. “I should have been a better person! Why am I so fucking petty?” she cried, adding that no yogurt is worth dying over. She left everything to Maximus, “the world’s first quadrillionaire dog,” who would open a shelter for other dogs with Doug’s help. The Grandmaster confirmed Doug would volunteer there every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Lumos got one last kiss on the cheek from her corgi. The Grandmaster told her to close her eyes, knowing her legacy would live on through Maximus. The Arbiter then dragged her away by the ankle, her head going “pop, pop, pop” all the way to the rune.

Down With Big Yogurt

Ferndell’s mother said “kisses” and vanished. The Grandmaster came down to hug the winner, having completely forgotten about tag. She told him he had made her, the Acolytes and his mother very proud, and reminded him to show up for dinner on Friday. Ferndell slipped yogurt from a little local brand into her pockets, and she approved. She raised him up to the Acolytes and made a proclamation: the Dread Fortress arena would use only local yogurt vendors, and the Arbiter would handle the contracts. Blue raspberry slushies rained down, and children waved their t-shirts for his autograph.

Dried Blood

Revived for the after-show interview, Lumos took her death gracefully: “It was well deserved. I was an asshole.” She admitted she could have used another fridge or simply asked him. She used to print notes asking the thief to stop, and Ferndell had answered them with smiley faces. Maximus, the Grandmaster declared, was on track to become “a small dog deity of his own,” and Ferndell said Lumos “did not die in vain whatsoever.” Lumos realized she had sat on quadrillions without funding a single nonprofit, and the others concluded she could have been Big Yogurt herself. Her parting warning was that anger will kill you, “And the only thing left from you will be yogurt.” When Lumos suggested Ferndell might need help with taxes, the Arbiter said, “Get in line,” and the Grandmaster made it official that the IRS is part of their world.

Notable Moments

• The Arbiter opened the season in chains and spectacles, doing the Grandmaster’s taxes on 203 chinchillas bought to stop a goblin uprising.
• The chinchilla stampede drew first blood, and the lead chinchilla refused to switch sides, citing union rules.
• Ferndell traded his hero point to Gerald, and the Grandmaster bullied the box into paying out two items.
• Maximus was ruled “humanoid enough” to charm because he sleeps with his head on the pillow, then bit his owner for cheese.
• A chaos-event hug from the Grandmaster turned into a game of tag that everyone forgot about.
• Ferndell’s sweet, cookie-baking mother killed Lumos, who left her fortune to the world’s first quadrillionaire dog.

Memorable Quotes

• The Arbiter: “It’s not really about the yogurt. It’s the principle of the yogurt, what the yogurt represents.”
• Ferndell Ironwind: “I didn’t even eat your yogurt. I opened it and I took the spoon, just threw everything in the trash can.”
• Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer: “My dear champions, I give you an arena of nowhere, but an audience of everyone.”
• Lumos the Spark: “I got LASIK through your action.”
• Gerald: “Hey, I don’t tell you how to do whatever it is you’re doing. Don’t tell me how to be a box of chaos.”
• The Arbiter: “It’s really not the teeth that hurt. It’s the betrayal.”

Lumos the Spark: “I should have been a better person! Why am I so fucking petty? Literally, pettiness is the death of me.”

Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer: “Down with big yogurt companies. Down with big yogurt.”

Who and What Appears

Characters

Lumos the Spark (Lumos’s player).

• A high elf, obsessed with corgis from time spent with “the faith [fae?] folk,” who ride corgis.
• She owns Maximus, a corgi who can fly.
• In another dimension she is an office worker and bounty hunter, a rival of Ferndell, and very wealthy (“quadrillion” dollars, per her will and Dried Blood).
• Lactose intolerant; her yogurt is special-order strawberry Greek, high in protein. She has cute boots in her favorite color (one heel cracked).
• Spells this episode: Healing Word, Word of Radiance, Wall of Fire, Fireball, a self-heal via hero point, Fast Friends. She carries a mace and has Daylight, Cure Wounds, Mass Healing Word and Mass Cure Wounds on her sheet.
• Immune to blindness and deafness for the rest of the match after saving vs Ferndell (“LASIK”).
• Died to Phantasmal Killer (Ferndell’s mom). She left everything to Maximus, and was revived for Dried Blood.

Ferndell Ironwind (Ferndell’s player).

• A dwarf wizard and bounty hunter in the office dimension. He wants to be the highest-earning bounty hunter there.
• Steals Lumos’s yogurts and throws them out uneaten; he’s “not supporting big yogurt.” He self-titled “the Yogurt Stealer” for Gerald.
• Spells this episode: shield, Blindness/Deafness, Slow, Misty Step, Charm Person (on Maximus), Fireball (from the Treatise), Phantasmal Killer at 5th level.
• First champion ever to sacrifice a hero point to the Box of Chaos. He received the Fulminating Treatise and a sentient greatsword (likely Hazirawn).
• His mother is a nice cookie-baking, grandmotherly lady in a white and pink apron, as his Phantasmal Killer made her murderous. She sent “kisses,” and expects him at dinner on Friday (per the GM).
• Winner; he slipped local yogurt into the Grandmaster’s pockets.

Maximus, Lumos’s corgi.

• Can fly. Sleeps in her bed with his head on the pillow, so he’s ruled “humanoid enough” for Charm Person. Has +2 Wisdom (“a smart dog,” “a good boy”).
• He likes cheese. Charmed and bribed, he bit Lumos.
• Inherits her fortune as “the world’s first quadrillionaire dog” and opens a dog shelter, run with Doug’s help.
• Caustic Phoenix in Dried Blood: “a small dog deity of his own.”

Doug the Pug (“our pug”).

• Sits on a fancy cushion by the Grandmaster’s throne and wears a collar. He rolls a plushie D20 after the Arbiter’s end-of-round rolls (13, 10) and beats him both times.
• Exchanged a respectful nod with Maximus. Volunteers at Maximus’s shelter Mon/Wed/Fri/Sun.

The Arbiter (Mudcat).

• Chained at wrists and ankles, in plain cloth clothes and spectacles instead of his black robes, doing the Grandmaster’s paperwork and taxes. The chains are blamed for his bad rolls and slow bathroom trips. Why he’s chained is not explained in this episode.
• Says Ferndell’s hero-point deal “might be one of the better ones I’ve ever seen.” Carried Lumos off by the ankle. Charged with the local-yogurt vendor contracts.

Grandmaster Elusia Skypiercer (Caustic Phoenix).

• Sleeps in to 9 PM on Sundays.
• Bought 203 chinchillas, one per goblin, to prevent a goblin uprising.
• Fears the IRS, has filed for extensions three times, and claims to be “illiterate” / bad at math.
• Overruled Gerald to double Ferndell’s reward. Played tag through a chaos-event hug (“You’re it”). Gave Lumos d4 inspiration.
• Decreed that D20 Deathmatch and the Dread Fortress arena will only use local yogurt vendors.

Gerald, the Box of Chaos (Mudcat).

• Shadowy hands, glowing yellow eyes, foul-mouthed. “Don’t tell me how to be a box of chaos.” He keeps items “laying around.”

The 203 chinchillas.

• Bought for the goblins. They stampeded the arena, and their leader smokes a cigarette and cites “union rules.”
• They left “to join their goblin owners.”

The goblins: owners of the chinchillas, prone to jealousy and uprisings.

Vegeta: a chat Acolyte who won a t-shirt (chat username).

Places

• The Dread Fortress halls: damp walls, steam from the lava outside, pictures of the Grandmaster everywhere.
• The Grandmaster’s throne room (Dread Fortress), with the Arbiter’s paperwork desk.
• The arena of nowhere / Room to Nowhere: the GM’s “favorite little getaway.”
  • Safe paths over an endless abyss, with a central fire because “the void out here is rather chilly.”
  • Three teleport runes: random destination, and they take everyone with you. Crowd stands above.
• The lava hellscape: lava rivers meeting at a “four corners” lava bed, and a flaming altar 15 ft up.
• The office dimension: Lumos and Ferndell’s bounty-hunter office, with the break room and fridge.

Items

• Fulminating Treatise: a crackling spellbook (Contingency, Fireball, Gust of Wind, Leomund’s Tiny Hut, Magic Missile, Thunderwave, Wall of Force), 3 charges.
• Sentient greatsword (“Hazuron,” likely Hazirawn): +2, necrotic, detect charges, wounding.
• The donkey piñata: Twinkies (melted), two Tootsie Rolls (one flaming), and a Werther’s.
• Doug’s plushie D20 and fancy cushion.
• Lumos’s cracked-heel boots. Ferndell’s bag of cheese treats. The local-brand yogurt in the GM’s pockets.

Lore statements

• Goblins need chinchillas to stay happy, one each, or they get jealous and revolt.
• The IRS exists in the Void’s world and has visited the Grandmaster before (Dried Blood: “made that official”).
• The void beyond the arena is chilly.
• The Box of Chaos’s fire gives off no heat.
• Champions can come from other dimensions/timelines. Lumos says they’ve met “in another dimension” as office workers.
• A hero point can be sacrificed to the Box of Chaos; this was the first time (Dried Blood).
• Lumos was revived after death (Dried Blood).

Full Round-by-Round

Every beat of the episode, with timestamps (click to expand)

Opening — the Arbiter in chains

1. 0:00:02 “Acolytes, we have returned. From where? No one will ever know. It’s magic.” Mudcat’s narration moves through the halls of the Dread Fortress. The walls are damp with moisture and steam from the lava outside, and pictures of the Grandmaster hang all around the halls.
2. 0:00:40 In the Grandmaster’s throne room there is only the Arbiter, sitting at a desk.
   • He is in chains at the wrists and ankles.
   • Instead of his normal black robes he wears plain cloth clothing, and he has spectacles on.
   • He is hunched over a pile of paperwork: “this makes no fucking sense who needs this many chinchillas.”
3. 0:01:21 The Grandmaster has been sleeping in. It’s “9 PM on a Sunday night” and she is just starting her weekend. She bursts the doors open with a flourish, and the gust of wind blows all the papers off the Arbiter’s desk.
4. 0:01:21 — Taxes.
   • The GM says the chinchilla receipts are tax deductible and must be documented. “We wanna make sure that our taxes are filed correctly this time.”
   • They have already filed for an extension three times and “can’t afford to have the IRS come visit us again.”
   • Arbiter: “We can’t afford these chinchillas.”
5. 0:02:09 — The 203 chinchillas. “Everyone needs at least 203 chinchillas.”
   • “If you want to keep goblins happy, you have to have chinchillas.”
   • Each goblin gets exactly one, to prevent a goblin uprising. If there were more, somebody would get two, the rest would get jealous, and everyone would need two.
6. 0:02:41 The Arbiter jangles his chains: “It’s not like I’m in a position to argue at this point.” Paying for the chinchillas will need a deathmatch. The GM assumed he’d arranged one already, since it’s “one of the responsibilities I gave you.”
   • “Oh, shit.” He fumbles through the papers. “You remembered, right?” “Yeah, of course I did.”
7. 0:03:06 He claps and rips open a portal in time and space, and two champions walk out: “Ferndell Ironwind versus Lumos the Spark.”

The champions and the yogurt feud

8. 0:03:38 — Lumos the Spark.
   • She is a high elf, “pretty cool,” and “questionably way too much into corgis.”
   • This is because she “spent a lot of time with the faith [fae?] folk,” and they ride corgis.
   • “I don’t know that there’s anything else really to my personality other than that.” She’s here “to get some revenge.”
9. 0:04:17 — The grievance. “I understand that this dimension’s really on fire and stuff, but there’s another dimension in which I have met this being before.”
   • In that dimension they are both office workers.
   • He keeps stealing the yogurt she brings in from the fridge. “I think it’d be better if he was just dead.”
   • Arbiter: “A true villain after my own heart.”
10. 0:04:55 — Ferndell. He is a dwarf wizard.
    • It’s “really weird” to hear they work in an office: “We do! We work in an office of bounty hunters.”
    • “If you have yogurt in the fridge I’m gonna take the yogurt.” He offers to buy her more yogurt, then takes it back: “No, we’re gonna battle to the death.”
    • He wants to be the highest-earning bounty hunter, and she’s his only competition.
11. 0:05:40 The GM: “yogurt is definitely high on my list.” She asks for the best flavor.
    • Lumos is lactose intolerant, so her yogurt is special-order, expensive, strawberry, Greek, high in protein, “because, you know, bounty hunting, murdering people.”
    • The Arbiter: “It’s not really about the yogurt. It’s the principle of the yogurt, what the yogurt represents.”
12. 0:06:28 — The twist. Ferndell never even ate it. “I opened it and I took the spoon, just threw everything in the trash can.”
    • Lumos: several yogurts have gone missing. “I don’t just murder people over one yogurt, okay? I’m reasonable.”
    • Ferndell: “I’m not supporting big yogurt here.”
13. 0:07:01 The GM: “Yes, this is the pettiness that I am loving. Stick it to them.” “To yogurt or not to yogurt…” She picks the arena: “Take them… To nowhere.” Arbiter: “Another bad choice for an evening’s entertainment.”

The arena of nowhere

14. 0:07:48 The GM calls it “one of my favorite little getaways.”
    • It is surrounded by an abyss. If you fall, “you’ll just keep falling for a very long, long, long, long, long, long, long time.” The Arbiter interrupts, and she was “making a point.”
    • There are safe pathways and a roaring fire in the middle, because “the void out here is rather chilly.”
15. 0:08:17 — Three runes, teleporters. There’s “no guarantee as to where it will take you or if that place will be safe.”
    • They are no way to run away: “if you step in there, You will take us all with you.”
    • “Our champions are brave. They face their yogurt problems head on.”
16. 0:09:15 The Arbiter: “It’s time for a dirty yogurt fight. Not the first one we’ve had, but it certainly will be memorable.” Call and response: “Acolytes, you’ve come! For dungeons! And dice. And of course, a deathmatch!”
17. 0:09:15 — Placement. Both roll a 4 on the d4, so both start in the fourth quadrant. The Arbiter fumbles the math: “It’s been a minute since we’ve done a Deathmatch. Sue me.”
    • GM: “You should know how to do math, though. You’re doing our taxes.” “That is your fault completely.” “We’re getting audited.”
18. 0:11:02 — The crowd above.
    • High above is a giant crowd raining down confetti, hot dogs and slushies. The mess falls into the void “creating waterfalls of goop and trash.” “It’s environmentally disposable. So it’s fine.”
    • The champions feel empowered by the crowd.
    • GM: “I give you an arena of nowhere, but an audience of everyone.” She tells them to fight for their stance on yogurt and also to appease the Acolytes: “Call to them, beg for their pleasure… You might find a few extra bonuses in your pocket.”

Chaos event — the chinchilla stampede (0:12:38)

19. The Acolytes trigger a chaos event before round one. Lumos rolls a 6.
    • A rumble shakes the pebbles, and rats flee from holes in the walls.
    • A giant hamster ball drops from nowhere and starts rolling at them.
    • The GM revises it on the spot: “let’s put a chinchilla in there for story time.” It becomes all 203 chinchillas rampaging toward them, “like the Stampede in Lion King of the Wildebeest.”
    • Crowd: “Chaos!” “Hamster Chaos!”
20. 0:14:29 Ferndell fails his Dex save.
    • The chinchillas are “small, light, and fluffy,” described in chat as “round rabbits or very fat squirrels.” For him it’s “a little bit more of a pride issue.” Ferndell: “My pride is hurt. I have no pride anymore.”
21. 0:15:02 — The reading lesson. Lumos struggles to find her Dex save on the sheet.
    • “Oh, was I supposed to read the words?… If you had told me I had to read, I would have just been like, you know what? He could take the yogurt.”
    • GM: “I am also illiterate… Attributes. That starts with an A and ends with tributes.”
    • Lumos claims it was all intentional (“I was told to play with my food”). Arbiter: “This was all a test. You all passed.”
22. 0:17:03 Lumos fails too. Both are trampled while locked in eye contact, glaring at each other, too focused to notice. Lumos takes 7 and Ferndell 4. “First blood goes to the chinchillas.” GM: “They’re very cute, but very dangerous in packs.”

Round 1

23. 0:18:12 — Maximus herds the chinchillas. Dogs love to chase chinchillas, but Lumos’s dog is “super friendly,” so he gently herds them away from her and toward Ferndell. Animal handling: 16.
    • “What is your corgi’s name?” “My corgi’s name is Maximus, obviously.” Ferndell: “I’m gonna die.”
24. 0:19:57 — A TED Talk for chinchillas. Ferndell counters with a reaction.
    • He gets down to their level to “talk to them. It’s kind of like a TED Talk, but for chinchillas,” to turn them on Lumos. He fails.
    • The lead chinchilla is smoking a cigarette: “Yeah, I’m not convinced.” “Please?” “Sorry, there’s nothing I can do about it. You know, union rules.”
    • He takes 6 more as they run off the map, “Off to join their goblin owners.”
25. 0:21:28 Lumos takes no further action: “Anybody’s being bludgeoned to death by chinchillas. You need a break.”
26. 0:21:41 — Ferndell’s turn.
    • He casts shield on himself (ruled a bonus action). The GM: “a strong offense is a good defense. No, wait.”
    • He asks how far away Lumos is. Lumos: “None of your business.” It’s 30 feet. “You know what else is 30 feet? Blindness and deafness.” He casts it at 2nd level. Someone quips “you can’t see your yogurt now.”
27. 0:23:17 — LASIK. Lumos passes the Con save, and the Arbiter rules she is now immune to being blinded or deafened for the rest of the deathmatch.
    • Lumos: “She’s got power eyeballs… I got LASIK through your action. I’m going to save so much on contacts.”
    • Table: “Free medical.”
    • Lumos: “I said Blizzbear and I would kill each other with our kindness.” (the episode title). “If you could cure my depression…”
28. 0:24:49 Ferndell moves 30 ft toward the bottom teleporter rune. They are still 35 ft apart.
29. 0:25:18 The GM sums up: “Some blood from chinchillas and some healing as well for eyesight… Incredibly kind, incredibly unexpected.”
30. 0:25:34 — The Arbiter’s roll. He rolls a 2: “It’s these chains, Grandmaster… I just don’t have the wrist action I used to.” The Acolytes laugh.
31. 0:25:47 — Doug the Pug.
    • As if on cue, Doug, “our pug,” pops up beside the Grandmaster’s throne on his own fancy cushion.
    • He looks down at Maximus and gives a small nod “as a mutual respect from one dog to another.”
    • Then he picks up his own plushie D20 and rolls a 13.
    • Arbiter: “Yeah, but he’s not in chains.” GM: “He has a collar on… it’s not chained to anything. He doesn’t even have thumbs.” “If you’re gonna listen to reason, I can’t deal with you.”

Round 2 — the Box of Chaos

32. 0:27:00 “Have we summoned the Box of Chaos?”
    • The Arbiter stands, snaps, and the Box of Chaos drops into the middle of the map.
    • The lid flips open, and a column of yellow, purple and pink flame shoots into the sky, turning the atmosphere pink.
    • A ring of fire makes it perilous to reach. Using it is a free action, and a sacrifice earns a magic item, “Could be good, could be bad.”
33. 0:28:03 The Acolytes chant their names, and each champion gets one hero point: “Think of them as your Red Bull.”
34. 0:28:53 — The kindness plot.
    • Lumos feels she has “an unfair advantage in just existing.” She had hoped to “decapitate you like really quick and then we could go our own ways.”
    • She offers to let Ferndell pet her dog. Ferndell suggests she heal him instead.
    • She wants the credit: “I really need the credit from other people that like, oh wow, she’s like so nice.” They agree to tell everyone it was her idea.
35. 0:30:13 The GM has the Arbiter roll perception to overhear the “secret mission.” He fails. Table: “Our first non-one.” The Arbiter is fidgeting with his chains, counting the rings, completely unaware.
36. 0:30:46 — The heal. “I have decided benevolently… to heal my opponent.” “Just somebody validate me, honestly.”
    • She casts Healing Word: 4 HP to Ferndell.
    • GM: “You’re lifting him up so you can tear him down.” Lumos: “this is the kindness of my heart… this is really petty to do over yogurt… I want the best for him.” GM: “Pretend you’re a Josh Groban, raise this up, and then just drop it.”
    • Ferndell: “Thank you so much. Now it’s an even playing field. And I’m ready to murder you.”
37. 0:33:01 — Word of Radiance. Ferndell fails the Con save and takes 6 radiant, which burns “Kind of like a bad sunburn.” Net loss: “I got four back and now I am losing six.”
    • Lumos: “You want some alloy [aloe] for that?” “Thank you, but I am a-okay.”
38. 0:34:43 — Who’s the better bounty hunter. With the yogurt dispute “buried for now,” the question becomes who’s the better bounty hunter.
    • Lumos: “if our murdering is anything like this, neither of us is very good at it.”
    • Arbiter: “The fact that you think Bounty Hunter’s murder also indicates your skill level.”
    • Ferndell: “Hey, bounty hunters don’t murder. Hard to collect that bounty if they’re dead.”
    • Lumos: “I only go for the bounty that needs murdering… The dead or alive kind.” She then moves (“I done did it. All by myself”).
39. 0:36:22 — “This is my box.” Ferndell moves toward the box.
    • He casts Slow (3rd level) on Lumos, “because I do not want them to get closer to the box whatsoever. This is my box.” She fails the Wisdom save. Ferndell reads out the effects.
    • GM: “I did not know Slow was so badass.”
    • He also slows Maximus and four other chinchillas.
40. 0:38:46 Lumos: “You can mess with me, but if you’re gonna mess with the dog, I am gonna John Wick your ass so bad.”
    • GM: “floofs running in slow motion are also super cute.” Lumos: “That booty… some Instagram cloud [clout].”
    • Ferndell: “I’m trying to help you as an influencer.” “Influencer bounty hunters?” “That’s gotta be a thing.” “Corgi butts in slow motion everywhere for the bounty hunters.”
41. 0:39:30 Ferndell Misty Steps straight into the box, skipping the Ring of Fire.

Gerald’s deal (0:39:53)

42. Dark shadowy hands creep out of the open lid, and a head with glowing yellow eyes pops up. Gerald: “Who the fuck are you?”
    • Ferndell: “I am Ferndale, the Yogurt Stealer.”
    • Gerald: “Is that like an actual title or are you just making that shit up?” Ferndell: “You made it seem like I had to like present myself with a cool title.”
    • Gerald: “Do you want to make a deal or not?”
43. 0:40:26 — The hero point sacrifice. Ferndell offers the box his hero point. The GM warns he doesn’t have to give something so precious. “No, why not?”
44. 0:40:50 The Grandmaster stands from her chair: “Give him two. Two, Gerald… You will give him two items for that hero point. Not one, two.”
    • Gerald: “Hey, I don’t tell you how to do whatever it is you’re doing. Don’t tell me how to be a box of chaos.” GM: “Fine.”
    • The lid slams shut and the box rumbles. Two d100s: 57 and 21. It’s Ferndell’s first ever d100. Lumos: “If I’m lucky, you just murdered yourself.”
    • GM: “Don’t play to my weaknesses, you fool!” Arbiter: “These are two items I’ve never even heard of.”
45. 0:42:47 — The items. The lid flips open. The column of fire gives off no heat; it’s some sort of magical fire. Gerald floats two items over: “You know, I had these laying around. See if you can make some use out of them.”
    • The Fulminating Treatise (“Treaties”): a thick spellbook that crackles with energy. It holds Contingency, Fireball, Gust of Wind, Leomund’s Tiny Hut, Magic Missile, Thunderwave and Wall of Force, with three charges.
    • A sentient greatsword “with a mind of its own.” It gives +2 to hit and damage and deals 2d6 necrotic. It has four charges of detect magic, detect evil and good and detect thoughts, and the wounding property (DC 15 Con). Ferndell: “Is it Hazuron?” Arbiter: “It is.” This is likely Hazirawn.
46. 0:44:44 Arbiter: “That was a very good use of a hero point, not gonna lie. Might be one of the better ones I’ve ever seen.”
47. 0:45:23 The Arbiter’s end-of-round roll is an 8. “It’s better than a two.” Doug hops up, curly tail high, nose up, and throws a 10. Arbiter: “Fuck, Doug. Makes you so cool, rolling his fucking 10s and shit.”

Round 3

48. 0:46:12 — The flying corgi plan.
    • Lumos reveals that Maximus can fly (“I have a flying corgi… I wrote it down in a notebook you cannot read”).
    • She planned to sacrifice one of her “really, really cute boots … my favorite color,” whose heel is cracked, by having Maximus fly it over to the box.
    • She worries about him landing over the abyss. Arbiter: “It’s a 60 foot throw. You want to toss your dog over there? I’m not going to stop you.” “Please stop me.”
    • She declines, because her luck can’t last. Ruling: typically each player gets one turn at the box.
49. 0:49:31 — The break-room story. Ferndell: “You brought us here.”
    • Lumos tells it. She found him in the break room holding the spoon. She “turned bright red” and stomped out, then told a coworker, “oh my god i’m so mad i could kill him.”
    • “I didn’t know that he was literally going to be like okay yeah kill me.” Ferndell was “so kosher with being murdered.”
    • “Did I want to murder him absolutely did I like mean it literally probably not but you know we’re here now.”
    • GM: “You weren’t sorry about the yogurt.”
50. 0:51:02 She dashes, then passes a Wisdom save (18) and ends Slow. “I’m gonna do some down dog with the dog… Instagram’s gonna love this.”
    • The Arbiter forgot to advance the round card: “we need a new card guy.”
51. 0:51:48 — Fireball from the book. Ferndell casts Fireball from the Fulminating Treatise. Lumos saves and takes half (14). GM: “Bring in the heat and she steps to side.”
    • Lumos: “Global warming is still happening in our dimension. I was plenty warm.”
52. 0:54:25 — The rune. Ferndell Misty Steps onto the top teleporter rune. “Did not think that’s what was gonna happen.”
    • The whole room warps and stretches (d6), and both are thrown in random directions into a hellscape.
53. 0:55:26 — The lava hellscape.
    • It has lava rivers meeting in the middle at a small lava bed, a raised altar area 15 ft up, and flames coming out from under the platform.
    • GM: “I don’t know if you all know this, lava is hot.”
    • Initiative is rerolled, and Ferndell gets back-to-back turns.
54. 0:56:28 — Break. The Arbiter has to go to the bathroom “and it takes me a while to get out of these chains.” The break is cut from the mp3.
55. 0:56:52 “One of you has gained a t-shirt. Congratulations, Vegeta.” (a chat winner)

Round 4 — the betrayal of Maximus

56. 0:57:24 — Charm Person on a dog. Ferndell, 45 ft away, wants to cast Charm Person on a dog. It needs a humanoid.
    • The GM’s argument: does the dog sit at the table to eat? Does it sleep in your bed with its head on the pillow?
    • Lumos: “For the rules of improv, yes, he does.” GM: “I would argue that’s humanoid enough.” Arbiter: “If he sleeps with the head on the pillow, that’s people.”
57. 0:59:09 Maximus gets +2 Wisdom (“he’s a smart dog”; “He’s a good boy… I don’t just let anybody sleep in bed with me on a pillow”). He fails, and Maximus is charmed. Lumos: “Should have thrown him when I could.”
58. 1:00:19 — The bribe.
    • Ferndell first just yells “attack Lumos!” (“that was pretty lame”).
    • Then: “Hey Maximus, I have a bag full of treats in my backpack. He likes cheese. They’re the best cheese that you could ever have in all dimensions of the world. All you have to do is attack Lumos.”
    • Animal handling with advantage: 23. Maximus bites Lumos for 5 psychic. Arbiter: “It’s really not the teeth that hurt. It’s the betrayal.”
59. 1:01:29 — The stolen yogurt. As this happens, Ferndell eats another yogurt he stole from Lumos at the office, hates it, and spits it out in front of her. On the intimidation roll: “She’s used to this at that point.” GM: “Slightly ticked off.”

Chaos event — the donkey piñata (1:02:02)

60. Ferndell rolls a 3. Against the browns, blues and reds of the hellscape, something red, yellow, bright pink and green falls from the sky.
    • It is a brightly colored donkey piñata, hovering 10 ft above the “four corners” where the lava rivers meet.
    • History checks (16 and 13). GM: “It’s bones, right?” No: they know it holds “goodies, yummy things that make you feel good inside.”

Chaos event — tag (1:04:35)

61. A third chaos event triggers immediately (“A third? You want more chaos?”). The Arbiter rolls a 10.
    • The Grandmaster stands, opens her wide wings, steps off her platform, floats down between them and holds out her arms.
    • Lumos: “Can we just hug? … it’s been like a really long day.” Both go in for a hug, with Dex saves (17 and 16).
62. 1:05:44 — “You’re it.” Ferndell reaches her first. She wraps both arms around him and whispers “You’re it,” then pushes him away and flies up.
    • His body burns hot where he embraced her, and the number 4 is burned into his chest. When it counts down to zero, “there might be something that happens.”
63. 1:06:29 — Tag back.
    • Ferndell moves to Lumos: “I’m so sorry, Lumos, I just don’t wanna be it. Tag, you are it.”
    • Lumos doesn’t dodge. She hugs him, smiling, and whispers in his ear: “you just lost the game.”
    • The number 3 is now burned into Lumos’s chest, singeing her skin. Ferndell: “I lost the game. And so many other people have lost the game now.”
    • The tag countdown is never resolved. The GM later forgets it (see item 90).

Lumos’s wall of fire

64. 1:07:58 “I am just about had it… I want to honestly burn the whole thing to the ground… who touches my dog and casts a spell against me? That’s just rude.” GM: “Scorched earth right here.”
    • She weighs Fireball (she’d be in the blast), Daylight (“It’s like a big flashlight… like a nightlight”), then settles on Wall of Fire, placed diagonally through Ferndell and the piñata.
65. 1:11:19 Ferndell fails his save and takes 25 fire.
    • Lumos: “I said John Wick, right? I don’t have a gun or multiple guns or any like books to shove into your face or pencils through your eye. This is what you’re getting. You’re getting fire.”
    • She pushes the wall out, and the ceiling and ground turn red from the heat.
66. 1:12:59 — The candy. The piñata catches fire and cracks open.
    • It’s full of Twinkies, individually wrapped “because… that’s what the FDA [says],” and they melt.
    • She searches for a salvageable Kit Kat. The GM: “No, no Kit Kats, but two Tootsie Rolls and a Werther’s exist.”
67. 1:13:41 — The Tootsie Roll. Lumos takes the Werther’s and throws a Tootsie Roll at Ferndell’s charred face.
    • It’s a nat 1. The Tootsie Roll was on fire from the piñata; it sticks to her hand and burns her for 1.
    • “I can’t even throw a Twinkie at her.” Crowd: “Disappointed!”
    • Lumos: “you’re like scorched earth, I’m done with this. And then still things backfire.” GM: “When you’re trying to leave angrily and then… your little jean belt gets hooked on the door.”
68. 1:15:29 The Arbiter’s end-of-round roll is 15: “See, we’re just warming up.”

Round 5 — Mom

69. 1:15:50 — The Twinkie. Ferndell searches for unmolten candy (perception 19).
    • Lumos is kicking around angrily in the ash, and she kicks up a gleaming Twinkie that flies right to him. He eats it, a free action, for 3 HP. “Every little bit helps.”
70. 1:17:03 He moonwalks back 30 feet “with style.”
71. 1:17:31 — Phantasmal Killer. He casts it at 5th level. Lumos’s deepest fear is Ferndell’s mom, standing in front of her “evil eyes… horrible and deadly.”
    • Who is she? “A very nice lady… she bakes cookies… how you imagine a grandmother looking with cookies fresh out of the oven, a nice white and pink apron, has recipes like everywhere, but like now looking deadly and murderous.”
72. 1:19:15 Lumos fails and takes 33. GM: “Did she beat you at a bake sale?”
    • Ferndell: “she throws a cookie at you, but it’s a very burnt cookie, so it’s honestly a shuriken at this point.” GM: “Mom is terrifying.”
73. 1:19:53 — Existential dread. Lumos sits down clutching her chest, “thinking about every choice in my life that’s brought me here… Did I leave a good legacy behind?”
    • She’ll have to save at the end of every turn. “No, I know I’m dying.” “I’m bleeding out… I’m coming in and out of consciousness.”
74. 1:21:06 — The Grandmaster’s inspiration. The Grandmaster stands: “Lumos, do not give up hope yet. You can do this… You show mom who’s boss,” and grants her a d4 inspiration.
75. 1:21:41 — The dog.
    • Lumos’s biggest worry is Maximus. Ferndell: “I can take care of your dog after you die.”
    • GM: “Make sure you have a will that takes care of your dogs, everyone.”
    • Lumos: “You will never see my dog again… Never talk to me or my son.”
    • She wants to heal Maximus. He isn’t hurt, because Ferndell charmed him. “Bribed.”
76. 1:22:41 — The hero point.
    • Lumos spends her hero point to act twice. She heals herself for 6: “Finally, I stopped bleeding when I cough, so that’s good news.”
    • She eats the Werther’s (d6): “It’s exactly what I thought Werther’s was gonna get me.” GM: “it’s just as healthy as the Twinkie.”
77. 1:25:57 Ferndell is 35 ft away, “Possibly a corgi throw if you’re strong.” “With the last of my strength, I summon a fireball.”
    • He saves and takes 14 (“we like to round up for pain”).
    • GM: “You’re both in the red. Perfect. Well matched… All for yogurt.” Arbiter: “All for yogurt.”
78. 1:28:11 — Fast Friends. As a bonus action she casts Fast Friends “so I can make sure that, like, if we both do die, that Ferndale doesn’t hate me.” “No hard feelings, my dude… I just, I want us to die friends.” GM: “Good friends push each other to the end in Deathmatches.”
    • Ferndell saves. Lumos: “You don’t want to be fucking friends, okay?… I’ll take every hint.”
    • Ferndell: “you support big yogurt and I don’t support big yogurt.”
    • Lumos: “Die alone, that’s fine, next to my dog.” “I can take care of your dog.” “I don’t let enemies touch my dog.” GM: “This is getting intense.”
79. 1:29:54 — The last save. “Mom appears again.” “You want some cookies?” (speaker uncertain: Lumos mimicking the mom, or a mom line). “Oy vey.”
    • She fails, and Mom deals 19 more. Lumos falls to her knees at 0 HP, conscious but dying.

Lumos’s death

80. 1:31:12 — Last words. “I should have been a better person! Why am I so fucking petty? Literally, pettiness is the death of me… learn from me, and know that no yogurt is worth dying over.”
81. 1:31:38 — The will.
    • “Maximus inherits all, so I’m really fucking loaded… He is the world’s first quadrillionaire dog.”
    • “He opens up a shelter for other dogs and actually Doug the Pug helps him run it.”
    • GM: “He absolutely does… Doug goes around helping out volunteers every Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sundays.”
82. 1:32:14 “I get one more kiss from Maximus on my cheek as I release my dying breath.”
83. 1:32:24 GM: “Lumos, close your eyes. Know that Maximus will be well taken care of and that your legacy will live on well through him. Arbiter, take Lumos off the field.” “Without the attitude.”
84. 1:32:41 The Arbiter flies down, grabs her by the ankle and drags her, her head going “pop, pop, pop,” through the rune, and disappears.

Victory

85. 1:32:58 — Mom’s goodbye. The GM asks what Ferndell’s summoned mother says in his moment of victory. “She says, kisses and then disappears.”
86. 1:33:20 — The hug. The Grandmaster steps down and opens her arms again, “completely forgetting that we had tag going on”; she has no idea who’s “it.” Table: there was no touching after the tag, so it would have killed Ferndell sooner if anything.
    • “Knowing that there is no ploy behind this,” Ferndell accepts.
    • GM: “Ferndell, you have made me, my acolytes, and your mother very proud.” She pulls away: “Now make sure you show for dinner on Friday. She told me to remind you about that.”
87. 1:34:08 — The pocket yogurt. Ferndell openly sticks yogurt into the Grandmaster’s pockets. She pulls it out: “it’s like from a little local brand here. So I’m all a fan of this.”
88. 1:34:34 She holds out her hand, and Ferndell is lifted into the sky to eye level with the Acolytes, who chant “Ferndell” (transcribed “burned out”).
89. 1:35:04 — The GM’s proclamation. “As promised, you had a huge fight showing blood and danger and fire and the hearts of dogs all around.”
    • “Ferndell as our winner, but also with yogurt. Down with big yogurt companies. Down with big yogurt. D20 Deathmatch and the Dread Fortress Arena will only use local yogurt vendors. The Arbiter, you’ll deal with the contracts.”
90. 1:35:41 The crowd goes wild. Blue raspberry slushies rain down, everyone screams his name, and children wave their t-shirts wanting him to sign them. “Welcome and good night.” “To D20 Deathmatch!”

Full Dried Blood notes (click to expand)

In-character or canon-relevant lines (Dried Blood):

• 1:37:03 GM: “You are currently revived, thus why you can participate in the interview.” Lumos is revived after her death.
• 1:36:49 Lumos reflects: “It was well deserved. I was an asshole… now that I’ve died, I had the opportunity to think back on my life.” She says she should have put the yogurt in another fridge, used an ice pack, or just asked him. “Like, I’m a miserable person. I was a miserable person.” Ferndell: “Yeah, you never asked me.”
• 1:38:29 Lumos used to print notes (“whoever’s taking my yogurt, can you not?”). Ferndell: “And it’s me responding with a smiley face.”
• 1:40:24–1:40:51 Maximus’s future.
  • Ferndell coins “Maximus the Bounty Hunter.”
  • Caustic Phoenix: “Maximus is a dog. He’s going to become a small dog deity of his own.”
  • Lumos: he’s “overcompensating for how crappy his owner was,” rescuing every animal nearby.
  • Ferndell thanks her because “it brought an amazing shelter… You did not die in vain whatsoever.”
• 1:40:59 Lumos: she was “sitting on quadrillion, quadramillions of dollars,” never funded nonprofits, and “probably like invested in Uber or WeWork.” “If I have the option to come back… a lot of like things I’ll have to change about my life.”
  • Ferndell and Caustic Phoenix: “You could have been Big Yogurt… You’re stealing from her company.”
• 1:45:02 Parting words.
  • Ferndell: “Don’t support big yogurt.” GM: “Local, every time.”
  • Lumos: “you cannot live with that anger. It will literally kill you… learn from my lesson, you will die. And the only thing left from you will be yogurt. And if you’re lucky, you’ll have a dog that can at least like atone for your life.”
• 1:45:55 Taxes. Lumos: “Arbiter, he might need some help with taxes since you’re doing taxes and stuff.” Arbiter: “Get in line.”
  • “The IRS is part of our world.” Caustic Phoenix: “We’ve made that official. I don’t know why we entered such an evil organization.” “We’ve done terrible things.”