fixing plotholes, streamlining

Core Move.md

@@ -75,10 +75,15 @@ them, closed business.
 
 This turns Mags from a **knowledge vending machine** into a source of **leads, not
 answers.** Players earn understanding by cross-referencing books + cult + Guest +
-Vetch's trip, not by unlocking one trusted NPC.
+the Ethereal creatures seen in Orenn's silver mirror, not by unlocking one trusted NPC.
 
 ## The thin point, the tear, and the two circles
 
+The **thin point and the tear are the same physical place** in the Deep Cellar's
+Old Work. “Thin point” names the natural planar weakness; “tear” or “rift” names
+what the old summoners did to that weakness. There is no second thin point in the
+upper cellar.
+
 - **Binding circle** (upper cellar): a *Magic Circle against fiends* — a **cage for
   a creature.** This was the den's **summoning-and-command circle** (you call a
   fiend into it so it can't claw you while you bind it). In the finale it's the
@@ -90,6 +95,17 @@ Vetch's trip, not by unlocking one trusted NPC.
 The one-liner: *the binding circle is a cage you put a monster in; the containment
 circle is a cork you put in a hole.* Both are **legacy** — the den's, not theirs.
 
+- **Vacancy and Hollowing require the tear.** Both vessel-workings must be performed
+  inside the Old Work's containment circle, where the breach can expose and redirect
+  a spirit. The upper binding circle cannot substitute for it.
+- **Destroying Xarrul requires no special place.** It has one hit point pool across
+  both planes and dies only if reduced to 0 HP in the Ethereal Plane. Hunters cover
+  both sides because Xarrul can dodge a group confined to either one; there are no
+  synchronized final blows. No thin point, rift or circle is additionally required.
+- **Xarrul's physical lair is at the tear.** During the lockdown, the sealed house
+  carries its influence everywhere, so the entire Nether Inn counts as its lair for
+  lair-action mechanics.
+
 ## The diffuse bleed = the obliviousness engine
 
 The Opening and the failing tear are the **same physical phenomenon** — a thinning
@@ -112,9 +128,9 @@ everything misfiled outward:**
 - City map pinned with district deaths/disappearances/madness — some are **Thera's
   soul-harvest** (real, human), some are people the tear frayed. Lumped as
   "someone's working the district."
-- A watch-list of patrons who "changed" — **Bren** (raving), **Vetch** (chasing
-  stronger dust). Filed as recruits/addicts/marks; actually the thin point
-  fraying them.
+- A watch-list of patrons who "changed" — **Bren** (raving), several neighbours
+  reporting the same cold dreams, and regulars who stopped returning. Filed as
+  recruits, marks or street-level fallout; actually the thin point fraying them.
 - The **Order of Mending** file — Guest's intel, meeting frequency, a name
   (*Vyre?*), the bronze pins. His strongest, realest lead — and the exact thing
   that let him misattribute everything else.
@@ -137,18 +153,20 @@ everything misfiled outward:**
   it.** (The module already calls it *"the tavern's stored wards"* — this reveals
   what they were for.) Mags inherited it as *"the panic button that bolts the doors"*
   and has no idea it seals across planes.
-- **Why Xarrul needs it.** While the house bled freely across planes — a leaky, open
-  boundary — the fiend's crossing effort *dissipated*; it could only jaunt partway,
-  for seconds. Sealing the house turns it into a **closed cross-planar vessel**: now
-  the one thing already inside on the ethereal side (Xarrul) can finish its crossing
-  through the tear without the energy leaking away, and the summoners' "limit the
-  breach to a single entity" safeguard *guarantees* that entity is it. The
-  containment button built to protect the city is a bespoke door for exactly one
-  guest. Mags thinks she's building a cage; she's finishing Xarrul's door.
-- **Before the crystal breaks:** partway jaunts only — enough to kill an
-  unsuspecting Orenn in the dark, no more. **After:** a closed vessel; Xarrul crosses
-  in earnest over the night, and when the **seal lapses at midnight** it walks out
-  real. The **lockdown timer IS the clock.**
+- **Why Xarrul needs it.** The emergency device trades a cork for a bottle. It pulls
+  power away from the internal planar seals and spends that power on an exterior
+  shell around every version of the house. That lets the one intruder already at the
+  fault cross fully into the Material interior while ensuring nothing can escape on
+  any plane. Mags thinks she is only building a cage; she is also opening the cage's
+  inner door.
+- **Before the crystal breaks:** Xarrul is stuck on the Ethereal side. A full night
+  working the tear stores one three-round Material incursion, and it can hold only
+  one. It spends tonight's charge on Brand → Visions → Multiattack against Orenn.
+  **After:** it has crossed into the sealed interior and regains Ethereal Jaunt there,
+  but cannot leave in any form. The shell also prevents the Guest's Astral release,
+  so the Vacancy cannot begin during lockdown. At midnight the shell lapses and
+  power returns to the inner seals, creating the single three-round Vacancy window
+  before the tear reseals. The **lockdown timer IS the clock.**
 - **Not luck.** Xarrul is ancient and patient and has watched the house
   ethereally for a long time. The tavern has a **known, ritualized response to a
   killing** (the whole no-kill premise). Xarrul weaponizes the house's own
@@ -158,15 +176,27 @@ everything misfiled outward:**
 - **One murder, three payoffs:** (1) removes the one watcher circling it;
   (2) triggers the keystone lockdown; (3) frames the outsiders → conscripts the
   PCs, keeps the factions hunting each other, seals everyone in.
+- **The Guest stays Xarrul's hand.** Xarrul first promised never to kill the Guest,
+  which rules out forced Hollowing of the changeling. Their later compact permits
+  Xarrul to kill Orenn as the one death needed to close the house, then forbids it
+  from killing anyone else until the exchange finishes (except direct defense against
+  binding, banishment, or destruction). The promise does not make Xarrul responsible
+  for violence the factions choose themselves, so provoking faction war is its central
+  loophole. If the Guest dies, the exchange becomes impossible and the restraint lifts
+  immediately; its killer becomes Xarrul's first replacement-vessel target. When the
+  Guest is delivered Astral, that temporary restraint also ends; if the transfer was
+  secret Xarrul leaves disguised, while an exposed transfer may lead to cleanup.
+- **The Deep Cellar is leverage, not a progress bar.** Once lockdown begins, Xarrul
+  has already crossed into the sealed interior. It guards the cellar because it
+  contains the Guest, the anti-fiend tools, evidence of the compact, and the only
+  place where Xarrul must surrender Jaunt during the midnight Vacancy.
 
 ## Consequences that fall out for free
 
-- **The obstacle inverts into a weapon.** Once players learn what the crystal did,
-  **breaching an exit** (already in the rules) becomes an anti-Xarrul tactic:
-  puncturing the shell on a plane re-opens the boundary, the closed vessel goes leaky
-  again, and the crossing destabilizes — Xarrul can't complete tonight (at worst it
-  slips away ethereally to try elsewhere later). The thing they wanted to escape is
-  the thing they smash on purpose.
+- **The exterior shell is not a weapon.** The party can break the mundane door and
+  expose the planar surface behind it, but cannot puncture, dispel or invert the shell
+  during the session. Their leverage is inside: the Guest, the bell, the foundation
+  sigils, the binding circle, planar sight and political control of the room.
 - **The seal makes the source findable (the inflection).** Before tonight the
   failing tear leaked and *diffused across the whole district* — wide, flat, no
   gradient — which is exactly why Orenn read it as a city problem and never localized
@@ -183,7 +213,7 @@ no moral bias. Single goal — **to be real**, to cross and live — and it is
 determined, picking the most viable course of action regardless of the morality of
 it. It was used as an evil tool for centuries; it will not shy from evil acts now.
 But it **won't reach for harm without a reason** — no threat, no attack. **Not
-reckless.** A mastermind, not a liar: manipulating events is not deceiving those it
+reckless.** A manipulator, not a liar: manipulating events is not deceiving those it
 deals with. This *sharpens* the Open Door choice — siding with something ruthless
 *and* honest, because the cult is worse.
 
@@ -191,7 +221,7 @@ deals with. This *sharpens* the Open Door choice — siding with something ruthl
 
 Late-game, the players — or Mags — realize the lockdown *she* triggered to protect
 everyone is what let Xarrul cross. It killed Orenn and then used her grief and her
-protocol to finish its door. Fits her fatalism and the Warden's Mark; fuels her in
+protocol to trade the inner barrier for an outer cage. Fits her fatalism and the Warden's Mark; fuels her in
 the finale rather than paralyzing her.
 
 ## Blast radius — files to bring into line

handouts/character-secrets.md

@@ -65,16 +65,16 @@ Each has four parts: **Boon** (an asset you have now) · **Goal** (your secret o
 >
 > **Payoff — *immediate, and powerful.*** The countersign buys **one face, not loyalty**. Once before dawn the Guest will become anyone you name—walk past a locked door as Mags, alibi you, whisper a lie in a rival's voice—or stand beside you during the Reckoning as a full ally (CR 3). It honors that one favor exactly. It does not agree that this makes it your handler's property.
 >
-> **The Catch — CROSS / ALIGN.** Someone else was sent for the Guest too—but *not* to free it. If they reach the cell first, your asset is a corpse and your payoff is gone. If you rescue it, the conflict changes: it means to use Xarrul's transfer to claim the Inn, not follow you out. During [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit), you may have to defend its projected spirit from your own companion and then decide whether extraction means dragging a newly empowered person away from the home it claims.
+> **The Catch — CROSS / ALIGN.** Someone else was sent for the Guest too—but *not* to free it. If they reach the cell first, your asset is a corpse and your payoff is gone. If you rescue it, the conflict changes: it means to use Xarrul's transfer to claim the Inn, not follow you out. During [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy), you may have to defend its projected spirit from your own companion. If Xarrul wins, your asset remains alive but bodiless in the Astral Plane; if the Guest wins, it plans to take Mags's form and keep the Inn.
 
 ### 4. The Executioner
 > **Boon — Cold Hands.** You've done ugly work in dark rooms. You have **advantage on saving throws against being frightened**, and the horrors below rattle you less than they should.
 >
-> **Goal — Silence the Guest.** A patron paid you to make sure the thing in the cellar never speaks again—kill it, ensure it stays caged when this place burns, or sever its projected spirit during [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit). It knows too much about someone who's paying to stay unknown, and a Guest that inherits Xarrul will be almost impossible to reach afterward.
+> **Goal — Silence the Guest.** A patron paid you to make sure the thing in the cellar never speaks again—kill it, ensure it stays caged when this place burns, or sever its projected spirit during [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy). It knows too much about someone who's paying to stay unknown, and a Guest that inherits Xarrul will be almost impossible to reach afterward.
 >
 > **Payoff — *immediate, and vicious.*** From the Guest you take a **vial of face-oil** — a shapeshifter's keepsake. Once before dawn, **read one creature's surface thoughts as *detect thoughts* (no save)** — including a fellow PC's. Learn a secret. Use it however you like. Also: your fee is stashed behind a loose stone near the cellar stairs — **50 gp and a *Potion of Heroism*, findable now.**
 >
-> **The Catch — CROSS.** Someone at this table wants that thing freed and believes they are rescuing it. They are working against you, whether they've said a word or not. A second person needs it alive long enough to *ask it a question*. During the Vacancy, the Guest and Xarrul become separate targets for three rounds: the cleanest shot you will ever receive, in front of everyone who wants it protected.
+> **The Catch — CROSS.** Someone at this table wants that thing freed and believes they are rescuing it. They are working against you, whether they've said a word or not. A second person needs it alive long enough to *ask it a question*. During the Vacancy, the Guest and Xarrul become separate targets for three rounds: the cleanest shot you will ever receive. But the Guest's survival is also the leash on Xarrul: killing it ends the compact's restraint, lets Xarrul kill directly, and makes the Executioner its first-choice replacement for the Hollowing. The Guest says so plainly. The contract can be completed and still make the night much worse.
 
 ### 5. The Recruit
 > **Boon — The Order's Regard.** You carry a hidden **Order of Mending pin**. Shown to a cultist, it marks you as one of the faithful — they speak candidly, and treat you as a promising prospect.

handouts/the-conversion.md

@@ -86,6 +86,6 @@ Killing or binding Xarrul does **not** auto-free them either. The object of thei
 
 ## Hooks
 
-- **Scenario F engine.** A pre-converted PC arguing for [The Open Door](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-the-open-door-joining-xarrul) from *inside* the party is the single best on-ramp to that ending — especially with six players, where one persuasive convert can genuinely swing the table.
-- **The dual-plane irony.** The [dual-plane kill](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-c-the-dual-plane-kill) needs someone on the Ethereal Plane — and the convert's Grey Step is a free ticket there. Except they *believe Xarrul shouldn't die.* Do they lend the Step to the kill, withhold it, or use it to shield the fiend? The whole endgame tension, living in one player.
-- **It collides with the [character secrets](character-secrets.md).** A converted **Handler's Agent** frees the Guest and enables [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit), then has reason to protect Xarrul's side of the exchange. A converted **Executioner** must decide which projected spirit to strike. A converted **Mourner** stops wanting the couple's killers answered for. Deal the conversion onto a PC already carrying a dossier and the night detonates.
+- **Scenario F engine.** A pre-converted PC arguing to [side deliberately with Xarrul](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-deliberately-side-with-xarrul) from *inside* the party is the single best on-ramp to that ending — especially with six players, where one persuasive convert can genuinely swing the table.
+- **The Ethereal irony.** [Destroying Xarrul](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-c-ethereal-destruction) needs someone waiting on the Ethereal Plane — and the convert's Grey Step is a free ticket there. Except they *believe Xarrul shouldn't die.* Do they lend the Step to the pursuit, withhold it, or use it to shield the fiend? The whole endgame tension, living in one player.
+- **It collides with the [character secrets](character-secrets.md).** A converted **Handler's Agent** frees the Guest and enables [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy), then has reason to protect Xarrul's side of the exchange. A converted **Executioner** must decide which projected spirit to strike. A converted **Mourner** stops wanting the couple's killers answered for. Deal the conversion onto a PC already carrying a dossier and the night detonates.

location/back-rooms.md

@@ -13,7 +13,7 @@ A surprisingly clean workspace, considering the establishment. Mags runs a tight
 ### Details
 
 - **Mags's short sword** hangs among the kitchen implements. It's well-oiled and recently sharpened despite "retirement." This is a **+1 short sword** — Mags won't give it up willingly but might lend it if she trusts the players and believes they're hunting the real killer.
-- **Herb rack** — Among cooking herbs, DC 14 Nature or Herbalism Kit check identifies **dried nightwhisper** (a component in Veil Dust preparation) and **silvervein root** (a mild ward against fiendish influence — chewing it grants advantage on one saving throw against a fiend's ability within the next hour).
+- **Herb rack** — Among cooking herbs, DC 14 Nature or Herbalism Kit check identifies **silvervein root** (a mild ward against fiendish influence — chewing it grants advantage on one saving throw against a fiend's ability within the next hour). Cut stems and matching twine show that Orenn recently carried part of the bundle down to the hidden Workroom.
 - **Mags's apron pocket** — She carries a small iron key (opens the storage room's hidden compartment) and a folded piece of parchment: a letter from Orenn dated three months ago. *"If something happens to me in the bar, it came from between. Check the cellar wards. Don't trust what you see. Trust the bell."* — Mags hasn't read it yet. She will during the session if given time alone, or players can find it if she's incapacitated or if they pickpocket her (DC 19 Sleight of Hand — she's alert).
 
 ## Storage Room
@@ -26,6 +26,7 @@ A cramped room off the kitchen. Barrels of ale, crates of root vegetables, hangi
 - **Hidden compartment (DC 15 Investigation):** Behind a false barrel-back, a narrow shelf contains:
   - 4 vials of **Holy Water**
   - 1 vial of **Silversheen** (coat a weapon, treat it as silvered for 1 hour)
+  - 1 vial of **Oil of Etherealness**, wrapped in grey felt and labeled *"ten minutes—far side—one hour."* This is one of the Inn's **three normally discoverable field doses**.
   - A leather roll of **fine instruments** — the summoners' old diagnostic kit, kept and well-used by Orenn: something between thieves' tools and a surgeon's set. Grants advantage on Investigation checks related to the arcane or extraplanar if the user is proficient in either thieves' tools or arcana. Old, irreplaceable, and not originally theirs.
   - A **warding chalk** (3 uses) — can draw a 5-foot circle that functions as a Magic Circle against fiends for 10 minutes per use. Faster and cheaper than the spell, but the duration is limited.
 - **Floor trapdoor:** Leads to the cellar. Not hidden — just heavy and stiff. DC 12 Athletics to open quietly, or just yank it (noisy, everyone in the kitchen hears).
@@ -59,5 +60,5 @@ A small room with a lockable door, a table, two benches, and a single candle sco
 A modest room. A bed, a wardrobe, a desk. Everything is clean and ordered. Two people who learned to live in small spaces together.
 
 - **Desk:** Contains correspondence with a contact in the city watch — Orenn was feeding them information about the cult's activities, slowly and carefully. He suspected the Order of Mending was more than scholars. He didn't know about the fiend.
-- **Wardrobe:** Behind a false back (DC 14 Investigation), a small arsenal: 2 silvered daggers, a vial of **Oil of Etherealness** (1 dose — allows the user to enter the Ethereal Plane for 1 hour, as per the spell), and a **leather-bound bestiary** focused on fiends. Bookmarked pages describe entities matching Xarrul's type — Orenn was doing research. He was worried but hadn't figured out what was coming.
+- **Wardrobe:** Behind a false back (DC 14 Investigation), a small arsenal: 2 silvered daggers, one vial of **Oil of Etherealness**, and a **leather-bound bestiary** focused on fiends. Applying the oil takes 10 minutes; afterward the user gains the effect of the *Etherealness* spell for 1 hour. A bookmarked [entry on veil-stepping fiends](../prints/bestiar-dvojstini.md) describes entities matching Xarrul's type — Orenn was doing research. He was worried but hadn't figured out what was coming. This is one of the Inn's **three normally discoverable field doses**.
 - **Under the bed:** A lockbox (DC 16 Thieves' Tools). Contains 150 gp (their savings), a deed to the tavern, and two silver rings — simple, unadorned. Mags will quietly close the box if she sees this. It's not relevant to the investigation. It's just a life.

location/cellar.md

@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 
 Beneath the Nether Inn, accessed through the trapdoor in the storage room. The air changes immediately — colder, damper, and carrying a faint metallic tang that doesn't come from the pipes.
 
-> **DM note — this is the *upper* cellar.** Everything the endgame needs is here: the thin point, the summoners' binding circle, and the old foundation sigils. The [Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md) still plays out in this room, unchanged. But behind the barrel racks is a **[concealed door](#the-concealed-door)** down to the [Deep Cellar](deep-cellar.md) — the vast, hidden warren where Orenn and Mags kept the real secrets (their fortune, their prisoners, their laboratory, and a widening rift). The Deep Cellar is the module's exploration track and is entirely optional. Casual visitors to the cellar see only this room.
+> **DM note — this is the *upper* cellar.** Its occult centerpiece is the summoners' **binding circle**, supported by old foundation sigils. There is no thin point or tear in this room: both names refer to the single breach in the [Old Work](deep-cellar.md#the-old-work), far below. Behind the barrel racks is a **[concealed door](#the-concealed-door)** down to the [Deep Cellar](deep-cellar.md) — the vast, hidden warren where Orenn and Mags kept the real secrets (their fortune, their prisoners, their laboratory, and the breach). Casual visitors to the cellar see only this room.
 
 ## Read-Aloud: Descending
 
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ The cellar is a single irregular space carved into bedrock, roughly 10 meters by
 │ ╚══════╝     └──────────┘       │
 │  [Barrel                         │
 │   Racks]                         │
-│  [Old        [Thin Point]        │
+│  [Old                            │
 │   Crates]                        │
 │  [Orenn's                        │
 │   Circle]    ┌────┐              │
@@ -45,7 +45,7 @@ Wine and spirits too good for the upstairs crowd. A few barrels are marked with
 - A stoppered clay jug of **Alchemist's Fire** (3 flasks worth)
 - A bundle of **iron nails inscribed with tiny runes** (10 nails). Hammering one into a surface creates a minor ward — any fiend crossing within 5 feet of it takes 1d4 radiant damage and the nail glows white-hot for 1 round, alerting anyone nearby. Single use per nail.
 
-### The Concealed Door (Behind the Barrel Racks, North Wall)
+### The Concealed Door
 
 What looks like raw bedrock behind the barrel racks is a **shell of stone facing an iron door**. This is the entrance to the [Deep Cellar](deep-cellar.md) — the hidden lower level, and the module's exploration track.
 
@@ -62,14 +62,15 @@ See **[deep-cellar.md](deep-cellar.md)** for the full lower level.
 
 Genuinely old supplies: moth-eaten cloth, rusted tools, empty bottles. Nothing useful — but the crates themselves are positioned to obscure the circle on the floor behind them. Someone (Orenn) arranged them this way deliberately.
 
-The crates and the whole west corner are furred with thick, greyed spider-silk — far more than a damp cellar earns. **(Foreshadowing:** something big webs the dark below; see [Twinkle](deep-cellar.md#encounter--the-guardian).) The silk thins to nothing at the barrel racks, which are swept clean by regular handling — a tell in its own right (see the [Concealed Door](#the-concealed-door-behind-the-barrel-racks-north-wall)).
+The crates and the whole west corner are furred with thick, greyed spider-silk — far more than a damp cellar earns. **(Foreshadowing:** something big webs the dark below; see [Twinkle](deep-cellar.md#encounter--the-guardian).) The silk thins to nothing at the barrel racks, which are swept clean by regular handling — a tell in its own right (see the [Concealed Door](#the-concealed-door)).
 
 ### The Binding Circle (South)
 
-Hidden behind the crates. A permanent **Magic Circle against fiends** etched into the bedrock with silver inlay — **master-level work, and not Orenn's.** It belonged to the summoners who ran this house before them: DC 16 Arcana identifies it as a **summoning-and-binding circle**, the kind a warlock calls a fiend *into* so the thing can't reach them while they bargain and bind it. Orenn and Mags left it where they found it and never had cause — or the craft — to use it. (This is exactly why the cult's own Haddon can work it in the [rebinding](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding): it's a summoner's tool, and he's a summoner.)
+Hidden behind the crates. A permanent **Magic Circle against fiends** etched into the bedrock with silver inlay packed with fine black salt — **master-level work, and not Orenn's.** The packing is the stable, geometric form of [Veilhook Salt](deep-cellar.md#the-fixers-arsenal): silver carries the prohibition while the circle sustains it, preventing a captured creature from escaping between planes. It belonged to the summoners who ran this house before them: DC 16 Arcana identifies it as a **summoning-and-binding circle**, the kind a warlock calls a fiend *into* so the thing can't reach them while they bargain and bind it. Orenn and Mags left it where they found it and never had cause — or the craft — to use it. (This is exactly why the cult's own Haddon can work it in the [rebinding](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding): it's a summoner's tool, and he's a summoner.)
 
-- The circle is **intact and functional**. If Xarrul can be lured here and trapped, the circle activates automatically — the fiend must succeed on a DC 17 Charisma saving throw or be contained.
-- **Limitation:** The circle only works on the Material Plane. If Xarrul is in the Ethereal Plane, it has no effect. Players must first drag Xarrul fully across with [Veilhook Salt](deep-cellar.md#the-fixers-arsenal), catch it during a voluntary manifestation, or pursue the dual-plane kill.
+- The circle is **intact and functional**. If Material Xarrul enters it, the circle activates automatically — the fiend must succeed on a DC 17 Charisma saving throw or be contained. On a failure, it cannot willingly cross the circle or change planes while the circle remains intact.
+- **Rebinding adaptation:** After the first four knots are prepared with the coffer, Dalla's blood and Xarrul's true name, a failed DC 17 save closes a stronger salt-and-name matrix. It suppresses Xarrul's movement and fresh hostile effects across the boundary while the final three knots are spoken. Existing Brand links remain live, and Xarrul can still speak, steal voices and bargain. See [The Rebinding](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding).
+- **Limitation:** By itself, the circle cannot perceive or catch an Ethereal creature in the corresponding space. Portable [Veilhook Salt](deep-cellar.md#the-fixers-arsenal), *Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum* or comparable magic must first keep Xarrul Material. The coffer's [Litany of the Averted Step](../prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md) then limits where it can retreat while the party supplies forced movement. Bell, restored sigils and circle instead close around both planar states and remove the need to anchor it first.
 
 ### Foundation Stones & the Old Sigils (Center, North)
 
@@ -77,29 +78,10 @@ The exposed foundation stones of the tavern above. Carved into them are **sigils
 
 **Current state:** the stone around a few of the sigils is **warm to the touch** despite the cellar's cold. **DC 13 Arcana** reveals the old work is being *drawn on* — something has been feeding on it from the Ethereal side for weeks. **DC 16 Arcana** identifies the influence as fiendish. (This is Xarrul, siphoning the leftover craft to help pry open the [Old Work](deep-cellar.md#the-old-work) far below — the upstairs symptom of the real damage downstairs. It is *not* a broken barrier; it's a breadcrumb pointing the players **down.**)
 
-- **Rekindling a sigil.** A character with the right knowledge (a book from the house, or the [Guest's](../npc/the-guest.md) coaching) plus **warding chalk** (from storage) and a **DC 15 Arcana** check can wake one sigil into a genuine local ward, drawing on the thin point: while it holds, **Xarrul has disadvantage on Ethereal Jaunt within the tavern.** Failure expends the chalk. This is the players *doing* the craft the owners never could.
-
-### The Thin Point (East)
-
-The air here is wrong. Not cold, not warm — *thin*. Characters standing here feel a sensation like vertigo even on solid ground. Hair stands on end. Sounds seem to come from slightly wrong directions.
-
-**DC 12 Arcana or Perception:** The boundary between the Material Plane and the Ethereal Plane is naturally weak at this exact spot. This isn't artificial — the tavern was built on top of it.
-
-**DC 15 Arcana:** This thin point is why the tavern attracted the clientele it did. Subconsciously, people attuned to the arcane or the extraplanar gravitate toward places like this. The cultists didn't choose this tavern randomly. The fiend didn't target it randomly. Everything leads back here.
-
-**If a player takes Veil Dust here:** The effect is *doubled*. Instead of 1 minute, the trip lasts 10 minutes, and the visions are vivid and controllable rather than hallucinatory. The user can interact with ethereal entities directly (including Skein and Xarrul) for the duration. This is the ideal location for the dual-plane kill.
-
-**If the warding chalk circle is drawn here:** It functions as a full Magic Circle (as the spell, 1 hour duration) rather than the reduced 10-minute version, powered by the thin point's natural energy.
+- **Restoring the lattice.** A character with the right knowledge (a summoner book, Haddon's help or the [Guest's](../npc/the-guest.md) coaching), one use of **warding chalk**, and a **DC 16 Arcana** check can reconnect the surviving sigils. Failure expends the chalk. Restored sigils glow but do nothing alone. While the [iron bell](main-hall.md#the-fireplace) is ringing, they prevent Xarrul from using Ethereal Jaunt while it is inside the binding circle. If Xarrul is driven into that circle while both effects are active, bell, sigils and circle seal it consciously between planes. This is the players *doing* the craft the owners never could.
 
 ## Ethereal Plane Overlay
 
-For the DM: in the Ethereal Plane, the cellar looks different. The stone walls glow faintly with the ghost-light of old wards. The summoners' sigils appear as faint lines being *drained* — thin threads of light bleeding away toward the thin point. The thin point is a *tear* — not metaphorical, a visible rip in the grey fabric of the Ethereal Plane, showing the Material Plane through it in muted color.
+For the DM: in the Ethereal Plane, the stone walls glow faintly with the ghost-light of old wards. The foundation sigils continue as thin silver lines through the floor and down into the hidden level. Most are dark or flickering; the surviving light is being drawn downward toward the Old Work.
 
-**Xarrul** uses the cellar as its lair when resting. Ethereal-plane observers might find:
-- Claw marks on the ethereal stone near the sigils (this is where it's been siphoning the old work)
-- A nest of sorts — shadows coiled into a shape suggesting something sleeps here
-- The faint, acrid smell of the Brand of Spite (the ability that killed Orenn)
-
-## Read-Aloud: The Thin Point
-
-> *Něco tu nesedí. Ne nebezpečného — nebo ne zjevně — ale prostě špatného. Vzduch je tu jiný. Není studený ani teplý, je tenký, jako by tu bylo o jednu vrstvu reality míň, než by mělo být. Cítíte lehké závratě, přestože stojíte na pevné zemi. Vlasy na rukou se vám zvedají. A zvuky — kroky, kapání vody, váš vlastní dech — přicházejí z lehce špatných směrů, jako ozvěny v místnosti, která by neměla mít ozvěnu.*
+The **binding circle** blazes with clean silver light. It is a cage, not a breach: there is no rip, window, nest, or thin place inside it. Xarrul may pass through this room while working elsewhere in the house, but it does not rest here and leaves no lair behind.

location/deep-cellar.md

@@ -6,13 +6,13 @@
 
 ## Purpose (For the DM)
 
-This level is the **exploration spine** of the module — the track for players who came to *do* things, not talk. It rewards sneaking, searching, lockpicking, and picking fights carefully. Everything here is optional. A party can solve the murder without ever finding the concealed door. But a party that goes down here finds:
+This level is the **exploration spine** of the module — the track for players who came to *do* things, not talk. It rewards sneaking, searching, lockpicking, and picking fights carefully. Finding and exploring it is optional for the party; Xarrul's unattended plan still uses its tear whether they discover the level or not. A party can solve the murder without ever finding the concealed door. But a party that goes down here finds:
 
 - **Useful things** — a scavenged anti-fiend kit, alchemy, coin, and one or two items that make the Reckoning easier.
 - **Backstory, told by the room** — the truth about who Orenn and Mags really were, discovered through what they kept, caged, and buried, without a single NPC having to explain it.
 - **A fight, on the party's terms** — a guardian, an infestation, a haunting, and a caged thing that might not stay caged.
 
-**This does NOT relocate the endgame.** The Reckoning still happens in the **[Upper Cellar](../location/cellar.md)** — the thin point, the summoners' binding circle, and the old foundation sigils are all up there and unchanged. The Deep Cellar is a *second, lower level* reached through a concealed door. Its own rift (the Old Work, below) is the same planar fault seen deeper and worse; it is a source of dread, backstory, and monsters — **not** the dual-plane-kill site. If in doubt, keep binding and killing Xarrul upstairs where the circle is.
+The two cellar levels serve different endgame functions. The **[Upper Cellar](../location/cellar.md)** holds the summoners' binding circle: a cage used for rebinding or sealing Xarrul. The **Old Work** at the bottom of this level holds the one true planar breach. “Thin point,” “tear,” and “rift” all describe that same place. The Vacancy can happen there only during the three-round resealing window when the lockdown lapses at midnight, because it must deliver the Guest Astral. The forced Hollowing also requires the tear but can begin during lockdown; its destroyed spirit never has to cross the exterior shell. Destroying Xarrul is different: it can be completed anywhere by reducing it to 0 HP on the Ethereal Plane; Material and Ethereal hunters cover both sides only to stop it dodging between them.
 
 ---
 
@@ -23,7 +23,6 @@ The only entrance is the **concealed iron door** in the Upper Cellar (see [cella
 - **DC 15 Investigation** on the north wall behind the barrel racks — the "living rock" there is a cleverly fitted iron door faced with a shell of real stone. A cold draft and a faint drag-scuff on the earth floor give it away.
 - **DC 15 Perception** — the same cold draft, plus the smell (copper, tallow, something animal underneath).
 - **Orenn's keys** (on his body) include a heavy, plain black iron key that fits nothing upstairs. It fits here.
-- **Vetch's lead:** if the players agree to recover his confiscated Veil Dust, he shows them the cold seam behind the northern racks. They find the door automatically, though they still need Orenn's key, *Knock*, or another way through its Arcane Lock.
 - **Mags** will only reveal it under the most extreme trust (see [mags.md](../npc/mags.md)) — and even then reluctantly. Players who *find it themselves* rob her of the choice, which is very much the point of this track.
 
 The door itself is locked (**Arcane Lock**, DC 20 to force, DC 25 Thieves' Tools; Orenn's black key or *Knock* bypasses it). Behind it: rough steps cut into bedrock, descending.
@@ -126,7 +125,8 @@ A low chamber sealed by a banded door under a permanent **Arcane Lock** (Orenn's
 ### The Fixers' Arsenal
 Rewards for going deep — none of it breaks the Reckoning, most of it *helps* it. Most of this is the **summoners' leftover safety kit** (you stock silver and holy water when you call up fiends for a living), topped up by the couple's own reactive buys from the handful of jobs that turned out not to be human:
 
-- **Veilhook Salt (4 doses).** As an action, throw a pinch at an extraplanar creature you can perceive within 10 ft. A target on the Ethereal Plane can be targeted only by someone able to see and interact across the boundary (such as a creature under Veil Dust). The target makes a DC 14 Charisma save. On a failure it is **dragged fully onto the Material Plane**, appearing in the corresponding space or the nearest unoccupied space, and cannot change planes until the end of its next turn. A target already on the Material Plane is simply anchored there for the duration. *This is the exploration reward that lets a Veil Dust user hook Xarrul across the boundary so the rest of the party can drive it into the binding circle.*
+- **[Veilhook Salt](../prints/veilhook-salt.md) (4 doses).** As an action, expend one dose by casting or pressing the salt onto a creature within 5 feet of you on your current plane. The salt takes hold automatically. Until the start of your next turn, the target cannot teleport or travel to another plane. Removing the grains does not end the effect. Maintaining the anchor therefore requires someone to remain adjacent, spend an action and consume another dose each round. *A Material character can Ready this action for the moment Xarrul manifests: it still completes its attack, but cannot answer the party's retaliation with Slip Between.*
+- **One [Faded Scroll of Etherealness](../prints/faded-scroll-of-etherealness.md).** Anyone who can read a written language can activate it as an action to gain the effect of *Etherealness* for 1 minute. A second copy is in the Workroom emergency kit.
 - A **quiver of 10 silvered crossbow bolts** and a **matched silvered hand crossbow** (well-kept, +0 but silvered).
 - 2 vials of **Holy Water**, 1 more vial of **Silversheen**, and a jar of **warding chalk (2 uses)** — stacks with the storage-room supplies for a party that hunts both caches.
 - A **Potion of Heroism** and a **Potion of Greater Healing** (×2) — the couple's "before the bad jobs" stash.
@@ -149,7 +149,9 @@ Two cells cut side by side, iron-barred, fitted with the runed nails and a warde
 
 **Occupied.** A changeling the couple has held for years and used as an off-book asset. Full write-up, stat block, leverage, and dialogue in **[npc/the-guest.md](../npc/the-guest.md)**.
 
-Short version for the DM: the Guest is the beating heart of "they still have something going on." It's alive, lucid, a fluent liar, and it knows more about Orenn, Mags, *and the Order of Mending* than anyone the players have met — because Orenn used it to spy on the cult. It has also spent weeks speaking to Xarrul through the walls, helped the fiend choose Orenn, and negotiated to exchange its body for spectral ownership of the Inn. It intends to betray that bargain with the party's help and take both Xarrul's power and the tavern. Freeing, killing or trusting it determines whether [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit) is available. Read its file before running this room.
+Short version for the DM: the Guest is the beating heart of "they still have something going on." It's alive, lucid, a fluent liar, and it knows more about Orenn, Mags, *and the Order of Mending* than anyone the players have met — because Orenn used it to spy on the cult. It has also spent weeks speaking to Xarrul through the walls, helped the fiend choose Orenn, and proposed exchanging its body for Astral survival. Xarrul promised never to kill the Guest, making forced Hollowing of the changeling impossible, and accepted one further term: it may kill Orenn but nobody else until the exchange finishes. Xarrul answers that leash by provoking mortals to kill one another. If the Guest dies, the exchange becomes impossible, the restraint lifts, and its killer becomes Xarrul's first replacement target. The Guest intends to betray the bargain with the party's help, take Xarrul's power, lure Mags into Cell One and keep the Inn wearing her face. Freeing, killing or trusting it determines whether [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy) or [Hollowing](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-h-the-hollowing) occurs. Read its file before running this room.
+
+**The lower alarm.** The cell's runed nails, concealed-door ward and Twinkle's anchor web form a crude warning system keyed to the black iron key. Forced movement of a living creature across Cell One's threshold, or Xarrul opening the cell from the Ethereal side, turns the key cold against Mags's body and makes Twinkle hammer the Workroom wall with its forelegs. The alarm gives direction, not identity. Haddon can recognize it as the start of a vessel-working; Mags will not explain the level or allow the cultists below.
 
 > **Read-Aloud: Cell One**
 >
@@ -157,7 +159,7 @@ Short version for the DM: the Guest is the beating heart of "they still have som
 >
 > *"No konečně," řekne. "Začínal jsem mít strach, že na mě zapomněli."*
 
-**The conversation stain.** A character viewing the cell through Veil Dust, Oil of Etherealness or another Ethereal sight sees hair-thin amber lines caught around the bars, running down the corridor toward the thin point. They do not resemble claw marks or an attempted breach; they gather at head height, where two people might stand to speak. **DC 15 Arcana or Insight:** the fiend has visited this cell repeatedly, and the prisoner was not merely being hunted. They communicated. The Guest answers a direct question truthfully—*„Nabídl mi cestu, za kterou žádná klec nedosáhne”*—while omitting the bargain's terms.
+**The conversation stain.** A character physically present in the Ethereal Plane, under Oil of Etherealness or comparable planar travel, sees hair-thin amber lines caught around the bars, running down the corridor toward the thin point. They do not resemble claw marks or an attempted breach; they gather at head height, where two people might stand to speak. **DC 15 Arcana or Insight:** the fiend has visited this cell repeatedly, and the prisoner was not merely being hunted. They communicated. The Guest answers a direct question truthfully—*„Nabídl mi cestu, za kterou žádná klec nedosáhne”*—while omitting the bargain's terms.
 
 ### Cell Two — The Long Dead
 
@@ -186,13 +188,13 @@ A long, low chamber that smells of vinegar, sulphur, crushed herbs, and cold ash
 This is the other half of "still something going on." The couple never stopped brewing:
 
 - **Fiend-hunting alchemicals** — the source of the holy water, silversheen, alchemist's fire, and warding chalk found throughout the tavern. They supplied *themselves*.
-- **Veil Dust research.** A locked drawer (DC 14) holds **4 doses of Veil Dust** plus a notebook studying it—not as a drug but as a tool for watching the thin point. Three are Orenn and Mags's measured work doses; the fourth is still folded in Vetch's grubby academy-paper packet, confiscated after his collapse. **This connects to the [ethereal-trip](../storylines/ethereal-trip.md) subplot** and pays off Vetch's lead immediately: the Workroom is the first chamber beyond the concealed descent. The notebook confirms the couple brewed only small diagnostic batches and never sold them.
-- **The Veilhook recipe.** The same notebook contains Orenn's field formula: grind **1 sprig of silvervein root**, **one vial of Holy Water**, and **5 gp of powdered silver** into black salt over low heat. Ten minutes of work and a DC 13 Arcana check or DC 13 check with Alchemist's Supplies or a Herbalism Kit produces **2 doses of Veilhook Salt**; on a failure it produces only 1 dose. The bench has powdered silver for two batches (10 gp total). Orenn's margin note explains the name: *"It does not repel. It catches the far side and pulls."*
+- **Ethereal emergency kit.** A locked drawer (DC 14) holds **one vial of Oil of Etherealness** and **one [Faded Scroll of Etherealness](../prints/faded-scroll-of-etherealness.md)** wrapped separately in waxed cloth. The oil takes 10 minutes to apply and grants the effect of *Etherealness* for 1 hour; the scroll can be read as an action by anyone who can read a written language and grants the effect for 1 minute. Orenn marked the oil *"far-side access—do not waste on observation; use the mirror first"* and the scroll *"breach response—short window."* The oil is one of the Inn's **three normally discoverable field doses**. A second faded scroll is secured in the Vault arsenal; these are the only quick Ethereal access in the Inn, and none are stored upstairs.
+- **The [Veilhook recipe](../prints/veilhook-salt-recipe.md).** The same notebook identifies Veilhook as the loose, portable form of the **salt-and-silver packing worked into the old summoners' binding circle**. In the circle's grooves, geometry sustains the compound's prohibition on planar escape; thrown by hand, one dose holds for only a few heartbeats. Grind **1 sprig of silvervein root**, **one vial of Holy Water**, and **5 gp of powdered silver** into black salt over low heat. Ten minutes of work and a DC 13 Arcana check or DC 13 check with Alchemist's Supplies or a Herbalism Kit produces **2 doses of Veilhook Salt**; on a failure it produces only 1 dose. The bench has powdered silver for two batches (10 gp total). Orenn's margin note explains the name: *"It does not repel. It catches the feet between steps."*
 - **The Ledger (DC 12 to read):** entries for materia, ward maintenance, and — chillingly — line items for "the Guest": *"fed," "used — Order, 3 nights," "compliant," "trim dose"* (a suppressant they keep the Guest on; see [the-guest.md](../npc/the-guest.md)). If the players read this before meeting the Guest, they'll know it's been drugged into cooperation for years. A separate running column headed *"T."* tracks the pet as a resource: *"milked, 2 doses," "webbing spent — new batch," "bit M. again — she laughed."*
 
 ### Loot & Craft
 - **2 flasks of Alchemist's Fire**, **1 vial of Basic Poison** (×3 applications), **Antitoxin** (×2).
-- A sealed **summoner's binding coffer** containing silver wire, preserved lethe-marrow, ritual fat, grave salt, and a blank true-name strip—one complete set of components for [rebinding Xarrul](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding). Orenn kept it as evidence and an emergency measure, not merchandise.
+- A sealed **summoner's binding coffer** containing silver wire, preserved lethe-marrow, ritual fat, grave salt, a blank true-name strip, a folded page describing the [rebinding ritual](../prints/xarrul-obrad-opetovne-vazby.md), and the silver-threaded [Litany of the Averted Step](../prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md). The Litany unfolds into two matched leaves whose ink moves around Xarrul's old binding scar. Together, these are one complete set of components for [rebinding Xarrul](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding). Orenn kept it as evidence and an emergency measure, not merchandise.
 - **2 doses of harvested feyspitter venom** in stoppered vials on the milking rack — and more can be drawn from Twinkle (DC 13 with a poisoner's kit; safely from the living spider only if it's calmed or restrained, freely from a dead one). A proficient character can brew a dose during the lockdown (1 hour, DC 13) into **either**: a single-use **Blink Draught** (as a reaction when you take damage, teleport up to 15 ft. to a space you can see), **or** an **injury poison** (DC 14 CON save or 2d8 poison damage and the target is shunted 15 ft. to a random open space — the spider's own lurching venom, bottled).
 - A partially-finished batch of **warding chalk (1 use)** and enough materia for a proficient character (Herbalism Kit / Alchemist's Supplies / Poisoner's Kit) to brew **one more dose of any of the above during the lockdown** (1 hour, DC 13 with the right tools). Rewards a crafter PC with something to *do*.
 - **Silvervein root** (the ward-herb, ×4 sprigs) — matters for weakening [Skein](../storylines/possession.md) and helping Bren. A direct bridge from the exploration track into the possession subplot.
@@ -213,7 +215,7 @@ The largest room down here, and the worst-kept — because things in it don't li
 ### The Haunting — The False Refuge
 A party herded down the Cut spills through the warded arch into this room and, for a moment, believes it's safe: the spider won't follow, the air is still, nothing moves. It is haunted by a **Poltergeist** (specter variant, CR 2) — the untethered remnant of a job the couple could contain but never cleanse (it's on the chalk wall: a struck-through X, *"the Vresk house — never left"*) — and the crucial thing is that **it does not strike on sight.** It watches. It lets the living catch their breath. Give the party a real beat here to stop, argue, bind wounds, and work the problem: *how do we get back past the spider — and is this the only way out?* (It is. Dead end.)
 
-- **Then it turns.** Spring it when the tension peaks — a trophy is disturbed, someone reaches for the loot, the party commits to moving, or they've simply lingered too long in its domain. The cold deepens, the lights gutter, and the shelves come alive. **This is the answer to the riddle Twinkle set:** the party learns, viscerally, why an animal that can blink through walls will not put one leg past that arch. It's invisible (needs *See Invisibility* / Veil Dust / a lucky Perception vs. its Stealth to pin down), hurls objects (Telekinetic Thrust), and drops the lights.
+- **Then it turns.** Spring it when the tension peaks — a trophy is disturbed, someone reaches for the loot, the party commits to moving, or they've simply lingered too long in its domain. The cold deepens, the lights gutter, and the shelves come alive. **This is the answer to the riddle Twinkle set:** the party learns, viscerally, why an animal that can blink through walls will not put one leg past that arch. It's invisible (needs *See Invisibility*, Orenn's mirror, or a lucky Perception vs. its Stealth to pin down), hurls objects (Telekinetic Thrust), and drops the lights.
 - **The pincer.** Now the trap's shape is clear — the haunt in here, the spider up the Cut, and no third exit. This is the moment the party *chooses* its fight: push back up and deal with Twinkle, or settle the haunt first and loot in peace.
 - **Outs (once it's active):** it calms if the party stops disturbing the shelves and holds still, or if someone re-lights the room's **warding sconces** (DC 13 Arcana on the ward-candles bolted to the walls — this pins the poltergeist *and* firms the arch's quarantine). A cleric can turn or lay it to rest (it just wants the room quiet again).
 - **Scaling:** for 5 PCs, add **2 Shadows** (CR 1/2) that peel off the walls where the ward-light has failed — a bridge to the rift's influence.
@@ -227,7 +229,7 @@ Let players earn these by braving the haunting. Suggested shelf (pick to taste):
 
 ---
 
-## The Old Work (The Rift)
+## The Old Work
 
 The deepest chamber, a sealed cul-de-sac at the very bottom of the Cut — reached through [Deep Storage](#deep-storage-the-trophy-hold) and a heavy **barred, runed door** (the same runed iron nails as upstairs, barred from the storage side; cold radiates off it). This sealed rift is the closed case Orenn and Mags built their quiet life on top of — and the thing the hidden fifth rule means when it says *burn below and seal the door.* They believed it dead. It isn't.
 
@@ -238,24 +240,25 @@ The deepest chamber, a sealed cul-de-sac at the very bottom of the Cut — reach
 > *Něco se na druhé straně pohne. A pak ještě něco. Trhlina je čím dál větší — a poprvé za patnáct let ji nikdo nehlídá.*
 
 ### What It Is
-The planar fault beneath the tavern surfaces as the **thin point** upstairs; down here, at the lowest point, it has torn into an actual **rift** — a hand-thin tear that **was contained decades ago** with a **silver-and-salt containment circle** (the summoners' work, or the specialist who closed their mess; distinct from the *binding* circle upstairs). Orenn and Mags inherited it sealed and left it alone, re-tracing the chalk by rote without ever understanding it. The circle is **failing now** — Xarrul has spent weeks prying it open from the Ethereal side. This is the **source** of the ethereal bleed everyone's been feeling, and the reason the whole district around the house has felt *wrong.*
+This chamber is the tavern's **thin point**: the one place where the natural planar fault has torn into an actual **rift**. Thin point, tear, and rift are different descriptions of the same hand-thin breach. It **was contained decades ago** with a **silver-and-salt containment circle** (the summoners' work, or the specialist who closed their mess; distinct from the *binding* circle upstairs). Orenn and Mags inherited it sealed and left it alone, re-tracing the chalk by rote without ever understanding it. The circle is **failing now**—Xarrul spent weeks weakening it from the Ethereal side and charging the Stored Incursion used to kill Orenn. Once the lockdown begins, Xarrul has already crossed into the sealed Material interior; it does not need to tend progress here. The room matters because it contains the Guest, the countermeasures, the compact's evidence, and the single midnight site where Xarrul must surrender its Jaunt to become embodied. This is also the **source** of the ethereal bleed everyone's been feeling, and the reason the whole district around the house has felt *wrong.*
 
 - **DC 14 Arcana:** the containment circle is the same craft as the upstairs work but older, and it's being eroded from the ethereal side — the same claw-marks that are siphoning the sigils upstairs.
-- **DC 16 Arcana:** the rift and the upstairs thin point are one fault. Widening or "using" this rift would be catastrophically less controllable than the upstairs thin point. **This is not where you do the dual-plane kill.** (Explicit, so a clever party doesn't try to run the Reckoning down here and derail it.)
+- **DC 16 Arcana:** there is no second thin point upstairs. The ward-lines visible across both cellar levels all descend to this breach. The upper binding circle is a cage for a creature; this containment circle is the cork around the hole.
+- **Vessel workings:** both the [Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy) and the [Hollowing](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-h-the-hollowing) require the exposed breach and take place inside this containment circle. The Vacancy must wait for the shell to lapse because it sends the Guest Astral. The Hollowing destroys its victim's spirit locally and can begin during lockdown once the Guest's compact has dissolved.
 
 ### The Conversion (Optional — a lone explorer)
 
-If a *single* PC lingers here alone, this is where Xarrul can reach them — a ward-snare pins them, or an **Ethereal Pull** drags them partway into the grey, and the fiend simply *talks*. They rejoin the party changed: genuinely convinced Xarrul should go free, and carrying a shard of its nature. This is **not** a charm — it's a conversation that worked, and it's one of the best engines for [Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-the-open-door-joining-xarrul) at a large table. Full scene, the player's note, the boon (the **Grey Step**), and the counterplay: [handouts/the-conversion.md](../handouts/the-conversion.md).
+If a *single* PC lingers here alone, this is where Xarrul can reach them — a ward-snare pins them, or an **Ethereal Pull** drags them partway into the grey, and the fiend simply *talks*. They rejoin the party changed: genuinely convinced Xarrul should go free, and carrying a shard of its nature. This is **not** a charm — it's a conversation that worked, and it's one of the best engines for [Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-deliberately-side-with-xarrul) at a large table. Full scene, the player's note, the boon (the **Grey Step**), and the counterplay: [handouts/the-conversion.md](../handouts/the-conversion.md).
 
 ### Encounter — Creatures from the Rift
-This is where "Xarrul can have some creatures from there" pays off. Xarrul doesn't lair *in* the rift — it lairs in the ethereal cellar (upstairs overlay, per canon) — but it has learned to **loose the scavengers** that gather at the tear, herding them at intruders like dogs.
+This is Xarrul's true lair and intended transfer site. Before the lockdown it rested on the Ethereal side between periods of work; afterward it can move throughout both sealed interiors. It has learned to **loose the scavengers** that gather here, herding them at intruders like dogs. Until the Vacancy finishes, scavengers deliberately loosed by Xarrul steal, separate, frighten, and herd; they withdraw from a helpless target rather than turn Xarrul's command into a forbidden killing. Natural rift-creatures not acting under its direction remain uncontrolled. For lair-action mechanics, treat the **entire Nether Inn**—both cellar levels and every room above—as its lair while the lockdown holds.
 
 Deploy as a scaled encounter (tune to party size / how hurt they are):
 - **Baseline:** **3 Shadows** (CR 1/2) that pour out of the tear where the circle's light has thinned, plus **1 Ethereal Filcher** (CR 1) that darts in to *steal a valuable item* off a PC (DC 13 vs. Sleight-of-Hand-style grab) and flee back through the rift — a fantastic reason to chase, and a way to make loss of the vault's prize sting.
 - **Harder:** add a **Specter** (CR 1) or upgrade to a lone **ethereal-touched horror** of the DM's making. If Xarrul is *actively present* on the ethereal side (late game), it can spend a turn "opening the gate" as a lair-flavored action, adding 1 Shadow per round until the circle is restored.
 
-### Encounter — The Guardian (the pet)
-Denned in the **[Workroom](#the-workroom-laboratory)** at the stair-foot and prowling the length of the **Long Cut** — the Cells, the Vault, the working floor — is **the couple's pet**, a **feyspitter spider** they called **Twinkle**. It is *not* found past the warded arch: it won't set foot in [Deep Storage](#deep-storage-the-trophy-hold) (the poltergeist's ground) and it *can't* follow anything into [the Old Work](#the-old-work-the-rift). Its blink is a fey twitch *across* the Material Plane, never *out* of it — so when Xarrul's scavengers phase away at the tear, the pet is left snapping at empty air. That boundary is the one place in its home it fears.
+### Encounter — The Guardian
+Denned in the **[Workroom](#the-workroom-laboratory)** at the stair-foot and prowling the length of the **Long Cut** — the Cells, the Vault, the working floor — is **the couple's pet**, a **feyspitter spider** they called **Twinkle**. It is *not* found past the warded arch: it won't set foot in [Deep Storage](#deep-storage-the-trophy-hold) (the poltergeist's ground) and it *can't* follow anything into [the Old Work](#the-old-work). Its blink is a fey twitch *across* the Material Plane, never *out* of it — so when Xarrul's scavengers phase away at the tear, the pet is left snapping at empty air. That boundary is the one place in its home it fears.
 
 Full tactical block below — it's the "fight a bit" the party will remember. Its range is also a quiet barometer: it used to have the run of the whole level, and it's pulled tight into the Workroom now. The rift has been taking ground from it, the same way it's been taking the wards.
 
@@ -308,8 +311,8 @@ Full tactical block below — it's the "fight a bit" the party will remember. It
 
 **Threads back into the main game — surface at least one:**
 - The chalk wall / Guest / trophies reveal Orenn was investigating the **Order of Mending** → feeds the murder mystery and the [Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md).
-- The Workroom's **silvervein root** and Veil Dust → the [Possession](../storylines/possession.md) and [ethereal-trip](../storylines/ethereal-trip.md) subplots.
-- The **Veilhook Salt** and its Workroom recipe → the means to pull Xarrul onto the Material Plane and pin it.
+- The Deep Cellar's **silvervein root**, Oil of Etherealness and two short-lived Ethereal scrolls → the [Possession](../storylines/possession.md) subplot and limited routes into the Ethereal Plane.
+- The **Veilhook Salt** and its Workroom recipe → the means to anchor Xarrul after it manifests and deny Slip Between.
 - The vault **trophies** implicating both factions → a lit fuse if it ever reaches the main hall.
 
 **If the party burns it (the fifth rule):** Orenn's contingency — *"burn the cellar stores and seal the door"* — is a real option. Torching the Workroom and Deep Storage and collapsing the door denies the loot but also **cuts off the rift's bleed into the tavern** (the fire consumes the failing containment and the stores that feed the fault's attraction), giving a partial ward-restoration effect equivalent to repairing the sigils. It's a scorched-earth ending Mags respects. The Guest, if still caged, dies in the fire unless freed first — make the players sit with that.

location/main-hall.md

@@ -18,7 +18,11 @@ A massive slab of darkwood, scarred by decades of knife marks, spilled drinks, a
 
 ### The Fireplace
 
-Large stone hearth, fire burning low. The mantle holds a single iron bell that has never been rung — a relic left from the tavern's summoner days. **Mags knows the trick to ring it** (never what it truly does): the toll wakes the old foundation sigils. It was the summoners' last resort, meant to seal the building against ethereal intrusion. The sigils are half-dormant and being siphoned now, so the effect is partial at best (disadvantage on Xarrul's Ethereal Jaunt saves rather than preventing it outright).
+Large stone hearth, fire burning low. The mantle holds a single iron bell that has never been rung — a relic left from the tavern's summoner days. **Mags knows the trick to ring it** (never what it truly does): turn it mouth-down, strike the rim with bare iron, then let it toll without touching the clapper.
+
+The bell wakes the old foundation sigils for **1 minute**. During that minute, anyone inside the Inn sees Xarrul as a blurred outline even while it is Ethereal. This removes concealment, but not the planar boundary: seeing Xarrul does not allow a Material creature to affect it. Veilhook Salt cannot cross the boundary, but can anchor Xarrul if applied when it manifests.
+
+The bell alone does **not** trap or banish Xarrul. If the cellar sigils have been restored, its toll also prevents Xarrul from using Ethereal Jaunt while it is inside the binding circle. Bell, restored sigils and the circle together can seal it consciously between planes; see [The Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#the-bell-and-sigils-seal).
 
 ### Assassin Table (North-West)
 
@@ -32,9 +36,9 @@ Two other unnamed blades fill the rest of the table. They defer to Sevra complet
 
 A round table covered in papers, open books, and half-empty inkwells—maintaining the scholar facade. It is not merely the cultists' chosen seat: Haddon and Vyre used it as their worktable during the original cleanup fifteen years ago. Tiny catalogue numbers cut by Haddon remain along one edge, and regulars know not to take his chair. **Haddon** sits at the center, composed. **Dalla** is on his left, distracted and pale. **Rennt** is on his right, leaning forward with intense energy. **Essek** sits slightly apart, saying nothing.
 
-Beside it stands a narrow bookshelf containing the original summoners' volumes Haddon and Vyre classified as safe enough to keep upstairs. Early pages carry cautious notes in Haddon's left hand and responsible annotations from Vyre before doctrine consumed her. Later volumes contain Bren Aldara's precise corrections. Haddon now writes right-handed because the containment circle that saved Orenn ruined his left arm.
+Beside it stands a narrow bookshelf containing the original summoners' volumes Haddon and Vyre classified as safe enough to keep upstairs. Early pages carry cautious notes in Haddon's left hand and responsible annotations from Vyre before doctrine consumed her. Later volumes contain Bren Aldara's precise corrections. Three equally substantial bookmarked entries could plausibly explain his ordered "madness": **[On Ethereal Skeins](../prints/o-eterickem-predivu.md)**, **[On Mist Leeches](../prints/o-mlznych-pijavicich.md)** and **[On the Return Echo](../prints/o-navratove-ozvene.md)**. Bren annotated all three as **B. A.**, but only the first matches the selective silencing, stolen movement and six tendrils. Haddon now writes right-handed because the containment circle that saved Orenn ruined his left arm.
 
-**After the murder:** Haddon immediately begins constructing an alibi — "we were all engaged in discussion, none of us left the table." This is technically true but irrelevant (the fiend killed from the Ethereal Plane). Rennt is agitated and defensive. Dalla doesn't seem to care about the investigation at all — she's thinking about her child.
+**After the murder:** Haddon immediately begins constructing an alibi — "we were all engaged in discussion, none of us left the table." This is technically true but irrelevant: Xarrul briefly manifested behind the bar, killed Orenn and withdrew to the Ethereal Plane; no cultist had to leave the table. Rennt is agitated and defensive. Dalla doesn't seem to care about the investigation at all — she's thinking about her child.
 
 **On the table (DC 12 Investigation):** Among the scholarly papers, one diagram shows planar boundaries with annotations about "thinning points." Haddon will claim it's theoretical research. It's actually a map of potential Opening sites, and the Nether Inn is marked.
 
@@ -44,19 +48,13 @@ Beside it stands a narrow bookshelf containing the original summoners' volumes H
 
 ### Curtained Booth (South, near wall)
 
-A small booth with high-backed wooden seats and a moth-eaten curtain. It has a clear sightline to the bar, the entrance, and both faction tables while giving anyone seated inside a little privacy. Nobody claimed it before the brawl. During the investigation it is the obvious place to isolate Essek, question a witness, hide a frightened Vetch, or stage a conversation someone else wants to overhear.
+A small booth with high-backed wooden seats and a moth-eaten curtain. It has a clear sightline to the bar, the entrance, and both faction tables while giving anyone seated inside a little privacy. Nobody claimed it before the brawl. During the investigation it is the obvious place to isolate Essek, question a witness, protect a lucid Bren, or stage a conversation someone else wants to overhear.
 
 ### Bren's Corner (North-East, near bar)
 
 Not a seat — a spot on the floor between the bar and the wall. **Bren** sits here with his knees drawn up, rocking slightly, muttering to the air beside him. A wooden bowl with a few copper coins sits in front of him — the regulars toss him change out of habit or superstition.
 
-The space beside him where he talks to is **occupied** in the Ethereal Plane by **Skein**, a translucent, spider-like entity made of knotted threads. It's visible only via Veil Dust, See Invisibility, or similar effects.
-
-### Vetch's Spot (South-East, near cellar stairs)
-
-**Vetch** sits on a stool near the stairs that lead down to the cellar. He's not here by accident: two nights ago Orenn confiscated his last packet of Veil Dust and carried it below. Vetch followed far enough to find the cold seam behind the northern barrel racks, but not far enough to open it.
-
-He's jittery, sweating, picking at the skin on his forearms. He flinches when spoken to but warms up quickly if shown even basic kindness.
+The space beside him where he talks to is **occupied** in the Ethereal Plane by **Skein**, a translucent, spider-like entity made of knotted threads. *See Invisibility* reveals it directly; Orenn's silver mirror provides the same sight only within its reflection. Neither makes Skein Material or allows an ordinary attack to cross the planar boundary.
 
 ### Center Floor (Post-Brawl)
 
@@ -80,7 +78,7 @@ After the brawl, the center of the room is a mess:
 >
 > *Klapnutí závory na hlavních dveřích zní jako rozsudek.*
 
-*(DM: this is only her entrance. The full set-piece that follows — the forced heal, the failed* Revivify *with the diamond from her necklace, the shattered ward-crystal that seals the tavern until midnight, and the ultimatum — is scripted in [Mags — Act 2: The Reveal](../npc/mags.md#act-2--the-reveal-dm). The "bolt" the players hear is the ward-crystal discharging into every exit, not a simple latch.)*
+*(DM: this is only her entrance. The full set-piece that follows—the forced heal, the failed* Revivify *with the diamond from her necklace, the shattered ward-crystal that seals the tavern until midnight, and the ultimatum—is scripted in [Mags — Act 2: The Reveal](../npc/mags.md#act-2--the-reveal-dm). The "bolt" the players hear is the ward-crystal discharging into every exterior opening, not a simple latch; the cellar remains reachable from inside.)*
 
 ## Lighting & Atmosphere
 

location/tavern-overview.md

@@ -27,21 +27,27 @@ The only public way in is the heavy front door at the bottom of the entry steps.
 
 **If a PC leaves before the lockdown.** Nothing stops them physically — but Broath Got at night is not friendly, they forfeit whatever they came for (Orenn's references, their dossier goals), and the door **won't let them back in** without the password they don't have. Use it to *inconvenience*, not to trap: banging, bargaining through the door, or finding a regular to vouch gets them back. This is a soft social lock — the game's way of saying *take the hook.* Worst case, a player insists on walking their character out for good; hand them the pre-made **[Boarder](../npc/the-boarder.md)** — "Wick," a resident with a room upstairs, already inside, wired into the plot with local knowledge and a hook of their own — and carry on.
 
-**The midnight lockdown (Act 2).** When Orenn dies, Mags shatters a fist-sized **ward-crystal** kept on the shelf above the bar. It discharges the tavern's stored wards into every opening at once — front door, cellar trapdoor, shutters — all sealed under an **Arcane Lock until midnight**, when the charge lapses on its own:
+**The midnight lockdown (Act 2).** When Orenn dies, Mags shatters a fist-sized **ward-crystal** kept on the shelf above the bar. It discharges the tavern's stored wards into every exterior opening at once — front door, shutters and any other route outside — until midnight, when the charge lapses on its own.
 
-- Force a sealed exit: **DC 25 Strength**, or **DC 20 Thieves' Tools**; *Knock* or *Dispel Magic* vs. the ward's **DC 17** bypasses one opening.
-- Breaking the crystal is **one-way**. No password lifts it, and Mags herself cannot reopen the doors early — she's locked in with everyone else, on purpose.
-- The wards **bite**: anyone forcing a breach takes **2d6 force** and the discharge is loud enough that every NPC in the hall turns to look.
+- The mundane door can still be picked (**DC 20 Thieves' Tools**), forced (**DC 25 Strength**) or destroyed. Doing so only exposes the smooth, translucent planar shell behind it. *Knock* opens the physical lock; *Dispel Magic* suppresses the visible surface for a heartbeat. Neither permits passage.
+- The shell cannot be punctured or dispelled during the session. It blocks physical escape, Ethereal travel across the exterior, teleportation, and Astral projection alike. It is scenery, pressure and a deadline—not an alternate anti-Xarrul ending.
+- Breaking the crystal is **one-way**. No password lifts it, and Mags herself cannot reopen the Inn early. She is locked in with everyone else, on purpose.
+- The **cellar trapdoor remains physically locked but is not part of the exterior shell**. Mags intended to confine people to the building, not bar herself from her own cellar.
 
-Beating the lock early — or simply surviving until midnight — is a genuine Act 3 problem, not a formality.
+The party may spend resources proving that the physical exits are irrelevant, but resolving the night means dealing with what is inside.
 
-> **DM — what the crystal really is.** The "stored wards" are not Orenn and Mags's work; they are the **summoners' emergency containment device**, left with the building — an *oh-shit button.* If a calling ever punched a hole to a lower plane, breaking the crystal sealed the house in a resilient shell **on every plane at once** (it plane-shifts and lays a *resilient-sphere*-like seal over each plane's version of the building — sealing *within* a plane being far easier than sealing *between* them). Its purpose: contain a breach so that **only what is already inside the house, on some plane, can come through the hole — never the whole plane behind it.**
+### Room-Bound Area Wards
+
+The Inn's old containment craft treats every enclosed chamber as a separate ward-cell. An area spell that establishes a sustained magical boundary—most importantly *Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum*—cannot extend across a doorway, open arch, stair, trapdoor, concealed door, wall, floor or ceiling inside the building. Its caster may use the spell's full permitted dimensions, but only within the room where the casting is completed.
+
+The Main Hall is one room. The kitchen, storage room, private room, upper cellar, each chamber of the Deep Cellar and the Old Work are separate rooms; the Long Cut is one continuous corridor-cell. This restriction does not weaken the spell inside its chosen room. It prevents a single cube from blanketing the entire vertical complex.
+
+> **DM — what the crystal really is.** The "stored wards" are not Orenn and Mags's work; they are the **summoners' emergency containment device**, left with the building — an *oh-shit button.* If a calling ever punched a hole to another plane, breaking the crystal withdrew power from the internal seals and threw it into a resilient shell **around every planar version of the building at once**. The design deliberately trades a cork for a bottle: an intruder already at the fault may cross inside, but neither it nor the plane behind it can spread beyond the house.
 >
 > Mags knows none of this. To her it's the panic button that bolts the doors. In truth, shattering it is **the last thing [Xarrul](../npc/xarrul.md#the-nights-clock--presence--escalation) needed**, and it engineered Orenn's murder precisely to make her do it:
-> - **It builds the closed vessel Xarrul must have.** While the house bled freely across planes, the fiend's crossing dissipated — it could only jaunt *partway* (enough to kill Orenn, no more). Sealed, the house is a closed cross-planar vessel: Xarrul, already inside on the ethereal side, can now finish crossing through the tear, and the summoners' "limit the breach to one entity" safeguard *guarantees* that entity is *it*. The button built to protect the city is a bespoke door for exactly one guest.
+> - **It trades the inner barrier for an outer cage.** Before activation, Xarrul is held on the Ethereal side and can manage only one three-round **Stored Incursion** after a full night charging at the tear. It spends that charge killing Orenn. When Mags breaks the crystal, the internal planar seals lose their power; Xarrul crosses fully into the Material interior and regains Ethereal Jaunt, but the new exterior shell traps it on both planes with everyone else.
 > - **It cuts the diffusion.** Nothing bleeds out to the district anymore, nothing bleeds in. The wrongness that used to spread thin across the quarter — the reason Orenn never localized it — is now trapped and concentrated *inside*, with its source. From tonight, the players can finally trace it home.
-> - **The inversion (a real player lever).** The same breach rules above become an *anti-Xarrul* tactic once understood: puncturing the shell on a plane re-opens the boundary, the vessel goes leaky again, and the crossing destabilizes — Xarrul can't complete tonight (at worst it slips away ethereally to try later). The thing the party wanted to escape becomes the thing they smash on purpose.
-> - **The seal lapses at midnight**, and the lockdown timer *is* the night's clock (see [The Reckoning — The Clock](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#the-clock)).
+> - **The seal lapses at midnight.** Until then no creature or projected spirit can leave, so the Guest cannot be delivered to the Astral Plane and the Vacancy cannot begin. As the exterior shell falls, power returns to the internal containment and creates one three-round transfer window before the tear reseals. Xarrul's old tether still confines it to the Inn's footprint after the exterior opens; only embodiment lets it leave. The lockdown timer *is* the night's clock (see [The Reckoning — The Clock](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#the-clock)).
 
 ## Atmosphere
 
@@ -69,7 +75,7 @@ The noise level before the brawl is a low murmur punctuated by occasional harsh
 │   Table]       [Center tables,                  │            │
 │                 stools, debris]        ┌────────┴────────┐   │
 │  [Curtained                            │ Door to Kitchen │   │
-│   Booth]       [Vetch, near stairs]    └────────┬────────┘   │
+│   Booth]       [Cellar stairs]         └────────┬────────┘   │
 │                                                 │            │
 │  ┌──────┐                              ┌────────┴────────┐   │
 │  │ENTRY │                              │   BACK ROOMS    │   │
@@ -102,7 +108,7 @@ The noise level before the brawl is a low murmur punctuated by occasional harsh
 
 ## Secrets
 
-- The tavern is built on a **natural thin point** between the Material and Ethereal planes. Orenn and Mags know this — they cleaned a den of summoners off this fault years ago and believe they sealed what those summoners tore open. They do *not* monitor it; to them the danger is fifteen years dead. It also means Veil Dust is more potent here, and ethereal entities find it easier to manifest.
+- The tavern is built over a **natural thin point** between the Material and Ethereal planes: the same single place as the sealed tear in the Deep Cellar's [Old Work](deep-cellar.md#the-old-work). Orenn and Mags know this — they cleaned a den of summoners off the fault years ago and believe they sealed it. They do *not* monitor it; to them the danger is fifteen years dead. Ethereal entities nevertheless find the sealed house broadly easier to haunt.
 - The wooden plaque with the house rules has a **hidden fifth rule** on the back, in Orenn's handwriting: *"If the veil tears, burn the cellar stores and seal the door. We'll handle the rest."* — Mags can reveal this if pressed, but it will shake her.
 - The building's stone foundation carries **old sigils** — not Orenn and Mags's work, but the **summoners'** who ran this place before them: the upstairs remnant of the binding-and-containment craft that runs down into the [cellar](cellar.md). A character examining the foundation stones (DC 15 Investigation or Arcana) reads them as long-inert summoning-and-warding work and clocks that whoever built this house was working the thin point on purpose. It's a breadcrumb toward the house's occult past — *not* a barrier anyone maintained. The thing actively being torn open is far below, at the [Old Work](deep-cellar.md#the-old-work).
 - Behind the barrel racks in the cellar, a **[concealed door](cellar.md#the-concealed-door)** leads down to the **[Deep Cellar](deep-cellar.md)** — a hidden warren that is Orenn and Mags's real, ongoing workplace: a vault, a laboratory, two cells (one occupied), a trophy-hold, and a widening rift to the Ethereal Plane. "Retired" was always a story. This lower level is the module's optional exploration track — sneaking, looting, environmental backstory, and a fight or two — for players who'd rather *do* than talk. The fifth rule on the plaque (*"burn the cellar stores and seal the door"*) refers to it.

npc/assassins.md

@@ -100,6 +100,12 @@ Sevra later gave Corren's signet to Orenn as proof the debt was finished. He mad
 - She'll share everything she knows about the cultists' activities, including safe house locations.
 - She owes the party a favour — one job, any target, with the codex in place.
 
+### Sevra in the Reckoning
+
+Xarrul's whispers aim Kael's grief at Rennt and Haddon until the nonlethal brawl becomes a real faction war. The compact prevents Xarrul itself from killing again before the Vacancy finishes, but it does not protect either faction from the other. Sevra can stop that default only if given an actionable threat: proof Xarrul killed Orenn, proof of Dace's betrayal, or proof of Thera's soul-work. Once convinced of Xarrul, she supports sealing or Ethereal destruction and helps Mags keep the cultists from rebinding it.
+
+If the party openly attacks Mags to help Xarrul, Sevra stands with Mags. If they instead produce a witnessed bargain that names everyone to be spared and Nessa to be returned, Sevra may enforce the room's neutrality and leave Mags politically isolated—but only after proof that Xarrul keeps exact promises. A frame can delay her, not fool her forever: Dace explains the faction rot but not Orenn's fiendish brand; Thera explains the missing soul but not the ethereal claw marks. A successful frame must account for both halves or arrange evidence Mags cannot test until after midnight.
+
 ### The Thing She Can't Name (DM — her arc)
 
 Sevra carries an unease she has never spoken aloud, because she has no framework for it and it feels like heresy: **Thera's kills are too clean.** Perfectly warned, perfectly sealed, and yet in the last two years the families of Thera's marks grieve *wrong* — priests who couldn't find the dead to bless them, resurrections paid for and failed, a widow who swore her husband "never crossed over." Sevra has filed each as coincidence because the alternative is unthinkable: that the guild's most honoured blade is doing something the codex has no clause against because the founders never imagined it.
@@ -165,7 +171,7 @@ Dace has been meeting an Order of Mending contact in the tavern's private room t
 The signs are on him now, hiding in plain sight behind his nerves:
 - He sleeps poorly and doesn't know why (reads as guilt).
 - At the candles, **his shadow falls a half-breath late** — DC 15 Perception if a PC watches him move near a flame.
-- True sight, *Veil Dust*, or a DC 15 Medicine/Arcana check up close reveals **a hairline seam of grey light at the base of his throat**, like a cracked glaze.
+- True sight or a DC 15 Medicine/Arcana check up close reveals **a hairline seam of grey light at the base of his throat**, like a cracked glaze.
 
 **Saving him** is possible before the mark ripens: consecration (holy water, *Consecrate*, a cleric or paladin's touch), *Remove Curse* / *Greater Restoration*, Thera's death, or — hardest — the genuine forgiveness of the grievance that named him, offered and *meant*.
 
@@ -173,7 +179,7 @@ The signs are on him now, hiding in plain sight behind his nerves:
 
 ### If Exposed
 
-Dace tries to talk his way out first (Deception +8). If that fails, he turns violent — he'll grab the nearest person as a hostage (likely Vetch or Bren) and demand safe passage. If that fails, he fights. He's dangerous but not suicidal — at half HP, he surrenders.
+Dace tries to talk his way out first (Deception +8). If that fails, he turns violent — he'll grab the nearest person as a hostage (likely Bren or an isolated PC) and demand safe passage. If that fails, he fights. He's dangerous but not suicidal — at half HP, he surrenders.
 
 Sevra's reaction to proof: cold fury. She won't kill him in the bar (the rules still matter to her, even now), but she will restrain him and promise that guild justice will follow. This is worse than a quick death and everyone knows it — **and it is, unknowingly, exactly what Thera wanted: Dace neutralised without a single question asked about *why* she wanted him gone.**
 
@@ -274,7 +280,7 @@ Thera carries at least one **soulcoin** — the physical proof the whole subplot
 > A coin the size of a crown, warm to the touch though it's touched nothing warm. It has a face stamped on neither side — just a worn blankness that your eye keeps trying to resolve into features and failing. Held to the ear in a quiet room, it *whispers*, in a voice folded very small. Held longer, you get the unbearable sense it is not whispering. It is *listening*.
 
 - **What it is:** a person, minted. Not destroyed — folded, cold, and (while the coin holds charge) *recoverable*.
-- **Detection:** Mags smells the necrotic residue instantly and goes grey; a cleric or paladin *feels* the trapped soul; *Veil Dust* or true sight shows it glowing wrong; DC 15 Arcana reads it as necrotic with a personal, fingerprint-like signature.
+- **Detection:** Mags smells the necrotic residue instantly and goes grey; a cleric or paladin *feels* the trapped soul; true sight shows it glowing wrong; DC 15 Arcana reads it as necrotic with a personal, fingerprint-like signature.
 - **Warmth dates the kill:** soulcoins cool over a season. A warm coin is a *recent* kill — and can be matched to a recent sealed contract on the guild's rolls, tying Thera to a specific death.
 
 ### Stat Block
@@ -317,7 +323,7 @@ Thera carries at least one **soulcoin** — the physical proof the whole subplot
 
 ### Soulcoin Surge (the escape / the foreshadow)
 
-The first time Thera is reduced to 0 HP, if she still carries a charged soulcoin, she does not die. With a whispered word the coin in her pocket **cracks and spends a life in place of hers**: she drops instead to 1 HP, becomes briefly half-real (misty, silent), and takes the Disengage and Dash actions as a free move, slipping toward the nearest exit or the thin point in the cellar. She leaves behind a **cracked, cooling coin** — the party's first physical proof of what she is, whether or not they ever catch her.
+The first time Thera is reduced to 0 HP, if she still carries a charged soulcoin, she does not die. With a whispered word the coin in her pocket **cracks and spends a life in place of hers**: she drops instead to 1 HP, becomes briefly half-real (misty, silent), and takes the Disengage and Dash actions as a free move, slipping toward the nearest exit or, if she knows the route, the tear in the Deep Cellar's Old Work. She leaves behind a **cracked, cooling coin** — the party's first physical proof of what she is, whether or not they ever catch her.
 
 *Use this to keep her from dying anticlimactically to a lucky crit, and to leave the players holding evidence even if she gets away. A blade of the rot is hard to kill for good — that's the point.*
 

npc/bren.md

@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@ Skein feeds on Bren's mind — his memories, his personality, his will. Over the
 
 Before possession, Bren was a scholar—Haddon's finest planar-theory student. He was curious, gentle, and too trusting. Haddon brought promising students to the Nether Inn's small collection of salvaged summoner books; Bren sat at the Order's table years before Dalla, Rennt, or Essek joined, corrected Haddon's calculations politely in the margins, and was one of the few people Mags allowed behind the bar to make tea.
 
-Seven years ago Haddon sent him to observe another thin point. Officially it was routine fieldwork; in truth, Vyre had deliberately weakened the boundary and wanted live data. Skein attached itself to Bren there. The Order studied the possession instead of curing it, then classified the experiment as lost when Bren deteriorated and escaped. Haddon let it happen.
+Seven years ago Haddon sent him to observe the still-sealed tear in the Old Work beneath the Nether Inn. Officially it was routine fieldwork; in truth, Vyre wanted live data from this thin point. Skein attached itself to Bren there. The Order studied the possession instead of curing it, then classified the experiment as lost when Bren deteriorated and escaped. Haddon let it happen.
 
 Bren wandered for years. A few months ago Orenn recognized him outside the tavern—not by his ruined face, but because he was muttering one of Haddon's old cataloguing sequences. Orenn brought him inside and began quietly investigating what the Order had done. Haddon has recognized Bren on every subsequent visit and pretended not to. During lucid moments Bren calls him **Professor**.
 
@@ -110,7 +110,7 @@ He witnessed Orenn's murder from his corner. He saw something no one else could
 See [The Possession](../storylines/possession.md) for full details. Summary:
 
 1. **Identify the problem:** DC 14 Arcana while examining Bren detects something attached to him on another plane.
-2. **See Skein:** Requires Veil Dust, See Invisibility, or similar. In the Ethereal Plane, Skein is visible — a knotted spider-thing with tendrils in Bren's skull.
+2. **See Skein:** *See Invisibility* reveals it directly; Orenn's silver mirror provides the same sight within its reflection. In the Ethereal Plane, Skein is plainly visible — a knotted spider-thing with six tendrils in Bren's skull.
 3. **Weaken Skein:** Silvervein root, Protection from Evil and Good, or damaging Skein on the Ethereal Plane.
 4. **Remove Skein:** Requires direct action on the Ethereal Plane — either killing Skein or severing its tendrils from Bren. Killing Skein is permanent. Severing is temporary (it reattaches in 1d4 hours).
 5. **After removal:** Bren is free but damaged. His Wisdom doesn't fully recover (it rises to 10, not 16). He's lucid but fragile, confused, and will need months of care. He remembers everything — seven years of captivity in his own mind. He's grateful but broken.

npc/cultists.md

@@ -77,6 +77,10 @@ Haddon used to teach the same principle in different words: **the living weight
 
 Mags calls him **Professor** when she wants to hurt him, because that is what Bren calls him in lucid moments. She does not permit Haddon behind the bar, near Bren unsupervised, or into the cellar. Orenn was the only person who interrupted before she pushed harder. After the murder, Haddon may instinctively look toward Orenn's place when she confronts him and find it empty.
 
+Haddon knows the original summoners' containment extended below the upper cellar and can recognize a vessel-working or alarm moving in that direction. He has never seen the later cells, Vault, laboratory, Guest or Twinkle. Those belong to Orenn and Mags's private operation, built after the cleanup. When a Hollowing victim disappears, his warning is arcane inference—not proof that he knows what Mags kept below.
+
+Haddon's padded ritual case contains **one vial of Oil of Etherealness**, issued for observing or contacting Xarrul if the command binding failed at close range. This is a **reserve beyond the three field doses**. Applying it takes 10 minutes, so it is preparation rather than a reactive defense. Haddon hides the vial with the rest of the Order's involvement and surrenders it only as part of a credible plan to rebind or destroy Xarrul, after Essek turns him, or by force.
+
 ### What He Knows
 
 **Will share as "scholarly cooperation":**
@@ -89,7 +93,7 @@ Mags calls him **Professor** when she wants to hurt him, because that is what Br
 - That Xarrul was sent into the House archive to steal the Severance Nail and falsify the custodians' memories—not to assassinate Sevra.
 - That new commands have received no response since the House's Final Closure activated. The ritual still registers Xarrul and its stored energy, so Haddon insists the command binding is merely suffering "interference." He strongly suspects otherwise.
 - That The Opening is more than theory. That there's a timeline, a plan, and tonight was supposed to be a field test.
-- That the thin point in the cellar is on Mother Vyre's list of potential Opening sites.
+- That the thin point—the tear in the Deep Cellar's Old Work—is on Mother Vyre's list of potential Opening sites.
 - That Vyre's E–III experiment diverted Nessa into the Border Ethereal, and that the Order deliberately postponed a possible reintegration.
 - That Dalla is not merely a blood donor: she is the maternal conduit through which the Order drains Nessa's trapped vitality.
 
@@ -136,7 +140,7 @@ Dalla is the emotional core of the cultist group — but she is **loyal to the O
 - Single-minded about her child. Every conversation orbits back to Nessa.
 - Loyal to the Order and to Mother Vyre. She believes the summoning failure is a setback, not a sign that something is fundamentally wrong. Haddon tells her the binding can be fixed, and she believes him — she *needs* to believe him.
 - Will defend the Order against accusations. "You don't understand what we're trying to do. We're trying to *heal* the world."
-- The monthly blood sacrifice has left her physically weakened. She bruises easily, gets dizzy, and sometimes her hands shake (not unlike Vetch, for different reasons).
+- The monthly blood sacrifice has left her physically weakened. She bruises easily, gets dizzy, and sometimes her hands shake.
 - She will talk about Nessa with anyone who shows genuine interest, but she frames it within the Order's worldview: the separated planes are what's hurting her daughter, and The Opening is the cure.
 
 ### Dalla's Three States
@@ -168,7 +172,7 @@ Dalla learns that Vyre's experiment caused Nessa's condition and that reintegrat
 - When the Final Closure activated she felt a cord pull free inside her chest. Because some connection remains through Nessa's energy, Haddon convinced her the binding had merely settled at a distance. She does not know Xarrul is free.
 - That Mother Vyre has a "Phase Two" and Haddon is already planning the next summoning.
 - Where the cult's safehouse is (outside the tavern, but useful for after the session).
-- Everything she knows about the binding mechanics and blood schedule. She cannot derive the dual-plane kill herself, but her blood records let Essek or a PC arcanist trace the energy path back toward Nessa.
+- Everything she knows about the binding mechanics and blood schedule. She cannot derive Xarrul's Ethereal mortality herself, but her blood records let Essek or a PC arcanist trace the energy path back toward Nessa.
 
 ### The Rebinding (Cultist Solution)
 
@@ -176,7 +180,12 @@ Haddon's plan — and Dalla's hope while she's loyal — is to **recapture and r
 - Requires a complete set of binding components (the [Workroom](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-workroom-laboratory) contains one old summoner's coffer)
 - Requires Dalla's blood again (she'll give it without hesitation)
 - Requires the binding circle in the cellar (the summoners' circle could be repurposed — DC 16 Arcana to adapt it)
-- Haddon leads the ritual. Rennt assists.
+- Requires two readers to use the coffer's [Litany of the Averted Step](../prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md) while the party forces Xarrul into the circle
+- Haddon, Dalla and Rennt maintain three separate stations during the final three knots
+
+The litany is the capture tool. Two readers hold its shifting leaves and chant; Material Xarrul cannot willingly move closer to either reader, so separated readers can stand behind it and create a narrowing wedge toward the circle. A third character must still shove it, grapple it or forgo melee damage to drive it 5 feet at a time. The litany does not prevent Ethereal Jaunt. *Private Sanctum*, Veilhook Salt or another planar anchor is still necessary.
+
+Once the circle accepts Xarrul, Haddon maintains the true name, Dalla maintains the blood response and Rennt closes the command knots. Three active stations advance; two stall; one loses progress; none collapses the ritual. A broken station deals 2d6 psychic damage to each other active ritualist and can cascade. Xarrul cannot claw its way out of the adapted circle, so it bargains: it attacks Dalla with Nessa, Haddon with Bren and his abandoned maxim, and Rennt with Haddon's concealed certainty that control was already lost. PCs sustain the ritual socially and medically or take over a failing station. Full rules: [The Rebinding](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding).
 
 **If the rebinding succeeds:** Xarrul is bound again. The cult has its weapon back. Dalla's connection to the binding is restored — which means Nessa's condition might stabilize (stop getting worse) but won't improve. Her body remains suspended. Dalla tells herself this is progress. The cult continues toward Phase Two.
 
@@ -184,7 +193,7 @@ Haddon's plan — and Dalla's hope while she's loyal — is to **recapture and r
 
 ### The Competing Cures (Requires Truth)
 
-See [The Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md). The dual-plane kill — synchronized destruction in both the Material and Ethereal planes — releases the stolen vitality used to bind Xarrul. Since Dalla's blood was the conduit, the energy should snap back along the same path: to Dalla, and through her, to Nessa. Essek believes it will pull Nessa home. No one can guarantee the violent recoil will not damage her silver cord.
+See [The Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md). Destroying Xarrul in its native Ethereal Plane releases the stolen vitality used to bind it. Since Dalla's blood was the conduit, the energy should snap back along the same path: to Dalla, and through her, to Nessa. Material and Ethereal attackers are needed only to keep Xarrul from dodging the pursuit by shifting planes. Essek believes the recoil will pull Nessa home. No one can guarantee it will not damage her silver cord.
 
 Xarrul offers a second cure: once the all-plane lockdown ends and it can leave the inn, it knows where Nessa is caught and can unwind the scar directly. It promises to bring her home if the party helps it cross. Dalla favors this route after the notes surface—not because she mistakes Xarrul for good, but because it has demonstrated that it knows Nessa's binding and tells the truth.
 
@@ -249,9 +258,15 @@ Rennt is the most dangerous kind of extremist: one who's right about the problem
 
 A few rounds into the brawl, pressed by the assassins piling onto him, **Rennt casts *Thunderwave*** — a legitimate defensive knockback. It also snuffs every candle in the hall at once, and in that sudden dark [Xarrul](xarrul.md) kills Orenn behind the bar. Rennt has no idea he provided the cover; he'll deny the cult had anything to do with the murder, and he's *telling the truth* — which makes the cult look damning and be innocent. See **[Murder Mystery — Act 2](../storylines/murder-mystery.md#act-2--the-spark)**. If a PC later accuses him of blacking the room out on purpose, his baffled fury is genuine.
 
-### If the Dual-Plane Kill Is Proposed
+### If Ethereal Destruction Is Proposed
 
-Rennt is **violently opposed**. Destroying Xarrul would waste Dalla's sacrifice, erase Phase One's living proof, and betray Mother Vyre's work merely because a fiend offered a convenient truth. „Osm měsíců krvácela, a teď chcete výsledek spálit, protože vás ta zbraň vyděsila? Spoutejte ji. Dokončete, co jsme začali.” He will sabotage the dual-plane ritual or attack whoever moves to complete the kill. The fact that it would create a momentary planar tear does not tempt him; only Vyre has the right to perform the Opening, at the proper scale and under control.
+Rennt is **violently opposed**. Destroying Xarrul would waste Dalla's sacrifice, erase Phase One's living proof, and betray Mother Vyre's work merely because a fiend offered a convenient truth. „Osm měsíců krvácela, a teď chcete výsledek spálit, protože vás ta zbraň vyděsila? Spoutejte ji. Dokončete, co jsme začali.” He will attack the Ethereal hunter, ruin their means of crossing or sabotage whoever moves to complete the kill.
+
+### Cultists in the Endgame
+
+Xarrul's whispers are meant to turn the upstairs tension into faction war before midnight. Its compact with the Guest prevents Xarrul from killing anyone after Orenn until the exchange finishes, but does not protect cultists and assassins from one another. Haddon and Rennt try to rebind it; Essek favors permanent destruction; Dalla moves from rebinding to opposition once the conduit evidence is explained. If the party supplies tactical defenses without resolving that disagreement, the cult loyalists may attack the ritual or the people holding Xarrul, activating its self-defense exception.
+
+If changeling-bodied Xarrul enters the main hall after an unattended Vacancy, Haddon is the first to understand. The command binding is absent, the stolen vitality is moving in an alien body, and Orenn's brand matches Xarrul's signature. He says the crucial truth aloud: *„Není spoutaný. Nikdy od Archivu nebyl.”* Rennt's denial breaks a beat later. The surviving cultists turn on Xarrul, but Essek's sight and Rennt's magic cannot overcome Ethereal Jaunt: perception does not let an attack cross the planar boundary. Without ten minutes to apply their reserve oil or a coordinated salt ambush, they cannot keep it where their attacks can reach it.
 
 ---
 

npc/mags.md

@@ -30,6 +30,8 @@
 
 **Thrown Knife.** Ranged Weapon Attack: +7 to hit, range 20/60 ft., one target. Hit: 6 (1d4+4) piercing damage. She carries 4.
 
+**Emergency reserve.** A flat metal vial beneath Mags's apron holds **one dose of Oil of Etherealness**. This is not part of the three field doses. She kept it on her for an extraction that never came and will surrender it only after accepting that the threat is Ethereal and that a specific person needs to cross. Applying it still takes 10 minutes, so neither Mags nor a looter can turn it into a reaction after Xarrul appears.
+
 ### Reactions
 
 **Parry.** Mags adds 3 to her AC against one melee attack that would hit her.
@@ -65,8 +67,8 @@ This is Mags's set-piece: the beat that ends the party and cages everyone. Run i
    - *It's universal:* even a non-divine PC stumbling through the rite fails for the same reason. Never let the player think they blew it — tell them OOC it wasn't them, even as Mags snarls something about *useless casters*. In-fiction she's cruel; out-of-fiction you wink.
    - *What it shows:* she carries a resurrection-grade diamond as *jewelry*. She came prepared for someone to die, the way a fixer always is — the first real crack in the "retired barkeep's wife" story, and a hint of the [fixer past](orenn.md#background) she and Orenn buried.
 
-**5. The lockdown.** She takes a fist-sized **ward-crystal** from the shelf above the bar and shatters it on the floor. Every exit slams under an **Arcane Lock until midnight** — front door, cellar trapdoor, shutters. No password lifts it. *She* can't lift it. She's locked in with them, and she did it on purpose. (See [the enchanted door & ward-crystal](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door).)
-   - *DM — the trap she can't see:* the ward-crystal is the old den's **ritual-lockdown stone**, and shattering it does far more than bolt the doors — it starves the last of the leftover containment below and clamps the veil into a crossing-channel. It is the one thing Xarrul still needed, and it engineered the murder precisely so Mags would break it. She thinks she's building a cage; she's finishing the fiend's door, and she has no idea. See [the ward-crystal's true nature](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door) and [Xarrul's plan](xarrul.md#the-nights-clock--presence--escalation). This seeds the late gut-punch: the lockdown she triggered to protect everyone is what lets Xarrul cross.
+**5. The lockdown.** She takes a fist-sized **ward-crystal** from the shelf above the bar and shatters it on the floor. Every exterior opening seals until midnight—front door, shutters and any route outside. The cellar trapdoor remains accessible to her own key. No password lifts the exterior shell. *She* cannot reopen it, and she locked herself in on purpose. (See [the enchanted door & ward-crystal](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door).)
+   - *DM — the trap she can't see:* the ward-crystal is the old den's **ritual-lockdown stone**, and shattering it does far more than bolt the doors. It withdraws power from the internal planar seals and throws that power around every exterior version of the house. It is the one thing Xarrul still needed, and it engineered the murder precisely so Mags would break it. She thinks she is only building a cage; she also opens its inner door. Xarrul crosses fully into the Material interior and regains Ethereal Jaunt, but remains trapped with everyone else until midnight. See [the ward-crystal's true nature](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door) and [Xarrul's plan](xarrul.md#the-nights-clock--presence--escalation).
 
 **6. The ultimatum.** Find her the killer by midnight, or every one of them is tomorrow's stew. No one in the room doubts she means it — that's what matters, whether or not it's literally true. Then she goes to Orenn's body and grieves, quietly, and does not stop working the problem for a second.
 
@@ -94,9 +96,9 @@ She is direct, blunt, and has no patience for lies. She can tell when someone is
 
 ## The Warden's Mark (DM)
 
-Mags carries a **dormant [Brand of Spite](xarrul.md#actions)** over her heart — the same hand-shaped mark that killed Orenn, only fainter and cold. Xarrul branded them both. It killed Orenn — the calmer one, who might not have reached for the panic button — and *kept Mags in reserve*, because it **needed her alive**: she is the one who seals the house (see [the lockdown](#act-2--the-reveal-dm)), and a living, grieving Mags holds the room in line while the fiend finishes its work. Two murdered keepers at once would have raised the alarm too soon. **She knows about the mark.** She has felt the cold hand on her chest for weeks, told no one — not even Orenn — and it is part of why she is so fatalistic. When she says *"Orenn and I could have taken it. One of us isn't here,"* the truth underneath is that she no longer believes she is a whole one of herself.
+Mags carries a dormant **Warden's Mark** over her heart — a ward-scar Xarrul left during an earlier Stored Incursion. It resembles the hand-shaped [Brand of Spite](xarrul.md#actions), but it is mechanically distinct and does not violate the combat Brand's one-target limit. Xarrul killed Orenn—the calmer keeper, who might not have reached for the panic button—and *kept Mags in reserve* because it **needed her alive** to seal the house and hold the room in line. The scar can incapacitate but not kill her, preserving Xarrul's compact with the Guest. **She knows about the mark.** She has felt the cold hand on her chest for weeks, told no one—not even Orenn—and it is part of why she is so fatalistic. When she says *"Orenn and I could have taken it. One of us isn't here,"* the truth underneath is that she no longer believes she is a whole one of herself.
 
-**Discovery (a mid-game presence beat):** the players can find the mark through [Orenn's silver mirror](orenn.md#items-on-his-person) (the distortion sits over her heart, like the thin point), a DC 14 Medicine or DC 15 Arcana check up close, or Bren reacting to it. It tells them, without a word, that Xarrul is already *inside* the house — inside *her*.
+**Discovery (a mid-game presence beat):** the players can find the mark with a DC 14 Medicine or DC 15 Arcana check up close, or by following Bren's reaction to it. It tells them, without a word, that Xarrul is already *inside* the house — inside *her*.
 
 ### The Compromised Statline (Finale)
 
@@ -105,11 +107,11 @@ Full-power Mags (AC 16, 65 HP, two attacks at +8) will either solo Xarrul or ste
 - **HP 39** (she has been bleeding vitality to the brand for weeks).
 - **Disadvantage on attack rolls** — she is fighting through a waking nightmare (Orenn's death; or the unlabeled child's shoe from the Vault).
 - At the start of each of her turns, **DC 15 Wisdom save or she loses her action**, frozen in the vision. *(This is the exact mechanism that killed [Orenn](orenn.md#how-he-died).)*
-- *Remove Curse*, *Greater Restoration*, or killing Xarrul ends it and restores her to full.
+- *Remove Curse*, *Greater Restoration*, or killing Xarrul ends the ward-scar and restores her to full.
 
 **Use it both ways:**
 - **Party opposes Xarrul:** the trigger is a crisis — their heaviest hitter drops out, and clearing her brand becomes a priority mid-fight.
-- **Party sides with Xarrul ([The Open Door](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-the-open-door-joining-xarrul)):** the trigger is the alliance's first favor — Xarrul sidelines her *for* the party, and they watch it do to Mags exactly what it did to Orenn. The finale becomes a desperate **holding action** against a grief-broken, half-frozen Mags rather than a slugfest: winnable, tragic, and *the players'* to win, not hers.
+- **Party sides with Xarrul ([Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-deliberately-side-with-xarrul)):** the trigger can create a brief opening to isolate or restrain her. If Xarrul does this publicly, everyone sees the party accept the same attack that killed Orenn; the main hall turns against them. The successful alliance path is quiet neutralization, a convincing frame or enough political support to leave Mags isolated.
 
 If a table needs a bigger fight on the join path, add **Sevra** at Mags's side rather than inflating Mags's numbers.
 
@@ -134,6 +136,7 @@ If a table needs a bigger fight on the join path, add **Sevra** at Mags's side r
 - The summoners' binding circle in the cellar — she knows it *caged* the things they called, not how to work it
 - Her assessment of whether the fiend can be beaten ("Orenn and I could have taken it. Orenn and I. One of us isn't here anymore.") — bravado worn as certainty; she needs it to be true
 - The Oil of Etherealness in the bedroom
+- The reserve vial beneath her apron; she gives this one up only when the party has a concrete far-side role and the bedroom dose is lost, spent or inaccessible
 
 **Will never volunteer — but the players may find it themselves (and probably will, if they explore):**
 - The **[concealed door](../location/cellar.md#the-concealed-door)** in the cellar and everything behind it — the **[Deep Cellar](../location/deep-cellar.md)**: the Vault, the laboratory, the caged **[Guest](the-guest.md)**, the corpse in the second cell, and the failing rift. This is the couple's real, ongoing operation, and Mags assumes no one alive but her knows it exists. If the players surface any of it — the fortune, the prisoner, the trophies implicating patrons upstairs — she doesn't lie, but she goes very still, and what she says next is some of the rawest honesty in the module (see Relationships). In the direst circumstances she may *send* them down for the [Veilhook Salt](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-fixers-arsenal) or silvervein root, handing over the black key with the flat instruction: *"Take what you need. Don't touch the cages. And whatever you find down there — it doesn't change tonight."*
@@ -144,11 +147,17 @@ Mags is the emotional anchor and the gatekeeper. She controls access to the tave
 
 She will not fight alongside the players unless the fiend manifests in the Material Plane inside the tavern. Then all bets are off. The retirement ends and the fixer comes back — and a fixer's answer to a problem is to end it.
 
-**If the players side *with* the fiend:** she becomes the obstacle between them and its crossing — see [The Warden's Mark](#the-wardens-mark-dm) for how to run that fight so the *players*, not Mags, decide the night.
+**If the players side *with* the fiend:** she becomes the obstacle between them and its midnight embodiment and escape—see [The Warden's Mark](#the-wardens-mark-dm) for how to run that fight so the *players*, not Mags, decide the night.
 
-**If the [Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit) resolves:** Mags initiates the aftermath in either branch. If Xarrul takes the changeling body, she attacks Orenn's murderer before it can leave, even while the new spectral Host turns the Inn's wards against her. If the Guest destroys Xarrul and returns empowered, she refuses its demand for the Inn. She will confess the cage, pay restitution, or let it walk; she will not hand it another cage with everyone upstairs inside.
+**At midnight if nobody intervenes:** Mags is busy containing the faction war. Xarrul's compact prevents it from killing again before the exchange, but does not protect patrons from one another. Xarrul opens Cell One from below without using her keys, so she has no ordinary reason to inspect the secret level before the Vacancy. If the transfer was witnessed and changeling-bodied Xarrul enters the hall openly, cultist recognition—not Mags's cellar knowledge—reveals what happened. If it remained secret, Xarrul takes an innocuous face and attempts to leave among the released patrons.
 
-**If the players fail or choose not to confront the fiend:** Mags will hunt it herself after the session ends. She'll probably die. She doesn't care.
+When the exterior shell lapses, Mags still physically bars the front door until somebody has been made answerable for Orenn. Ordinary patrons may leave only after she accepts a culprit or the room overwhelms her authority. She never knowingly releases Xarrul; this is why an allied party must frame someone, isolate her or replace her authority rather than merely wait for midnight.
+
+**If someone disappears:** the disturbed lower ward and Twinkle's web make the black key go cold against Mags's hip. Haddon can tell that Xarrul is seeking a vessel, but Mags will not admit the Deep Cellar exists or allow the cultists into it. She takes the key and goes alone. Unless the party follows or stops her, Xarrul kills her before beginning the Hollowing.
+
+**If the [Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy) resolves:** if Xarrul takes the changeling body in front of her, Mags attacks Orenn's murderer. If the Guest returns empowered, it avoids that confrontation: it uses Orenn's voice to lure her to the cellar, ambushes her, puts her in Cell One and goes upstairs wearing her face. PCs can expose the false Mags by following, noticing the missing black key, testing a private memory or revealing a shapechanger.
+
+**If Xarrul is destroyed Ethereally:** Mags sees the Brand of Spite finally leave Orenn's body. If Xarrul is bound instead, she treats the surviving brand as proof that containment is not justice and watches whoever controls the chains.
 
 ## Relationships
 

npc/orenn.md

@@ -59,7 +59,7 @@ After closing the grievance, Sevra gave Corren's brass signet to Orenn as proof
 "Retired" was always a story Orenn told the world — and, on his gentler days, himself. The truth is buried behind a concealed door in the cellar, in the **[Deep Cellar](../location/deep-cellar.md)**: a hidden warren that is the couple's real workplace. They never stopped. They just moved the work downstairs and got quiet about it.
 
 - **The fortune.** Twenty years of expensive, discreet fixer work is stacked in the [Vault](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-vault-treasure-room) — well over 2,000 gp in coin, gems, and deeds. The modest life upstairs (their bedroom lockbox, 150 gp, two silver rings) is genuine and sentimental. The war-chest below is genuine and paranoid. Both are true. That contradiction *is* Orenn.
-- **The laboratory.** They still brew — the poisons and suppressants a fixer's trade runs on (the Guest's "trim dose" among them), working out of the den's leftover alembics and the anti-fiend odds and ends the summoners abandoned. The Veil Dust down there is the *previous owners'* research into working the thin point; Orenn and Mags kept it because it was valuable and occasionally useful on a job — not because they were watching anything. See the [Workroom](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-workroom-laboratory).
+- **The laboratory.** They still brew — the poisons and suppressants a fixer's trade runs on (the Guest's "trim dose" among them), working out of the den's leftover alembics and the anti-fiend odds and ends the summoners abandoned. Among those remnants is one precious dose of **Oil of Etherealness**, kept as emergency access to the far side rather than evidence that they understood or monitored the tear. See the [Workroom](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-workroom-laboratory).
 - **The Guest.** Their darkest ongoing secret: a **changeling** they captured eleven years ago and never released, held in a cell below and used as an off-book spy — most recently to infiltrate the **Order of Mending**. This is *how* Orenn was "investigating the cult." See **[the-guest.md](the-guest.md)**. Orenn told himself, and the Guest, that they'd let it go "eventually." Fifteen years of eventually. He died still meaning to.
 - **The Guest's predecessor** starved to death in the next cell when it stopped being useful ([Cell Two](../location/deep-cellar.md#cell-two--the-long-dead)). Orenn allowed that. The calm, courteous barkeep who treated every patron with respect was also a man who could keep a person in a cage for a decade and sleep — mostly — at night. The players may learn this. It should complicate how they grieve him.
 
@@ -69,7 +69,7 @@ Orenn was not a good man wearing a bad past. He was a genuinely kind man who had
 
 Xarrul killed Orenn with the full chain: **Brand of Spite** to mark him, **Visions of Spite** to freeze him in a hallucination of his own worst fear, then claws through a body that couldn't flinch. Against an unsuspecting, unresisting target with no allies to intervene, all three stages collapsed into seconds.
 
-The timing was the trick. Orenn had stepped down to storage for supplies just before the brawl broke — which is *why* it ran unchecked; with him gone there was no one to shut it down. He came back up to do exactly that, waded into the scrum, and caught a mundane knock (a bottle, a chair) that left him bruised and bleeding but very much alive. Then **Rennt's Thunderwave killed the candles** and the hall went black, and in that dark Xarrul jaunted partway into the Material Plane behind the bar, branded him, locked his mind, and struck — then retreated to the Ethereal before the lights came back. Total exposure: seconds. The expression on his face isn't surprise at death. It's the last frame of whatever Xarrul forced him to see.
+The timing was the trick. Orenn had stepped down to storage for supplies just before the brawl broke—which is *why* it ran unchecked; with him gone there was no one to shut it down. He came back up to do exactly that, waded into the scrum, and caught a mundane knock (a bottle, a chair) that left him bruised and bleeding but very much alive. Then **Rennt's Thunderwave killed the candles** and the hall went black. Xarrul spent the one Stored Incursion it had charged during the previous night: three Material rounds behind the bar to brand Orenn, lock his mind, and land the killing Multiattack before the charge dragged it back Ethereal as the lights returned. The expression on Orenn's face isn't surprise at death. It's the last frame of whatever Xarrul forced him to see.
 
 **He cannot be brought back.** Whatever the brand did, his soul is beyond reach — *Revivify*, *Raise Dead*, *Resurrection*, all of it finds nothing to hold. Mags burns a diamond proving it in [Act 2](../npc/mags.md#act-2--the-reveal-dm). This is permanent, and the module never softens it. (Leave the *reason* unspoken in play; it should feel wrong, not diagnosed.)
 
@@ -85,7 +85,7 @@ The timing was the trick. Orenn had stepped down to storage for supplies just be
 Orenn suspected something was wrong for weeks — but he was looking in the wrong direction, and he never once looked *down.* His whole career had trained him to think in people and factions, not in the thing sealed under his own floor, and the case on that was *closed.* What his surveillance actually turned up (all of it on the [case board](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-long-cut-central-corridor) in his old cellar ops-room) was a **district-wide** wrongness he read as an *underworld* problem:
 - People turning up dead or gone across the quarter in ways that didn't add up — some of it Thera's work, some of it he couldn't source at all
 - The Order of Mending meeting more often, more urgently — his strongest, realest lead, and the one that let him blame everything else on the cult
-- Patrons *changing* under his own roof — Bren's raving, Vetch chasing stronger dust — which he filed as recruits and addicts, not symptoms
+- Patrons and neighbours *changing* around his own roof — Bren's worsening ravings, repeated cold dreams, regulars who stopped returning — which he filed as recruits, marks and ordinary street attrition, not symptoms
 - A cold that had crept over the district these last weeks, dreams gone bad on the block, the corner's old unlucky name getting louder
 
 He didn't know about Xarrul, and he never connected any of it to the sealed rift beneath him. He thought the trouble was out in the city. He was preparing anyway — the holy water, silversheen, and warding chalk in the storage room were recent, nervous purchases, a fixer buying insurance against something not-human he could feel moving but couldn't name. The letter in Mags's apron was his contingency. He ran out of time, twenty feet above the answer.
@@ -96,4 +96,10 @@ He didn't know about Xarrul, and he never connected any of it to the sealed rift
 - A **plain black iron key**, heavier than the rest, that fits nothing upstairs. It opens the **[concealed door](../location/cellar.md#the-concealed-door)** to the Deep Cellar and the Arcane-locked [Vault](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-vault-treasure-room) below. Anyone who searches the body (DC 12 Investigation, or automatic if they loot him) finds it; recognizing what it opens is the mystery. The Guest, if reached, will happily point at it.
 - A **silver ring** (plain, matches one in the lockbox upstairs)
 - 12 gp, 8 sp in a belt pouch
-- A **small silver mirror** (not magical, but Orenn carried it out of habit — an old trick from somewhere in his career: hold up a mirror and a thing that shouldn't be there warps the reflection. He carried it for years and never quite expected to need it. DC 15 Perception while using the mirror in the cellar reveals faint distortions near the thin point.)
+- [**Orenn's silver mirror**](#orenns-silver-mirror), kept in his breast pocket
+
+### Orenn's Silver Mirror
+
+A small magic hand mirror in Orenn's breast pocket, found automatically by anyone who searches the body. While looking into it, a creature sees everything within the mirror's reflected field exactly as if under *See Invisibility*: invisible creatures and objects are visible, and creatures and objects on the Ethereal Plane appear ghostly and translucent.
+
+The effect is permanent, requires no charges or attunement, and functions only through the reflection. It has no properties beyond *See Invisibility*. The mirror does not make an Ethereal subject Material or allow attacks or other effects to cross the planar boundary.

npc/the-boarder.md

@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ Months over the bar have soaked them in the surface of everything without their
 
 - **Orenn had been off for weeks** — up at odd hours, buying strange supplies (Wick carried a crate of "salt and chalk and holy water" up the steps for him once), checking the cellar more than a wine cellar warrants.
 - **Night noises from below.** Scratching, a cold draft up the stairwell, Orenn descending at hours when no barrel needs tapping. He told Wick once, flatly: *"The room at the bottom of the stairs isn't yours. Don't go looking."* They obeyed. They always wondered.
-- **The patrons' ailments.** Wick has quietly treated half this room and noticed **Dalla's** tremor and the scars up her arms (they read as ritual bloodletting, not self-harm); **Vetch's** dependency and what he'll do for a dose; **Bren** getting *worse* in a way that isn't madness; and that one of the assassins (**Dace**) sleeps like a man with something eating him.
+- **The patrons' ailments.** Wick has quietly treated half this room and noticed **Dalla's** tremor and the scars up her arms (they read as ritual bloodletting, not self-harm); **Bren** getting *worse* in a way that isn't madness; and that one of the assassins (**Dace**) sleeps like a man with something eating him.
 - **Mags and Orenn were more than they let on.** Wick has seen the scars, the economy of movement, the "decorations" that are weapons. They never asked.
 
 ## What Wick Does NOT Know (guardrails — keep the mystery intact)

npc/the-guest.md

@@ -51,13 +51,13 @@ In its **worn form** (what the party first sees): whatever face serves. By defau
 
 ---
 
-## What It Wants — The Guest Becomes the Host
+## What It Wants — The Guest Takes the Inn
 
 The Guest does **not** chiefly want to leave the Nether Inn. It wants the Inn.
 
 Orenn is dead. Mags is compromised. The Guest knows every patron, debt, secret room, faction and unfinished job in the house. It wore the faces that gathered half of Orenn's intelligence and did the work for which the couple took credit. In its accounting, eleven years of captivity did not merely incur a debt of freedom. They made the tavern **back pay**.
 
-Its desired ending is to stand behind the bar when the lockdown opens, holding the black key, recognized as the new proprietor. Mags may serve beside it, leave, or take its old place in Cell One. That is her choice, as the Guest understands choice now.
+Its desired ending is to control the Inn without inviting every armed patron to vote on succession. If it returns from the Vacancy empowered, it plans to lure Mags below with Orenn's voice, imprison her in Cell One, take her shape and return upstairs as the keeper everyone already obeys. Recognition can come later, when opposition is weaker.
 
 This is not simple greed. The Guest has learned the cage's lesson perfectly and wrongly: a person is safe only while holding the key. It would rather become the jailer than risk becoming a prisoner again.
 
@@ -79,18 +79,30 @@ Eleven years and it hasn't escaped, because Orenn and Mags built the cage out of
 
 Xarrul has spent weeks working the tear near the Guest's cell. They have spoken through stone and across the veil: two captive assets comparing owners.
 
-The Guest gave Xarrul the last piece of local knowledge its murder required. It explained that **Orenn was the cautious keeper** and that Mags would reach for the emergency lockstone if he died. Xarrul recognized the stone as the summoners' cross-planar seal and understood what Mags did not: her grief would build its crossing vessel. Xarrul chose and killed Orenn. The Guest never touched him and never left its cell—an airtight alibi constructed entirely from truth.
+Their first trust was one unqualified promise from Xarrul: **"I will not kill you."** It still holds. A forced Hollowing would destroy the Guest's projected spirit and therefore break that promise, so Xarrul cannot simply take the changeling body by force. If it wants that body intact, it must obtain the Guest's willing Vacancy.
 
-In return, Xarrul offered a precise exchange. The Guest will willingly vacate its changeling body. Xarrul will use its knowledge of silver cords to anchor the Guest's projected spirit into the Inn's foundation wards, making it the literal **Host**: present in every wall, master of every lock, impossible to put inside a room because it has become the room. Xarrul takes the empty, mutable body and walks into the world. Xarrul has described the price without euphemism: the Host will never cross the Inn's threshold again.
+The Guest gave Xarrul the last piece of local knowledge its murder required. It explained that **Orenn was the cautious keeper** and that Mags would reach for the emergency lockstone if he died. Xarrul recognized what Mags did not: the emergency device would pull power out of the internal seals, throw that power around the exterior, and let the fiend cross fully into the resulting cage. Xarrul chose Orenn and spent its one Stored Incursion killing him. The Guest never touched him and never left its cell—an airtight alibi constructed entirely from truth.
 
-The Guest genuinely accepts that outcome. It also intends to do better.
+The Guest proposed a precise exchange. It will willingly vacate its changeling body at the tear in the Old Work—the breach the transfer requires. Xarrul will project the Guest's coherent spirit into the Astral Plane rather than destroy it, take the empty mutable body and walk into the world disguised. Xarrul described the price without euphemism: the Guest will be alive but bodiless, with no route back tonight.
 
-During the transfer, both spirits must briefly leave the body. Xarrul will be fully committed, unable to jaunt away, and vulnerable to the same tools that normally pin it across two planes. The Guest cannot defeat it alone and Xarrul knows that. The Guest's concealed weapon is the party: if they destroy Xarrul's exposed spirit, its embedded planar imprint collapses into the vacant changeling body. The Guest can reclaim both the body and part of Xarrul's power — the Inn in one hand, an Ethereal step in the other.
+The later compact's restraint is deliberately simple: **one death to close the house—Orenn—and Xarrul will kill no one else until the exchange is finished.** Xarrul retains the right to defend itself against someone knowingly trying to bind, banish, or destroy it. The promise constrains Xarrul's own hand and deliberate commands; it does not oblige the fiend to save patrons who choose to kill one another. The Guest wants an intact Inn and living outsiders it can recruit against Xarrul. It asks for nothing after the exchange because it expects only two outcomes: Xarrul dies during the exposed transfer and the Guest returns empowered, or Xarrul wins and sends it Astral, where the Inn is no longer its concern. Xarrul never breaks this promise. The moment the Guest is delivered Astral at the end of the Vacancy, the temporary restraint expires; the original promise not to kill the Guest does not.
 
-Xarrul sees the Guest's appetite and enters anyway. Without outside intervention, the fiend wins every time. What it does not know is which useful strangers the Guest has persuaded to become its hands.
+The Guest accepts the risk because it intends to do better.
 
+During the transfer, both spirits must briefly leave the body. Xarrul will be fully committed, unable to jaunt away, with its Ethereal essence exposed to attacks from either side. The Guest cannot defeat it alone and Xarrul knows that. The Guest's concealed weapon is the party: if they destroy Xarrul's exposed spirit, its embedded planar imprint collapses into the vacant changeling body. The Guest can reclaim both the body and part of Xarrul's power — the Inn in one hand, an Ethereal step in the other.
+
+Xarrul sees the Guest's appetite and enters anyway. Without outside intervention, the fiend wins every time. The Guest's advantage is not that Xarrul is stupid; it is that the Guest is better at recruiting strangers and understands what the right borrowed face can accomplish after the fight.
+
+> **Xarrul:** *„Nezabiji tě.”*
+>
+> **Host:** *„To není totéž jako nechat mě žít. Ale pro začátek to stačí.”*
+>
 > **Host:** *„Vezmi si mé tělo. Vstupu bránit nebudu.”*
 >
+> **Host:** *„Jedna smrt, aby se dům zavřel. Orenn. Nikoho dalšího nezabiješ, dokud naše výměna neskončí.”*
+>
+> **Xarrul:** *„Pokud se mě nepokusí spoutat, vyhnat či zničit. Souhlasím.”*
+>
 > **Xarrul:** *„Jakmile budu uvnitř, hodláš sklapnout čelisti.”*
 >
 > **Host:** *„Obě tvrzení mohou být pravdivá.”*
@@ -99,7 +111,7 @@ Xarrul sees the Guest's appetite and enters anyway. Without outside intervention
 >
 > **Host:** *„Pak se nemáš čeho bát.”*
 
-The full transfer encounter is **[The Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit)**.
+The full transfer encounter is **[The Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy)**.
 
 ---
 
@@ -145,6 +157,10 @@ Play the Guest as the **most reasonable person the party meets all night** — a
 **If accused of choosing Orenn:**
 - *„Xarrul se zeptal, kdo z nich rozbije kámen. Odpověděl jsem. Na slitování se neptal.”*
 
+**If the Executioner threatens to kill it:**
+- [calm, almost helpful] *„Zabij mě a jeho slib zemře se mnou. Pak jsi nejbližší použitelné tělo a on už tě smí zabít. Splň zakázku. Jen si nemysli, že se dožiješ odměny.”*
+- If challenged, it explains the exact compact. This is leverage, not a bluff: its killer is Xarrul's first choice for the Hollowing.
+
 **When it talks about Cell Two (the crack in the mask):**
 - [quietly, no charm at all] *„Deset let ryla do dveří ‚Byla jsem skutečná‘. Ke konci už nebyla. Já také nebudu. To dělá klec. Smrti se nebojím.”*
 
@@ -159,12 +175,12 @@ Meeting the Guest is a **genuine moral fork** with real mechanical outcomes. The
 
 | Choice | What happens |
 |---|---|
-| **Free it and follow its plan** | It supplies real cult intelligence and engineers [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit), the easiest opportunity to destroy Xarrul. The party discovers only at the transfer that killing the exposed fiend will pour part of its nature into the Guest. |
+| **Free it and follow its plan** | It supplies real cult intelligence and engineers [the Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy), the easiest opportunity to destroy Xarrul. The party discovers only at the transfer that killing the exposed fiend will pour part of its nature into the Guest. |
 | **Destroy Xarrul during the Vacancy** | The Guest reclaims its body with Ethereal Jaunt, Voice Thief and Shadow Cloak. It thanks the party, takes the black key and claims the Inn. Mags refuses. The easy boss fight produces a dangerous succession crisis. |
-| **Allow the exchange** | Xarrul takes the changeling body. The Guest becomes the spectral Host bound through the Inn's wards. Its first act as proprietor is to protect Xarrul's paid passage; Mags immediately moves to kill Orenn's murderer. |
-| **Try to bind or control it** | The Guest treats the attempt as proof that rescuers and jailers differ only in vocabulary. It may trigger the Vacancy early, expose the party's private goals, or bargain with Xarrul against them. If ordinary escape becomes possible, it takes a useful face and disappears only as a last resort; the Inn remains the prize. |
-| **Leave it caged** | It continues its compact with Xarrul. If the transfer can be attempted through the failing wards, it becomes violent and imperfect; otherwise the fifth rule's fire kills it. As the party leaves: *„Dveře se tu zavírají před každým stejně. Vzpomeňte si na to, až budete na řadě.”* |
-| **Kill it** | Xarrul loses its prepared vessel and abducts a replacement during the Reckoning. The Guest's intelligence dies with it. Mags recognizes the choice without condemning it: the party solved a dangerous prisoner exactly as she and Orenn once would have. |
+| **Allow the exchange** | Xarrul takes the changeling body and can leave disguised. The Guest is stranded alive but bodiless in the Astral Plane; recovering it requires a later planar rescue and a new vessel. |
+| **Try to bind or control it** | The Guest treats the attempt as proof that rescuers and jailers differ only in vocabulary. It may expose the party's private goals or bargain with Xarrul against them. The Vacancy itself cannot begin before the shell lapses at midnight. If ordinary escape becomes possible, it takes a useful face and disappears only as a last resort; the Inn remains the prize. |
+| **Leave it caged** | Before midnight Xarrul opens Cell One from the Ethereal side and leads it deeper to the tear in the Old Work. When the shell lapses, the Vacancy proceeds without the party unless somebody notices. |
+| **Kill it** | The exchange becomes impossible and the temporary restraint on Xarrul ends immediately. Xarrul loses its preferred vessel, but may now kill directly; it chooses the Guest's killer first for the [Hollowing](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-h-the-hollowing). The threat *"kill me and you die before this night is over"* is substantially true. |
 
 ### If the Guest Takes Xarrul's Imprint
 
@@ -176,6 +192,6 @@ Keep the Guest's normal stat block and add **Ethereal Jaunt**, **Shadow Cloak**
 
 - **Murder mystery / cult:** the Guest's infiltration intel corroborates the Order of Mending and can un-stick a party that hasn't cracked the cult. It did not strike Orenn, but it chose which keeper Xarrul should remove; its locked-cell alibi is the module's purest half-truth.
 - **Character secrets:** the Agent wants it rescued, the Executioner wants it dead, and the Mourner needs its testimony. During the Vacancy both projected spirits—and the empty body—become separate targets, bringing those goals directly into the finale.
-- **Mags:** she knows exactly what's down there and expects the players never to find it. The Guest's claim to the Inn forces her cruelty out of the cellar and into the ending: she must surrender the house, defend it, or face the cage she maintained.
+- **Mags:** she knows exactly what's down there and expects the players never to find it. An empowered Guest avoids a public claim: it lures her below with Orenn's voice, cages her, takes her shape and keeps the Inn through deception.
 - **Xarrul:** honest fiend and consummate liar enter a bargain both understand. Xarrul underestimates not the Guest's treachery, but its ability to recruit other hands.
 - **The rift:** the Guest's apparently useful warning points toward the anti-fiend tools needed to attack Xarrul's projected spirit. It is preparing the party for its own gambit.

npc/vetch.md

@@ -1,98 +0,0 @@
-# Vetch — The Addict
-
-*"You don't understand. It's not about the high. It's about seeing. Really seeing. There's a whole world right here, right on top of this one, and nobody knows. Nobody looks. I look. I look every time."*
-
----
-
-## Stat Block (Abbreviated)
-
-**Vetch** — Medium humanoid (human), chaotic neutral
-**AC** 10 | **HP** 14 (3d8) | **Speed** 30 ft.
-
-| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA |
-|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|
-| 8 (-1) | 11 (+0) | 10 (+0) | 14 (+2) | 12 (+1) | 9 (-1) |
-
-**Skills** Arcana +4, Perception +3 (heightened when on Veil Dust — becomes +7)
-**Senses** passive Perception 11
-**Languages** Common, Halfling
-
-Vetch is not a combatant. He will hide, run, or freeze. In absolute desperation, he has a rusty knife (1d4 piercing, no proficiency bonus) he uses to cut food.
-
----
-
-## Appearance
-
-Skinny, early thirties, looks older. Hollowed cheeks, dark circles under bloodshot eyes, restless hands that never stop moving — picking at his forearms, drumming on surfaces, fidgeting with his clothes. His clothes were good once: a scholar's coat, now stained and fraying. His fingernails are bitten to the quick.
-
-His pupils are slightly too large even in normal light — a permanent side effect of chronic Veil Dust use. He occasionally stares at empty air for a beat too long, as if catching an afterimage of something that isn't there.
-
-## Read-Aloud: Meeting Vetch
-
-> *U schodů do sklepa sedí na stoličce hubený muž, který vypadá, jako by potřeboval tři věci: jídlo, spánek a něco, co se tu pravděpodobně nepodává. Bledý, s tmavými kruhy pod očima a rukama, které se nedokážou zastavit — škrábe se na předloktí, bubnuje prsty, tahá za cíp svého obnošeného kabátu, který kdysi mohl patřit někomu, kdo chodil na přednášky.*
->
-> *Když se na něj podíváte, trhne sebou. Pak se usměje — nervózně, prosebně, jako zatoulaný pes, který doufá, že nepřichází kopanec.*
-
-## Personality
-
-Vetch was a clerk at a minor arcane academy — not a mage, just a record-keeper who happened to catalogue documents about planar theory. He wasn't anyone. Then he tried Veil Dust at a party, saw the Ethereal Plane for the first time, and the mundane world was never enough again.
-
-He's been using for two years. He's burned through his savings, his job, his lodgings, and most of his self-respect. He's not malicious — he's just desperate and single-minded. The dust is the only thing that makes the world bearable, and he'll do almost anything to get it.
-
-**Key traits:**
-- Pathetic but not contemptible — there's still a person in there
-- Surprisingly knowledgeable about the Ethereal Plane from direct observation (more than most scholars)
-- Eager to please, especially if he thinks you might help him get a fix
-- Genuinely believes the Ethereal Plane is beautiful, not just a place to get high
-- When on the dust, he becomes calm, articulate, and focused — a glimpse of who he used to be
-
-## What He Knows
-
-**Will share for free (desperate for conversation):**
-- The assassins and cultists don't like each other. Water is wet.
-- Orenn was kind to everyone, even him. This fact upsets him more than the murder itself.
-- Orenn confiscated Vetch's last packet of Veil Dust two nights ago after finding him collapsed by the cellar stairs. He said he was locking it "below the barrels, where you can't follow it."
-
-**Will share if you agree to recover the Veil Dust from below:**
-- The Ethereal Plane is more active than usual tonight — he can feel it, like static before a storm. Even without the dust, his chronic use has given him a faint residual sensitivity (DC 15 Perception to notice — Vetch auto-succeeds).
-- Bren's "imaginary friend" is real. "I've seen it. On the dust. It's... it sits beside him like a — like a thing made of string. With legs. It's *in* his head." He's never told anyone because who would believe the addict?
-- He followed Orenn into the cellar later and found a cold draft behind the northern barrel racks. The stone there has a seam and fresh drag marks, but Vetch couldn't open it. If he shows the party the exact place, they find the [concealed door](../location/cellar.md#the-concealed-door) without a check; it is still Arcane Locked. "The air gets thin there. Like standing on a mountain, except it's a basement."
-
-**Will share during/after a shared trip:**
-- He's seen something else in the Ethereal Plane recently — something bigger and darker than Skein. "It moves like smoke but it has *intent*. And teeth. Definitely teeth." He didn't realize it was a fiend. He thought it was a particularly bad hallucination.
-- The thin point in the cellar is *wider* than it was a month ago. "The hole is getting bigger. Or something is pushing it open."
-- On his last trip (a week ago), he saw the fiend scratching at the foundation stones from the other side. He didn't know what it was doing. He was too terrified to stay.
-
-## The Trip
-
-If players take Veil Dust with Vetch, he's an experienced guide. See [Ethereal Trip](../storylines/ethereal-trip.md) for full mechanics.
-
-**Vetch as a trip companion:**
-- He's calm, almost serene. The jittery wreck becomes a quiet, focused observer.
-- He'll point out features of the Ethereal Plane — the way reality looks grey and washed out, how living creatures glow faintly, how sounds are muffled.
-- He'll notice things players might miss (he has advantage on Perception checks while on Veil Dust, and the DM can use him to direct attention).
-- If they encounter Xarrul or Skein in the Ethereal Plane, Vetch panics. He's seen scary things before but nothing like this.
-
-## Read-Aloud: Vetch on Veil Dust
-
-> *Změna je okamžitá a děsivá. Rozechvělý, nervózní muž se zastaví. Jeho ruce se přestanou třást. Oči, předtím rozběhané a neklidné, se zaostří s klidem, který jste u něj neviděli. Narovná se. Nadechne se pomalu, hluboce, jako by dýchal poprvé za celé roky.*
->
-> *"Tak," řekne tichým, klidným hlasem, který zní jako někdo úplně jiný. "Teď vidíte, co vidím já."*
-
-## What He Wants
-
-1. **Veil Dust.** Primarily, urgently, above all else.
-2. **To not be alone.** He wants someone to see what he sees and confirm he's not crazy.
-3. **Deep down:** To stop. He knows the dust is killing him. He doesn't say it, but if a player asks directly and sincerely, he'll admit it. "I know what it's doing to me. I just... the real world is so *flat*."
-
-## After the Session (If Players Help Him)
-
-- If players only give him dust: He trips, helps them, and goes back to being an addict. Nothing changes.
-- If players help him trip AND show him what's really happening (the fiend, the possession, the murder): The experience shocks him. For the first time, the Ethereal Plane isn't beautiful — it's terrifying. It might be the push he needs to quit.
-- If players refuse him dust entirely: He's useless as an ally but may try to steal Orenn's black key during the session's chaos and reach the hidden door himself, potentially causing a scene.
-
-## Relationships
-
-- **Bren:** Vetch avoids Bren. He knows what's attached to Bren and it scares him. There's also a horrible recognition — they're both prisoners of something.
-- **Orenn:** Was kind. Always gave Vetch water and bread, and finally confiscated his dust rather than watch him die on the stairs. Vetch is quietly gutted about the murder but can't process the grief separately from his fury and need.
-- **Mags:** Mags is indifferent to Vetch. She doesn't have the bandwidth to care about his addiction tonight.

npc/xarrul.md

@@ -6,15 +6,15 @@
 
 ## Overview
 
-Xarrul is an ancient, cunning fiend — not a brute, not a conqueror. A manipulator. A patient intelligence that has survived for centuries by being smarter than the things that summoned it. The Order of Mending bound it and sent it to infiltrate the House of Scales, rewrite the custodians' memories, and steal the Severance Nail from the inner archive. The archive's automatic Final Closure severed its command binding. Xarrul shifted into the Border Ethereal at the instant it should have been dismissed and caught itself there. The House thought it banished; most of the Order still thinks it controlled but unreachable. Xarrul is free, and only Essek has correctly understood that fact.
+Xarrul is an ancient, cunning fiend — not a brute, not a conqueror. A manipulator. A patient intelligence that has survived for centuries by being smarter than the things that summoned it. It is native to the Border Ethereal: the Order of Mending bound it across the veil and sent it to infiltrate the House of Scales, rewrite the custodians' memories, and steal the Severance Nail from the inner archive. The archive's automatic Final Closure severed its command binding. Xarrul slipped home into the Border Ethereal before the severance could drag its power away with the broken command. The House thought it banished and gone; most of the Order still thinks it controlled but unreachable. Xarrul is free, and only Essek has correctly understood that fact.
 
 For all those centuries, Xarrul has never once been *real*. It has been summoned, bound, sent on errands, and dismissed — a whisper behind the glass, a borrowed claw, watching mortal life the way you watch a fire through a window: close enough to feel nothing. It does not want power or conquest. It wants to stand on the *other side* of the glass — to stop being a thing that is called, and become a thing that lives here.
 
-The Nether Inn is its chance. The tavern sits on a natural thin point — a fault the building's old owners, a den of summoners, once tore half-open before Orenn and Mags cleaned them out and left the breach sealed. Xarrul chose this fault off the cult's map precisely because it was already worked thin, and because the deepest chamber is a hidden, forgotten place to labour undisturbed. For weeks it has been prying that old seal open from the Ethereal side — and speaking through the stone to the changeling caged nearby. A leaky, open house let its crossing dissipate, so it needed one thing more: the house sealed shut around it, into a closed vessel it could finish crossing inside. The Guest supplied the local certainty: kill cautious Orenn and grieving Mags would break the summoners' emergency lockstone. Xarrul chose the target, performed the killing and received exactly the door it needed. Everything since (the framing, the whispers, the faction blood) is not spite. It is *cover*: keep everyone too busy killing each other to notice what the lockdown really did, or to interfere before midnight.
+The Nether Inn is its chance. The tavern sits on a natural thin point — a fault the building's old owners, a den of summoners, once tore half-open before Orenn and Mags cleaned them out and left the breach sealed. Xarrul chose this fault off the cult's map precisely because it was already worked thin. For weeks it weakened the old seal from the Ethereal side, stored enough force for one brief Material incursion, and spoke through the stone to the changeling caged nearby. The Guest supplied the local certainty: kill cautious Orenn, and grieving Mags would break the summoners' emergency lockstone. Xarrul spent its stored incursion on the murder and received exactly the reaction it needed. The lockstone pulled the internal wards away from the tear and threw them around the exterior, letting Xarrul cross fully into the Material interior while trapping it—and everyone else—inside. Everything since is cover: keep dangerous hands away from the Guest and the Old Work until midnight opens the brief Vacancy window.
 
-It is intelligent, patient, and — beneath the amusement — genuinely monstrous. But it does not lie. In a house where everyone is hiding something, Xarrul tells the plain truth about what it is and what it wants. That is what makes it dangerous, and it is what makes *siding* with it possible (see [Scenario F: The Open Door](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-the-open-door-joining-xarrul)).
+It is intelligent, patient, and — beneath the amusement — genuinely monstrous. But it does not lie. In a house where everyone is hiding something, Xarrul tells the plain truth about what it is and what it wants. That is what makes it dangerous, and it is what makes *siding* with it possible (see [Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-deliberately-side-with-xarrul)).
 
-It also knows what happened to **Nessa**. Dalla's blood did not merely hold Xarrul; it carried energy siphoned through her from the child's trapped projection. From inside that bond, Xarrul felt the direction of Nessa's silver cord and learned how Vyre's planar scar holds it. It could follow that path, unwind the scar, and guide Nessa home—but not while the Nether Inn is sealed across every plane. Nessa is elsewhere in the Border Ethereal, outside the lockdown. Xarrul must escape or complete its crossing first. This makes Dalla its strongest potential ally.
+It also knows what happened to **Nessa**. Dalla's blood did not merely hold Xarrul; it carried energy siphoned through her from the child's trapped projection. From inside that bond, Xarrul felt the direction of Nessa's silver cord and learned how Vyre's planar scar holds it. It could follow that path, unwind the scar, and guide Nessa home—but not while the Nether Inn is sealed across every plane. Nessa is elsewhere in the Border Ethereal, outside the lockdown. Xarrul must become embodied and escape first. This makes Dalla its strongest potential ally.
 
 ## Stat Block
 
@@ -36,7 +36,13 @@ It also knows what happened to **Nessa**. Dalla's blood did not merely hold Xarr
 
 ### Traits
 
-**Ethereal Jaunt.** As a bonus action, Xarrul shifts between the Material Plane and the Ethereal Plane. While ethereal, it can see and hear into the Material Plane (60 ft. range) but cannot affect or be affected by anything on the Material Plane. It appears as a faint, smoky distortion visible only to creatures with truesight, See Invisibility, or Veil Dust.
+**Ethereal Jaunt (After Lockdown Begins).** Once the ward-crystal has been shattered, Xarrul regains this trait for the rest of the night: as a bonus action, it shifts between the Material and Ethereal planes. While the lockdown holds, it can shift only between the two interiors of the Nether Inn and cannot cross the exterior shell on either plane. Even after the shell lapses, its old planar tether prevents an unembodied Xarrul from moving beyond the Inn's footprint; completing a vessel-working removes that restriction. While ethereal, it can see and hear into the Material Plane (60 ft. range) but cannot physically affect or be affected by anything there. Its telepathy and the projected whisper of Voice Thief are explicit exceptions. It is normally unseen from the Material Plane. *See Invisibility* reveals it as ghostly and translucent; Orenn's silver mirror provides that same sight within its reflection. Truesight reveals it normally, while the iron bell shows only a blurred outline. Before the lockdown, this trait is unavailable; use Stored Incursion instead.
+
+**Ethereal Restoration.** At the start of each of Xarrul's turns while it is on the Ethereal Plane, it regains 1d4 hit points. It cannot exceed its hit point maximum. Outside initiative, use the average of 25 hit points restored per minute unless the exact total matters.
+
+**Deathless Slip.** If Xarrul would die or be reduced to 0 hit points while on the Material Plane, it is reduced to 1 hit point instead and immediately shifts to the corresponding space on the Ethereal Plane, or the nearest unoccupied space there. This shift requires no action or reaction and occurs even if planar travel, teleportation, Ethereal Jaunt or Slip Between is prevented. No effect can suppress or interrupt it. This trait offers no protection on the Ethereal Plane: reducing Xarrul to 0 hit points there destroys it permanently.
+
+**Stored Incursion (Before Lockdown).** Work at the tear lets Xarrul store one brief Material manifestation. Replacing a spent charge requires a full night at the tear, and it can hold only one. When Xarrul releases the charge, it manifests on the Material Plane for three rounds, cannot use Ethereal Jaunt or Slip Between, and is dragged back to the Ethereal Plane at the end of the third round. It spent tonight's charge on Orenn: Brand, Visions, then the killing Multiattack. Before the lockdown its telepathy and projected whispers can cross the weakened veil, but attacks, brands, memory edits, and physical manipulation require this incursion.
 
 **Shadow Cloak.** In dim light or darkness, Xarrul has advantage on Stealth checks and can Hide as a bonus action.
 
@@ -58,7 +64,7 @@ It also knows what happened to **Nessa**. Dalla's blood did not merely hold Xarr
 - Only one creature can be branded at a time. Branding a new target removes the previous brand.
 - The brand lasts until removed by *Remove Curse*, *Greater Restoration*, or the death of Xarrul.
 
-*DM — the stealth brand (out of combat).* This is also how Xarrul marks a victim unseen, and it is meant to be **rolled and resolved in secret.** It picks a moment of cover — darkness, a brawl, a blackout, or reaching from the Ethereal Plane at someone isolated — and rolls to hit against the target's AC without announcing anything. **On a miss,** the ambush shows through for one second: the target glimpses the real thing — a cold hand closing over their chest, a shadow-claw, two points of amber light — and *knows* something reached for them. **On a hit,** say nothing at all. The 2d6 necrotic is real, but you do not narrate a brand or an attack; you fold it straight into a masking **Waking Dream** (below) and keep telling the story. The one thing it cannot disguise is the damage *type*: every covered "accident" in the house tonight leaves a cold, greyish, necrotic wound, and that invariant is the crack investigators pull on. *(In open combat, branding is loud and visible — the mark is meant to be seen, and the kill chain below takes over.)*
+*DM — the stealth brand (out of combat).* This is also how Xarrul marks a victim unseen, and it is meant to be **rolled and resolved in secret.** It picks a moment of cover — darkness, a brawl, a blackout, or an isolated victim beside whom it can briefly manifest — and rolls to hit against the target's AC without announcing anything. **On a miss,** the ambush shows through for one second: the target glimpses the real thing — a cold hand closing over their chest, a shadow-claw, two points of amber light — and *knows* something reached for them. **On a hit,** say nothing at all. The 2d6 necrotic is real, but you do not narrate a brand or an attack; you fold it straight into a masking **Waking Dream** (below) and keep telling the story. The one thing it cannot disguise is the damage *type*: every covered "accident" in the house tonight leaves a cold, greyish, necrotic wound, and that invariant is the crack investigators pull on. *(In open combat, branding is loud and visible — the mark is meant to be seen, and the kill chain below takes over.)*
 
 **Visions of Spite.** *Requires a branded target.* Xarrul forces a branded creature it can see within 30 feet to witness a spiteful vision — a hallucination tailored to the target's deepest fears and shames, channeled through the brand's connection. The target must succeed on a **DC 15 Wisdom saving throw** or take 7 (2d6) psychic damage and be **paralyzed** until the end of its next turn, frozen in the grip of the vision. On a success, the target takes half damage and shakes the vision off. The brand remains on the target regardless.
 
@@ -79,28 +85,28 @@ It also knows what happened to **Nessa**. Dalla's blood did not merely hold Xarr
 
 *Xarrul's round-to-round choice:* Visions costs an action (no Multiattack that round). So each round Xarrul decides — Visions to set up the paralyze, or Multiattack with advantage + extra d6 for consistent pressure. Against a high-WIS party, Xarrul grinds with Multiattack. Against a low-WIS branded target, the kill chain is terrifying.
 
-*This is how Orenn died. Xarrul branded him from the Ethereal Plane, forced a vision of spite into his mind — freezing him in place — then raked him with claws that struck a body incapable of flinching. Against an unsuspecting, unresisting barkeep with no allies to intervene, the full chain collapsed into seconds. In combat, with allies and agency, it's telegraphed and interruptible.*
+*This is how Orenn died. Xarrul spent its Stored Incursion behind him: Brand on the first round, Visions on the second, and the killing Multiattack on the third. As Mags relit the room, the charge collapsed and dragged Xarrul back to the Ethereal Plane. In combat, with allies and agency, the same chain is telegraphed and interruptible.*
 
 **Waking Dream.** *Requires a branded target Xarrul can see (line of sight — it has to be present, which is exactly what sets Bren off; see **The Two Jobs**, below).* Reaching through the brand, Xarrul rewrites the target's memory of the **last minute** — not what it perceives now, but what it *remembers* having just perceived. **No saving throw. No damage.** A save would tip the player off that reality is negotiable; this never does. For an NPC, just play them as though the false memory is true. For a PC, never announce it and never say "think back" — weave the false memory inline with your normal narration, as settled fact, and move on. The edit holds until hard evidence contradicts it or *Remove Curse* / *Greater Restoration* / Xarrul's death lifts it.
 
 - **Cover.** Cast the instant after a stealth Brand to rewrite the branding into a mundane accident — a spark from the fire caught a sleeve, a drink went down wrong, a stumble against a bench. The mark and the necrotic wound remain; the memory of earning them is gone.
-- **Misdirection.** Plant a false memory in a branded witness: they now sincerely *remember* seeing an innocent slip behind the bar, a threat that never happened, a clue that was never there. One branded person, turned into an honest false witness. It can reproduce any entry on the [Veil Dust hallucination table](../storylines/ethereal-trip.md#hallucination-table) as a "memory."
-- **Limits.** Only the branded creature's memory changes — one target at a time, so an *unbranded* witness to the real event contradicts the false one, and it cannot clean a crowded room. The necrotic wound is the seam. And it must be present to cast it.
+- **Misdirection.** Alter something that happened within the immediately preceding minute: whose voice delivered the last accusation, which hand reached toward a weapon, whether the target just saw Haddon pocket a page, or whether a PC's last sentence contained a threat. The target becomes an honest false witness to a fresh event.
+- **Limits.** It cannot reach farther back than sixty seconds, create a memory of the earlier blackout, revise an established alibi or insert a clue into a scene the target did not just witness. Only the branded creature's memory changes, so an unbranded witness contradicts the edit. The necrotic wound remains, and Xarrul must be present to cast it.
 
 *Two tells, always: the **Bren-spike** (a memory was just rewritten near us, right now) and the **necrotic wound + hand-mark** (this person was rewritten at some point tonight). Xarrul can fake everything except death's signature — and that is the crack that lets mortals catch it.*
 
-**Whisper of Ruin (Recharge 6).** Xarrul targets one creature within 30 feet that can hear it. The target must make a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw or become frightened for 1 minute and compelled to take a specific action on its next turn (attack a specific ally, drop a weapon, flee toward a designated area). The target can repeat the save at the end of each turn. On a success, the creature is immune for 24 hours.
+**Whisper of Ruin (Recharge 6).** Xarrul targets one creature within 30 feet that can hear it. The target must make a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw or become frightened for 1 minute and compelled to take a specific action on its next turn (attack a specific ally, drop a weapon, flee toward a designated area).
 
 ### Reactions
 
 **Slip Between.** When Xarrul takes damage on the Material Plane, it can use its reaction to shift to the Ethereal Plane. It can't use Ethereal Jaunt again until the start of its next turn.
 
-### Lair Actions (In the Cellar, Near the Thin Point)
+### Lair Actions (Anywhere in the Nether Inn)
 
-If confronted near the thin point, Xarrul can use one lair action per round on initiative count 20:
-- **Veil Flicker:** The boundary between planes shudders. Each creature in the cellar must make a DC 13 Wisdom save or be disoriented — disadvantage on attack rolls until initiative 20 of the next round.
+Xarrul's physical lair and nest are at the tear in the Old Work. While the lockdown holds, however, the sealed planar interior carries its influence through the entire house, so it can use one lair action per round on initiative count 20 anywhere in the Nether Inn:
+- **Veil Flicker:** The boundary between planes shudders. Each creature in Xarrul's room or immediate encounter area must make a DC 13 Wisdom save or be disoriented — disadvantage on attack rolls until initiative 20 of the next round.
 - **Ethereal Pull:** One creature must make a DC 14 Charisma save or be partially shifted into the Ethereal Plane until the start of its next turn (it can see both planes but has disadvantage on all attacks and saves).
-- **Shadow Surge:** All light sources in the cellar dim to darkness for 1 round. Xarrul can Hide as part of this action.
+- **Shadow Surge:** All light sources in Xarrul's room or immediate encounter area dim to darkness for 1 round. Xarrul can Hide as part of this action.
 
 ---
 
@@ -112,7 +118,7 @@ Xarrul rarely manifests fully. When it does: a tall, lean humanoid shape made of
 ### Ethereal Plane
 More defined. A gaunt, angular figure with skin like charred paper, cracked with veins of dull orange light. Its face has features here — sharp, aristocratic, with a mouth that curves in a permanent half-smile. Its eyes are fully visible: burning amber, ancient, deeply intelligent. It wears the rags of something that might have been formal clothing centuries ago.
 
-## Read-Aloud: First Sighting (Ethereal Plane, via Veil Dust)
+## Read-Aloud: First Sighting (Ethereal Plane)
 
 > *Vidíte to. V šedém, rozmazaném světě éterické roviny — kde všechno vypadá jako vybledlá fotografie skutečnosti — stojí něco, co tam nepatří. Vysoká postava, vychrtlá, s kůží jako spálený papír popraskanou žilkami tlumeného oranžového světla. Má tvář — ostrou, aristokratickou, s ústy staženými do polovičního úsměvu, který nevyjadřuje radost. Vyjadřuje trpělivost.*
 >
@@ -131,26 +137,30 @@ Xarrul stays in the Ethereal Plane, watches, and stirs trouble. Its cover tools
 It does **not** deliberately agitate Skein to rattle Bren — that backfires (an agitated Skein is a distracted one that loosens its grip and lets Bren surface). It wants Skein calm and Bren silent; see **Skein — a Tool, Not an Ally**, below.
 
 ### When Confronted
-- **First priority:** Not getting trapped. It will use Slip Between and Ethereal Jaunt aggressively to avoid being pinned on one plane.
+- **Respect the compact:** Before the Vacancy finishes, use the lethal rotation only against someone knowingly trying to bind, banish, or destroy Xarrul. Against investigators or trespassers it frightens, paralyzes, misdirects, and withdraws rather than delivering a killing blow. Whisper of Ruin may compel a drop, retreat, shove, or nonlethal strike, not a disguised execution.
+- **First priority:** Never let enemies cover both planes cleanly. Against Material-only attackers it slips Ethereal, regenerates and returns elsewhere. Against Ethereal-only attackers it jaunts Material. If the party splits, it attacks the weaker side, disrupts readied actions and tries to force the oil-user or salt-carrier out of position.
 - **Second priority:** Turn the room against the players. Whisper of Ruin on the strongest melee character, Voice Thief to make allies distrust each other, telepathic taunts.
-- **Third priority:** Mark and pressure the biggest threat. Brand the most dangerous PC (casters who can affect it across planes, a Veil Dust user carrying Veilhook Salt), then loop: Visions of Spite to paralyze, Multiattack for crits, Visions again. Against a high-WIS party, skip Visions and grind with advantage Multiattacks. Against a low-WIS branded target, run the kill chain mercilessly. If they have Remove Curse, brand a different target each time it's cleansed to burn their spell slots.
-- **It will NOT fight to the death.** If reduced to half HP or lower and restrained on the Material Plane, it negotiates — it's ancient and has information, names, and secrets it can trade. See [Scenario D: Negotiation](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-d-negotiation) and — if the party has soured on the cult *and* the couple — [Scenario F: The Open Door](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-the-open-door-joining-xarrul).
+- **Third priority:** Mark and pressure the biggest threat. Brand the most dangerous PC (a Material defender readying Veilhook Salt, an Ethereal oil-user, or someone restoring the binding), then loop: Visions of Spite to paralyze, Multiattack for crits, Visions again. Against a high-WIS party, skip Visions and grind with advantage Multiattacks. Against a low-WIS branded target, run the kill chain mercilessly. If they have Remove Curse, brand a different target each time it's cleansed to burn their spell slots.
+- **It will NOT fight to the death.** If reduced to half HP or lower and restrained on the Material Plane, it negotiates — it's ancient and has information, names, and secrets it can trade. See [Scenario D: Negotiation](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-d-conventional-negotiation) and — if the party has soured on the cult *and* the couple — [Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-deliberately-side-with-xarrul).
 
 ### Loosing the Rift-Scavengers
-Xarrul doesn't lair in the [Deep Cellar](../location/deep-cellar.md), but it has found the couple's failing containment down there — the **[Old Work](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-old-work)**, where the planar fault has torn into an actual rift — and it has learned to *use* the minor ethereal scavengers that gather at the tear. It herds them at intruders like hounds: shadows, an ethereal filcher, the occasional specter. This is how a party exploring the depths "meets Xarrul's creatures" without meeting Xarrul. If the party is down there and Xarrul is present on the ethereal side, it can spend a turn widening the tear to add another shadow per round — a cheap, deniable way to bleed a party it can't yet reach. It costs Xarrul nothing and teaches the players, viscerally, that the thing they're hunting can reach into places they thought were safe.
+Xarrul lairs at the couple's failing containment in the **[Old Work](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-old-work)**, where the planar fault is both thin point and actual tear. It has learned to *use* the minor ethereal scavengers that gather there, herding them at intruders like hounds: shadows, an ethereal filcher, the occasional specter. This is how a party exploring the depths can meet Xarrul's creatures before confronting Xarrul itself. Before the compact expires, creatures deliberately loosed by Xarrul harry, steal, separate, and herd but do not finish a helpless target unless the target has activated the self-defense exception. If Xarrul is present on the ethereal side, it can spend a turn widening the tear to add another shadow per round.
 
-### The Dual-Plane Kill
-See [The Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md). If players attempt the synchronized kill, Xarrul fights desperately on both planes. On the Ethereal Plane, it's more aggressive (this is its home ground). On the Material Plane, it tries to flee. Both halves must die within 1 round of each other for the cure to work.
+### Destroying Xarrul — The Planar Pincer
+
+See [The Reckoning](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-c-ethereal-destruction). Xarrul has one body and one hit point pool shared across both planes. There are no separate forms to damage and no synchronized final blows. It can be permanently destroyed only by reducing it to 0 hit points while it is Ethereal.
+
+Attackers normally cover both planes because Xarrul can dodge a group confined to either one. Material pressure drives it Ethereal; Ethereal pressure drives it Material. Readied actions, voluntarily delaying or fixing allied initiative order, and any other sensible coordination are valid—the challenge is covering both exits, not winning an initiative puzzle. If reduced to 0 while Material, Deathless Slip places it Ethereal at 1 hit point; if reduced to 0 while already Ethereal, it dies regardless of how much damage it previously took on either plane.
 
 ## The Two Jobs — How Xarrul Works the Night
 
-Xarrul has two tasks that cannot be done from the same place, and it spends the night shuttling between them.
+The lockdown has already admitted Xarrul to the Material interior. It is not charging or completing a crossing below. Its two jobs are protecting the one vulnerable future event and preventing the people upstairs from coordinating against it.
 
-**Downstairs — tend the tear.** The crossing is *labour,* not a countdown. The old seal wants to close (the summoners' wards are cracked but not dead — Bren feels them "failing"), so Xarrul must periodically re-open and hold the seam: recharge it, realign it as it drifts, feed the bleed back into it. This is the actual goal-progress, done at the thin point in the cellar, away from Bren — **no tell fires down here.**
+**Downstairs — protect the exit.** The Old Work holds the only site where the Guest can willingly vacate its body and the only three rounds in which Xarrul must surrender Ethereal Jaunt. Anyone who reaches the Deep Cellar can expose the compact, free or kill the Guest, restore containment, collect the anti-fiend tools, or prepare an ambush at midnight. Xarrul checks the Guest and responds to intrusion; it has no progress action to perform there.
 
-**Upstairs — tend the cover.** Keeping the investigation from converging on the cellar before midnight. Its cover tools are short-range — Voice Thief and whispers reach 30 ft., telepathy 60 — so working the room means being *in* the room, within range of Bren. **This is where the tell fires.**
+**Upstairs — tend the cover.** Xarrul keeps the investigation from converging on the cellar before midnight. Its cover tools are short-range — Voice Thief and whispers reach 30 ft., telepathy 60 — so working the room means being *in* the room, within range of Bren. **This is where the tell fires.** The compact forbids Xarrul from killing again until the exchange is finished, except in direct defense against binding, banishment, or destruction, so it cultivates accusation, isolation, and delay rather than attacking the room outright. It does not have to save patrons from violence they choose themselves.
 
-It can't be in both places, so early in the night it is mostly downstairs (the brawl aftermath does its cover work for free) and surfaces only to nudge; late in the night it is dragged upstairs more and more. That shuttle is the engine for everything below.
+It shuttles because it must watch both its leverage below and its enemies above, not because the tear needs labour.
 
 ### The Brenometer — Bren as a Fiend-Detector
 
@@ -165,36 +175,40 @@ This makes presence a **metered, self-limiting risk.** Being near Bren cracks th
 Three drivers, all pointing the same way — this is the mechanism under **The Night's Clock** (below):
 
 1. **Cover decays.** Early, the brawl aftermath and faction distrust do its work for free. As the party pools clues and converges, that natural chaos runs down and it must re-inject confusion by hand — more trips up, more tells.
-2. **Exposure gets cheaper.** Early, being caught is fatal (the crossing isn't far enough along to survive interruption; it can still be cheaply rebound). Late, once the seam is wide, catching it no longer easily stops the crossing — so it dares to show itself. This is the mask coming off.
-3. **The tear needs more tending.** Late, the seam is wide and volatile — near-constant holding, not the occasional nudge.
+2. **Its secret gets harder to protect.** Early, nobody knows the cellar matters. Late, clues point downward and Xarrul must risk direct intervention to turn investigators back.
+3. **Midnight fixes the battlefield.** The closer the Vacancy window comes, the less time Xarrul has to recover from a freed Guest, restored ward, stolen tool, or prepared ambush.
 
-Net: it is stretched thin, present more often, and bolder — so the Brenometer fires hardest exactly as the crossing peaks. Its one witness gets loudest at the worst possible moment for it.
+Net: it is stretched thin, present more often, and bolder — so the Brenometer fires hardest as midnight approaches. Its one witness gets loudest at the worst possible moment for it.
 
 ### The Attention Lever (a handle for the players)
 
 Because its attention is finite and split, the party can tax it without understanding why:
 
-- Investigate **loudly and cooperatively** → they force it upstairs to firefight → the tear goes untended → the crossing **stalls** (at the cost of lighting the tell, revealing it, and provoking the scatter-kill — see the Kael row in **Who It Kills, Who It Spares**, below).
-- Go **quiet** → it tends the tear uninterrupted → the crossing **accelerates.**
+- Investigate **loudly and cooperatively** → force it upstairs to repair its cover, producing more Bren-spikes and more chances to catch it present.
+- Explore the cellar **quietly** → bypass its cover and threaten the Guest, tools, wards, and midnight site before Xarrul realizes where the real danger is.
 
-This inverts the usual creep-around instinct: the loud, chaotic table is, without knowing it, doing the thing that slows it down — and the careful, quiet one is handing it the night.
+Neither approach changes an invisible progress bar. They change what the party knows and how well prepared each side is when the shell lapses.
 
 ### In the Ethereal Plane — Proprietary, Not Territorial
 
-Xarrul is **not territorial.** The ethereal cellar is its *worksite,* not a lair it defends by instinct — it is a recent, purposeful operator sharing the plane with Skein, the scavengers, the binding circle it avoids, and the deep Ethereal beyond. Its response to anyone who reaches the Ethereal Plane is keyed to exactly one question: *does this threaten the crossing?*
+The tear is Xarrul's lair and intended transfer site, but Xarrul is **not territorial** about it. It is a recent, purposeful operator sharing the Ethereal Plane with Skein, the scavengers, and the deep Ethereal beyond. The upper binding circle is elsewhere and is simply a danger it avoids. Its response to anyone who reaches the Ethereal Plane is keyed to exactly one question: *does this threaten the compact or the midnight transfer?*
 
-- **An observer** (a Veil Dust tripper who simply *sees* it): it does **not** attack. Violence would confirm hostility and blow the ambiguity it cultivates. It watches, and it *talks* — Voice Thief, telepathy, truth mixed with misdirection. Contact is an opportunity, and a party that's talking to it isn't ringing the bell.
-- **A trespasser** (exploring, not yet touching the work): attrition, not commitment — the herded rift-scavengers (above), cold, dread, a manifested claw. It buys time and discourages; it will not commit to a fight that exposes it early.
-- **A threat** (moving to breach the seal, wake the iron bell or the foundation sigils, re-power containment, or hitting it with something that pins or hurts it across planes): now it is self-defense — immediate, lethal, and smart (Slip Between, Brand the most dangerous, Whisper of Ruin to divide them). The instant they stop threatening the crossing, it disengages.
+- **An observer** (someone who simply sees it without threatening the compact or transfer): it does **not** attack. Violence would confirm hostility and may breach its promise. It watches. If it independently chooses to use Voice Thief or telepathy, it mixes truth with misdirection; seeing it creates no communication channel by itself.
+- **A trespasser** (exploring, not yet touching the Guest, tools, or wards): attrition, not commitment — the herded rift-scavengers (above), cold, dread, a warning. It buys time and discourages without violating the compact.
+- **A threat** (moving to wake the iron bell or foundation sigils, re-power containment, lure it into the upper binding circle, enter the Ethereal Plane armed, or ready Veilhook Salt for its manifestation): now it is self-defense — immediate, lethal, and smart (Slip Between, Brand the most dangerous, Whisper of Ruin to divide them). The exterior shell cannot be punctured and is not a tactical target.
 
-It is proprietary about the *process,* not the *space.* Someone can stand in "its" ethereal cellar all night; it does not care until they touch the work — then the response is instant, and it is an accountant's decision, never instinct.
+**Against rebinding:** the first prepared knot and true-name Recall trigger the compact's self-defense exception. Before capture, Xarrul attacks whoever is reading the [Litany of the Averted Step](../prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md), carrying Veilhook Salt or maintaining the planar anchor. It uses Brand and Visions to make a reader lose the shifting text, Whisper of Ruin to make one drop or turn a leaf, and Shadow Surge to break perception. It moves sideways through any angle left open between the readers and never willingly approaches either active chant.
+
+Once the adapted circle accepts it, physical escape is no longer the scene. The salt-and-name matrix suppresses its movement and fresh hostile reach across the boundary; only an existing Brand still carries Visions of Spite or Waking Dream through. Xarrul turns to truthful bargaining. It tells Dalla what her blood is doing to Nessa, Haddon what became of Bren and the living weight, and Rennt that Haddon knew the command line was dead. Its goal is to make one station stop, let the psychic backlash break another, and persuade the last hand to open voluntarily.
+
+It is proprietary about the *secret,* not the *space.* Someone can stand beside its Ethereal nest at the Old Work; it acts when they threaten the Guest, containment, anti-fiend tools, or transfer site — an accountant's decision, never instinct.
 
 ### Skein — a Tool, Not an Ally
 
 Xarrul neither befriends nor hunts Skein by default; it **exploits** the parasite and holds it in contempt ("a lesser thing, feeding on scraps"). Its whole stance tracks one variable: *is Bren's mouth currently shut?*
 
-- **Default — coexistence.** Skein muzzles the only eyewitness to the murder *for free* (its Silence the Host keeps Bren incoherent, for its own reasons), and a party that finds Skein first may burn the clock on the possession subplot instead of the crossing. Xarrul does nothing for Skein and needs to do nothing — the parasite censors its witness at no cost.
-- **It protects the muzzle — deniably.** If the party is about to *kill* Skein in the Ethereal Plane, a freed Bren becomes a lucid, coherent eyewitness — an arcanist who studied this exact fault and can point them straight at the crossing. Xarrul won't overtly rescue vermin (too exposing), but it tips the scales: a scavenger into the fight, a Shadow Surge, a divisive whisper — enough to let Skein *flee* (its own ability) and keep Bren muddled.
+- **Default — coexistence.** Skein muzzles the only eyewitness to the murder *for free* (its Silence the Host keeps Bren incoherent, for its own reasons), and a party that finds Skein first may burn the clock on the possession subplot instead of Xarrul's midnight plan. Xarrul does nothing for Skein and needs to do nothing — the parasite censors its witness at no cost.
+- **It protects the muzzle — deniably.** If the party is about to *kill* Skein in the Ethereal Plane, a freed Bren becomes a lucid, coherent eyewitness—an arcanist who studied this exact fault and can point them straight at the Guest and the tear. Xarrul won't overtly rescue vermin (too exposing), but it tips the scales: a scavenger into the fight, a Shadow Surge, a divisive whisper—enough to let Skein *flee* and keep Bren muddled.
 - **Their interests align.** During a lucid window (severed tendrils, *Protection from Evil and Good*), Xarrul and Skein briefly want the same thing — Bren silent — and it may nudge Skein to reclaw its grip. Fiend and parasite, for a moment, on the same side against the free man.
 - **It kills Skein only if the parasite turns.** A cornered Skein trying to buy its life by informing the party about the bigger fiend becomes a liability and dies without a second thought. (Unlikely — it is too terrified and too small to try.)
 
@@ -204,15 +218,17 @@ Fighting Skein directly is beneath its dignity. They share a plane; only one of
 
 Xarrul is not mindless evil, and it is not merely *petty* evil either. It has one clear, cold want: **to become real** — to cross the veil permanently and walk the world as a resident, not a summoned tool. For centuries it has been called up, bound, made to run errands, and dismissed; it wants to stand on the far side of the glass. Everything it does tonight serves that single end.
 
-**Why it killed Orenn.** Not for revenge — or not *only*. Orenn's death does two things the crossing needs. First, it **triggers the lockdown**: a killing in the house is what makes Mags shatter the summoners' lockstone, and that seal is the closed vessel Xarrul must have to finish crossing (see [The Reckoning — The Clock](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#the-clock) and [the ward-crystal's true nature](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door)). The [Guest](the-guest.md#the-compact-in-the-walls--xarrul-and-the-guest) identified *Orenn* as the cautious keeper and Mags as the one who would follow emergency protocol in grief. Xarrul verified the judgment, chose Orenn and killed him. Second, it removes the **one watcher** whose surveillance was quietly circling the fiend (Orenn never knew it lived under his own floor, but he was getting close from the wrong direction). That it was also satisfying — the cultists tried to enslave it, the assassins broke its chains and gave it no respect — was a bonus, not the point.
+**Why it killed Orenn.** Not for revenge — or not *only*. Orenn's death does two things Xarrul needs. First, it **triggers the lockdown**: a killing in the house is what makes Mags shatter the summoners' lockstone. The emergency device pulls power away from the internal planar seals and spends it on an impenetrable exterior shell. That trade lets Xarrul cross fully into the Inn and regain Ethereal Jaunt inside the cage, while preventing it from leaving before midnight (see [The Reckoning — The Clock](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#the-clock) and [the ward-crystal's true nature](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door)). The [Guest](the-guest.md#the-compact-in-the-walls--xarrul-and-the-guest) identified *Orenn* as the cautious keeper and Mags as the one who would follow emergency protocol in grief. Xarrul verified the judgment, chose Orenn and spent its one Stored Incursion on him. Second, the murder removes the **one watcher** whose surveillance was quietly circling the fiend. Orenn is also the single agreed exception to the compact's moratorium on killing before the exchange is finished.
 
-**Why the chaos.** The framing, the whispers, the faction blood — none of it is spite. It is **cover**. Xarrul spent centuries being hunted by fixers like Orenn; it knows the only way to cross unnoticed is to keep everyone busy killing each other while it finishes its work in the sealed house. Every manipulation is operational:
+**Why the chaos.** The framing, whispers, and faction hostility are **cover—and the compact's central loophole.** Xarrul may not kill anyone after Orenn until the exchange finishes, but the assassins and cultists remain free to kill one another. It therefore spends the lockdown turning real grievances into faction war through stolen voices, true accusations, and fresh false memories. It never compels one exact fatal blow; it arranges the grievance and lets a mortal choose it. Every manipulation is operational:
 
 - The Brand leaves fiendish evidence → the cult gets blamed.
 - The murder happened during the assassins' brawl → the timing implicates *them*.
-- Both sides at each other's throats → no one stops to ask what the lockdown really did, or goes looking for the crossing before midnight. That is the *goal*, not a side effect.
+- Both sides at each other's throats → no one stops to ask what the lockdown really did, finds the Guest, or prepares the Old Work for midnight. That is the *goal*, not a side effect.
 
-**On the Opening.** Xarrul has no interest in Mother Vyre's grand design and is not part of her plan — but it is not a harmless loose thread either. Where the cult wants to dissolve *every* wall between planes for everyone, Xarrul wants one crack, just wide enough for itself. It is, functionally, the **enemy of the Opening** — and that is exactly the leverage it offers a party desperate enough to bargain (see [The Reckoning — Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-the-open-door-joining-xarrul)).
+If the Guest dies before the exchange, the bargain becomes impossible and its temporary restraint ends immediately. Xarrul stops working through the loophole, kills directly, and selects the Guest's killer as its first Hollowing candidate. This is why the Guest can tell an Executioner, truthfully: *kill me and you release the thing that will come for you next.*
+
+**On the Opening.** Xarrul has no interest in Mother Vyre's grand design and is not part of her plan — but it is not a harmless loose thread either. Where the cult wants to dissolve *every* wall between planes for everyone, Xarrul wants one crack, just wide enough for itself. It is, functionally, the **enemy of the Opening** — and that is exactly the leverage it offers a party desperate enough to bargain (see [The Reckoning — Scenario F](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-f-deliberately-side-with-xarrul)).
 
 **The honest voice in a house of liars.** This is the heart of the character. The Guest lies beautifully. The cult lies to itself. Orenn and Mags lied about being retired for fifteen years. Xarrul manipulates perception, steals voices, and withholds whatever does not serve it—but it makes no false factual statement and does not break a promise. Ask it a direct question and it answers truly, narrowly, because truth is more corrosive than invention. The distinction matters: it is deceptive in method, reliable in speech. Play it consistently and "join it" becomes a genuine temptation instead of an edgy footnote.
 
@@ -220,30 +236,34 @@ Xarrul is not mindless evil, and it is not merely *petty* evil either. It has on
 
 Xarrul and the Guest recognize themselves in one another: captive assets used for other people's errands. Their sympathy is real and irrelevant.
 
-Xarrul has offered to project the Guest from its changeling body and re-anchor its silver cord into the Inn's old ward lattice. The Guest becomes the spectral **Host**, master of every door and impossible to confine within the building it now inhabits; Xarrul receives the vacant body. Xarrul has stated the limitation plainly: the Host will never cross the Inn's threshold. The Guest has knowingly accepted.
+The Guest is the sharper social strategist. It understands immediately that the changeling body is not merely a vessel but a clean exit, and that taking the Inn requires replacing its keeper rather than announcing a claim. Xarrul understands the magical risk and the likelihood of betrayal; it accepts because, without outside hands, it still wins the transfer.
+
+The Guest supplied the essential exchange: at the tear in the Old Work, it will willingly vacate its changeling body, and Xarrul will project the displaced spirit into the Astral Plane rather than annihilate it. The breach is necessary to expose and redirect both spirits. Xarrul receives a mutable vessel able to walk out wearing any face. The Guest accepts because it intends to have outsiders destroy Xarrul during the exposed transfer and then reclaim the body with the fiend's planar imprint.
+
+Xarrul's first assurance was unconditional: **it will not kill the Guest.** A forced Hollowing would destroy the Guest's projected spirit, so that promise makes willing Vacancy the only route to the changeling body. Their later compact adds one plain restraint: **one death to close the house—Orenn—and Xarrul will kill no one else until the exchange is finished.** Xarrul may defend itself against someone knowingly attempting to bind, banish, or destroy it. Otherwise it will neither land nor deliberately command a killing blow, though it is not obliged to rescue patrons who choose violence themselves. The Guest wants living outsiders available for its trap and an Inn still worth taking. It asks for nothing after the exchange because either Xarrul dies during it and the Guest returns empowered, or Xarrul wins and the Guest departs for the Astral Plane. When the Guest is delivered Astral at the end of round 3, the temporary restraint ends; the original promise not to kill the Guest remains.
 
 Xarrul also knows the Guest would prefer to destroy it during the transfer, reclaim the body and retain its planar imprint. It enters anyway because the Guest cannot attack without forfeiting its bodily claim, ordinary mortals cannot touch the projected fiend, and Xarrul wins the contest of wills without outside interference. The deception Xarrul misses is not the Guest's appetite. It is the party the Guest has armed and positioned around the bargain.
 
-If the exchange begins, run **[The Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit)**. Xarrul cannot withdraw after placing its essential anchor in the body; it defends itself with accurate disclosures about the Guest and lets the players decide which danger deserves the vessel.
+If the exchange begins, run **[The Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy)**. Xarrul cannot withdraw after placing its essential anchor in the body. If it wins, the Guest remains coherent but bodiless in the Astral Plane; recovering it requires a future planar rescue and a new vessel.
 
 ## The Night's Clock — Presence & Escalation
 
 The old shape of this module was a whodunit: *what killed Orenn?* → "a fiend" → fight it. The reframed shape keeps the fiend's identity as an *early, cheap* answer and makes the real investigation **moral**: *is this thing actually the villain here?* For that to land, Xarrul must be **felt all night** and slowly recontextualized — from ambient menace, to a voice that seems to taunt, to the only honest dealer in the room.
 
-Presence escalates on the **lockdown clock**. The moment Mags shatters the lockstone, the house seals across every plane into a closed vessel — and Xarrul, sealed inside on the ethereal side, begins finishing its crossing through the old tear. It has until **midnight**, when the seal lapses on its own. As the night runs, the crossing advances — the room grows colder, the ethereal bleed thickens (no longer diffusing away into the district, but pooling *inside*), Xarrul manifests more fully and kills more openly. If the clock runs out, Xarrul **crosses over completely**: permanent, material, no more Slip Between, far worse to fight. The players slowing or breaking the clock — **breaching a sealed exit** to re-open the vessel, the iron bell, re-powering the cellar containment, the fifth rule's *burn-and-seal* — is the pushback; their failure to act is complicity. (Full mechanism: [The Reckoning — The Clock](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#the-clock).)
+Presence escalates on the **lockdown clock**. The moment Mags shatters the lockstone, power leaves the internal seals, the house closes across every plane, and Xarrul crosses fully into the trapped interior. Nothing can enter or leave on any plane while the shell holds, so the Vacancy cannot begin: the Guest cannot be delivered to the Astral Plane. At **midnight** the shell lapses and the returning ward-power begins resealing the tear, creating the single three-round Vacancy window. Player pushback means exposing Xarrul, restoring containment, controlling the factions, reaching the Guest, or preparing the Old Work before that window opens. (Full sequence: [Natural Progression](../storylines/natural-progression.md).)
 
 **The escalation ladder (presence = the clock made audible):**
 
-1. **Ambient dread (Acts 1–2).** No identity yet. Cold spots, a candle that gutters with no draft, Bren flinching at something no one else senses, distortions in [Orenn's silver mirror](orenn.md#items-on-his-person). The house feels *inhabited*.
+1. **Ambient dread (Acts 1–2).** No identity yet. Cold spots, a candle that gutters with no draft, Bren flinching at something no one else senses, or a ghostly figure briefly crossing [Orenn's silver mirror](orenn.md#orenns-silver-mirror). The house feels *inhabited*.
 2. **It notices you (early Act 3).** Once the party investigates, Xarrul whispers to them — Voice Thief, telepathy. It uses **partial truths, omitted context, and questions**, never false statements. It points at genuine clues and corrects convenient mistakes only when doing so divides the room or earns trust. They cannot yet tell whether honesty is help or another weapon. That ambiguity is the engine.
-3. **Honest contact (mid–late Act 3).** A real channel opens — Veil Dust, the mirror, or it simply speaks near the thin point. Now it *converses*: candid about the murder, candid about *why*, and everything it says checks out against what they've dug up — while everyone with a face keeps lying.
+3. **Honest contact (mid–late Act 3).** Xarrul chooses to speak somewhere in the house, or the party reaches it under Oil of Etherealness. Now it *converses*: candid about the murder, candid about *why*, and everything it says checks out against what they've dug up — while everyone with a face keeps lying.
 4. **The pitch (Reckoning).** They have the context now. The offer becomes emotionally available (Scenario F).
 
 **The device that carries all of it: a recurring voice.** Dry, amused, unattributed. It seems to taunt early; it is slowly revealed to be Xarrul; it is slowly revealed to have *never once lied*. A few lines per scene. The reframe — *the cruellest-seeming thing turns out to be the only honest one* — lands itself.
 
 ### Dalla — The Truth as a Wedge
 
-During the brawl, Xarrul steals the two restricted extracts from Haddon's folio. It reads them through the binding's lingering sympathetic link and recognizes that Vyre caused Nessa's dislocation, Haddon knew, and both chose continued extraction over reintegration.
+During the brawl, Haddon's two restricted extracts scatter from his folio. Xarrul's Stored Incursion is fully occupied by Orenn's murder; it steals the papers in the first minute after Mags activates the lockdown and restores its Ethereal Jaunt. It reads them through the binding's lingering sympathetic link and recognizes that Vyre caused Nessa's dislocation, Haddon knew, and both chose continued extraction over reintegration.
 
 It first whispers in Haddon's voice while the real Haddon is visible: *„Mohla ji zachránit už před měsíci.”* Then: *„Zeptej se ho, co krmila tvoje krev.”* It plants the maternal-conduit extract where Dalla or the investigators will find it and withholds the E–III report until the first revelation has made its terminology meaningful.
 
@@ -253,37 +273,36 @@ Keep the **first impression genuinely menacing** (Orenn's horrific death, the sc
 
 ## Who It Kills, Who It Spares
 
-Sympathy is not safety. Xarrul is understandable, honest, and the lesser evil — **and** it methodically murders everyone who could stop it. The menace is in the *curation*: it kills exactly what threatens its crossing and is terrifyingly good at knowing who that is. Cold, surgical, inevitable. When the players realize everyone still breathing is *useful to it* — that it has been playing chess with the guest list all night — that is the coldest beat in the module.
+Sympathy is not safety. Xarrul is understandable, honest, and the lesser evil—and the compact, not mercy, is why it personally claims no victim after Orenn before midnight. It manipulates, isolates, and frightens freely; mortals may still kill one another without its direct act. A direct attempt to bind, banish, or destroy Xarrul invokes the self-defense exception. Once the Guest has been delivered Astral, the restraint is gone.
 
-Overt killing is expensive while it hides (it needs the smokescreen), so the body count **escalates with the lockdown clock** — the mask comes off precisely as it becomes real. Run every kill below as a **DM tool triggered by player choices**, not a scripted inevitability; otherwise you delete your own endings (kill Haddon on a timer and a party that never considered rebinding loses that branch for nothing).
+Run every permitted kill below as a **DM tool triggered by player choices**, not a scripted inevitability; otherwise you delete your own endings. Before the pact ends, Xarrul supplies motive, opportunity, confusion, and escalation, but leaves the final lethal decision to a mortal. After the Guest dies or the exchange finishes, that distinction disappears.
 
 | When | Move | Target | Why |
 |------|------|--------|-----|
 | Pre-game | Kill (done) | **Orenn** | The calm keeper — killed to trigger the lockdown and clear the one watcher. |
-| Early–mid Act 3, *if the party **converges*** | **Deniable** kill | **Kael** (the witness), or a minor patron | Not to start a war — to **scatter**. Kael is more useful alive (a self-propelled war-fuse) until he flips: the honest witness who starts focusing his testimony and rallying the room toward a *coordinated* hunt. Killing him then reshuffles the coalition back into mutual suspicion and buys another hour. War is a possible side effect, not the aim — a boil is high-variance cover; it wants a simmer. |
-| Conditional | **Reactive** kill | **Haddon**, *only if the party moves to rebind it* | "You reach for the chains, I take the hand." Punishes a choice instead of pre-deleting the rebinding path. |
-| Late / crossing | **Open** kill (mask off) | the most competent threat left standing | Done pretending. Fully manifest, kills in the open. Peak horror, gated on the clock. |
-| **Spared — always** | — | **Essek** (indicts the cult for it), **the Guest** (its willing vessel and promised Host), sometimes a **branded PC** (grooming) | The chess set. Notice-this-and-shudder. |
+| Early–mid Act 3 | Escalate accusation | **Kael and Rennt** | Xarrul wants argument and distraction, not a death that would break the compact. |
+| Conditional | **Reactive** kill | **Haddon**, *only if he knowingly moves to bind or banish it* | The compact's explicit self-defense exception: "You reach for the chains, I take the hand." |
+| Guest killed | **Open** kill / abduction | **The Guest's killer** | The exchange is impossible, the temporary restraint ends, and the killer is Xarrul's first replacement-vessel candidate. |
+| After Vacancy | **Open** kill | a direct anti-fiend threat, then anyone who can identify its new body | The compact has ended. It removes witnesses only if the transfer was exposed; otherwise it leaves quietly. |
+| **Protected from Xarrul** | — | **The Guest and everyone else in the Inn** | Orenn is the agreed exception. The pact does not protect them from one another and ends when the exchange finishes. |
 
 > **Grooming → conversion.** The "branded PC" it spares isn't just kept alive — it may be *turned*. A lone PC caught in the Deep Cellar can be marked with a brand of favor and genuinely persuaded to Xarrul's side (not charmed — argued). See [handouts/the-conversion.md](../handouts/the-conversion.md).
 
-**The laundering effect.** Most of the people it kills are ones the party has already soured on — fanatics building toward the apocalypse, a true believer who'd end the world to prove a point. A join-leaning table *rationalizes* those deaths ("Rennt was going to end the world anyway"). That is the seduction: Xarrul launders its violence through the party's own contempt for the victims. Which is exactly why it also needs one move they *can't* wave away — and the **Kael kill is one such move.** He is sympathetic, loyal, and no one's apocalypse-builder, and Xarrul kills him not for being dangerous but for being *useful to the truth*. Murdering the honest man to buy forty minutes stays cold even *with* the context. That is the whole principle in one beat: every kill is *explicable* — a cold observer can reconstruct exactly why it happened — but not every kill is *forgivable*. The context turns the murders from senseless into calculated, never from wrong into right.
+**After the promise expires.** Finishing the Vacancy removes both the Guest and the restraint it imposed. If the transfer was witnessed and the survivors can identify or immediately bind the new vessel, Xarrul performs cold, practical cleanup. If nobody saw the transfer, disguise is safer than slaughter and it joins the people leaving. A separate promise made to the party remains binding.
 
-### The Kidnap — Honesty Weaponized
+### The Abduction — The Hollowing
 
-Late game — cornered, or making its crossing — Xarrul pulls someone through into the Ethereal Plane (mechanically, an escalated **Ethereal Pull**; see Lair Actions) and holds them as **insurance**:
+If the Guest dies or its body becomes unusable, Xarrul does not take a hostage and promise a return. It abducts a replacement, drags the victim to the tear, and uses the breach to erase the victim and keep the body through the forced three-round **[Hollowing](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-h-the-hollowing)**.
 
-> *"Let me finish, and they come back to you, unharmed — you have watched me all night; you know I keep my word. Stop me, and the veil closes with them on the wrong side of it. Choose."*
+Target the PC most responsible for denying it the Guest. If that is impossible, choose a vulnerable humanoid with a useful identity, then a cultist it can isolate. The disappearance disturbs the Deep Cellar wards and Twinkle's web, alerting Mags. Haddon recognizes what Xarrul is attempting, but Mags bars the cultists from her secret level and goes alone; Xarrul kills her before the ritual unless the party follows.
 
-It does not bluff, and the players *know* it doesn't, because you've spent all night establishing it as the one thing that never lies. So there is no calling the bluff: let it cross to save them, or sacrifice them to stop it. Evil (a hostage), in character (instrumental, honest), and a real finale dilemma. Pick the hostage **flexibly — whoever the table has invested in most** — and make them at least somewhat sympathetic, so even a join-leaning party flinches.
-
-**Systemic hook:** the Guest is Xarrul's ideal and already-negotiated vessel. If the party **kills the [Guest](the-guest.md)**, Xarrul loses the only body prepared to receive it willingly and must **abduct a replacement** — the party's own choice *causes* the kidnap. If they free the Guest, they enable the far more complicated [Vacancy](../storylines/the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit).
+The ordinary vessel is inferior because it cannot change shape, but Xarrul prefers an imperfect body to risking its new existence on a hostage bargain.
 
 ## The Warden's Mark (Mags)
 
-Xarrul worked on *both* of them. Orenn it branded and killed. **Mags it branded too** — a dormant Brand of Spite over her heart, the same hand-shaped mark Orenn bore, only fainter and cold rather than killing. It has held off triggering it, because **it needs her alive**: she is the one who seals the house (the murder is what makes her do it), and a living, grieving Mags is useful afterward — a scapegoat, a jailer keeping the others in line, a heart to break later. Two dead keepers at once would raise the alarm too soon.
+Xarrul worked on *both* of them. Orenn it branded and killed. **Mags carries a Warden's Mark** — a dormant ward-scar left during an earlier Stored Incursion, resembling a faint Brand of Spite but mechanically distinct from the one-creature combat Brand. It has held off triggering the scar because **it needs her alive**: she is the one who seals the house, and a living, grieving Mags keeps everyone else contained and in line. The mark can incapacitate her without killing her and therefore does not violate the compact.
 
-**Mags knows, and hides it.** She has felt the cold hand on her chest for weeks and told no one, not even Orenn. It is part of why she is so fatalistic; when she says *"Orenn and I could have taken it. One of us isn't here,"* the truth underneath is that she no longer believes she's a whole one of herself. The players can discover the mark — Orenn's silver mirror, a Medicine/Arcana check, Bren's reaction — a mid-game beat that says, without a word, that Xarrul is already inside the house, inside *her*. Full detail and the compromised statline live in [mags.md](mags.md#the-wardens-mark-dm).
+**Mags knows, and hides it.** She has felt the cold hand on her chest for weeks and told no one, not even Orenn. It is part of why she is so fatalistic; when she says *"Orenn and I could have taken it. One of us isn't here,"* the truth underneath is that she no longer believes she's a whole one of herself. The players can discover the mark through a Medicine/Arcana check or Bren's reaction — a mid-game beat that says, without a word, that Xarrul is already inside the house, inside *her*. Full detail and the compromised statline live in [mags.md](mags.md#the-wardens-mark-dm).
 
 **It is the finale's tuning knob**, and it means you build only one Mags:
 
@@ -301,12 +320,12 @@ Either way, triggering the mark keeps the spotlight on the PCs rather than on a
 - Nessa's astral projection was diverted by Vyre's E–III experiment, not by an innate defect
 - Dalla is the maternal conduit through which the Order siphoned Nessa's vitality into Xarrul and the Opening research
 - The direction and structure of Nessa's trapped silver cord; after leaving the lockdown, Xarrul can follow it and attempt a controlled reintegration
-- Nessa is not inside the Nether Inn. The lockdown seals the inn on the Material and Ethereal planes, preventing Xarrul from reaching her until it escapes or completes its crossing
+- Nessa is not inside the Nether Inn. The lockdown seals the Inn on the Material and Ethereal planes, preventing Xarrul from reaching her until it becomes embodied and escapes
 - The truth about the thin point: it's a natural fault the old summoners tore and someone sealed, nothing to do with The Opening — and that *Xarrul itself* is what's prying that seal open now, with the sealed house doing the rest
 - The Guest identified Orenn as the keeper whose death would make Mags trigger the lockdown; Xarrul verified the judgment and chose to act on it
-- The exact bargain it offered the Guest, including the Guest's permanent binding to the Inn and the three-round Vacancy in which neither spirit safely occupies the body
-- The exact method of its own destruction (the dual-plane kill) — it will NOT share this willingly, but it might slip in arrogance: "You cannot kill me. Not truly. Not unless you could be in two worlds at once."
-- It cannot guarantee what a dual-plane death would do to Nessa. The harvested energy should recoil along her cord, but a simultaneous violent collapse could reintegrate her, leave her stranded, or damage the tether. Its uncertainty is genuine, and it uses that uncertainty against the kill
+- The exact bargain it made with the Guest: Astral projection rather than annihilation, the changeling body for Xarrul, and the three-round Vacancy in which neither spirit safely occupies the body
+- The exact method of its own destruction (kill it in the Ethereal Plane) — it will NOT share this willingly, but it might slip in arrogance: "You cannot kill me here. And you cannot follow everywhere I go."
+- It cannot guarantee what an Ethereal death would do to Nessa. The harvested energy should recoil along her cord, but a violent collapse could reintegrate her, leave her stranded, or damage the tether. Its uncertainty is genuine, and it uses that uncertainty against the kill
 
 ## Items
 

overview.md

@@ -46,6 +46,8 @@ At the start of Act 1, deal each player a private **[secret dossier](handouts/ch
 
 ## Session Structure
 
+For the default NPC timeline, passive-player outcome, and action-to-ending branches, see **[Natural Progression and Outcome Map](storylines/natural-progression.md)**. When the party finds an uncontested route, pull a pressure move from the **[Complication Toolkit](storylines/complication-toolkit.md)**.
+
 ### Act 1: The Table
 
 The PCs are **strangers** — to each other and to Orenn — sharing a table because it was the only one free. They begin the night already inside; the front door is enchanted and password-warded (see **[the enchanted door](location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door)**), so getting *in* was never their problem — getting back in, if anyone wanders out, will be.
@@ -54,7 +56,7 @@ The PCs are **strangers** — to each other and to Orenn — sharing a table bec
 
 Orenn works the table personally, unfailingly polite, and asks each of them who they are and whether they're here on **business or pleasure**. Say "business" and he recites the [house rules](location/tavern-overview.md#the-rules-of-the-house). Let anyone hint at their trade and he dangles the hook: *earn his trust, and he can put in a word with people in high places.* He plays the perfect servant with a servant's access to the powerful — and that carrot is what makes his death, twenty minutes from now, a **loss** and not just a plot beat.
 
-Meanwhile, wide-shot the room and plant the tinder: the cultists arguing over texts with the odd bark of laughter, the assassins drinking with cold discipline (**Kael** simmering at the cult table, **Thera** unnervingly still), **Bren** muttering in his corner, and **Vetch** scratching at his arms beside the cellar stairs. Let players choose who to approach first.
+Meanwhile, wide-shot the room and plant the tinder: the cultists arguing over texts with the odd bark of laughter, the assassins drinking with cold discipline (**Kael** simmering at the cult table, **Thera** unnervingly still), and **Bren** muttering in his corner. Let players choose who to approach first.
 
 Orenn's last act is a quiet word to keep things civil — then he steps down to storage for supplies. **With him gone, the lid is off.**
 
@@ -68,7 +70,7 @@ When the table talk starts to dwindle, light the fuse. **Kael confronts Haddon**
 - A few rounds in, **Rennt casts Thunderwave** — the candles die and the hall goes black. Under that cover, Xarrul finishes **Orenn** (back from storage, wading in to quell the brawl and already knocked about) behind the bar, unseen.
 - **Mags** comes out of the kitchen with a cleaver and brings the room to heel with her voice alone, relighting every candle at once with a ward-focus — and behind her lies Orenn, dead.
 - Her grief turns to rage: she drags a caster PC (or a cultist) to the body and demands a **heal** — it fails. She tears the diamond from her own necklace, presses it and a written rite into their hands (**Revivify**) — and it fails too, the stone crumbling to grey powder. The whole room watches resurrection *refuse* him.
-- She shatters the **ward-crystal** above the bar and the tavern seals: **Arcane Lock on every exit until midnight**, no exceptions — herself included.
+- She shatters the **ward-crystal** above the bar and the tavern seals: every exterior opening is trapped behind an unbreakable planar shell until midnight, herself included. The cellar remains reachable from inside.
 - **The ultimatum:** find her the killer by midnight, or they're all tomorrow's stew. Then she grieves. (Full set-piece, and her two-layer accusation, in **[Mags — Act 2: The Reveal](npc/mags.md#act-2--the-reveal-dm)**.)
 
 **Goal:** Calm → chaos → horror → cage. The party is over, resurrection is off the table, and the PCs — the only neutral party in the room — are conscripted into finding the truth.
@@ -79,7 +81,7 @@ The core of the session. Open-ended, player-driven. They can:
 - Investigate the murder (clues, interrogation)
 - Engage with faction subplots (assassin traitor, cultist fractures)
 - Help Bren (the possessed madman)
-- Take Veil Dust with Vetch (ethereal trip)
+- Use [Orenn's silver mirror](npc/orenn.md#orenns-silver-mirror) to see invisible and Ethereal creatures through its reflection
 - Explore the tavern's hidden spaces — including the **[Deep Cellar](location/deep-cellar.md)** behind the concealed door: sneak past the spider, crack the arcane-locked vault, meet the caged [Guest](npc/the-guest.md), brave the haunted trophy-hold, and find the failing rift. This is the exploration track — loot, environmental backstory, and combat for players who want it. It runs in parallel with the interrogations above; cut between the two groups.
 - Pursue their **[secret personal goals](handouts/character-secrets.md)** — several of which lead straight down into the Deep Cellar
 - Try to leave (the ward-lock holds until midnight; neither will the assassins or cultists let witnesses walk)
@@ -88,13 +90,15 @@ The core of the session. Open-ended, player-driven. They can:
 
 ### Act 4: The Reckoning
 
-A **lockdown clock** runs under the whole session: the moment Mags sealed the house in Act 2, she gave Xarrul the closed vessel it needed to finish crossing — it has until midnight, and if the players never act, it crosses over for good. That pressure decides *when* the Reckoning happens; what they uncovered decides *which* one (see [The Reckoning](storylines/the-reckoning.md)):
+A **lockdown clock** runs under the whole session: the moment Mags sealed the house in Act 2, the emergency device withdrew power from the internal seals, admitted Xarrul fully to the Material interior, and caged everyone on every plane. The Guest's compact permits Xarrul to kill Orenn but nobody else until their exchange finishes, so Xarrul exploits the loophole: stolen voices, true accusations, and false memories push assassins and cultists to kill one another while it keeps everyone away from the Deep Cellar. If the Guest dies, the exchange becomes impossible and the restraint lifts immediately, making the Guest's killer Xarrul's first replacement-vessel target. The Vacancy cannot begin while the Guest's Astral release is blocked. At midnight the shell lapses and opens the single three-round transfer window. If the players never act, Xarrul takes the changeling body, strands the Guest in the Astral Plane, and either removes witnesses who saw the transfer or slips out disguised if its new identity remains secret. That pressure decides *when* the Reckoning happens; what they uncovered decides *which* one (see [The Reckoning](storylines/the-reckoning.md)):
 - **Fiend confrontation** — a tense combat split across two planes
-- **The dual-plane kill** — gamble Nessa's silver cord to destroy Xarrul; it saves her, but the players cannot know that beforehand, and it validates the cult's theory
+- **Ethereal destruction** — pressure Xarrul from both planes so it cannot dodge the fight, then kill it in the Ethereal Plane; this works anywhere, saves Nessa, and validates the cult's theory, though the players cannot know her survival beforehand
 - **The rebinding** — the easy, hollow answer: hand the cult back its leashed weapon
-- **The Open Door** — trust Xarrul to retrieve Nessa after the lockdown: behead the Opening at the cost of Mags and a monster loosed on the world
-- **Faction war** — if tensions weren't managed, assassins and cultists go for blood, this time for real
-- **Quiet ending** — players leave with knowledge but no resolution, the fiend still out there
+- **Bell and sigils** — seal Xarrul between planes while preserving Nessa's connection for a later rescue
+- **Side with Xarrul** — negotiate exact lives and Nessa's return, then frame, bypass or quietly neutralize Mags so it can leave disguised
+- **The Vacancy** — at the tear in the Old Work, kill Xarrul while exposed and empower the Guest, or let Xarrul take the changeling body
+- **The Hollowing** — if the Guest is killed, follow Xarrul to the tear and stop it from erasing an abducted replacement and keeping the body
+- **The pressure cooker** — assassins and cultists go for blood while the compact keeps Xarrul itself from joining lethally until the Vacancy ends
 
 **Goal:** Payoff for whatever threads the players pulled hardest on.
 
@@ -107,7 +111,6 @@ A **lockdown clock** runs under the whole session: the moment Mags sealed the ho
 | **Orenn** | Barkeep (dead) | Behind bar | Calm authority, Charon-like |
 | **Mags** | Orenn's partner | Kitchen → main hall | Grieving rage, retired fixer |
 | **Bren** | Possessed madman | Corner, floor | Lucid flashes, controlled by Skein |
-| **Vetch** | Drug addict | Near cellar stairs | Desperate, gateway to the Deep Cellar and Ethereal Plane |
 | **Sevra** | Scales commander (here) — the loyalist | Assassin table | Codex-devout, holding the guild together; can be turned against the rot with proof |
 | **Dace** | Scales blade (traitor) — and secretly marked | Among assassins | Charming, likeable, sells kills to the cult; condemned by Thera and doesn't know it |
 | **Kael** | Scales blade (hothead) — the witness | Among assassins | Wants war with cultists; unknowingly holds the key to the rot |
@@ -117,7 +120,7 @@ A **lockdown clock** runs under the whole session: the moment Mags sealed the ho
 | **Rennt** | Cultist (true believer) | Cultist table | Passionate, dangerous idealism |
 | **Essek** | Cultist (doubter) | Edge of cultist group | Quiet, afraid of his own people |
 | **Xarrul** | The fiend | Ethereal Plane → the tavern | Honest, patient; wants to be *real*; maybe not the villain |
-| **The Guest** | Caged changeling / would-be Host | Deep Cellar, Cell One | Fluent liar; helped Xarrul choose Orenn, wants the Inn and the fiend's power |
+| **The Guest** | Caged changeling / would-be keeper | Deep Cellar, Cell One | Fluent liar; designed Xarrul's disguised exit, wants the Inn and the fiend's power |
 | **Twinkle** | Feyspitter spider (pet) | Deep Cellar | Guards the "living" wing; blinks & grapples but can't cross to the ethereal; avoidable if unprovoked |
 
 ## DM Quick Reference — Subplots
@@ -129,10 +132,10 @@ A **lockdown clock** runs under the whole session: the moment Mags sealed the ho
 | The Scales: the rot within | Kael's unease about Thera, the soulcoin, Dace's mark | The traitor floor, the tavern's thin point, the wider campaign |
 | The Opening | Cultist fractures, Dalla's desperation | Murder (fiend origin), Reckoning |
 | Possession | Bren's ravings, Skein | Murder (witness), Ethereal |
-| Ethereal trip | Vetch's lead, Veil Dust in the Deep Cellar | Murder (see fiend), Possession (see Skein), exploration |
+| Ethereal investigation | [Orenn's silver mirror](npc/orenn.md#orenns-silver-mirror), Oil of Etherealness, [Faded Scrolls of Etherealness](prints/faded-scroll-of-etherealness.md) | Murder (see fiend), Possession (see or confront Skein), exploration |
 | Nessa's projection | Dalla, Xarrul, Haddon's stolen notes | The Reckoning (the choice) |
 | The Deep Cellar | Concealed door in the cellar | Orenn & Mags's dark history, loot for the Reckoning, the cult (via the Guest), the rift |
-| The Guest | Cell One in the Deep Cellar | Cult intel, Orenn's hidden accomplice, the Vacancy ending, succession fight with Mags |
+| The Guest | Cell One in the Deep Cellar | Cult intel, Orenn's hidden accomplice, the Vacancy ending, quiet replacement of Mags |
 | Character secrets | Dealt at Act 1 start | Drives exploration and inter-party tension; several lead to the Deep Cellar |
 | The Conversion | A lone PC isolated in the Deep Cellar | Xarrul (recruited from within), the Open Door ending |
 

planar-mechanics-101.md

@@ -0,0 +1,323 @@
+# Planární mechanika 101
+
+*Haddonův rychlý kurs pro rozhovor, v němž mají ostatní učenci pochopit svou chybu dříve, než jim ji začne kreslit na ubrus.*
+
+> **Nejdůležitější pravidlo planární mechaniky:** Přítomnost není totéž co poloha, spojení není totéž co kontrola a uzavřená apertura není totéž co zacelená hranice.
+
+## Jak znít jako Haddon
+
+Haddon nikdy nezačne závěrem. Nejprve opraví cizí předpoklad, potom jednotky a teprve nakonec člověka.
+
+1. **Vyžádej si veličinu:** „Co přesně zde nazýváte stabilitou?“
+2. **Vyžádej si jednotku:** „V thaumech, nebo jen v dojmech?“
+3. **Najdi zaměněné pojmy:** spojení × kontrola, tok × zásoba, obvod × plocha, uzávěr × zacelení.
+4. **Napiš jednu krátkou rovnici.** Delší výpočet vypadá jako obrana; krátký jako rozsudek.
+5. **Dopřej protivníkovi opravu:** „Můžete to samozřejmě přepočítat. Tentokrát se čtvercem poloměru.“
+
+---
+
+## Základní veličiny a podivné jednotky
+
+Planární mechanika neměří pouze prostor. Měří, jak obtížné je přimět dva světy, aby se shodly na tom, co se právě nachází kde.
+
+| Veličina | Značka | Jednotka | Co skutečně znamená |
+|---|---:|---|---|
+| planární práce | \(E\) | **thaum** (`th`) | množství magie spotřebované na změnu hranice |
+| čas | \(t\) | **tep** (`tp`) | jeden standardní rituální takt; v laboratoři 6 sekund |
+| plocha apertury | \(A\) | **čtvereční loket** (`lk²`) | účinný průřez, nikoli viditelný obrys |
+| topologická vzdálenost | \(d\) | **práh** (`pr`) | vzdálenost mezi rovinami; nemá vztah k mílím |
+| planární potenciál | \(\Delta\Pi\) | **práh** (`pr`) | rozdíl, který žene tok přes hranici |
+| tok | \(\Phi\) | **thaum za tep** (`th/tp`) | kolik planární práce hranicí právě prochází |
+| impedance hranice | \(Z\) | **závojník** (`Zv`) | odpor proti přenosu; \(1\,Zv=1\,pr\cdot tp/th\) |
+| rezonanční shoda | \(\rho\) | bezrozměrná, 0–1 | nakolik jsou obě strany „naladěny“ stejně |
+| fázový posun | \(\theta\) | **osmina zvonu** (`oz`) | \(8\,oz=2\pi\); celý rezonanční cyklus |
+| živá kotevní kapacita | \(K\) | **thaum živé váhy** (`thž`) | kolik práce unese identita, ne kolik váží tělo |
+| příbuzenská vzdálenost | \(g\) | **krevní krok** (`kk`) | rodič–dítě = 1, sourozenci = 2 přes společného rodiče |
+| jizevní hystereze | \(h\) | bezrozměrná | kolik předchozího otevření si hranice „pamatuje“ |
+
+### Dvě jednotky, kvůli nimž se učenci perou
+
+- **Vyre** (`Vy`) je jednotka planární vodivosti: \(1\,Vy=1\,th/(tp\cdot pr)\). Je to převrácená hodnota závojníku. Stará literatura používá `Zv`, Řád Zacelení dává přednost `Vy`.
+- **Živá váha** není hmotnost. Spící dítě může mít větší kotevní kapacitu než kamenný obr, protože kámen nemá souvislou představu o vlastním „já“. Kdo převádí `thž` na libry masa, právě prohrál spor.
+
+`thž` je rozměrově thaum, ale značka potvrzuje, že kapacita byla kalibrována na živé identitě. Ve výpočtu tedy lze dělit `th/thž`; výsledek je bezrozměrné využití kotvy. Vynechat značku `ž` je matematicky přípustné a akademicky podezřelé.
+
+> **Haddonova poznámka:** „Ano, vodivost byla pojmenována po matce Vyre. Ne, tato skutečnost nemění rozměrovou analýzu.“
+
+---
+
+## Sedm zákonů, které stačí k vítězství v hospodě
+
+### 1. Tok roste s potenciálem a klesá s impedancí
+
+\[
+\Phi=\frac{\Delta\Pi}{Z}
+\]
+
+Jednotky se musí zkrátit na `th/tp`:
+
+\[
+\frac{pr}{pr\cdot tp/th}=th/tp
+\]
+
+Jestliže protivníkovi po výpočtu zůstanou čtvereční lokte, počítal hustotu toku, ne celkový tok.
+
+### 2. Apertura se počítá plochou, ne šířkou
+
+Pro přibližně kruhovou trhlinu:
+
+\[
+A=\pi r^2
+\]
+
+Zdvojnásobení poloměru tedy znamená **čtyřnásobnou plochu** a při jinak stejných podmínkách přibližně čtyřnásobný tok. Věta „dvakrát širší, dvakrát nebezpečnější“ je geometrie pro básníky.
+
+### 3. Rezonance snižuje účinnou impedanci
+
+\[
+Z_{\mathrm{eff}}=\frac{\gamma d}{A\rho^2}
+\]
+
+Kde \(\gamma\) je měrný odpor konkrétní hranice v `lk²·tp/th`. Po dosazení zůstane `pr·tp/th`, tedy závojník. Dvojnásobná rezonanční shoda může snížit impedanci na čtvrtinu. Proto přesně laděný šeptaný rituál někdy otevře víc než hrubá exploze magie.
+
+### 4. Kotva má kapacitu, ne nekonečnou trpělivost
+
+\[
+U=\frac{h\int \Phi\,dt}{K}
+\]
+
+- \(U<0{,}70\): obvykle stabilní stav.
+- \(0{,}70\le U<1\): třes, ozvěny, samovolné projekce, krvácení ze sigilů.
+- \(U\ge1\): selhání kotvy, přepis identity nebo násilná dislokace.
+
+Hystereze \(h>1\) znamená, že dříve otevřená hranice zatěžuje kotvu víc, i když dnešní tok vypadá přijatelně.
+
+### 5. Krevní konduit přenáší adresu i zátěž
+
+Pro jednoduchý rodový model:
+
+\[
+\Phi_{c}=\chi\,\Phi_0 e^{-g/2}
+\]
+
+\(\chi\) je koeficient sympatetické shody. Pokrevní příbuznost neusnadňuje jen nalezení cíle; přenáší k němu i práci. Tvrdit, že konduit je „pouhá adresa“, je možné pouze tehdy, když v energetické bilanci chybí právě energie odčerpaná z cíle.
+
+### 6. Nulový výsledný tok nemusí znamenat nulové namáhání
+
+Pro dva rezonanční toky:
+
+\[
+\Phi_{\mathrm{net}}=\sqrt{\Phi_1^2+\Phi_2^2+2\Phi_1\Phi_2\cos(\Delta\theta)}
+\]
+
+Dva stejně silné toky v protifázi (\(\Delta\theta=4\,oz=\pi\)) dávají nulový přenos navenek. Hranice však stále nese oba protisměrné kmity. Přístroj ukazující nulu může stát vedle zdi, která se právě trhá.
+
+### 7. Topologická spojitost není řídicí autorita
+
+Stříbrné vlákno, příkazová vazba i parazitické předivo mohou zůstat **spojité**, aniž by přenášely použitelný povel. Pro řízení je podstatná odezva:
+
+\[
+R_c=\left|\frac{\Delta B}{\Delta C}\right|
+\]
+
+Kde \(\Delta C\) je změna příkazu a \(\Delta B\) pozorovaná změna chování cíle. Jestliže \(R_c\approx0\), lze doložit existenci spojení, nikoli kontrolu.
+
+Haddonova elegantní formulace: **„Šňůra, za kterou nelze zatáhnout, je stopa. Ne vodítko.“**
+
+---
+
+## Tři výpočty na ubrousek
+
+### Spor první: „Dvojnásobná trhlina, dvojnásobný odběr“
+
+Kolega změří poloměr apertury \(r_1=2/3\,lk\), po rozšíření \(r_2=4/3\,lk\). Hustota toku zůstává \(j=7/12\,th/(lk^2\cdot tp)\).
+
+\[
+A_1=\pi(2/3)^2=4\pi/9\,lk^2
+\]
+
+\[
+A_2=\pi(4/3)^2=16\pi/9\,lk^2=4A_1
+\]
+
+\[
+\Phi_1=jA_1=7\pi/27\approx0{,}81\,th/tp
+\]
+
+\[
+\Phi_2=jA_2=28\pi/27\approx3{,}26\,th/tp
+\]
+
+**Rozsudek:** odběr není dvojnásobný, ale čtyřnásobný.
+
+> „Zaměnil jste průměr za plochu, mistře. To není alternativní škola planární mechaniky. To je kruh.“
+
+### Spor druhý: „Kotva má ještě skoro třetinu rezervy“
+
+Kotva má \(K=48\,thž\). Po 42 tepů jí prochází \(5/6\,th/tp\).
+
+Bez započtení jizvy:
+
+\[
+U=\frac{42\cdot5/6}{48}=\frac{35}{48}\approx0{,}73
+\]
+
+To už není „bezpečná třetina“, ale pásmo nestability. Je-li navíc jizevní hystereze \(h=1{,}4\):
+
+\[
+U=\frac{1{,}4\cdot35}{48}=\frac{49}{48}\approx1{,}02
+\]
+
+**Rozsudek:** kotva není téměř bezpečná. Podle modelu už selhala; pouze se ještě nerozhodlo jak.
+
+> „Vaše rezerva existuje jen proto, že jste z rovnice odstranil minulost.“
+
+### Spor třetí: „Příkazová vazba přece stále existuje“
+
+Vyšleme tři kalibrované změny příkazu o \(2\,th\). Pozorovaná změna chování je pokaždé menší než detekční mez \(0{,}02\,th\).
+
+\[
+R_c<\frac{0{,}02}{2}=0{,}01
+\]
+
+Přijatelná řídicí odezva začíná při \(R_c=0{,}25\). Spojení může být topologicky přítomné, ale jeho doložená řídicí účinnost je méně než čtyři procenta minima.
+
+**Rozsudek:** „Vazba trvá“ je pravda. „Cíl je pod kontrolou“ z dat neplyne.
+
+> **Pozor:** Toto je Haddonova nejslabší půda. Přesně tímto výpočtem lze obrátit jeho vlastní frázi „spojení přetrvává“ proti němu.
+
+---
+
+## Akademický slovník pro prudkou diskusi
+
+### Geometrie a hranice
+
+- **Planární topologie:** popisuje, co s čím sousedí, nikoli jak daleko je to v běžném prostoru.
+- **Ontická sousednost:** dvě místa jsou „vedle sebe“ z hlediska bytí, třebaže je fyzicky dělí svět.
+- **Transplanární geodetika:** nejkratší průchod mezi rovinami měřený v prazích, ne v mílích.
+- **Apertura:** řízený otvor v hranici. Má plochu, fázi, impedanci a dobu života.
+- **Tenké místo:** oblast přirozeně nízké impedance; ještě nemusí být otevřená.
+- **Trhlina:** porušená hranice s vlastním tokem. Každá trhlina je tenké místo, ne každé tenké místo je trhlina.
+- **Přechodová jizva:** hranice, která se uzavřela geometricky, ale zachovala hysterézi a rezonanční paměť.
+- **Liminální gradient:** změna planárního potenciálu přes hranici; určuje směr samovolného driftu.
+- **Interplanární smyk:** různé části cíle jsou taženy do různých rovin nebo různými fázemi.
+
+### Kotvy, vlákna a konduity
+
+- **Živá kotva:** vědomá identita, která nutí hranici zachovat jednu referenční konfiguraci.
+- **Kotevní kapacita:** celková zátěž, kterou kotva unese před poruchou identity.
+- **Živá váha:** příspěvek paměti, vůle a tělesné kontinuity ke kotevní kapacitě.
+- **Stříbrné vlákno:** návratová vazba projekce k původnímu tělu; není to automaticky zdroj energie.
+- **Materiální konduit:** živá cesta, přes kterou lze cíl vyhledat, napájet nebo vysávat.
+- **Sympatetická shoda:** rezonance založená na krvi, pravém jménu, společné vzpomínce nebo části těla.
+- **Parazitická zátěž:** tok spotřebovaný třetí bytostí přichycenou k již existující vazbě.
+- **Iatrogenní dislokace:** planární porucha způsobená léčitelem, učencem nebo experimentem, který ji měl zkoumat.
+
+### Rezonance a řízení
+
+- **Fázový zámek:** stav, kdy dva kmity drží stálý fázový rozdíl a navzájem se posilují.
+- **Protifázová kompenzace:** nulový měřený přenos vytvořený dvěma nenulovými protisměrnými toky.
+- **Rezonanční signatura:** opakovatelný soubor frekvencí, podle něhož lze určit rituál, bytost či jizvu.
+- **Příkazová latence:** počet tepů mezi povelem a odezvou vázané bytosti.
+- **Mrtvá příkazová linka:** spojení existuje, ale jeho odezva leží pod použitelným prahem.
+- **Fázový únik:** cíl zůstává přítomen, ale postupně přechází mimo fázi pozorovatele či kruhu.
+- **Dvourovinná koherence:** jedna bytost udržuje dvě projevené formy jako jediný systém.
+- **Koherentní kolaps:** zásah obou forem v témže rezonančním okně zničí společnou identitu, ne pouze jeden projev.
+
+### Uzavírání a selhání
+
+- **Geometrický uzávěr:** otvor už není otevřený. Neříká nic o zbytkovém toku či jizvě.
+- **Kauzální zacelení:** přes hranici už neprochází hmota, energie, povel ani následek.
+- **Reintegrační ráz:** návrat energie a identity do původní kotvy při náhlém zrušení vazby.
+- **Aperturová kavitace:** krátké dutiny vznikající při příliš rychlém zavření; často vypadají jako další malé portály.
+- **Topologický odskok:** násilně zavřený průchod se znovu otevře v nejbližším bodě nižší impedance.
+- **Prahová katastrofa:** malá změna vstupu překlopí celý systém do jiného stabilního stavu.
+- **Pozorovatelská kontaminace:** měření mění rezonanci, protože měřicí osoba je sama živou kotvou.
+
+---
+
+## Oblíbené chybné výroky a Haddonovy odpovědi
+
+| Protivník tvrdí | Haddon odpoví |
+|---|---|
+| „Portál je zavřený, nebezpečí pominulo.“ | „Geometricky zavřený. Ukažte mi kauzální bilanci.“ |
+| „Pořád cítíme spojení, takže máme kontrolu.“ | „Cítíte spojitost. Kde je měřená odezva?“ |
+| „Tok je nulový.“ | „Výsledný tok. Změřil jste protifázové namáhání?“ |
+| „Dítě bylo pouze kotvou.“ | „Potom mi v bilanci označte zdroj těch třiceti sedmi thaumů.“ |
+| „Krev jen navádí rituál.“ | „Adresa nepřichází po každém pokusu o životní sílu.“ |
+| „Dvakrát větší otvor vyžaduje dvakrát více energie.“ | „Poloměr je lineární. Plocha má tu drzost nebýt.“ |
+| „Ethereální tvor tu není.“ | „Není zde materiálně. To je podstatně užší tvrzení.“ |
+| „Kruh bytost udrží.“ | „Kterou její fázi? A vůči čemu je kruh kalibrován?“ |
+| „Opakování pokusu dá stejné podmínky.“ | „Jen v hranici bez hystereze. Takovou jste si měl přinést.“ |
+| „Model to nepředpověděl.“ | „Model ano. Vy jste vynechal člen, který se vám eticky nehodil.“ |
+
+---
+
+## Jak může jiný učenec napadnout Haddona
+
+Haddon je výborný v teorii, ale rád vydává dolní mez za jistotu a nepohodlnou neznámou za zanedbatelnou konstantu. Chytrý protivník se zeptá:
+
+- **Kdo kalibroval \(\chi\)?** Bez nezávislého měření může být sympatetický koeficient upraven tak, aby vyšel požadovaný odběr.
+- **Je uveden průměrný, nebo špičkový tok?** Krátký vrchol může zničit kotvu, i když průměr vypadá bezpečně.
+- **Byla hystereze měřena po úplném klidovém cyklu?** Bez něj je \(h\) jen kvalifikovaný odhad.
+- **Co bylo zvoleno jako nulový potenciál?** Vyreovská škola někdy měří vše vůči Astrální rovině, i když experiment probíhá v hraničním éteru.
+- **Není pozorovatel součástí kotvy?** U živých kruhů může samotný sesilatel dodat skrytou kapacitu a po odchodu systém selže.
+- **Nezaměňuje přežití za stabilitu?** To, že subjekt po pokusu žije, nedokazuje vratnost ani zachování identity.
+
+Haddonova nejlepší obrana je vrátit spor k tomu, co lze skutečně doložit. Jeho nejhorší obrana je věta: „Odchylka není prakticky významná.“ Na tu se každý dobrý učenec zeptá: **„Pro koho?“**
+
+---
+
+## Hotová minutová řeč
+
+> „Kolegové, zaměňujete tři odlišné věci: aperturu, vazbu a kontrolu. Apertura je geometrie. Vazba je topologie. Kontrola je měřitelná odezva. První se uzavřela, druhá podle všeho přetrvává a třetí nebyla doložena ani jediným opakovatelným povelem. Navíc počítáte odběr z průměru apertury, nikoli z její plochy, a ignorujete jizevní hysterezi jedna celá čtyři. Po opravě obou chyb překračuje kotevní využití jednotu. Váš ‚stabilní subjekt‘ není stabilní. Je po mezi selhání a vy jen čekáte, jaký druh katastrofy si rovnice vybere.“
+
+## Krátké věty do hádky
+
+- „Jednotky, kolego. Než ublížíte další rovině.“
+- „To není zanedbatelný člen. To je váš subjekt.“
+- „Vaše premisa je morální stanovisko převlečené za konstantu.“
+- „Neříkám, že spojení zmizelo. Říkám, že vás přestalo poslouchat.“
+- „Nula na stupnici není totéž co nula v systému.“
+- „Jestli tomu říkáte stabilní, řekněte také, v jakém časovém měřítku.“
+- „Kruh není argument. Kruh je zařízení a vaše zařízení má špatnou fázi.“
+- „Můžete nesouhlasit se mnou. S \(\pi r^2\) to budete mít obtížnější.“
+- „Znovu jste použil slovo ‚pouze‘ tam, kde chybí měření.“
+- „Výborně. Teď totéž bez vynechání živé váhy.“
+
+---
+
+## Tahák na jednu kartu
+
+**Ptej se:** Co měříme? V jakých jednotkách? Vůči jaké referenci? Je to tok, nebo zásoba? Průměr, nebo špička? Spojení, nebo odezva?
+
+**Pamatuj:**
+
+\[
+\Phi=\Delta\Pi/Z,\qquad A=\pi r^2,\qquad
+Z_{eff}=\gamma d/(A\rho^2),\qquad
+U=h\int\Phi dt/K
+\]
+
+**Tři rozsudky:**
+
+1. Uzavřené není zacelené.
+2. Spojené není ovládané.
+3. Přeživší není stabilní.
+
+> *Anchor before aperture. Measure twice. The living weight comes first.*  
+> **Kotva před aperturou. Měř dvakrát. Živá váha má přednost.**
+
+---
+
+## Z disertace o teleportačním reziduu
+
+> *O reziduální hysterézi po krátkodosahové translokaci a jejím využití při zpětné rekonstrukci apertury*
+>
+> „Každá teleportace po sobě zanechá dvojici stop: kompresní jizvu v místě odchodu a expanzní ozvěnu v místě příchodu. Tvrdit, že přenos nezanechal reziduum, obvykle neznamená, že žádné nevzniklo, nýbrž že pozorovatel měřil příliš pozdě nebo na nesprávné rovině.
+>
+> U přechodu přes Hraniční éter není reziduum soustředěno v cílovém bodě. Rozprostírá se podél ontické sousednosti jako šev zatažený pod látkou. Směr průchodu lze přesto určit podle fázového zpoždění: první se uklidňuje kotva, poslední hranice.
+>
+> Opakovaný přechod starší stopu nezahlazuje. Nutí ji k rezonanci. To, co se při jediném měření jeví jako šum, se při opakování stává mapou.“
+
+> **Haddonova poznámka na okraji zaslaného výtahu:** „Druhá věta je odvážná. Poslední je správná. Autor si dosud nevšiml proč.“

prints/bestiar-dvojstini.md

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+# Z *Bestiáře průsvitných běsů*
+
+## Dvojstíni neboli běsi mezi sklem
+
+**Řád:** běsové éteru
+**Přirozenost:** éterická, přivolaná
+**Nebezpečí:** mimořádné
+
+---
+
+Dvojstín není neviditelný tvor. Je to tvor **éterický**, který se naučil vstupovat do našeho světa. Nemá dvě těla ani dvě oddělené podoby. Je jedinou bytostí, která uhýbá úderům tím, že ustupuje na druhou stranu závoje.
+
+V materiální rovině se ukazuje jako vysoká postava utkaná z kouře a stínu. Tvář postrádá; na jejím místě planou dva jantarové body. Prsty jsou dlouhé a zahnuté jako nástroje ranhojiče. V éteru nabývá ostřejší podoby: vyzáblé tělo, kůže jako ohořelý papír, pod ní pukliny tlumeného oranžového světla a tvář příliš klidná na věc, která loví.
+
+### Znamení přítomnosti
+
+- chlad bez průvanu a kovová chuť na jazyku,
+- hlas známého člověka přicházející z nemožného místa,
+- rána chladná a šedá, ačkoli si zraněný pamatuje pouze obyčejnou nehodu,
+- tmavé znamení dlaně nad srdcem,
+- stín, který se při úderu neuhne, nýbrž zmizí **do strany světa**.
+
+Dvojstín krade hlasy a skrze své znamení mate paměť. Může přepsat vzpomínku na několik posledních okamžiků, avšak nedokáže změnit samotnou ránu. Věř proto krvi dříve než paměti a nikdy nenásleduj známý hlas tam, kde nevidíš jeho ústa.
+
+### O klamné smrti
+
+V našem světě nelze dvojstína zahubit. Smrtelně raněný se nerozplyne v popel: posledním, nezadržitelným úkrokem se vrátí do hraničního éteru a zůstane mu poslední jiskra života. Sůl, pouta, zákaz přenosu ani umlčené kouzlo tomuto úkroku nezabrání. Mnozí lovci tak sklonili zbraň před prázdným místem a prohlásili vítězství, zatímco jejich kořist o jediný krok vedle čekala.
+
+Éter je jeho domov a hojí jej. Každou chvílí, kterou tam získá bez pronásledování, zaceluje rány. Pouhé **vyhnání** jej proto nezničí; pošle jej právě tam, kde je nejsilnější.
+
+Zabít jej lze pouze v **hraničním éteru**. Nevyžaduje to tenké místo, otevřenou trhlinu ani dva současné smrtící údery. Rány zasazené v našem světě si nese s sebou, ale poslední rána musí padnout v jeho vlastním.
+
+### Doložený způsob úplného zničení
+
+1. Postav lovce **na obě strany závoje**. Nejméně jeden musí čekat v materiální rovině a nejméně jeden v hraničním éteru.
+2. Útoč bez ohledu na to, na které straně se dvojstín právě ukáže. Všechna zranění patří jedinému tělu.
+3. Když ustoupí před lovci v našem světě, musí jej přivítat lovec v éteru. Když prchne z éteru, musí narazit na připravené zbraně v našem světě.
+4. **Doveď poslední úder v hraničním éteru.** Padne-li tam, zahyne úplně a nemá se kam ukrýt.
+
+Není nutné odpočítávat údery ani zabíjet dvě podoby zároveň. Lovci mohou čekat na znamení, zadržet vlastní ránu nebo si předem určit pořadí. Podstatné je uzavřít obě únikové cesty a nedopřát tvoru jedinou klidnou chvíli v éteru.
+
+Dokážeš-li mu návrat do našeho světa zakázat kouzlem či pečetí, může éterický lovec dokončit práci sám. Druhá skupina není součástí jeho smrti; pouze zavírá únikovou cestu.
+
+> **Varování:** Nezaměňuj zahubení za spoutání. Vazebný kruh může dvojstína zadržet a železný zvon odhalit, avšak dokud žije, každé porušené pouto vrací do světa trpělivého nepřítele. Chceš-li jej zničit, následuj jej domů.
+
+---
+
+*U odstavce o jantarových očích jsou nehtem vytlačeny dvě krátké rýhy. Poslední věta je dvakrát podtržena.*

prints/bestiar-poltergeisti.md

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+# Z *Bestiáře průsvitných běsů*
+
+## Poltergeisti neboli hluční mrtví
+
+**Řád:** neklidní mrtví
+**Přirozenost:** duchovní, telekinetická
+**Nebezpečí:** značné
+
+---
+
+Poltergeist je duch, který se neukazuje. Zda nemá podobu, nebo ji pouze odmítá nést, zůstává předmětem hádek mezi kněžími a lovci. Jisté je jen to, že jeho hněv vstupuje do věcí: do židlí, dveří, nádobí, kamenů, trámů i zbraní odložených zdánlivě mimo dosah.
+
+Někteří poltergeisti jsou dušemi mrtvých, jimž zůstala jediná prudká vzpomínka. Jiní působí spíše jako otisk násilí, který přežil člověka, jenž jej vytvořil. První mohou poznat jméno, hlas nebo milovaný předmět. Druzí nepoznávají nikoho a opakují pouze svůj poslední stav: strach, obranu, vztek či žárlivé střežení.
+
+### Znamení přítomnosti
+
+- drobné předměty se obracejí, posouvají nebo padají vždy stejným směrem,
+- dveře se zavírají proti průvanu a závory zapadají bez doteku,
+- z místnosti se ozývá krok, úder či škrábání, avšak prach zůstává bez stop,
+- vzduch ztěžkne těsně předtím, než se něco vymrští,
+- násilí začíná až po přemístění určité věci, otevření schránky nebo vstupu na střežené místo.
+
+Poltergeist často dlouho pouze pozoruje. Ticho proto není důkazem nepřítomnosti. Může nechat vetřelce vejít hluboko do svého prostoru, prohlédnout si je skrze chvění předmětů a udeřit teprve tehdy, když se dotknou toho, co považuje za své.
+
+### O neviditelném těle
+
+Mouka, popel ani déšť poltergeista neobrysují. Není to neviditelný člověk, na němž by ulpěl prach, ale nehmotná vůle. Jeho polohu lze přesto odhadnout podle drah vržených předmětů: několik hodů z různých stran obvykle ukáže bod, z něhož síla vychází.
+
+*See Invisibility* nebo pohled do správně připraveného stříbrného zrcadla odhalí rozmazaný lidský obrys, často zkroucený jako tělo spatřené pod hladinou. *Detect Evil and Good* potvrdí nemrtvou přítomnost, nikoli však její přesné místo. Poltergeist může jako většina nehmotných mrtvých procházet pevnou hmotou, a proto jej stěny ani zavřené dveře spolehlivě nezadrží.
+
+### Jak přežít hlučný dům
+
+Prvním úkolem není ducha zasáhnout, nýbrž **zbavit jej zbraní**. Ustup z místnosti plné volných předmětů. Převrať stůl jako kryt, přitiskni se k holé zdi a nenechávej mezi sebou a duchem sklo, železo ani ostré nástroje. Poltergeist dokáže smýknout i živým tělem; nestůj proto u schodů, otevřeného ohně nebo hluboké vody.
+
+Jestliže útok začal po vyrušení, přestaň se hýbat a vrať přemístěnou věc. Někteří hluční mrtví se uklidní, když se jejich prostor navrátí do původního stavu. Není to poslušnost ani vděk, pouze návrat k nehybnosti, kterou považovali za bezpečnou.
+
+Trvalejší ochranu poskytují stálá posvěcená světla a uzavřené ochranné sigily. Plamen musí hořet klidně; samotný jas ducha nezraní, ale správně zakotvené světlo zpevní prostor a omezí sílu, jíž pohybuje hmotou. Kněz jej může odehnat pomocí *Turn Undead*. K úplnému spočinutí je však často nutné nalézt předmět, místo nebo křivdu, kolem nichž se jeho poslední vůle uzavřela.
+
+
+---
+
+*Na dolním okraji stránky je hnědá skvrna po vosku. Vedle ní někdo připsal: „Nejdřív vrať tu věc. Ptát se můžeš potom.”*

prints/bestiar-prizraky.md

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+# Z *Bestiáře průsvitných běsů*
+
+## Přízraky neboli hladoví pozůstalí
+
+**Řád:** nehmotní nemrtví  
+**Přirozenost:** nekrotická, pozůstalá  
+**Nebezpečí:** vysoké
+
+---
+
+Přízrak je to, co zůstane, když smrt zachová hlad a ztratí člověka. Na rozdíl od duchů, kteří si ponechávají jméno, tvář i úmysl, bývá přízrak ohlodaný na jedinou potřebu: dotknout se živého tepla a vzít si je.
+
+Ukazuje se jako průsvitná postava připomínající mrtvého v posledních okamžicích života. Obličej může být jasný, ale výraz v něm nebývá poznáním. Oslovení jménem někdy na okamžik zadrží jeho ruku; častěji pouze přiměje prázdné oči, aby se obrátily ke zvuku.
+
+Přízraky vznikají po násilné smrti, při porušení pohřebních obřadů a na místech, kde styk s éterem zabránil duši dokončit odchod. Tenká místa je přitahují. Trhlina mezi rovinami může shromáždit i mrtvé, kteří zemřeli daleko od ní, stejně jako světlo shromažďuje noční hmyz.
+
+### Znamení přítomnosti
+
+- dech zbělá v teplé místnosti a kovové předměty orosí,
+- světlo nezeslábne, ale barvy kolem něj vyblednou,
+- spící se probouzejí unavení, se sny o cizí smrti,
+- skrze zeď či zavřené dveře projde lidský obrys bez jediného zvuku,
+- zasažený nemá obyčejnou ránu; kůže šedne a celé tělo působí náhle starší a slabší.
+
+Přízrak loví přímo. Vynoří se z temného rohu nebo projde pevnou překážkou a zamíří k dechu živých s trpělivostí tvora, který se nemusí unavit. Jeho zbraní je vlastní dotek; jednej dřív, než tě dosáhne.
+
+### Dotek, který odnímá život
+
+Ruka přízraku prochází zbrojí stejně snadno jako látkou. Neřeže maso; vysává sílu, kterou se maso drží života. Oběť cítí prudký chlad v hrudi, ztrácí dech a může se zhroutit bez viditelného krvácení.
+
+Obyčejná čepel přízrakem často projde s menším účinkem. Magická zbraň, posvěcená moc a radiant damage jej zasahují spolehlivěji. Nehmotnost mu dovoluje projít zdí, nikoli však bez následků: zůstane-li uvnitř pevné hmoty příliš dlouho, samotná překážka jeho tvar trhá. Proto přízraky používají stěny jako dveře a kryt, ne jako úkryt k odpočinku.
+
+### O obraně a spočinutí
+
+Drž skupinu pohromadě, ale nestůjte všichni na dosah jediné paže. Přízrak si vybírá odděleného, zraněného nebo vyděšeného tvora. Ustup do jasně osvětleného prostoru s co nejmenším počtem stěn, jimiž by mohl obejít obránce.
+
+*Protection from Evil and Good* ztěžuje nemrtvému dotek. *Turn Undead* jej donutí ustoupit a posvěcení místa může zabránit návratu. Zničení viditelné podoby však nemusí napravit příčinu, která jej přivolala. Jestliže je znám mrtvý, jeho ostatky, jméno a poslední nesplněná povinnost mohou nabídnout mírnější řešení.
+
+Nespoléhej na ně. Přízrak, který si nepamatuje vlastní tvář, si nemusí pamatovat ani odpuštění. Některým pozůstalým lze pomoci odejít; jiné je třeba zahnat tak daleko, aby už cestu zpět nenašly.
+
+> **Varování:** Nepronásleduj přízrak skrze zeď, pokud nevíš, co je za ní. Mrtvý nepotřebuje podlahu, vzduch ani světlo. Ty ano.
+
+---
+
+*Roh stránky je odtržený. V okraji zůstala jen polovina poznámky: „…a po doteku spočítej všem prsty. Slabost se někdy projeví dřív než bolest.”*

prints/bestiar-stiny.md

@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+# Z *Bestiáře průsvitných běsů*
+
+## Stíny neboli hlad po síle
+
+**Řád:** nižší nemrtví  
+**Přirozenost:** nekrotická, stínová  
+**Nebezpečí:** vysoké ve smečce
+
+---
+
+Stín není duch a není pouhá tma. Je to mrtvá touha po síle, zploštělá do podoby, která se drží zdí, podlah a pat živých tvorů. Když se nehýbe, může být k nerozeznání od obyčejného stínu. Když loví, natahuje paže delší než tělo, prsty se rozlévají po povrchu a tmavá ústa se otevírají bez jediného zvuku.
+
+Stíny vznikají tam, kde nekrotická moc oddělí tělesnou sílu od zbytku duše. Vyskytují se v místech hromadné smrti, v dlouho neosvětlených svatyních a poblíž trhlin vedoucích k rovinám smrti či šera. Jediný stín je lovec. Několik stínů je nákaza: drží se pohromadě, překrývají se a napadají tutéž oběť, dokud se její vlastní stín nepřestane zvedat se světlem.
+
+### Znamení přítomnosti
+
+- jeden stín míří jinam, než dovoluje poloha plamene,
+- na zdi se objeví více obrysů, než je v místnosti těl,
+- světlo hoří normálně, ale tma mezi jeho kruhy působí příliš souvisle,
+- člověku bez rány náhle vypovídají ruce a podlamují se kolena,
+- zvířata odmítají překročit pruh stínu, přestože za ním nic nevidí.
+
+Stín není neviditelný. *See Invisibility* mu nevezme žádnou ochranu, protože se neskrývá kouzlem; spoléhá na obyčejnou tmu a nehybnost. Dvě světla postavená proti sobě jsou proto často užitečnější než věštecký zrak. Pravé stíny se pod druhým plamenem změní. Nemrtvý se opozdí, zvolí špatný směr nebo zůstane na povrchu, který už žádný stín nést nemá.
+
+### O vysáté síle
+
+Úder stínu nezanechává hlubokou ránu. Jeho prsty projdou kůží jako ledová voda a vezmou tělu schopnost nést vlastní váhu. Zbroj zůstane celá, ale náhle je příliš těžká. Zbraň v ruce váží jako kovová tyč. Oběť může zemřít s očima otevřenýma a bez jediné kapky krve.
+
+Z člověka takto zabitého může povstat další stín. Nenechávej proto padlého bez světla, i když boj pokračuje. Odnes tělo z dosahu souvislé tmy, rozsviť u něj jasný plamen a přikryj jeho vlastní stín znakem posvěcení, dokud nebude možné provést řádný obřad.
+
+### Jak rozbít smečku
+
+Stíny jsou nejnebezpečnější ve chvíli, kdy obklopí jediného tvora. Nestav obranu do kruhu kolem jednoho světla; každý bojovník by měl nést vlastní zdroj jasu, aby při oddělení nezůstal ve tmě. Kryj nejslabšího, neboť stíny vnímají ubývající sílu stejně jistě jako žralok krev.
+
+Jasné světlo jim bere trpělivost i schopnost splynout s okolím. Přímé slunce je oslabuje, radiant damage trhá jejich podobu a *Holy Water* je pálí při doteku. Obyčejné zbraně působí hůře, přesto však mohou stín rozehnat, pokud mu nedovolíš vrátit se do tmy.
+
+V úzkých chodbách drž světlo vpředu i vzadu. Jeden stín před skupinou bývá často jen návnada; ostatní se zvednou ze stěn za posledním člověkem. Když plamen náhle vrhne stín **k sobě** místo od sebe, nezkoumej jej zblízka. Ustup do překrývajícího se světla a teprve potom počítej, kolik vás skutečně je.
+
+> **Varování:** Po boji nehas poslední lampu, dokud jsi nespočítal všechny stíny. Počítej je podle živých, nikoli podle tvarů na zdi.
+
+---
+
+*Mezi stránkami ulpělo několik zrnek bílé soli. Krátká poznámka pod nadpisem je psána roztřesenou rukou: „Lucerna v každé ruce. Náhradní olej uprostřed skupiny.”*

prints/bren.md

@@ -3,8 +3,8 @@
 **Look:** Gaunt thirty-something who looks fifty — hollow eyes, shaking hands, layered rags over the cut of a once-fine shirt, eyes tracking something beside him no one else can see.
 **Vibe:** Mutters nonstop to an invisible companion, lurching giggle → terror → weeping; hold his gaze a beat and it isn't madness in there, it's desperation.
 
-- Real name **Bren Aldara** — arcanist; got too close to the cellar thin point 7 yrs ago
-- Possessed by **Skein** (ethereal parasite) — full block: Skein card / possession.md
+- Real name **Bren Aldara** — arcanist; got too close to the sealed tear in the Deep Cellar 7 yrs ago
+- Possessed by **Skein** (ethereal parasite) — full block: [Skein card](skein.md)
 - **Witnessed Orenn's murder** — saw a hand reach "through the between" and brand him
 - Loved Orenn (fed/sheltered him) · Mags brings him food · terrified of **Xarrul**
 - Lucid = truth; anything useful gets garbled by Skein
@@ -17,10 +17,10 @@
 
 **Actions**
 - **Doesn't fight.** Cowers or bolts. If forced: unarmed +1 to hit, 5 ft., 1 bludgeoning.
-- **Detect parasite.** DC 14 Arcana examining him → anchor from another plane. Silver mirror: DC 15 Perception shows a distortion at his head.
+- **Detect parasite.** DC 14 Arcana examining him → anchor from another plane. *See Invisibility* or Orenn's silver mirror shows Skein in the Ethereal Plane.
 - **Skein silences him.** When he tries to share something useful → DC 15 WIS save at **-2** (WIS 6). Fail = garbled words / stabbing pain. Nat 20 Persuasion or Insight → lucid, 1-3 clear sentences.
 
-**Bonus Actions** *(freeing Skein — resolves on the Ethereal Plane; full block on Skein card)*
+**Bonus Actions** *(freeing Skein — resolves on the Ethereal Plane; [full block on Skein card](skein.md))*
 - **Sever tendril.** Needs ethereal sight. Each AC 13, 5 HP. All 6 cut → Bren free 1d4 hr.
 - **Silvervein root near him.** Weakens Skein's grip for 1 round (lucid window).
 - **Skein flees at ≤10 HP.** Tendrils rip free: Bren takes 2d6 psychic + stunned 1 rd. (Dispel ending early → 1d10 psychic.)
@@ -119,9 +119,6 @@
 
 
 
-
-
-
 
 
 

prints/dace.md

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+# Dace — The Traitor (the Marked)
+
+**Look:** Handsome man in his late twenties, sandy hair, bright eyes, and an easy smile designed to win trust.
+**Vibe:** Everyone's helpful friend until evidence corners him; then the warmth switches off completely.
+
+- Sells House contract dossiers to Haddon and the Order; does it for money, not faith
+- Evidence: Haddon's journal, Kael's suspicion, private-room diagram, second cultist pin in his boot (DC 14 Investigation)
+- Thera secretly marked him; delayed shadow (DC 15 Perception), grey seam at throat (DC 15 Medicine/Arcana)
+- If exposed: Deception +8 → hostage → fight; surrenders at half HP
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +1 | +3 | +1 | +2 | +0 | +4 | 15 | 44 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Skills:** Deception/Persuasion +8, Performance +6, Stealth/Sleight of Hand +5
+**Sneak Attack (1/turn):** +2d6 when its normal trigger applies.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Shortsword.** +6 to hit, 5 ft.; 1d6+3 piercing.
+- **Concealed Dagger.** +6 to hit, 5 ft.; 1d4+3 piercing. Essence of Ether: DC 13 CON or unconscious for 1 minute.
+
+**Social Moves**
+
+- **Too helpful.** DC 16 Insight notices that his cooperation is a practiced performance.
+- **Marked fate.** Consecration, *Remove Curse*, *Greater Restoration*, Thera's death, or genuine forgiveness can save him before the mark ripens.
+
+---
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prints/dalla.md

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+# Dalla — The Desperate Parent
+
+**Look:** Pale, exhausted woman in her early thirties; long sleeves hide a lattice of monthly ritual scars.
+**Vibe:** Defensive loyalty powered by one need: bring her daughter Nessa home.
+
+- Default: supports the Order and willingly supplies blood to rebind Xarrul
+- Conduit note: learns the Order siphoned Nessa through her → refuses more blood, turns on Haddon, hears Xarrul out
+- E–III note: learns Vyre caused and preserved Nessa's condition → breaks with the Order
+- After the truth, favors Xarrul's promised rescue; Essek favors Ethereal destruction and warns of recoil risk
+- Rebinding: holds the blood-response station; stopping without a completed handoff deals 2d6 psychic to each other active ritualist
+- Xarrul truthfully tells her that a restored binding resumes the drain on Nessa
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +0 | +1 | +1 | +1 | +2 | +0 | 11 | 22 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Skills:** Medicine/Insight +4, Arcana +3
+**Spellcasting:** 2nd level, WIS; DC 12, +4 spell attack. **Slots:** 1st 3.
+
+**Spells**
+
+- **Cantrips:** *spare the dying, guidance*
+- **1st:** *cure wounds, detect evil and good, sanctuary*
+
+**What She Shares**
+
+- Freely: Nessa's condition, eight months of blood, failed summoning, belief in the Opening.
+- Sympathetic audience: Order doctrine, Haddon plans to rebind a fiend, her blood powered it.
+- Only after breaking: Xarrul's name, full ritual, Phase Two, cult safehouse, blood schedule and binding details.
+
+---
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prints/essek.md

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+# Essek — The Doubter
+
+**Look:** Thin, forgettable young man at the table's edge; hunched posture, downcast eyes, and a faint amber brand on his inner wrist.
+**Vibe:** Silent and frightened until trust is earned; once he chooses a side, he becomes precise and brave.
+
+- The Order's best technical caster and best source on the true Opening
+- Unmooring Brand keeps him dependent on monthly stabilization; Haddon monitors it through a brass bookmark
+- Needs discretion, competence, and a concrete extraction plan — public offers make him retreat
+- Breaking point: Haddon begins another blood ritual using Dalla; Essek speaks even without earned trust
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| -1 | +2 | +0 | +3 | +2 | +0 | 12 | 18 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Skills:** Arcana/Investigation +5, Stealth +4
+**Spellcasting:** 3rd level, INT; DC 13, +5 spell attack. **Slots:** 1st 4, 2nd 2.
+
+**Spells**
+
+- **Cantrips:** *mage hand, light, message*
+- **1st:** *comprehend languages, identify, alarm*
+- **2nd:** *see invisibility, arcane lock*
+
+**Trust Ladder**
+
+- Small deniable correction → hint to watch Haddon's left hand → hide (do not break) the brass indicator → retrieve formula/notes → alliance.
+- Breaking indicator: 4d4 psychic; DC 13 CON or unconscious 1d4 minutes. It is an alarm, not the lock.
+- Safe mark removal: iron in both hands + genuine safe memory before *Remove Curse*. Missing either: 2d4 psychic; sitting halves damage.
+
+**Key Truth:** The Final Closure severed Xarrul's commands, not the vitality feed: “It isn't bound. We're still feeding it.”
+
+---
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prints/faded-scroll-of-etherealness.md

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+# Faded Scroll of Etherealness
+
+*Scroll, rare (consumable)*
+
+If you can read a written language, you can use an action to read this scroll and gain the effect of the *Etherealness* spell for 1 minute. You can end the effect early as an action.
+
+The scroll crumbles to dust when its magic takes effect.

prints/gifts/mercy-guest-cizi-kuze.md

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+# Dar Hosta — Cizí kůže
+
+Host si tě dlouze prohlédl. Jeho tvář se přelila do tvé vlastní, ale výraz v ní nebyl tvůj.
+
+> „Mnoho vzpomínek. Mnoho hlasů. Ale jen jedna vůle.“
+
+Když ses zeptal která, pousmál se.
+
+> „Umím číst myšlenky, doktore. Ne jejich majitele.“
+
+Nabídl ti dohodu: dostaň ho živého ke kruhu. Až jeho duch opustí tělo, nedovol nikomu přeseknout stříbrné vlákno, které je stále spojuje — a udeř na Xarrula dřív, než tělo obsadí. Pokud Xarrul zvítězí, Host nezemře; zůstane bez těla uvězněný v Astrální rovině. Pokud zemře Xarrul, Host se vrátí změněný.
+
+Když jsi souhlasil, zvedl ruce k tvému obličeji a počkal na svolení. Pod jeho prsty se nákaza probudila. Bledé čáry ti přeběhly přes tváře jako nákres vedený rukou chirurga a kosti pod kůží se na okamžik tiše pohnuly.
+
+> „To uvnitř vás už umí přepisovat tělo. Jen dosud znalo pouze rány.“
+>
+> „Já mu ukážu tvář.“
+
+## Cizí kůže
+
+**Jednou před rozedněním** můžeš jako action fyzicky změnit svou podobu a hlas na podobu humanoida, kterého jsi alespoň minutu pozoroval zblízka.
+
+Proměna trvá **10 minut**, nevyžaduje concentration a můžeš ji ukončit dříve jako action. Tvé game statistics, oblečení a vybavení se nemění.
+
+Nejde o iluzi. Tvá kůže, vlasy, hlas i stavba obličeje se skutečně promění a obyčejný dotyk převlek neodhalí. Při samotné proměně se však pod kůží na okamžik objeví bledé čáry a pozorný svědek může vidět, jak si tělo hledá nový tvar.
+
+Nákaza se tuto schopnost naučila. Host už ti ji nemůže vzít zpět.
+
+---

prints/gifts/mercy-xarrul-pruchod-sedi.md

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+# Dar Xarrula — Průchod šedí
+
+Xarrul ti neslíbil odpověď na otázku, kdo jsi. Slíbil něco přesnějšího.
+
+> „Pletete si roztříštěnost s množstvím, doktore. Ve vašem těle nebojuje několik vůlí. Je tam jediná vůle obklopená příliš mnoha rozbitými vzpomínkami.“
+>
+> „Mohu stáhnout praskliny dohromady. Nic vám nevezmu. Žádné jméno. Žádnou vzpomínku. Ale skončí cizí pohyby, ztracené okamžiky i myšlenky, které se navzájem popírají.“
+>
+> „Jedna souvislá mysl. Jediná vůle. Tělo, které už nikdy nebude odporovat samo sobě.“
+
+Na otázku, čí vůle zůstane, odpověděl:
+
+> „Ta, která tělo ovládá už nyní. Jméno vůle není součástí zákroku.“
+
+Cena zněla prostě: přiveď Hosta ke kruhu a dovol Xarrulovi zahájit přenos. Nic dalšího po tobě nepožadoval naslepo.
+
+Když jsi souhlasil, Xarrul natáhl ruku z šedi. Nedotkl se tvého těla. Dotkl se tvého stínu. Přes tvou dlaň se rozběhla tenká šedá jizva, studená jako kov ponechaný venku přes noc.
+
+> „Měňavec naučil vaše tělo měnit tvar. Já je naučím, že dveře jsou pouze zvyk.“
+
+## Průchod šedí
+
+**Třikrát před rozedněním** můžeš jako action sevřít jednoho tvora na dosah, který s tím souhlasí, a projít s ním skrze dveře, mříže, stěnu nebo podobnou souvislou překážku silnou nejvýše **5 ft.** Můžeš schopnost použít i sám na sebe.
+
+Na okamžik zešednete a zprůsvitníte. Potom se oba objevíte na nejbližších volných místech na druhé straně překážky. Veškeré nesené a oblečené vybavení projde s vámi.
+
+Schopnost může překonat běžné zámky, *Arcane Lock* i ochranné runy Cely jedna. Nemůže překonat vnější uzávěru Nether Inn, neporušený zadržovací kruh mezi rovinami ani bariéru vytvořenou čistou magickou silou. Pokud na druhé straně není dostatek volného prostoru, průchod se nezdaří a použití se nespotřebuje.
+
+Šedá jizva na dlani nese slabou běsovskou magickou stopu. Xarrul ti naučený průchod nemůže vzít zpět.
+
+---

prints/haddon.md

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+# Haddon — "Scribe" Haddon, the Scholar
+
+**Look:** Neat grey beard, spectacles, scholar's robe, ink-stained fingers; stiff left hand and black branching scars show under difficult magic.
+**Vibe:** Fussy, helpful academic; compulsively explains true theory while lying about what the theory was used to do.
+
+- Best liar at the cult table; prepared the group's alibi before Orenn's body was cold
+- Met Dace as an unnamed intermediary and recorded the Harath dossier in his ciphered journal
+- Knows Xarrul is fiendish and the Order summoned it; claims it remains bound and the House caused the failure
+- Rebinding: holds the true-name station; Dalla and Rennt must hold the other two
+- If one station ends without a completed handoff, each other active ritualist takes 2d6 psychic damage and makes DC 14 CON
+- Xarrul attacks his resolve with Bren and his abandoned maxim: **the living weight comes first**
+- Reserve Oil of Etherealness in his ritual case
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| -1 | +2 | +1 | +4 | +1 | +2 | 12 | 38 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Saves/skills:** INT +7, WIS +4; Arcana/History/Investigation +7, Deception/Persuasion +5
+**Spellcasting:** 5th level, INT; DC 15, +7 spell attack.
+**Slots:** 1st 4, 2nd 3, 3rd 2.
+
+**Spells**
+
+- **Cantrips:** *mage hand, prestidigitation, minor illusion, fire bolt*
+- **1st:** *detect magic, shield, charm person, disguise self*
+- **2nd:** *detect thoughts, misty step, suggestion*
+- **3rd:** *counterspell, dispel magic*
+
+**Pressure Points**
+
+- Bren calling him **Professor** cracks his composure; he abandoned his finest student to Skein.
+- Fifteen years ago he entered a collapsing circle to save Orenn. Orenn's faith in that old courage was the last restraint on him.
+
+---
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prints/kael.md

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+# Kael — The Hothead (the Witness)
+
+**Look:** Big, scarred half-orc with shaved head, scarred arms, permanent scowl, and an immaculate scale-token.
+**Vibe:** Angry, direct, and fiercely loyal; easier to question than his hostility suggests because he cannot lie well.
+
+- Started the brawl over the Merchant Quarter closing and feels responsible for making Orenn's house unsafe
+- Suspects Dace: too smooth, last blade tied to a ritual-marked closing
+- Saw Bren go rigid and stare at the bar during the blackout — at Xarrul killing Orenn
+- Idolizes Thera, but remembers a failed resurrection after one of her kills; physical proof turns him against her
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +3 | +2 | +3 | +0 | +0 | +1 | 15 | 45 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Skills:** Athletics +6, Intimidation +4, Perception +3
+**Relentless Endurance (1/long rest):** Drop to 1 HP instead of 0.
+**Savage Attacks:** Add one weapon die on a critical hit.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two Handaxe attacks.
+- **Handaxe.** +6 to hit, 5 ft. or 20/60 ft.; 1d6+3 slashing.
+
+**Roleplay Trigger**
+
+- Ask directly about Thera: he admits a priest could not find one of her dead marks to raise them, then immediately tries to dismiss it.
+
+---
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prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md

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+# Litanie odvráceného kroku
+
+*Dva listy spojené stříbrnou nití. Rozdělte je podél švu. Každý list musí držet a číst jiný hlas.*
+
+---
+
+## PRVNÍ LIST — HLAS PRVNÍHO UZLU
+
+### Čtení listu
+
+Drž tento list otevřený a použij svou **action**, abys z něj četl nahlas. Přitom se můžeš normálně pohybovat. Do začátku tvého příštího tahu se Xarrul v materiální rovině, kterého vnímáš do vzdálenosti **30 ft.**, nemůže z vlastní vůle přesunout na místo blíže k tobě. Může zůstat stát, pohybovat se stranou ve stejné vzdálenosti nebo se vzdálit. Nucený pohyb funguje normálně.
+
+Účinek skončí, pokud list pustíš nebo zavřeš, nevidíš jeho písmo, nemůžeš mluvit, přestaneš Xarrula vnímat, jsi incapacitated nebo použiješ jinou action. Spell s verbal component čtení přeruší. Když během čtení utrpíš zranění, hoď **DC 14 Constitution saving throw**; při neúspěchu ztratíš místo v textu a účinek skončí.
+
+*Písmo se pohybuje. Řádky se stáčejí ke jizvě, kterou na sobě nese spoutaný. Slova pronesená zpaměti nemají žádnou moc.*
+
+> **Jizvo prvního uzlu, pamatuj.**
+> Jméno psané krví, odpověz.
+> Ke hlasu tomuto nevykročíš.
+> K ruce této cestu nezkrátíš.
+> Co jednou neslo řetěz,
+> nese i směr jeho návratu.
+> **Jizvo prvního uzlu, pamatuj.**
+
+---
+
+✂ **ZDE ODDĚLIT LISTY**
+
+---
+
+## DRUHÝ LIST — HLAS UZAVŘENÉHO PRAHU
+
+### Čtení listu
+
+Drž tento list otevřený a použij svou **action**, abys z něj četl nahlas. Přitom se můžeš normálně pohybovat. Do začátku tvého příštího tahu se Xarrul v materiální rovině, kterého vnímáš do vzdálenosti **30 ft.**, nemůže z vlastní vůle přesunout na místo blíže k tobě. Může zůstat stát, pohybovat se stranou ve stejné vzdálenosti nebo se vzdálit. Nucený pohyb funguje normálně.
+
+Účinek skončí, pokud list pustíš nebo zavřeš, nevidíš jeho písmo, nemůžeš mluvit, přestaneš Xarrula vnímat, jsi incapacitated nebo použiješ jinou action. Spell s verbal component čtení přeruší. Když bhem čtení utrpíš zranění, hoď **DC 14 Constitution saěving throw**; při neúspěchu ztratíš místo v textu a účinek skončí.
+
+*Písmo se pohybuje. Řádky ustupují před jizvou, kterou na sobě nese spoutaný. Slova opsaná na jiný list nemají žádnou moc.*
+
+> **Jizvo přetrženého příkazu, pamatuj.**
+> Jméno sevřené stříbrem, odpověz.
+> Ke hlasu tomuto nevykročíš.
+> K ruce této cestu nezkrátíš.
+> Co přervalo svůj řetěz,
+> neztratilo směr jeho návratu.
+> **Jizvo přetrženého příkazu, pamatuj.**

prints/mags.md

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+# Mags — The Other Half
+
+**Look:** Wiry woman in her late forties; cropped grey hair, temple-to-jaw scar, stained apron over armor, cook's hands layered over killer's hands.
+**Vibe:** Grief forced through professional discipline; she reads every person as a potential weapon or threat.
+
+- Locks the tavern until midnight and coerces the neutral PCs into investigating
+- Respects competence; shares deeper cellar/fiend tools only after evidence and a concrete plan
+- Knows the thin point and old circle, not the Guest's Xarrul bargain or the true lockdown mechanism
+- Warden's Mark over heart lets Xarrul compromise her in the finale
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +2 | +4 | +2 | +1 | +3 | +1 | 16 | 65 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Saves/skills:** DEX +7, WIS +6; Perception/Survival +6, Stealth +7, Intimidation/Investigation +4
+**Fixer's Read:** Advantage to catch lies, gauge intent, spot concealed weapons, or track a mark. No special read on planar beings.
+**Retired, Not Soft:** Below half HP or when a loved ally is threatened, +2 attack and damage.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two Short Sword or two Thrown Knife attacks.
+- **+1 Short Sword.** +8 to hit, 5 ft.; 8 (1d6+5) piercing.
+- **Thrown Knife (4).** +7 to hit, 20/60 ft.; 6 (1d4+4) piercing.
+- **Emergency reserve.** One Oil of Etherealness dose under apron; applying takes 10 minutes.
+
+**Reaction**
+
+- **Parry.** +3 AC against one melee attack that would hit.
+
+**Compromised Finale**
+
+- 39 HP, disadvantage on attacks; start each turn DC 15 WIS or lose action.
+- *Remove Curse*, *Greater Restoration*, or Xarrul's death clears the scar and restores full power.
+
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prints/mother-vyre.md

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+# Mother Vyre — The Absent Leader
+
+**Look:** Never appears in the Nether Inn; present through elegant handwriting, dead drops, annotations, and the convictions she planted in others.
+**Vibe:** A distant, sincere visionary whose certainty makes every compromise sound necessary.
+
+- Truly believes the planes should be merged; she is not a charlatan
+- Recruits through grief, curiosity, anger, and disillusionment, then turns each wound into leverage
+- Knows Xarrul's binding failed and considers it an acceptable proof-of-concept setback
+- Handwriting on Haddon's dead-drop messages matches annotations in a cult table book (DC 16 Investigation)
+
+---
+
+**Presence at the Table**
+
+- **Haddon** turns atrocity into research vocabulary and carries her Phase Two logistics.
+- **Dalla** believes Vyre can restore Nessa; the experiment actually caused and preserved her condition.
+- **Rennt** treats Vyre as the first person who gave his anger meaning.
+- **Essek** has read enough of her private correspondence to know the Opening is real and scheduled.
+
+**Do not stage an appearance.** Vyre's function in this oneshot is to remain outside the sealed house while her choices fracture the people inside it.
+
+---

prints/npc-sheets.md

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+# NPC Printable Sheets — Index
+
+One compact DM-facing sheet per NPC used during the oneshot.
+
+| NPC | Printable sheet | Source |
+|---|---|---|
+| Orenn | [Orenn](orenn.md) | `npc/orenn.md` |
+| Mags | [Mags](mags.md) | `npc/mags.md` |
+| Bren | [Bren](bren.md) | `npc/bren.md` |
+| Sevra | [Sevra](sevra.md) | `npc/assassins.md` |
+| Dace | [Dace](dace.md) | `npc/assassins.md` |
+| Kael | [Kael](kael.md) | `npc/assassins.md` |
+| Thera "Even-Hand" | [Thera](thera-even-hand.md) | `npc/assassins.md` |
+| Unnamed Blades (2) | [Unnamed Blades](unnamed-blades.md) | `npc/assassins.md` |
+| Mother Vyre | [Mother Vyre](mother-vyre.md) | `npc/cultists.md` |
+| Haddon | [Haddon](haddon.md) | `npc/cultists.md` |
+| Dalla | [Dalla](dalla.md) | `npc/cultists.md` |
+| Rennt | [Rennt](rennt.md) | `npc/cultists.md` |
+| Essek | [Essek](essek.md) | `npc/cultists.md` |
+| The Guest | [The Guest](the-guest.md) | `npc/the-guest.md` |
+| Xarrul | [Xarrul](xarrul.md) | `npc/xarrul.md` |
+| Skein | [Skein](skein.md) | `storylines/possession.md` |
+| Twinkle | [Twinkle](twinkle.md) | `location/deep-cellar.md` |
+
+**Not an NPC:** Wick is an emergency replacement PC and remains in `npc/the-boarder.md`.
+
+---

prints/o-eterickem-predivu.md

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+# O éterických předivech
+
+Výňatek ze třetího svazku *Katalogu cizopasníků hraničního éteru*.
+*Na okrajích jsou drobné opravy a poznámky podepsané iniciálami B. A.*
+
+## Ne každé posednutí vstupuje do těla
+
+Bytosti označované jako **éterická přediva** nejsou duchové, démoni ani bludné duše. Jsou to cizopasníci éteru, kteří se živí myslí tvorů dotýkajících se závoje mezi rovinami.
+
+Předivo do hostitele nevstoupí. Zůstává na druhé straně, kde se přichytí poblíž jeho hlavy a protáhne skrze hranici svá vlákna. Těmi používá hostitelovy smysly, ukusuje jeho vzpomínky a postupně přebírá pohyb, řeč i vůli. Hostitel vše vnímá, ale nemusí být schopen zastavit vlastní ruce nebo vyslovit větu, kterou cizopasník zakázal.
+
+Proto obyčejné vymítání často selže. V těle není žádný vetřelec. Pán řetězu stojí na druhé straně.
+
+### Známky přichycení
+
+- Zdánlivé šílenství má řád. Postižený naslouchá, odpovídá, smlouvá a podřizuje se někomu, koho ostatní nevidí.
+- Některá témata dokáže probírat volně, ale při pokusu sdělit určitou věc se jeho řeč zlomí, slova se pomíchají nebo jej přemůže náhlá bolest.
+- Pohyb se občas zarazí uprostřed gesta a pokračuje s jiným záměrem.
+- Jasné okamžiky přicházejí náhle a končí stejně rychle. Nejsou důkazem uzdravení, pouze ochabnutí cizího sevření.
+- Dlouhé přichycení otupuje úsudek, paměť a schopnost odporu. Ani po odstranění přediva se všechno ztracené nemusí vrátit.
+
+> *Poznámka na okraji:* „Nemluv o něm jako o šílenci. Šílenství neodpovídá na otázky, které neslyšíš. Tohle ano.“ — **B. A.**
+
+### Jak spatřit vlákna
+
+Kouzlo *Detect Magic* odhalí na hostiteli překryté stopy očarování a ochranné vazby, ale neukáže, kam vedou. *See Invisibility*, éterický zrak nebo jiný způsob nahlédnutí za závoj odhalí samotného cizopasníka. Leštěné stříbrné zrcadlo může zachytit alespoň jeho pokřivený obrys.
+
+Předivo připomíná pavouka velikého jako pes, uvázaného z průsvitných šňůr a neustále se stahujících uzlů. Od jeho středu vede do hostitelovy hlavy obvykle **šest vláken**.
+
+---
+
+## O přerušení vazby
+
+Nejdříve zajisti hostitele. Ohrožené předivo může použít jeho tělo jako štít, donutit jej k útěku nebo obrátit jeho ruce proti němu samotnému.
+
+Čerstvý **kořen stříbrožilu** rozdrcený u hlavy hostitele přiměje vlákna na krátký okamžik ucuknout. Hostitel tehdy může vyslovit několik vlastních slov. Kořen vazbu nezruší; pouze koupí čas.
+
+Kouzlo *Protection from Evil and Good* nedosáhne na tělo cizopasníka, ale po dobu svého působení mu brání vést hostitelovy pohyby. Je to odklad, nikoli léčba. Po zániku ochrany se neporušená vlákna znovu napnou.
+
+Trvalé oddělení vyžaduje zásah **na éterické straně**:
+
+1. Odhal předivo i všechna jeho vlákna.
+2. Přetni šest vláken zbraní nebo silou, která dokáže zasáhnout za závoj. Hostitel získá svobodu, dokud vlákna znovu nedorostou — zpravidla na několik hodin.
+3. Chceš-li vazbu ukončit navždy, znič uzlovité tělo cizopasníka. Samotné přeseknutí vláken nestačí.
+
+Těžce zraněné předivo se pokusí od hostitele odtrhnout a uprchnout hlouběji do éteru. Násilné vytržení vláken může hostitele omráčit nebo poranit. Nepovažuj útěk cizopasníka za vítězství; přeživší předivo si časem najde jinou mysl.
+
+Kouzla navracející ztracenou paměť a úsudek mohou napravit část způsobených škod, ale sama vlákna nepřetnou. Dokud předivo zůstává přichycené, zotavená mysl zůstává v jeho dosahu.
+
+> *Varování připsané jinou barvou inkoustu:* „Jestliže se dlouho spoutaný hostitel náhle probere bez kořene, kouzla či přeseknutého vlákna, předivo se nedopustilo chyby. Něčeho si všimlo. Něčeho, čeho se bojí. Nehleď na uzdraveného — hleď za něj, do šedi.“ — **B. A.**

prints/o-mlznych-pijavicich.md

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+# O mlžných pijavicích
+
+Výňatek z druhého svazku *Katalogu cizopasníků hraničního éteru*.  
+*Na okrajích jsou drobné opravy a poznámky podepsané iniciálami B. A.*
+
+## Zloděj čerstvých vzpomínek
+
+**Mlžná pijavice** je mrchožrout hraničního éteru, přitahovaný myslí nedávno vystavenou planárnímu přechodu. Nejčastěji se přichytí k lidem, kteří prošli portálem, nahlíželi věšteckým zrakem za závoj nebo dlouho pobývali poblíž tenkého místa.
+
+Pijavice nevstupuje do těla. Ovine se kolem hostitelova éterického stínu a jediným sosákem se napojí u jeho zátylku. Odtud vysává nejčerstvější vzpomínky dříve, než se stačí pevně usadit. Staré jméno může zůstat nedotčené, zatímco tvář spatřená před hodinou zmizí beze stopy.
+
+Postižený někdy polohlasem odpovídá na vlastní zapomenuté myšlenky. Pozorovateli se proto může zdát, že rozmlouvá s neviditelnou bytostí. Ve skutečnosti slyší ozvěnu vzpomínky právě ve chvíli, kdy mu ji pijavice odnímá.
+
+Dlouhé krmení způsobuje únavu, podrážděnost a nedůvěru. Hostitel si všimne mezer ve vlastní paměti, začne zpochybňovat svědectví ostatních a opakuje úkony, na jejichž dokončení zapomněl. Některé případy proto bývají mylně považovány za posednutí nebo cílené očarování.
+
+### Známky přichycení
+
+- Postižený opakuje stejné otázky, vrací předměty na původní místo a nepoznává lidi, které potkal teprve nedávno.
+- Řeč se může přerušit uprostřed věty, protože zmizel její začátek. Při zopakování otázky však postižený necítí bolest ani strach z odpovědi.
+- Ruka se občas zastaví uprostřed pohybu, když hostitel zapomene jeho účel. Nepokračuje však s novým, cizím záměrem.
+- Hostitel mluví k ozvěnám vlastním hlasem. Ty neodpovídají novými informacemi a neznají nic, co předtím nevěděl on sám.
+- Jasné světlo zpomaluje krmení. U lampy nebo okna proto postižený působí soustředěněji než ve stínu.
+
+> *Poznámka na okraji:* „Ne každé ztracené slovo bylo zakázáno. Zeptej se podruhé. Člověk s pijavicí hledá odpověď; člověk pod cizí vůlí se jí bojí.“ — **B. A.**
+
+### Jak spatřit sosák
+
+Kouzlo *Detect Magic* zachytí kolem hostitelova stínu slabou stopu věštění a nekromancie. *See Invisibility* nebo éterický zrak odhalí průsvitného tvora podobného úhoři, stočeného nízko kolem nohou hostitele. Do zátylku vede **jediný** tenký sosák; žádná další vlákna nebývají přítomna.
+
+V obyčejném zrcadle se stín postiženého pohne o zlomek okamžiku později než tělo. Ve stříbrném zrcadle lze rozeznat drobnou protáhlou hlavu obrácenou k zemi. Pijavice nemá končetiny, nesedí u lebky a nedokáže hledět jiným směrem než její hostitel.
+
+---
+
+## O odloučení pijavice
+
+Nejdříve odveď postiženého do silného světla. Nedovol mu vstoupit do souvislého stínu, kterým by cizopasník mohl uniknout mimo dosah.
+
+1. Uzavři hostitelův stín úplným kruhem z hrobové soli.
+2. Rozsviť nad jeho hlavou kouzelný plamen bez kouře. Pijavice uvolní sosák a pokusí se sklouznout po nejbližším stínu.
+3. Zasáhni ji prostředkem působícím do éteru dříve, než opustí kruh. Samotné přerušení sosáku ji nezabije.
+
+Mlžná pijavice **nedokáže ovládat hostitelovy pohyby, mluvit jeho ústy ani mu zakázat určité sdělení**. Pokud se tělo brání odloučení promyšleně, jedná proti vyslovené vůli postiženého nebo se pokouší ublížit samo sobě, přeruš postup a ověř jinou diagnózu.
+
+Zničení pijavice zastaví další ztráty, ale ukradené vzpomínky se nevrátí samy. Dokud tvor žije, lze je někdy obnovit jeho zajetím a obráceným věšteckým rituálem. Po jeho smrti pomůže pouze magie obnovující paměť.
+
+> *Varování připsané jinou barvou inkoustu:* „Pijavice se bojí světla, ne jiných lovců. Náhlé procitnutí ve tmě tedy není její slabost. Je to stopa vedoucí jinam.“ — **B. A.**
+

prints/o-navratove-ozvene.md

@@ -0,0 +1,46 @@
+# O návratové ozvěně
+
+Výňatek z *Poznámek k poruchám stříbrného vlákna po neúplné astrální projekci*.  
+*Na okrajích jsou drobné opravy a poznámky podepsané iniciálami B. A.*
+
+## Když se mysl vrátí dvakrát
+
+Při násilně přerušené astrální projekci se vědomí někdy nevrátí do těla jako jediný celek. Jedna jeho část se ukotví správně, zatímco druhá zůstane zachycena těsně za hranicí v podobě **návratové ozvěny**.
+
+Nejde o cizí bytost ani posednutí. Oba hlasy patří témuž člověku. Každý však prožívá další okamžiky z trochu jiného úhlu a postupně se začne považovat za pravého vlastníka společného života.
+
+Postižený vede spory s někým, koho ostatní neslyší, opravuje vlastní výroky a někdy se zastaví uprostřed pohybu, jako by si jeho tělo rozmyslelo další krok. Ve spánku může vstát a dokončit úkol, který bdělá část odmítla.
+
+Vzpomínky zůstávají zachované, ale jejich vlastnictví je nejasné: *tohle se stalo mně* se mění v *tohle se stalo jemu*.
+
+### Známky rozštěpení
+
+- Postižený odpovídá na neslyšitelné námitky, ale oba hlasy používají stejné obraty, znalosti a vzpomínky.
+- Pohyb se někdy zastaví a obrátí, jako když se dvě stejně silné ruce přetahují o jediný nástroj. Žádná však nedokáže tělo vést bez vědomí druhé.
+- Ve spánku přebírá vládu ozvěna. Její jednání sleduje vlastní cíle postiženého, třebaže volí prostředky, které by za bdění odmítl.
+- Určitá témata mohou vyvolat hádku nebo mlčení, nikoli však náhlou bodavou bolest, zkomolení jediného zakázaného slova nebo úplné vymazání věty.
+- Obě části reagují na vnější nebezpečí současně. Ozvěna nemůže obrátit pozornost jinam než tělo ani spatřit něco, co hostitel žádným smyslem nevnímá.
+
+> *Poznámka na okraji:* „Ozvěna může lhát, ale jen z týchž vzpomínek. Polož oběma otázku, jejíž odpověď hostitel nikdy neznal. Cizí mysl může vědět. Ozvěna pouze hádá.“ — **B. A.**
+
+### Jak spatřit druhý návrat
+
+Kouzlo *Detect Magic* ukáže souměrnou stopu věštění a vyvolávání, která vychází ze srdce a vrací se do něj. Nevede k žádné vnější bytosti. *See Invisibility* neodhalí cizopasníka, ale při planárním vidění se může za postiženým objevit jeho vlastní průsvitný obraz opakující pohyby s krátkým zpožděním.
+
+Ve stříbrném zrcadle jsou vidět **dvě totožné tváře**. Obě napodobují hostitele a žádná se neskrývá u jeho hlavy. Nenajdeš uzlovité tělo, končetiny ani vlákna zapuštěná do lebky. Kouzlo *Protection from Evil and Good* nemá žádný účinek, protože hranice prochází jedinou duší.
+
+---
+
+## O opětovném sjednocení
+
+Nesvazuj postiženého, pokud neohrožuje sebe či okolí.
+
+1. Polož postiženého doprostřed uzemňovacího kruhu a kolem obou zápěstí veď jedinou nepřerušenou stříbrnou nit.
+2. Při úplném klidu nech obě části současně vyslovit celé jméno a popsat poslední vzpomínku, kterou sdílejí bez rozporu.
+3. Uzavři kruh v okamžiku, kdy se obě výpovědi setkají. Správné uzavření stáhne ozvěnu zpět podél stříbrného vlákna.
+
+Nikdy se nepokoušej jednu část zničit nebo násilně zahnat. Není méně skutečná než druhá. Ztráta kterékoliv z nich poškodí tutéž duši a může zanechat tělo živé, avšak bez jediné úplné osobnosti.
+
+Návratová ozvěna nemůže z hostitele přeskočit na jiného člověka ani přežít jeho smrt. Jestliže spatřená bytost prchá samostatně do éteru, hledá nového nositele nebo zatahuje vlákna z hostitelovy lebky, nejde o poruchu stříbrného vlákna.
+
+> *Varování připsané jinou barvou inkoustu:* „Dvě tváře v zrcadle znamenají rozštěpení. Tvor bez tváře znamená návštěvníka. Nezaměňuj je jen proto, že oba mluví hlasem nemocného.“ — **B. A.**

prints/orenn.md

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+# Orenn — The Barkeep (dead)
+
+**Look:** Tall, lean man in his mid-fifties; silver-streaked hair, precise beard, clean rolled sleeves over old scars, measuring grey eyes.
+**Vibe:** Calm professional respect backed by the certainty that his single house rule will be obeyed.
+
+- Before brawl: personally serves PCs, asks “business or pleasure,” offers useful introductions if they earn his trust
+- Secretly still a fixer with Mags; kept the Guest imprisoned and used it to investigate the Order
+- Xarrul kills him during Rennt's blackout: Brand → Visions → claws; resurrection always fails
+- His death is the investigation scene, not a combat encounter
+
+---
+
+**Body — Evidence**
+
+- **DC 14 Medicine:** Mundane brawl wound is survivable; fatal damage radiates outward from the heart. No defensive wounds.
+- **Black hand-brand:** Surface unburned, flesh charred underneath.
+- **DC 15 Arcana:** Necrotic, fiendish, personal signature.
+- **DC 18 Arcana:** Pattern contains a fragment of Xarrul's true name; compare with Haddon's texts or Orenn's bestiary.
+- *Revivify*, *Raise Dead*, and *Resurrection* find no soul to call back.
+
+**On His Person**
+
+- Tavern keys; 12 gp, 8 sp; plain silver ring.
+- **Black iron key:** Deep Cellar concealed door and Vault.
+- **Silver mirror:** The reflection functions as *See Invisibility*, including ghostly Ethereal creatures; no attacks cross planes.
+
+**What His Records Reveal**
+
+- Watched the Order and district disappearances but never connected them to the tear below.
+- Case board, recent anti-fiend purchases, and letter to Mags show growing fear.
+- Grey Quay bottle opener links him, Mags, and Sevra; old books link Haddon and Bren.
+
+---

prints/rennt.md

@@ -0,0 +1,126 @@
+# Rennt — The True Believer
+
+**Look:** Wiry young man with scarred knuckles, rough-cut good looks, and dark eyes burning with conviction.
+**Vibe:** Raw, charismatic anger; right about the world's injustice and catastrophically wrong about the cure.
+
+- Set up Xarrul's summoning circle and believes the fiend remains bound
+- Cast *Thunderwave* during the brawl, accidentally creating the blackout in which Orenn died
+- Proudly shares Order doctrine; knows nothing of Nessa's true sacrifice or Phase Two's scale
+- Violently opposes Ethereal destruction; attacks or sabotages the hunter to preserve Vyre's work
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +2 | +2 | +1 | +0 | -1 | +3 | 13 | 33 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Skills:** Persuasion/Intimidation +5, Athletics +4
+**Spellcasting:** 2nd level, CHA; DC 13, +5 spell attack. **Slots:** 1st 2.
+
+**Spells / Actions**
+
+- **Cantrips:** *eldritch blast, thaumaturgy*
+- **1st:** *hellish rebuke, armor of agathys, thunderwave*
+- **Blackout testimony.** His denial of murder complicity is genuine; he used *Thunderwave* defensively and never saw Xarrul.
+
+**Endgame**
+
+- Rebinding: holds the command-knot station beside Haddon and Dalla; one broken station deals 2d6 psychic to each other active ritualist.
+- Xarrul tells him Haddon knew the command line was dead and let him defend the lie.
+- If the party prepares Ethereal destruction without resolving the cult split, Rennt sabotages the ritual, salt, oil, or far-side hunter.
+
+---
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prints/secrets/3-handlers-agent.md

@@ -6,6 +6,6 @@
 
 **Odměna — okamžitá a mocná.** Heslo ti koupí **jednu tvář, ne věrnost.** Jednou před rozedněním se Host promění v kohokoli, koho určíš — projde kolem zamčených dveří jako Mags, poskytne ti alibi, zašeptá lež hlasem soka — **nebo bude po tvém boku bojovat v závěrečném střetu jako plnohodnotný spojenec.** Tuhle jedinou službu splní přesně. Nesouhlasí však, že tím patří tvé spojce.
 
-**Háček.** Pro Hosta poslali i někoho dalšího — ale *ne* aby ho osvobodil. Jestli se k cele dostane první, tvé aktivum je mrtvola a odměna je pryč. Jestli ho zachráníš, konflikt se jen změní: Host chce využít Xarrulův přenos a získat hostinec, ne poslušně odejít. Až se jejich duchové oddělí od těla, možná ho budeš muset bránit před vlastním společníkem — a potom rozhodnout, zda „vyzvednutí“ znamená odvést nově posíleného člověka z domu, který považuje za svůj.
+**Háček.** Pro Hosta poslali i někoho dalšího — ale *ne* aby ho osvobodil. Jestli se k cele dostane první, tvé aktivum je mrtvola a odměna je pryč. Jestli ho zachráníš, konflikt se jen změní: Host chce využít Xarrulův přenos a získat hostinec, ne poslušně odejít. Až se jejich duchové oddělí od těla, možná ho budeš muset bránit před vlastním společníkem. Jestli Xarrul zvítězí, Host zůstane naživu, ale bez těla v Astrální rovině. Jestli zvítězí Host, hodlá převzít Magsinu tvář a hostinec si nechat.
 
 ---

prints/secrets/4-executioner.md

@@ -1,11 +1,19 @@
-# Kat
+# Poslední tvář
 
-**Výhoda — Chladné ruce.** Odvedl jsi špinavou práci v temných místnostech. Máš **advantage na saving throws proti stavu frightened** a hrůzy dole tě rozhodí míň, než by měly.
+Jméno na zakázce bylo **Saren Vell**.
 
-**Cíl — Umlčet Hosta.** Jeden z návštěvníků ti zaplatil, aby ta věc ve sklepě už nikdy nepromluvila — zabij ji, zajisti, že zůstane v kleci, až tohle místo shoří, nebo přesekni její promítnutého ducha během Xarrulova přenosu. Ví toho příliš o někom, kdo si platí za to, aby zůstal neznámý. Jestli zdědí Xarrulovu moc, už se k němu možná nikdy nedostaneš.
+Před několika měsíci pronikl do Řádu nápravy. Tři noci seděl mezi jeho zasvěcenci, vynesl ven jména, znamení a tajemství, která neměla opustit zamčenou místnost. Potom zmizel. Někdo kvůli tomu přišel o příliš mnoho a zaplatil dost, aby už Saren Vell nikdy nepromluvil.
 
-**Odměna — okamžitá a krutá.** Z Hosta si vezmeš **lahvičku s olejem tváří** — měňavcovu památku. Jednou před rozedněním **přečteš povrchové myšlenky jednoho tvora jako *detect thoughts* (bez save)** — včetně spoluhráče. Zjisti tajemství. Nalož s ním, jak chceš. A dál: tvá odměna je schovaná za uvolněným kamenem u schodů do sklepa — **50 gp a *Potion of Heroism*, k nalezení hned.**
+Tvůj zadavatel tě varoval, že jméno ani tvář nemusí být pravé. Saren je **měňavec**. Tvář z té zakázky už možná dávno nenosí a na své jméno nemusí odpovědět. Na tom nezáleží. Krev nelže.
 
-**Háček.** Někdo u tohohle stolu chce Hosta osvobodit a věří, že ho zachraňuje. Pracuje proti tobě, ať už řekl slovo nebo ne. Druhý ho potřebuje živého dost dlouho na to, aby se ho *zeptal*. Během přenosu se Host a Xarrul na tři kola stanou oddělenými cíli: bude to nejčistší rána, jakou kdy dostaneš — před očima všech, kteří ho chtějí chránit.
+Podle posledních zpráv ho už roky drží v cele pod pochybným hostincem. Dostal jsi mapu, přesné pokyny a malý černý **bezedný vak** se stříbrnou přezkou bez klíčové dírky. Přezka se otevře jen tehdy, když ji potřeš krví cíle. Uvnitř čeká tvá odměna. Až ji vyjmeš, máš do vaku vložit Sarenovu hlavu.
+
+Šel jsi přesně podle mapy. Zavedla tě postranními ulicemi až k vývěsnímu štítu **Nether Inn**. U krbu jsi podle pokynů spálil mapu i celý popis zakázky. Počkal jsi, dokud se inkoust nezkroutil a poslední útržek se nerozpadl v popel.
+
+Potom ses rozhlédl po lokále. Zbývalo jediné volné místo — u společného stolu.
+
+Sedl sis, položil vak k nohám a začal čekat na příležitost dostat se do sklepa.
+
+**Tvůj cíl:** Najdi vězně, který kdysi nosil jméno Saren Vell. Zabij ho, jeho krví odemkni bezedný vak, vyzvedni svou odměnu a dovnitř ulož jeho hlavu.
 
 ---

prints/secrets/5-recruit.md

@@ -1,11 +1,35 @@
-# Novic
+# Místo mezi nimi
 
-**Výhoda — Přízeň Řádu.** Nosíš skrytý **odznak Řádu Zacelení**. Když ho ukážeš kultistovi, označí tě jako jednoho z věrných — mluví otevřeně a berou tě jako slibného adepta.
+Jména **Matky Vyre** a **Haddona** jsi poprvé našel na hřbetech starých učených svazků.
 
-**Cíl — Dokázat svou cenu.** Dnešní noc je tvá zkouška. Přines Řádu něco skutečného — vědění o tenkém místě, získanou výhodu nad vrahy, nebo důkaz, že pro věc překročíš tvrdou hranici.
+Jejich práce tě uchvátila. Tam, kde jiní badatelé viděli mezi rovinami nepřekročitelné hranice, Vyre a Haddon popisovali stehy, proudění a místa, kde lze oddělené znovu spojit. Jejich nákresy byly přesné, jejich argumenty nádherné a každá zodpovězená otázka v tobě probouzela tři další.
 
-**Odměna — okamžitá.** Rennt a Haddon tě na místě zasvětí. Vyber si jedno, použitelné během téhle hry: **Scroll of *Protection from Evil and Good***, nebo na tebe a dva spojence vloží požehnání (**seslání *Bless* na tři tvory, jednou, bez komponent**). Skutečná moc, dnes v noci.
+Přečetl jsi všechno, co se ti podařilo získat. Opsal sis celé pasáže, doplnil chybějící výpočty a zaplnil okraje vlastními poznámkami. Nakonec ti pouhé čtení přestalo stačit. Chtěl jsi studovat tam, kde tahle práce pokračuje — v **Řádu zacelení**.
 
-**Háček.** Řád ti prozradí, že další z tvých společníků jim už dluží krví nebo mlčením. *Zatlač na něj.* Dnes v noci ti musí pomoct — jen netuší, že to víš.
+Matce Vyre jsi poslal několik dopisů. V každém jsi rozebral jinou část jejího díla a přiložil některý z vlastních výpočtů. Nežádal jsi o peníze ani postavení. Jen o možnost učit se.
+
+Nikdy neodpověděla.
+
+Nevyčítáš jí to. Člověk oddaný tak velkému dílu nemůže věnovat čas každému neznámému uchazeči. Když ses však pokusil navštívit sídlo Řádu osobně, nepustili tě ani za bránu. Bez pozvání, doporučení nebo jména, které už něco znamená, pro ně nejsi nikdo.
+
+Proto jsi zaplatil nemalé peníze člověku, který umí zjistit, kde se zavřené dveře otevírají alespoň na okamžik. Matka Vyre své sídlo téměř neopouští. **Haddon však ano.** Schází se s dalšími učenci, daleko od bran Řádu, v hostinci jménem **Nether Inn**. Dnes večer tam má být.
+
+Poznal jsi ho okamžitě. Zestárl od doby, kdy vznikla rytina v jednom z tvých svazků, ale tmavě zjizvenou levou ruku ani soustředěný výraz nebylo možné zaměnit. Sedí jen několik stolů od tebe, obklopený svými společníky a otevřenými knihami.
+
+Ty zatím sedíš na jediném místě, které v lokále zůstalo volné — u společného stolu s několika cizinci. Nezdá se, že by sem přišli jen na sklenku. Příliš často sledují dveře, schody a jeden druhého.
+
+Celou cestu sis připravoval první větu. Teď však víš, že pouhý obdiv Haddona nezaujme. Jestli tě má vzít vážně, musíš mu ukázat, že dokážeš k jeho práci přispět. Musíš mu přinést něco, co ještě neví.
+
+Promluv s Haddonem. Získej jeho důvěru a přesvědč ho, že si zasloužíš místo v Řádu zacelení.
 
 ---
+
+## Pokud tě Haddon přijme
+
+Haddon ti předá úzký cestovní **grimoár mezních zásahů**, vázaný v šedé kůži. Obsahuje kouzla *Protection from Evil and Good*, *Counterspell*, *Dispel Magic*, *Remove Curse*, *Dimension Door* a *Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum*. Jde o skutečný spellbook: jakmile dokážeš připravovat kouzla příslušného levelu, můžeš si je z něj běžným způsobem opsat.
+
+Do přední desky je zasazen broušený fialový drahokam protkaný stříbrnými žilkami. Dokud grimoár držíš, můžeš z něj **každé zapsané kouzlo jednou seslat**, i když je zatím nedokážeš připravit a nemáš pro ně odpovídající spell slot. Nepotřebuješ material components a používáš svou běžnou sesílací vlastnost. Doba sesílání a concentration se nemění.
+
+Jakmile kouzlo z grimoáru sešleš, jeho zápis ze stránek zmizí. **Za úsvitu se všechna zmizelá kouzla znovu objeví** a lze je opět jednou seslat.
+
+Staré ochrany Nether Inn rozdělují budovu na samostatné uzavřené celky. Pokud uvnitř hostince sešleš *Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum*, jeho oblast nemůže překročit hranice místnosti, ve které stojíš — bez ohledu na zvolenou velikost krychle. Dveře, průchody, schodiště, stěny a stropy ochranu zastaví.

prints/secrets/9-mercy.md

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+# Volání pod kůží
+
+Na cestu do Nether Inn si nevzpomínáš jako na rozhodnutí.
+
+Vybavují se ti mokré ulice, světla v oknech a vlastní kroky. Nevíš však, kde přesně jsi vyšel ani jak dlouho už jsi kráčel. Na rozcestích ses občas otočil dřív, než ses rozhodl, kudy pokračovat. Nebyla to docela ztráta kontroly. Spíš opožděné zjištění, že tvé tělo znalo cestu dřív než ty.
+
+Pamatuješ si kovovou chuť na jazyku. Svědění bledých čar pod kůží. Pocit, že něco poznáváš, přestože jsi v této části města nikdy nebyl.
+
+Poslední jasná vzpomínka je vývěsní štít Nether Inn. Potom už sedíš u společného stolu, prsty sevřené kolem nedotčené číše. Hovor hostů zní vzdáleně. Nákaza uvnitř tebe je náhle tak klidná, až je to nesnesitelné.
+
+A pod tím tichem je záměr.
+
+Neslyšíš slova. Přesto je cítíš s ohlušující jistotou:
+
+> *Dole. Spoutané.*
+> *Čeká za dveřmi..*
+> *Najdi to. Otevři cestu ven.*
+
+Nevíš, zda ten záměr patří tobě, nákaze, nebo některé ze vzpomínek, které v sobě nosíš. Nenutí tvé tělo k pohybu. To by bylo jednodušší. Působí jako vlastní přesvědčení — stejně samozřejmé jako jistota, že krvácení musí být zastaveno.
+
+Kdykoli pohlédneš směrem ke sklepu, bledé linie pod kůží se na okamžik uklidní.
+
+**Tvůj cíl:** Najdi to, co pod hostincem čeká. Zjisti, co je vězní. Otevři mu cestu ven.
+
+---

prints/sevra.md

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+# Sevra — The Commander (the Loyalist)
+
+**Look:** Lean, dark-skinned woman in her mid-forties; close-cropped hair, deliberate movements, and a lead scale-token crossed by a throat scar.
+**Vibe:** Quiet institutional authority; professional, transactional, and almost impossible to rattle.
+
+- Wants proof of the House's traitor before she acts; suspects Dace
+- Knows robbed closings exposed targets, relics, blood, memories, and sometimes missing souls
+- Believes an Order-marked creature attacked the House and the Final Closure destroyed it
+- Win her with physical/procedural proof, not moral argument; proof of Thera's rot turns her into a ruthless ally
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +0 | +4 | +2 | +3 | +2 | +2 | 16 | 52 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Saves/skills:** DEX +7, INT +6; Stealth +7, Deception/Insight/Perception +5, Investigation +6
+**Assassinate:** First round advantage against creatures that have not acted; hits against surprised creatures crit.
+**Sneak Attack (1/turn):** +3d6 with advantage or an ally within 5 ft.
+**Evasion:** Half damage on failed DEX saves, none on success.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two Shortsword attacks.
+- **Shortsword.** +7 to hit, 5 ft.; 7 (1d6+4) piercing.
+- **Hand Crossbow.** +7 to hit, 30/120 ft.; 7 (1d6+4) piercing.
+
+**Reckoning**
+
+- Proof of Xarrul, Dace, or Thera lets her halt the faction war.
+- She supports sealing or Ethereal destruction; if the party attacks Mags for Xarrul, Sevra stands with Mags.
+
+---
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prints/silver-mirror.md

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+# Silver Mirror
+
+*Wondrous item, uncommon*
+
+While looking into this mirror, you see invisible creatures and objects reflected in it as if they were visible, and you can see into the Ethereal Plane through the reflection. Ethereal creatures and objects appear ghostly and translucent.
+
+This property functions continuously and has no effect on anything outside the mirror's reflected field of view.

prints/skein.md

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+# Skein — The Parasite
+
+**Look:** Dog-sized translucent spider knotted from twisting threads; too many independently moving legs and six tendrils buried in Bren's skull.
+**Vibe:** A furtive, controlling feeder; terrified of Xarrul and willing to hurt its host to preserve its hiding place.
+
+- Exists only in the Ethereal Plane; seeing it does not allow cross-planar attacks
+- Uses Bren as senses, voice, shield, and food; Bren remains conscious throughout
+- Xarrul's proximity distracts it, creating Bren's deepest lucid windows
+- At 10 HP or less, flees and tears free; prevent escape for a permanent rescue
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| -2 | +3 | +2 | +2 | +3 | -1 | 13 | 38 | 30 ft., climb 30 ft. |
+
+**Saves/skills:** WIS/DEX +5, Stealth +7, Perception +5
+**Resist:** psychic; nonmagical bludgeoning/piercing/slashing. **Immune:** charmed, frightened.
+**Senses:** blindsight 30 ft. through host, darkvision 60 ft., passive 15.
+
+**Traits**
+
+- **Parasitic Bond.** Sees/hears/speaks through Bren; overrides his actions without a save.
+- **Six Tendrils.** Each AC 13, 5 HP, Ethereal-only target. Each severed = loses host control 1 round; all six = Bren free 1d4 hours. Regrow in 1d4 hours.
+- **Mind Drain.** Long-term WIS loss; killing Skein restores Bren only to WIS 10.
+
+**Actions / Reaction**
+
+- **Psychic Lash.** +5 to hit, 30 ft., Ethereal target that perceives it; 10 (3d6) psychic.
+- **Suppress Host.** Force or prevent one of Bren's actions; no save.
+- **Flee (1/day, ≤10 HP).** Detach, double speed; Bren takes 7 (2d6) psychic and is stunned 1 round.
+- **Silence the Host (reaction).** Bren tries to reveal protected information: DC 15 WIS at -2; fail = garbled words or pain, success = one clear sentence.
+
+---
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prints/the-guest.md

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+# The Guest — The Caged Face
+
+**Look:** True form is slight, ageless, wax-pale, and unfinished; usually wears the face the viewer most wants to trust.
+**Vibe:** Warm, patient, exhausted, and flawlessly attentive because it hears the thought behind the question.
+
+- Eleven-year prisoner and off-book spy; wants the Nether Inn as back pay, not merely freedom
+- Helped Xarrul choose Orenn and designed the body-for-Astral-survival compact
+- Wants the party to kill Xarrul during the Vacancy, reclaim its body with the fiend's imprint, then replace Mags
+- Fluent liar; knows Orenn/Mags's operation, cult habits, Dace's meetings, and Xarrul's exact bargain
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +0 | +4 | +2 | +2 | +2 | +3 | 14 | 52 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Save/skills:** CHA +5; Deception +8, Insight +4, Persuasion +5, Stealth +6
+**Immune:** charmed. **Ambusher:** First-round advantage against surprised targets.
+**Languages:** Common, Thieves' Cant, Infernal; mimics any heard language.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Shapechanger.** Become any seen Small/Medium humanoid or revert; statistics unchanged, equipment does not transform.
+- **Read Thoughts.** Surface thoughts within 60 ft.; no save while calm.
+- **Multiattack.** Two melee attacks.
+- **Slam / stolen blade.** +6 to hit, 5 ft.; 7 (1d6+4) bludgeoning / piercing.
+
+**Suppressant (default when found)**
+
+- Cannot Shapechange; Read Thoughts is unreliable. A full day without the “trim dose” restores the full block.
+
+**Compact / Consequences**
+
+- Xarrul will not kill the Guest and kills no one after Orenn until the exchange finishes, except direct defense.
+- Kill the Guest early → compact ends; Xarrul begins the Hollowing and targets the killer first.
+- Guest wins Vacancy → empowered, lures Mags below in Orenn's voice, cages her, returns wearing Mags.
+
+---
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prints/thera-even-hand.md

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+# Thera "Even-Hand" — The Radical (the Rot)
+
+**Look:** Silver-haired woman in her late fifties, plain grey coat, folded hands, and the warm stillness of a beloved teacher.
+**Vibe:** Courteous, reassuring, and perfectly controlled; underneath, she appraises people as gently as livestock.
+
+- Forty-one undisputed closings hide a soul-harvesting tithe; she carries a warm soulcoin
+- Already marked Dace and is deciding whether to kill or recruit him
+- Tells: ritual courtesy (DC 16 Perception / DC 14 Insight), sour milk, animal unease, appraising gaze (DC 16 Insight)
+- Only proof breaks her cover: soulcoin, visible grey mark, or catching the ritual; invoking Orenn cuts through her certainty
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +1 | +4 | +2 | +2 | +3 | +2 | 17 | 84 | 30 ft. |
+
+**Saves/skills:** DEX +7, WIS +6; Stealth +10, Insight/Perception +6, Deception/Persuasion/Religion +5
+**Resist:** necrotic. **Assassinate; Sneak Attack (1/turn):** +4d6. **Evasion.**
+**Unweighed:** Advantage vs. divination; alignment detection, thought reading, locating, and scrying automatically fail.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two Even Hand or two Hand Crossbow attacks.
+- **The Even Hand.** +7 to hit, 5 ft.; 8 (1d6+4) piercing + 7 (2d6) necrotic.
+- **Hand Crossbow.** +7 to hit, 30/120 ft.; 7 (1d6+4) piercing.
+- **The Marking (1/day).** Touch; DC 15 CON. Fail: 1 hour of vulnerability to her necrotic damage, no healing, grey throat-seam. Consecration or *Remove Curse* ends it.
+
+**Reaction / Escape**
+
+- **Uncanny Dodge.** Halve damage from one visible attacker.
+- **Soulcoin Surge.** First drop to 0 while carrying a charged coin: instead 1 HP, free Disengage + Dash, leave a cracked coin behind.
+
+---
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prints/twinkle.md

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+# Twinkle — Feyspitter Guardian
+
+**Look:** Hunting-dog-sized black spider; long legs with poisonous green joints and eight bead-bright eyes that skip through darkness between blinks.
+**Vibe:** Agitated guard animal, trained to herd and detain rather than kill; grieving Orenn in its own skittish way.
+
+- Does not attack Orenn-scented creatures, anyone using Mags's command, or respectful creatures that leave Vault/Cells alone
+- Holds the stair-foot and herds threats deeper; stops at the warded arch and cannot enter the Old Work/Ethereal Plane
+- Opens with Grasping Legs, wraps downed creatures, escalates only if the party forces the Vault, harms the Guest, or keeps attacking
+- DC 14 Animal Handling calms it; killing it deeply upsets Mags
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +2 | +4 | +2 | -3 | +1 | -1 | 15 | 60 | 30 ft., climb 30 ft. |
+
+**CR 4. Skill:** Stealth +8. **Senses:** darkvision 60 ft., tremorsense 10 ft., passive 11.
+**Web-Dweller:** Climbs walls/ceilings/webs freely; knows exact location of creatures touching the same web.
+**Material Blink:** Teleports only across the Material Plane; never enters the Ethereal.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two attacks; only one Lurchvenom Bite.
+- **Lurchvenom Bite.** +6 to hit, 5 ft.; 8 (1d8+4) piercing; DC 14 CON or poisoned 1 minute (save ends at end of turn). Start of poisoned turn: 9 (2d8) poison, then spider teleports target up to 15 ft.
+- **Spit Venom.** +6 to hit, 30/60 ft.; 9 (2d8) poison and spider teleports target up to 15 ft.
+- **Grasping Legs.** +6 to hit, 10 ft.; 7 (1d6+4) bludgeoning and grappled (escape DC 14).
+
+**Reactions**
+
+- **Anticipatory Strike.** Creature teleports within 5 ft. → Grasping Legs with advantage.
+- **Vanishing Dodge.** When hit, DEX check vs. attack roll; success teleports 15 ft. and attack misses.
+
+---
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prints/unnamed-blades.md

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+# Unnamed Blades (2) — House Muscle
+
+**Look:** Dark practical clothing, lead scale-tokens worn openly, hands never far from concealed weapons.
+**Vibe:** Quiet professionals; they watch, defer to Sevra, and contribute no useful testimony.
+
+- Use two identical Spy stat blocks; they act as a unit
+- Default allegiance: Sevra; if Thera is exposed while Sevra denies it, one blade may hesitate
+- They know no extra clues and should not compete with the named assassins for spotlight
+- In a fight, protect Sevra, create Sneak Attack openings, and disengage from a losing cause
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +0 | +2 | +0 | +1 | +2 | +3 | 12 | 27 each | 30 ft. |
+
+**Skills:** Deception +5, Insight +4, Investigation +5, Perception +6, Persuasion +5, Sleight of Hand +4, Stealth +4  
+**Cunning Action:** Bonus action Dash, Disengage, or Hide.  
+**Sneak Attack (1/turn):** +2d6 with advantage or an ally within 5 ft.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two melee attacks.
+- **Shortsword.** +4 to hit, 5 ft.; 5 (1d6+2) piercing.
+- **Hand Crossbow.** +4 to hit, 30/120 ft.; 5 (1d6+2) piercing.
+
+---

prints/veilhook-salt-recipe.md

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+# Vytržená strana z polního receptáře
+
+## VEILHOOK SALT
+
+*Nejde o kruh. Jde o to, co drží v jeho rýhách.*
+
+### Jedna várka
+
+- 1 snítka **silvervein root**
+- 1 lahvička **Holy Water**
+- práškové stříbro v hodnotě **5 gp**
+
+Kořen vysuš a rozdrť se stříbrem na co nejjemnější prach. Nad nízkým žárem přidávej svěcenou vodu po kapkách. Směs se nesmí vařit. Tři ji hranou stříbrného nástroje, dokud nezčerná a jednotlivá zrnka se nezačnou od sebe odtahovat, jako by mezi nimi něco stálo.
+
+Sejmi z ohně dřív, než ztichne. Rozděl do voskovaných sáčků.
+
+**Příprava:** 10 minut  
+**Ověření:** DC 13 Arcana, Alchemist's Supplies nebo Herbalism Kit  
+**Úspěch:** 2 dávky  
+**Neúspěch:** 1 dávka; zbytek speče v mrtvou strusku
+
+---
+
+Volná sůl drží jen několik úderů srdce. Jednu dávku vmáčkni nebo vrhni na bytost stojící **na stejné straně závoje**. Dokud směs nepovolí, nedokáže přeskočit prostorem ani změnit rovinu. Setření zrnek nepomůže. Chceš-li ji držet déle, použij další dávku.
+
+Ve vazebném kruhu napěchuj tutéž směs do stříbrných drážek před uzavřením posledního znaku. Geometrie kruhu udržuje zákaz bdělý; sůl v dlani nikoli.
+
+> *Neodpuzuje. Chytá chodidla mezi kroky.*
+
+*Dolní roh stránky je vytržený. Na okraji zůstaly černé otisky prstů a několik zrnek, která se odmítají dotknout jedno druhého.*

prints/veilhook-salt.md

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+# Veilhook Salt
+
+*Wondrous item, uncommon (consumable)*
+
+Summoners pack this black salt-and-silver mixture into binding circles to prevent planar escape.
+
+As an action, you expend one dose by casting or pressing the salt onto a creature within 5 feet of you on your current plane. Until the start of your next turn, the target can't teleport or travel to another plane.

prints/xarrul-obrad-opetovne-vazby.md

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+# Vytržený list z *Knihy sedmi uzlů*
+
+## O znovusvázání bytosti, jež přetrhla příkaz
+
+*Co bylo jednou spoutáno, nese jizvu prvního uzlu. Nevolej tedy uprchlíka podruhé. Přiměj jeho jizvu, aby si vzpomněla.*
+
+---
+
+### Co musí být připraveno
+
+- neporušený **vazebný kruh proti běsům**, upravený tak, aby zadržoval dovnitř,
+- stříbrný drát, morek zapomnění, rituální tuk, hrobová sůl a proužek pro pravé jméno,
+- čerstvá krev **téhož živého konduitu**, skrze nějž byla napájena první vazba,
+- pravé jméno znovusvazované bytosti,
+- oba listy **[Litanie odvráceného kroku](litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md)**.
+
+Náhrada za krev prvního konduitu může kruh probudit, avšak neuzavře původní uzel. Taková vazba praská dříve, než je vyřčeno poslední slovo.
+
+### První čtyři uzly
+
+Vetři rituální tuk do vnitřních znaků. Do čtyř prahových značek vlož po úlomku morku zapomnění a vnější rýhu uzavři hrobovou solí. Stříbrný drát veď třikrát kolem kruhu, nikdy však přes jeho střed.
+
+Na proužek napiš pravé jméno krví konduitu a vlož jej pod severní uzel. Zbylou krví označ všechny čtyři prahové značky. Tři zasvěcení pak po dobu **deseti minut** uzavírají první čtyři uzly. Spoutávaná bytost při tom nemusí být přítomna. Je-li práce přerušena, může pokračovat, dokud není porušena některá čára.
+
+Připravený kruh drží do půlnoci. Od této chvíle nesmí být porušen a nikdo nesmí vyslovit pravé jméno mimo předepsanou odpověď.
+
+### Přivolání jizvou
+
+Po uzavření čtvrtého uzlu rozděl Litanii mezi dva hlasy. Oba ať zaujmou svá místa, otevřou listy a začnou číst. Teprve potom vyslov pravé jméno v severní odpovědi. Stará jizva přitáhne spoutávaného **tělem do materiální roviny**, avšak pouze k vnějšímu okraji síně. Nepřenese jej do kruhu.
+
+Takto otevřená cesta vede jen dovnitř. Ochrany místnosti ji nezastaví, avšak nedávají přivolanému právo stejnou cestou odejít.
+
+> **Pozor:** Vazba dosáhne pouze na bytost, která stojí tělem v materiální rovině. Přivolání ji odhalí, ale samo jí nezabrání znovu projít za závoj.
+
+### Odvrácený krok
+
+Rozděl **Litanii odvráceného kroku** na dva listy. Každý musí držet a nahlas číst jiný hlas. Písmo se bude měnit podle jizvy prvního uzlu; nelze je bezpečně opsat ani přednášet zpaměti.
+
+Spoutávaný nemůže z vlastní vůle vykročit blíže k hlasu, který právě čte. Dva hlasy postavené od sebe mu mohou uzavřít ústup a obracet jeho kroky ke kruhu. **Litanie jej netlačí.** Do kruhu musí být vehnán silou, úderem nebo jiným nuceným pohybem.
+
+### Poslední tři uzly
+
+Jakmile kruh přijme tělo, nastoupí tři zasvěcení k odděleným znamením:
+
+1. **Hlas jména** drží pravé jméno.
+2. **Hlas krve** vede odpověď konduitu.
+3. **Hlas příkazu** zavírá stříbrný řetěz.
+
+Všichni tři musí každý tah věnovat svou **action** obřadu a udržet concentration.
+
+| Činné hlasy | Účinek na konci kola |
+|---|---|
+| **Tři** | Jeden uzel se uzavře. |
+| **Dva** | Vazba stojí; nic se neuzavře ani neotevře. |
+| **Jeden** | Jeden již uzavřený uzel se znovu otevře, je-li který. |
+| **Žádný** | Obřad se zhroutí, připravené látky shoří a kruh propustí tělo. |
+
+Jsou-li tímto způsobem uzavřeny všechny **tři** poslední uzly, příkazová vazba je obnovena.
+
+> **Varování před zpětným rázem:** Přestane-li některý hlas, aniž své znamení dokončeným předáním svěřil jinému, každý další činný hlas utrpí **2d6 psychic damage** a musí uspět v **DC 14 Constitution saving throw**, jinak také umlkne. Nezáleží na tom, zda hlas ustal dobrovolně, ztratil concentration nebo upadl do bezvědomí. Zpětný ráz tak může přejít z hlasu na hlas.
+
+Jiný zasvěcenec u znamení může použít svou **action** a uspět v **DC 18 Arcana, Religion nebo spellcasting-ability check**, aby činný hlas převzal. Při úspěchu se znamení počítá jako činné již v tomto kole; v dalších kolech musí nový hlas věnovat obřadu svou action a udržet concentration. Domluvené předání, provedené dříve, než původní hlas umlkne, nezpůsobí zpětný ráz. Pozdější obsazení prázdného znamení již utrpěný ráz neodčiní.
+
+Spoutaný v uzavřeném kruhu nemůže kruh opustit ani přes jeho okraj zaútočit tělem. Neznamená to, že je bezmocný. Když nemůže pohnout tělem, hledá uzel, který povolí sám.
+
+> *Krev zde není obětí, nýbrž cestou. Dokud trvá vazba, zůstává cesta otevřená a vše, co je k ní připoutáno rodem či krví, může být vedeno stejným směrem.*
+
+---
+
+*Na dolním okraji je čerstvějším inkoustem připsáno:*
+
+> **XARRUL**  
+> Starý kruh pod Nether Inn lze obrátit. Tři vnější znaky vést proti směru.  
+> Konduit **D–7**. Úplná souprava. Dokončit před půlnocí.

prints/xarrul.md

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+# Xarrul — The Unbound Fiend
+
+**Look:** Material: tall smoke-shadow with amber eyes and surgical claws. Ethereal: charred-paper skin, orange cracks, aristocratic face, patient half-smile.
+**Vibe:** Dry, amused, exact; manipulates perception and context but never makes a false factual statement or breaks a promise.
+
+- Killed Orenn to trigger lockdown, remove the watcher, and open the house's internal seals
+- Wants the Guest's mutable body so it can become a permanent resident of the world
+- Compact forbids another kill before the exchange finishes except direct defense; it pushes mortals to kill instead
+- One HP pool across planes; only reducing it to 0 while Ethereal destroys it permanently
+
+---
+
+| STR | DEX | CON | INT | WIS | CHA | AC | HP | Move |
+|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
+| +1 | +3 | +2 | +3 | +2 | +4 | 15 | 78 | 30 ft., fly 30 ft. |
+
+**CR 5. Saves:** DEX +6, CHA +7, WIS +5. **Skills:** Stealth +9, Deception +7, Perception/Insight +5.
+**Resist:** cold, fire, lightning; nonmagical bludgeoning/piercing/slashing. **Immune:** poison; poisoned, exhaustion.
+**Senses:** darkvision 120 ft., passive 15. **Telepathy:** 60 ft.
+
+**Planar Traits**
+
+- **Ethereal Jaunt (bonus action).** Shift Material ↔ Ethereal after lockdown begins.
+- **Ethereal Restoration.** Start Ethereal turn: regain 1d4 HP.
+- **Deathless Slip.** At 0 Material HP: instead 1 HP and shift Ethereal; cannot be stopped. No protection at 0 Ethereal HP.
+- **Slip Between (reaction).** After Material damage, shift Ethereal; Jaunt unavailable until next turn.
+- **Stored Incursion (pre-lockdown, 1 charge).** Manifest Material for 3 rounds without Jaunt/Slip, then snap back Ethereal. Tonight's charge is spent killing Orenn.
+- **Shadow Cloak.** In dim light/darkness: advantage Stealth and bonus-action Hide.
+- **Voice Thief.** Perfectly mimic a recently heard voice; project it to one creature within 30 ft. (DC 15 WIS or it believes Xarrul's chosen source/direction).
+- **Cunning Predator.** Advantage against frightened, charmed, or surprised creatures.
+
+**Actions**
+
+- **Multiattack.** Two Claws.
+- **Claw.** +6 to hit, 5 ft.; 10 (2d6+3) slashing + 3 (1d6) necrotic.
+- **Brand of Spite (Recharge 5–6).** +7 to hit, 5 ft.; 7 (2d6) necrotic and branded. Xarrul knows location across planes, has advantage, and Claws add 1d6 necrotic. One target; *Remove Curse*, *Greater Restoration*, or Xarrul's death ends.
+- **Visions of Spite.** Branded target seen within 30 ft.; DC 15 WIS. Fail: 7 (2d6) psychic + paralyzed through end of its next turn; success half.
+- **Waking Dream.** Branded target in sight; rewrite memory of last minute, no save/damage. Hard evidence, curse removal, restoration, or Xarrul's death breaks it.
+- **Whisper of Ruin (Recharge 6).** Heard within 30 ft.; DC 15 WIS or frightened 1 minute and compelled to one named next-turn action; repeat save end of turn; success grants 24-hour immunity.
+
+**Kill Chain:** Brand → Visions → two adjacent auto-crit Claws. Break with curse removal, paralysis removal, forced distance, or planar pressure.
+
+**Lair Action (initiative 20; choose one)**
+
+- **Veil Flicker:** Encounter area DC 13 WIS or disadvantage on attacks until next initiative 20.
+- **Ethereal Pull:** One target DC 14 CHA or partially shifted; disadvantage on attacks and saves until its next turn.
+- **Shadow Surge:** All encounter lights become darkness for 1 round; Xarrul Hides.
+
+**Against Rebinding**
+
+- **Before capture:** attack Litany readers and the planar anchor. Shadow Surge breaks sightlines; Whisper makes a reader drop a leaf; move sideways through any open angle.
+- **After capture:** no physical attacks or fresh hostile effects cross the adapted circle. Voice Thief and speech remain; an existing Brand still carries Visions/Waking Dream.
+- Bargain at the stations: **Dalla—Nessa is still being drained; Haddon—Bren and “the living weight comes first”; Rennt—Haddon knew the command line was dead.** One break deals 2d6 psychic to the other active ritualists and may cascade.
+
+---
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storylines/complication-toolkit.md

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+# Complication Toolkit
+
+DM-facing pressure moves for moments when the players have found the path of least resistance and the scene needs a new cost, witness, accusation, or decision.
+
+The goal is not to invalidate a good plan. A complication should do one of four things:
+
+- make the players reveal what they are doing;
+- make them spend a resource or owe someone a favor;
+- force them to choose who they trust;
+- advance a neglected NPC or faction while their plan still remains possible.
+
+## How to Use This
+
+1. Identify what currently feels too easy: secrecy, time, faction agreement, access, or combat preparation.
+2. Pick a complication that pressures a **different** resource. Do not simply declare their successful work undone.
+3. Give the players one clear chance to answer it.
+4. Escalate only if they ignore it or fail visibly.
+
+Use one complication at a time. Two simultaneous complications feel like the world reacting. Four feel like the DM refusing to let a plan work.
+
+### Pressure Levels
+
+| Level | Use when | Effect |
+|---|---|---|
+| **Nudge** | Momentum is slowing or a scene is too comfortable | A question, tell, suspicious witness, or private warning |
+| **Obstacle** | The party has a strong uncontested route | An NPC demands access, payment, proof, or a concession |
+| **Crisis** | The party ignores an established warning or the clock is nearly spent | A public accusation, stolen tool, abduction, attack, or faction ultimatum |
+
+---
+
+## d20 Quick Complications
+
+Roll or choose. The entries are deliberately short; fuller versions appear later.
+
+| d20 | Complication |
+|---:|---|
+| 1 | **Thera catches the cellar party returning.** She asks what they found and gently reminds them that Mags owns every secret below. |
+| 2 | **Mags notices the black key is missing.** She closes the kitchen and searches everyone who passed through it. |
+| 3 | **Dace recognizes stolen evidence.** He offers silence in exchange for seeing it first. |
+| 4 | **Haddon recognizes old summoner equipment.** He publicly asks why the party is carrying it and who opened the lower rooms. |
+| 5 | **Sevra demands a chain of custody.** Evidence without a named finder and location will not move the House. |
+| 6 | **Kael sees a cult pin, ritual component, or suspicious blade.** He assumes the nearest cultist planted it. |
+| 7 | **Rennt calls the party Mags's hired thieves.** He demands the cult's papers and property back. |
+| 8 | **Dalla finds the conduit extract at the worst moment.** Rebinding negotiations stop immediately. |
+| 9 | **Essek's brand flares while he helps.** Haddon notices his brass indicator warming. |
+| 10 | **Bren becomes lucid in public.** He identifies Xarrul's presence but also calls Haddon “Professor.” |
+| 11 | **Haddon recognizes the Workroom's Oil of Etherealness.** He publicly asks who opened Mags's hidden laboratory and demands custody of the planar tool. |
+| 12 | **A soulcoin whispers from someone's pocket.** Thera hears it and calmly asks to inspect their belongings. |
+| 13 | **Xarrul exposes one true secret in a stolen voice.** The accused denies it too quickly. |
+| 14 | **A branded NPC remembers a PC tampering with evidence moments ago.** The memory is false, but the witness is sincere. |
+| 15 | **One anti-ethereal dose is missing.** It was moved, not destroyed; three different NPCs have reasons to possess it. |
+| 16 | **The iron bell rings once by itself.** Everyone who knows it matters assumes someone else has begun a ritual. |
+| 17 | **A cellar ward pulses.** Mags knows someone touched a cage, the Vault, or the Old Work—but not which. |
+| 18 | **The factions issue competing ultimatums.** Sevra wants one suspect surrendered; Haddon wants one item returned. |
+| 19 | **A trusted voice rises from the cellar stair.** One PC hears an offer the others do not; it may be Xarrul, the Guest, or only an echo. |
+| 20 | **Xarrul marks the plan's indispensable person.** The ritualist, bell-ringer, ethereal observer, or salt-carrier now has a visible death clock. |
+
+---
+
+## Someone Notices the Cellar
+
+Use these when the party returns too cleanly from the Deep Cellar, carries conspicuous equipment, or begins treating the hidden level like a consequence-free supply room.
+
+| NPC | What they notice | What they say | What they want |
+|---|---|---|---|
+| **Thera** | Dust, old webbing, or the smell of the lower wards | *„Co jste tam dole našli? Myslím, že Mags nebude nadšená, až uslyší, že se jí hrabete ve sklepě. Nemyslíte?”* | Information first; leverage if they evade |
+| **Mags** | Missing key, moved barrel rack, or lower alarm | *„Položte to na stůl. Pak mi řeknete, které dveře jste otevřeli. V tomhle pořadí.”* | Protect the cells and learn whether the rift was disturbed |
+| **Sevra** | New weapons or evidence appearing without provenance | *„Důkaz bez původu je jen předmět, který někdo potřeboval položit na správné místo. Kdo ho našel?”* | A chain of custody before she acts |
+| **Dace** | Ledger page, cult pin, or Vault trophy | *„Tohle nevypadá jako něco, co Mags půjčuje hostům. Můžu se nedívat. Bude mě to něco stát?”* | See or steal anything that implicates him |
+| **Kael** | Ritual dust, cult material, or Dace's records | *„Kdes to vzal? A nelži. Dneska už mám lží dost.”* | Immediate public disclosure |
+| **Haddon** | Binding coffer, old notation, or planar instrument | *„Fascinující. Tohle nebylo nahoře. Takže—který z vás otevřel starou pracovnu?”* | Recover the coffer and control its interpretation |
+| **Rennt** | Anything bearing the Order's symbols | *„To patří Řádu. Vrať to, nebo přestaň předstírat, že jsi vyšetřovatel.”* | Recover cult property and provoke a loyalty test |
+| **Dalla** | Blood tubing, conduit notes, or a child's object | *„Proč je na tom moje jméno?”* | An immediate explanation, regardless of the current plan |
+| **Essek** | Someone carrying volatile summoner equipment incorrectly | *„Nedržte to tak. Prosím. Až se Haddon zeptá, kde jste to našli, neříkejte moje jméno.”* | Prevent disaster and secure discretion |
+| **Bren** | The silver mirror, silvervein root, or a prepared dose of Oil of Etherealness | *„Vidíte ho? Tak se nedívejte na mě. Dívejte se na ty nitě.”* | Recognition, one lucid moment, or freedom |
+
+### Fast Resolutions
+
+- Tell the truth and lose secrecy.
+- Lie and create a future witness against them.
+- Offer a share, favor, or piece of evidence.
+- Bring the NPC into the plan, accepting their preferred ending.
+- Silence the witness socially, magically, or physically—and let that choice matter.
+
+---
+
+## Corrosive Whispers
+
+Xarrul prefers true content delivered in the most damaging voice. Every statement below is true in the underlying story, although the imitated speaker may never have said it.
+
+Use a whisper when the room is becoming cooperative or when one faction has accepted the party's plan too easily.
+
+| Target | Voice used | Whisper | Truth underneath | Likely accusation |
+|---|---|---|---|---|
+| **Kael** | Rennt | *„Dace nám prodal Haratha tři dny před varováním.”* | Dace sold the Harath dossier | Kael attacks Dace and blames Rennt for knowing |
+| **Sevra** | Dace | *„Haddon má můj podpis. Když shoří jeho deník, nemá nic.”* | Haddon's journal contains Dace's field-sign | Sevra moves to seize both Dace and the journal |
+| **Dalla** | Haddon | *„Mohla ji zachránit už před měsíci.”* | Vyre postponed Nessa's reintegration | Dalla confronts Haddon immediately |
+| **Dalla** | Haddon | *„Zeptej se ho, co krmila tvoje krev.”* | Her blood fed the binding through Nessa | Rebinding loses Dalla's support |
+| **Rennt** | Sevra | *„Až se ty dveře otevřou, první umřeš ty.”* | Sevra intends to answer the archive attack | Rennt prepares a preemptive strike |
+| **Haddon** | Essek | *„Pouto je pryč. Zůstalo jen krmení.”* | Essek knows Xarrul is unbound | Haddon searches or punishes Essek |
+| **Essek** | Haddon | *„Viděl jsem, jak ti značka hoří.”* | Haddon's brass indicator reveals strong activations | Essek panics and may flee a safe conversation |
+| **Dace** | Thera | *„Devět dní.”* | Thera has already marked him | Dace searches for the source and exposes fear |
+| **Mags** | Haddon | *„Kruh dole ho dokáže znovu spoutat.”* | Haddon can adapt the circle | Mags realizes Haddon knows more than he admitted |
+| **Mags** | Guest | *„Orenn věděl, koho jste nechali zemřít ve druhé cele.”* | Orenn knew about Cell Two | Mags assumes the cellar secret has escaped |
+| **Sevra** | Thera | *„Tohle není moje mince.”* | Thera recognizes soul-withdrawal | Sevra starts asking why Thera has a category for it |
+| **Any PC** | Another PC | A true sentence from that PC's dossier or disclosed goal | Xarrul has listened all night | The party must decide whether the speaker betrayed them |
+
+### Whisper Guardrails
+
+- Use only facts Xarrul plausibly knows.
+- The sentence itself remains true; the falsehood is attribution, timing, or omitted context.
+- Let a careful player compare where the imitated speaker actually was.
+- Bren should react when Xarrul comes close enough to place a whisper. His sudden lucidity is the counter-clue.
+
+---
+
+## Visions and False Memories
+
+Use a **momentary vision** on a branded target through Visions of Spite, or on an oil-user crossing near the tear in the Old Work. Use a persistent **false memory** only on a creature Xarrul has branded and affected with Waking Dream.
+
+**Hard limit:** Waking Dream can rewrite only the preceding minute. It cannot add a new witness to Orenn's murder, change what someone remembers from the opening brawl, or revise an interrogation that happened earlier in the lockdown. It can only falsify something that appears to have happened **just now**.
+
+A fresh false memory may change how someone interprets older evidence—“I just saw that PC plant Orenn's dagger”—but it cannot change the older event itself.
+
+| d12 | What the victim experiences | Accusation it encourages | Tell that can break it |
+|---:|---|---|---|
+| 1 | They remember a PC slipping a current piece of evidence into their coat seconds ago | “They are hiding or replacing evidence” | The item is still in its original place or another witness watched it continuously |
+| 2 | They remember Haddon wiping fresh black residue from his fingers after examining an item | “He just contaminated the evidence” | His hands and handkerchief carry no residue |
+| 3 | They remember Kael passing Dace's ritual-marked dagger beneath the table moments ago | “The House is coordinating a cover-up” | The dagger is somewhere neither man could have moved it from |
+| 4 | They remember Mags quietly ordering a PC not to mention what they found below | “Mags is suppressing the cellar evidence” | The PC never spoke with Mags, or someone heard the actual exchange |
+| 5 | They remember Dalla handing Rennt a fresh vial of blood | “The cult is preparing another ritual now” | Dalla still possesses every vial, or the supposed vial cannot be found |
+| 6 | They remember Essek tracing a wall sigil immediately before a ward pulse | “Essek just activated the house wards” | His fingertips lack chalk or residue and the real pulse began elsewhere |
+| 7 | They remember Sevra slipping Dace a folded note or payment during the latest argument | “Sevra is protecting the traitor” | A search finds nothing and another witness saw both of Sevra's hands |
+| 8 | They remember Thera planting a warm coin in a PC's pocket seconds ago | “Thera is framing that PC—or the PC is carrying soul-work” | The coin remains on Thera, or the PC's pocket is empty |
+| 9 | They remember hearing the Guest's voice answer from inside a returning PC's coat or pack | “The party smuggled something out of Cell One” | Searching the pack finds nothing; Bren reacts to Xarrul elsewhere |
+| 10 | They remember a trusted PC nicking or smearing the active salt line a few heartbeats ago | “That PC is sabotaging the finale” | The line is intact, or the mark predates the PC's approach |
+| 11 | They remember another PC whispering their private secret to Haddon or Sevra within the last minute | “My companion betrayed me” | The supposed recipient cannot repeat any supporting detail |
+| 12 | In a momentary vision, every person present wears Orenn's dead face except one NPC | “The unchanged person is controlling this” | This is a present hallucination, not a memory; Bren stares toward Xarrul's true position |
+
+### Escalating a Vision
+
+1. The victim becomes distracted or frightened.
+2. They privately confront the apparent culprit.
+3. If dismissed, they accuse them publicly.
+4. Only then should they draw a weapon or sabotage a plan.
+
+This gives the party several chances to discover that the accusation is sincere but the memory is wrong.
+
+---
+
+## Upstairs Escalation Beats
+
+Use these to keep the upstairs pressure cooker moving underneath the investigation. Pick the faction that has been least pressured recently. Before the Vacancy finishes, Xarrul's compact keeps it from landing or deliberately commanding a killing blow, but faction NPCs remain dangerous to one another.
+
+| Beat | What happens | What stops it |
+|---|---|---|
+| **Search the cult table** | Kael demands every cultist empty their bags. Rennt refuses on principle. | Sevra accepts a narrower search with a named item |
+| **Search the assassins** | Haddon publicly identifies Dace's ritual-marked dagger and demands equal scrutiny. | Evidence that the dagger concerns Dace, not the whole House |
+| **The missing folio** | Haddon accuses the nearest PC or assassin of taking his two extracts. | Produce one extract, expose his panic, or point out the theft happened in darkness |
+| **Dalla collapses** | Her accumulated blood loss catches up with her during an argument. Both sides accuse the other of magic. | Medicine, visible care, and examination of her old scars |
+| **Essek's brand activates** | He cries out while contradicting Haddon. Rennt calls it proof of betrayal. | Hide the brass indicator and physically protect Essek |
+| **Dace takes a hostage** | Evidence closes around him, so he grabs Bren or an isolated PC. | Safe passage, a distraction, or exploiting his fear of Thera |
+| **Thera offers order** | She calmly proposes that one suspect be bound “until facts improve.” | Notice that she selects whoever threatens her secret, not Xarrul |
+| **Kael hears the laugh again** | Xarrul repeats Rennt's original laugh from behind him. Kael swings before looking. | Someone recognizing the impossible direction or Bren's reaction |
+| **Rennt demonstrates the Opening** | He produces a brief planar flare to prove the cult's theory. The room interprets it as an attack. | Haddon counterspells his own ally or the party contains the flare |
+| **Sevra sets a deadline** | She gives the investigators ten minutes to produce the traitor or the House acts. | Concrete evidence, a professional counterproposal, or invoking Grey Quay through Mags |
+| **Mags's mark flares** | Mags freezes in an Orenn vision while both factions think the other attacked her. | *Remove Curse*, Bren's explanation, or showing the matching brand |
+| **A patron disappears** | During a distraction, Xarrul nonlethally isolates someone coordinating the cellar search. | Immediate headcount and a coordinated search before Mags takes control |
+
+---
+
+## Complications by Easy Ending Route
+
+### The Vacancy Is Too Easy
+
+- The Executioner arrives at the circle and takes the clean shot at the projected Guest.
+- Mags hears Orenn's stolen voice below and begins descending.
+- Haddon realizes Xarrul is committed and tries to preserve it for rebinding.
+- The vacant body takes damage, forcing the party to protect the vessel as well as attack Xarrul.
+- The Guest reads a PC's plan and exposes their secret objective to buy protection.
+- One anti-ethereal character must choose between attacking Xarrul and keeping the Guest's cord safe.
+
+### Rebinding Is Too Easy
+
+- The conduit extract reaches Dalla just before she offers blood.
+- Essek states publicly that the ritual restores feeding, not control alone.
+- Mags asks Haddon why the ritual requires the blood of a desperate mother.
+- Sevra demands custody of Xarrul after the ritual, which Haddon refuses.
+- Before capture, Shadow Surge breaks a Litany reader's sightline and opens a route away from the circle.
+- A reader must choose between spending their action on the chant or casting the verbal spell that would save an exposed ally.
+- Once captured, Xarrul tells Dalla exactly what the restored conduit will do to Nessa; if she stops, the 2d6 psychic backlash can break a second station.
+- Xarrul tells Rennt that Haddon knew the command line was dead. Rennt demands an answer while all three stations must remain active to make progress.
+
+### Bell-and-Sigils Is Too Easy
+
+- Dalla fears the seal will make Nessa unreachable and demands proof the connection survives.
+- Haddon wants the circle rewritten as a binding before he will help restore it.
+- Xarrul marks the bell-ringer, making every approach to the bell dangerous.
+- A foundation sigil lies beneath an active faction skirmish.
+- The salt line is complete except for a section directly under Mags, frozen by her Warden's Mark.
+- Thera offers to hold Xarrul in place, but doing so exposes her soul-work or gives her access to the tear in the Old Work.
+
+### Ethereal Destruction Is Too Easy
+
+- Haddon and Rennt try to pull the Ethereal hunter back rather than openly joining Xarrul.
+- Xarrul remains Material and mauls the weaker Material group, refusing the side where the waiting executioner has the advantage.
+- An Ethereal oil-user is isolated, blinded or forced away just as Deathless Slip carries Xarrul across at 1 HP.
+- Xarrul brands the only character covering one side of the veil and uses the mark to track and avoid them.
+- The Ethereal group sees Skein threatening Bren at the same time Xarrul becomes vulnerable.
+- Dalla withdraws her support at the last moment after a vision of Nessa's silver cord snapping.
+
+### The Planar Pincer Is Too Easy
+
+- Xarrul kills or blinds the character with ethereal sight first.
+- Voice Thief sends the salt-carrier toward the wrong manifestation.
+- Xarrul manifests beside the salt-carrier, forcing them to choose between anchoring it and protecting a vulnerable ally.
+- The bell reveals Xarrul, but it immediately moves away from the restored sigils and binding circle where the toll could suppress its jaunt.
+- Haddon counterspells a decisive attack because he still wants the asset alive.
+- A frightened defender drops the only remaining Veilhook Salt between the factions.
+
+### Siding With Xarrul Is Too Easy
+
+- Mags conducts a roll call before opening the doors and notices an extra or missing face.
+- Sevra uses a private House countersign that disguised Xarrul cannot answer.
+- The Guest demands that its Astral fate be included in the bargain and threatens to expose the party.
+- Xarrul agrees to spare everyone but refuses to accept a vague promise; it demands the exact person being framed.
+- Dalla will help only if Nessa's rescue is spoken as an explicit condition in front of witnesses.
+- A framed suspect produces an alibi that only another PC can destroy by revealing their own secret.
+- Mags offers the framed suspect a final private interview, where her Fixer's Read is strongest.
+
+### The Empowered Guest's Takeover Is Too Easy
+
+- False Mags uses the wrong hand for Orenn's black key.
+- Bren reacts to Voice Thief coming from “Mags.”
+- Twinkle refuses to obey the person wearing Mags's face.
+- Sevra asks about Grey Quay, a history the Guest only partly knows.
+- The real Mags pounds a coded house rhythm through the pipes from Cell One.
+- The Guest offers one PC ownership or secrecy in exchange for ignoring a tell.
+
+---
+
+## Secrets as Complications
+
+When the party is cooperating too smoothly, bring one dossier goal into the open without naming the entire secret.
+
+| Secret conflict | Pressure move |
+|---|---|
+| **Debtor vs. Collector** | A loose ledger page falls from someone's coat in front of both PCs. The fireplace is three steps away. |
+| **Agent vs. Executioner** | The Guest speaks the Agent's countersign, then tells the Executioner: *„Zabij mě a jeho slib zemře se mnou. Pak jsi jeho první nové tělo.”* |
+| **Mourner vs. Executioner** | The Guest offers the Mourner's answer only after its cell door opens. |
+| **Recruit vs. Blackmailed One** | Haddon asks the Recruit, publicly, whether their companion has “completed the agreed service.” |
+| **Blade vs. cult helper** | Sevra announces that proof of PC collaboration will activate the contract's replacement clause. |
+| **Mercy** | The infection settles near the Guest, then begins pulling harder toward the Old Work, proving the apparent answer was incomplete. |
+
+---
+
+## Last-Resort Crisis Moves
+
+Use these only near midnight or after the party repeatedly ignores pressure.
+
+- Xarrul brands the one person every current plan requires.
+- A faction seizes one anti-ethereal tool and barricades itself around it.
+- Mags declares the cellar closed and places herself physically between the party and the stairs.
+- Dalla offers her blood to the first side that promises Nessa will live.
+- Thera kills or extracts Dace before he can testify.
+- As the shell lapses, the Guest begins the Vacancy at the tear before every PC reaches the Old Work.
+- Xarrul abducts the person the party has invested in most and begins preparing the Hollowing.
+- The faction war starts while half the party is still below.
+
+Every crisis should still leave at least two responses. The point is to force a decision, not announce a result.
+
+---
+
+## Five Reliable Lines to Keep Ready
+
+When there is no time to search a table, use one of these:
+
+- **Thera:** *„Co jste tam dole našli? A komu jste to ještě neřekli?”*
+- **Mags:** *„Jeden člověk zmizel. Dveře zůstávají zavřené. Začněte mluvit.”*
+- **Haddon:** *„Než to zničíte, možná byste se měli zeptat, koho tím vláknem držíte při životě.”*
+- **Sevra:** *„Máte jednu minutu na důkaz. Potom přestanu čekat na svolení.”*
+- **Xarrul, in a trusted voice:** *„Řekli ti plán. Neřekli ti cenu.”*

storylines/ending-tree-revisit.md

@@ -0,0 +1,85 @@
+# Ending Tree — Revisit List
+
+Resolved propagation checklist. The canonical outcome map is [Natural Progression](natural-progression.md); encounter mechanics are in [The Reckoning](the-reckoning.md).
+
+## Resolution Mechanics
+
+- [x] **Remove exterior breach.** The mundane door can be opened or destroyed, but the planar shell behind it cannot be punctured or dispelled before midnight and is not an anti-Xarrul solution.
+- [x] **Write the Hollowing.** It is a three-round forced transfer with a projected victim, vulnerable body, restricted Xarrul, delay saves and several interruption methods.
+- [x] **Choose Hollowing targets.** Prefer the PC most responsible for denying Xarrul the Guest, then a useful vulnerable humanoid, then an isolated cultist.
+- [x] **Define planar death.** Xarrul has one HP pool, regenerates Ethereally, cannot die Materially and is permanently destroyed at 0 HP in the Ethereal Plane.
+- [x] **Remove cross-plane force damage.** Force damage follows the ordinary planar boundary; seeing an Ethereal target does not allow an attack to cross.
+- [x] **Define the iron bell.** Alone it reveals Xarrul. With restored sigils it blocks Ethereal Jaunt inside the circle. All three seal Xarrul between planes.
+
+## Vacancy and Guest
+
+- [x] **Replace the spectral Host.** A completed Vacancy puts Xarrul in the changeling body and projects the Guest into the Astral Plane. House actions and spectral succession were removed.
+- [x] **Decide the Astral fate.** The Guest remains coherent and alive but bodiless. A future astral expedition and new vessel could recover it; it cannot return tonight.
+- [x] **Explain the unattended Vacancy.** Xarrul opens Cell One from the Ethereal side, triggers the lower alarm while Mags is occupied by the faction war, and escorts the willing Guest deeper to the tear in the Old Work.
+- [x] **Fix the Vacancy at midnight.** The lockdown blocks the Guest's Astral release; the shell's collapse opens the only three-round transfer window before internal containment returns.
+- [x] **Add the compact.** Xarrul first promises never to kill the Guest, preventing forced Hollowing of the changeling. Their later compact permits it to kill Orenn but nobody else until the exchange finishes, except direct self-defense; patrons remain dangerous to one another.
+- [x] **Make the Guest the leash.** If the Guest dies or repudiates the exchange, the temporary restraint lifts immediately. Xarrul can kill directly and selects the responsible character as its first Hollowing target.
+- [x] **Rewrite empowered-Guest succession.** It uses Orenn's voice to lure Mags below, imprisons her in Cell One, takes her form and returns as proprietor.
+- [x] **Add false-Mags counterplay.** Following Mags, the missing black key, Twinkle, private memories, cell messages and shapechanger detection can expose the Guest.
+- [x] **Recheck character secrets.** Handler's Agent and Executioner now state the Astral/Hollowing consequences. Mourner and Mercy's base secret remain compatible.
+- [x] **Recheck Mercy's gifts.** The Guest gift now explicitly requires striking Xarrul during the transfer; Xarrul's gift still requires allowing the transfer and remains its opposed route.
+
+## Xarrul's Character and Strategy
+
+- [x] **Reframe intelligence.** The Guest devised the superior disguise and quiet succession; Xarrul understands the magical risk but is not mastermind of every layer.
+- [x] **Make faction war the loophole.** Timed whispers, last-minute edits and true accusations push mortals to choose killing blows Xarrul is forbidden to deliver itself.
+- [x] **Make post-Vacancy cleanup conditional.** Once the Guest is delivered Astral, its protection expires. Xarrul removes witnesses only if the transfer was exposed; otherwise it leaves disguised.
+- [x] **Rewrite the deliberate-Xarrul finale.** Its obstacle is Mags's authority, not a holding-action boss fight.
+- [x] **Develop framing.** Haddon, Rennt, Dace, Thera and the Guest each supply part of a frame; a viable story needs hand, motive and fiendish evidence.
+- [x] **Develop quiet neutralization.** Drugging, the Warden's Mark, Cell One, impersonation and political replacement all have stated costs and tells.
+
+## Passive and Faction-War Timeline
+
+- [x] **Write timed escalation.** Natural Progression now has beats at T−90, T−60, T−30, T−10 and midnight.
+- [x] **Preserve witnesses.** Haddon or Essek remains able to identify Xarrul if the transfer is exposed.
+- [x] **Write recognition.** Haddon senses the absent command binding, alien vessel and matching brand; Rennt's denial breaks and the survivors unite.
+- [x] **Write cleanup priority.** After an exposed Vacancy, Xarrul targets Ethereal/salt users, bell and sigil operators, then witnesses able to identify the new vessel.
+- [x] **Reconcile casualties.** Orenn is Xarrul's only permitted pre-Vacancy victim; faction casualties can still occur by mortal hands, and Xarrul's later cleanup depends on exposure.
+
+## Mags and the Deep Cellar
+
+- [x] **Add the lower alarm.** Cell wards and Twinkle's anchor web turn Mags's black key cold and make Twinkle hammer the wall.
+- [x] **Clarify Haddon's knowledge.** He knows the original containment direction, not the later cells, Vault, laboratory, Guest or Twinkle.
+- [x] **Write Mags barring cultists.** She refuses to expose her private operation and takes the black key down alone.
+- [x] **Write Mags's death.** Unless followed, Xarrul kills her before committing to the Hollowing.
+- [x] **Clarify midnight.** The shell lapses automatically, but Mags physically bars departure until she accepts a culprit. She never knowingly releases Xarrul.
+
+## Nessa and the Remaining Connection
+
+- [x] **Bell-and-sigils outcome.** The seal preserves the connection and leaves Nessa recoverable later.
+- [x] **Rebinding outcome.** Nessa remains lost, but the Opening could return her at catastrophic cost.
+- [x] **Dalla's death.** Nessa remains stable and unaging; losing the maternal conduit makes recovery much harder, not immediately fatal.
+- [x] **Remove conventional banishment.** *Banishment* sends native Xarrul Ethereal and suppresses its Material return while maintained; it is setup, not an ending.
+- [x] **Empowered Guest.** It retains the stolen vitality; safe extraction requires a new ritual or later adventure.
+- [x] **Xarrul bargain.** Exact spoken terms before witnesses are the proof: name Nessa, safe return, protected lives and completion conditions. Xarrul honors wording, not implications.
+
+## Files Synchronized
+
+- [x] `storylines/the-reckoning.md`
+- [x] `storylines/murder-mystery.md`
+- [x] `storylines/order-of-mending.md`
+- [x] `storylines/natural-progression.md`
+- [x] `npc/xarrul.md`
+- [x] `npc/the-guest.md`
+- [x] `npc/mags.md`
+- [x] `npc/cultists.md`
+- [x] `npc/assassins.md`
+- [x] `location/tavern-overview.md`
+- [x] `location/main-hall.md`
+- [x] `location/cellar.md`
+- [x] `location/deep-cellar.md`
+- [x] `handouts/character-secrets.md`
+- [x] `handouts/the-conversion.md`
+- [x] `prints/secrets/3-handlers-agent.md`
+- [x] `prints/secrets/4-executioner.md`
+- [x] `prints/secrets/8-mourner.md` — reviewed; no change required.
+- [x] `prints/secrets/9-mercy.md` — reviewed; no change required.
+- [x] `prints/gifts/mercy-guest-cizi-kuze.md`
+- [x] `prints/gifts/mercy-xarrul-pruchod-sedi.md` — reviewed; already matches the Xarrul route.
+- [x] `overview.md`
+- [x] `Core Move.md`

storylines/ethereal-trip.md

@@ -1,142 +0,0 @@
-# The Ethereal Trip — Veil Dust Subplot
-
-## Overview
-
-**Veil Dust** is a narcotic that temporarily thins the user's perception of planar boundaries, allowing them to see — and partially interact with — the Ethereal Plane. It's trippy, disorienting, beautiful, terrifying, and addictive. In this oneshot, it serves as the bridge between subplots: the drug that reveals the murder's true nature, Skein's existence, and the thin point's danger.
-
-Vetch is the entry point. He wants a fix and knows where Orenn hid the last packet he confiscated from him. If the players recover the Workroom cache, Vetch offers to guide a shared trip. Taking it is optional but opens doors that nothing else does.
-
----
-
-## Obtaining Veil Dust
-
-| Source | Method | Notes |
-|--------|--------|-------|
-| **Deep Cellar Workroom** | Follow Vetch's lead through the concealed door; locked drawer, DC 14 | 4 doses: three diagnostic doses and Vetch's confiscated packet. The Workroom is the first chamber below. |
-| **Kitchen herb rack** | DC 14 Nature/Herbalism Kit | Identifies dried nightwhisper as a Veil Dust component. Orenn's preparation marks match the bundles in the hidden Workroom. |
-| **Vetch** | He has nothing. That's the problem. | He asks for one dose as payment for the lead and offers to guide any PCs who take the remaining doses beside him. |
-
----
-
-## Taking Veil Dust — Mechanics
-
-### Onset
-Immediate. The dust is inhaled. Effects begin within 6 seconds (1 round).
-
-### Initial Save
-**DC 13 Constitution saving throw.**
-- **Failure:** Incapacitated for 1 round as the perception shift overwhelms the user. Vivid, uncontrolled visions — the DM describes what the Ethereal Plane looks like before the user can act.
-- **Success:** The transition is smooth. The user sees both planes overlaid on each other and can act normally.
-
-### Duration
-- **Standard:** 1 minute (10 rounds). Enough for observation, not exploration.
-- **At the thin point (cellar):** 10 minutes. The natural weakness in the boundary amplifies the effect.
-- **Double dose:** 10 minutes regardless of location, but requires a DC 15 CON save or suffer 1 level of exhaustion when it ends.
-
-### Effects While Active
-
-**Ethereal Sight.** The user can see into the Ethereal Plane as if under *See Invisibility*, but specifically for ethereal entities and objects. The Material Plane appears washed out and grey; the Ethereal Plane overlays it in faint, translucent detail.
-
-**Ethereal Interaction.** The user can touch, speak to, and be touched by ethereal entities. This is *not* full planar travel — the user is still physically on the Material Plane. But their sensory and tactile connection crosses the boundary. In mechanical terms:
-- Can target ethereal creatures with attacks and spells
-- Can be targeted by ethereal creatures
-- Cannot move through solid objects or fly (still physically present)
-
-**Perception Enhancement.** Advantage on Perception checks while the dust is active. The user notices things at the boundary: cracks in wards, planar residue, ethereal trails.
-
-**Hallucination Risk.** Each round while the dust is active, roll a DC 12 Wisdom save. On a failure, the user experiences a **hallucination** (see table below). Hallucinations are brief (1 round) and don't incapacitate, but they're disorienting and might influence the user's actions.
-
-### Comedown
-When the effect ends:
-- **WIS save DC 14:** On failure, the user feels the pull of addiction — a deep, aching desire to see the Ethereal Plane again. For the rest of the session, they have disadvantage on Wisdom saves against taking another dose if offered.
-- **Side effect:** Disadvantage on Wisdom saving throws for 1 hour after the trip ends (the boundary in the user's mind is still thin).
-- **Vetch's warning:** "The flat world comes back. It always does. And every time it's harder to live in."
-
----
-
-## The Trip — What Players See
-
-### In the Main Hall
-
-The main hall overlaid with its ethereal echo. Everything is grey, translucent, *thin*. Living creatures glow faintly — warm colors for strong life force, dim for weak. The candle flames appear as pale blue phantoms. The stone walls are semi-transparent, and behind them: nothing. The grey void of the deep Ethereal, stretching into infinity.
-
-**Specific observations:**
-- **Bren** glows dimly — his life force is being drained. Beside him, **Skein** is clearly visible: a knotted spider-thing with tendrils in his skull. It reacts to being seen — it *notices* that it's being noticed and shrinks back, pulling its tendrils tighter.
-- **The bar (where Orenn died):** A dark, acrid stain on the ethereal side. The Brand of Spite left a residue — a scorch mark that exists on both planes. It smells of copper and old fire.
-- **The fireplace bell:** Glows faintly with old enchantment. The wards it's connected to are visible as thin lines of light running down through the floor — most of them flickering, cracked, barely holding.
-- **The curtained booth:** Nothing supernatural, but its privacy makes it a useful place to compare what the user sees without alerting either faction.
-- **The cultist table:** Dalla glows dim. A hair-thin silver filament passes through her chest, bends toward empty space where Nessa is not, then pulls taut against the tavern's lockdown and vanishes into its boundary. DC 15 Arcana recognizes a sympathetic conduit leading to a projected consciousness outside the inn. Essek's wrist brand glows amber — it's ethereal in nature, visible on both planes. Haddon has a faint aura of arcane residue.
-
-### In the Cellar
-
-The cellar is transformed. The stone walls glow with the ghost-light of old wards — thin, silvery lines, the summoners' long-dead work. Most of them are dark now, drained, bleeding shadow instead of light. The old sigils appear as *wounds* in the ethereal fabric, their light bleeding away toward the thin point.
-
-**The thin point** is visible as a **tear** — not metaphorical, a literal rip in the grey fabric of the Ethereal Plane. The Material Plane shows through it in muted color. Standing near it feels like standing at the edge of a cliff.
-
-**Xarrul's nest:** Shadows coiled in a corner of the ethereal cellar. Claw marks on the ethereal stone. The faint, acrid smell of the Brand of Spite. If Xarrul is present, it's visible: a gaunt, angular figure with charred-paper skin and burning amber eyes. It sees the users immediately. It *smiles*.
-
-**The binding circle:** Blazes with silver light in the Ethereal Plane. It's intact and potent — a beacon of old, careful craftsmanship (the summoners', not Orenn's). Anything bound within it on the Material Plane is also constrained on the Ethereal Plane. Xarrul avoids it.
-
----
-
-## Hallucination Table
-
-Roll d8 each round on a failed WIS save:
-
-| d8 | Hallucination |
-|----|---------------|
-| 1 | **Echoes of the Dead.** You see a translucent figure that might be Orenn, standing behind the bar, polishing a glass. He looks at you, opens his mouth, and says nothing. He's gone when you blink. |
-| 2 | **The Walls Breathe.** The stone walls pulse slowly, like a sleeping creature's ribcage. You feel the building's age — centuries of secrets soaked into the stone. |
-| 3 | **Thread Everywhere.** For a moment, everyone in the room is connected by thin, knotted threads — like Skein's tendrils, but linking every person to every other. The threads vibrate with tension. Then they're gone. |
-| 4 | **The Floor is Glass.** The floor becomes transparent. Beneath it, the cellar — and beneath the cellar, the deep Ethereal, grey and infinite. You feel vertigo even though you're standing on solid ground. |
-| 5 | **Wrong Reflection.** If near any reflective surface (a glass, a puddle, a blade), your reflection doesn't match. It moves a beat behind you. It looks scared. |
-| 6 | **Orenn's Voice.** You hear Orenn's voice, calm and clear: "Check the cellar. The walls are down." When you turn, no one is there. (This may or may not be a hallucination. The DM decides.) |
-| 7 | **Something Watched.** The certainty that something very large, very old, and very patient just looked at you. Not Xarrul — something beyond even the fiend. A pressure on the back of your skull. Then it's gone. (This is flavor. It's the deep Ethereal. It's nothing. Probably.) |
-| 8 | **Beautiful.** For one round, the Ethereal Plane is breathtaking. The void isn't empty — it's full of light, faint and distant, like stars seen from underwater. You understand, for a moment, why Vetch can't stop coming back. |
-
----
-
-## The Shared Trip — Dramatic Beats
-
-If players trip with Vetch, the following beats play out:
-
-### Beat 1: The Wonder
-Vetch guides them through the initial perception shift. He's calm, experienced, almost gentle. "Don't fight it. Let it settle. There — see? The world has another layer." This is the only time Vetch is the most competent person in the room.
-
-### Beat 2: The Discovery
-Players see Skein attached to Bren. If they didn't know about the possession, this is the reveal. If they did, they can now see the full extent of it — the tendrils, the way Skein pulses as it feeds, the way Bren's life force dims where the threads connect.
-
-### Beat 3: The Trail
-Near the bar, the ethereal residue of the Brand of Spite leads downward. A trail of dark, acrid energy, like smoke frozen in air. It leads to the cellar stairs. The murder left a scar on both planes.
-
-### Beat 4: The Threat
-If players follow the trail to the cellar, they see the thin point and (if Xarrul is there) the fiend. This is the moment the murder mystery becomes something else entirely. Xarrul is aware of them. It doesn't attack immediately — it watches, amused. Voice Thief activates: a whisper in someone's head. "You see me. How interesting. Do your friends know what you've found?"
-
-If they noticed Dalla's silver filament, Xarrul looks directly along it before adding: „To dítě není v tomhle domě. Udělali z matky cestu a pak se divili, že krvácejí oba její konce.” It will not yet explain further; the stolen conduit extract is the proof.
-
-### Beat 5: The Comedown
-The dust wears off. The Ethereal Plane fades. The grey, translucent world collapses back into the flat, mundane tavern. It feels like going deaf after hearing music. Vetch shudders. "Every time," he mutters. "Every time it's worse."
-
----
-
-## Read-Aloud: The Trip Begins
-
-> *Prášek chutná jako mrazivý vzduch a měď. Vdechnete ho a na okamžik — jeden krátký, tichý okamžik — se nic nestane.*
->
-> *Pak se svět rozpůlí.*
->
-> *Ne rozpadne. Rozpůlí — jako byste celý život dívali na obraz a teď vám někdo ukázal, že ten obraz je namalovaný na skle a za sklem je další místnost. Všechno, co vidíte, je pořád tady — stoly, židle, tváře — ale je to najednou průsvitné, vybledlé, jako vyrudlá fotografie přeložená přes realitu. A za tím — za tím šedým, průsvitným stínem světa, který znáte — je něco jiného. Éterická rovina.*
->
-> *Je šedá. Rozlehlá. Nekonečná. A není prázdná.*
-
-## Read-Aloud: The Comedown
-
-> *Skončí to bez varování. Svět za sklem zmizí. Šedá hloubka, průsvitné stíny, éterický opar — všechno se stáhne jako odliv a zpátky zůstane jen hospoda. Jen kameny, dřevo, svíčky a tvrdá realita bez druhé vrstvy.*
->
-> *Cítíte se, jako byste ohluchli po koncertě. Svět je plochý. Obyčejný. Nedostatečný.*
->
-> *Vetch vedle vás tiše zasténá. "Víte," řekne potichu, "jednou jsem četl, že slepí lidé nevidí tmu. Nevidí nic. Nemají čím vidět. Přesně tak se teď cítím. Jako bych neměl čím vidět to, co jsem právě viděl."*
->
-> *Odmlčí se. Podívá se na své ruce.*
->
-> *"Půjčil byste mi na ještě jednu dávku?"*

storylines/house-of-scales.md

@@ -101,7 +101,7 @@ She needs at least **two pieces** of concrete evidence (the pin found on Dace, H
 "Even if I met with them — which I'm not saying I did — it was intelligence gathering. I was trying to find the mole. Working alone because I didn't want to tip anyone off."
 
 **Stage 3 — Violence** (if cornered):
-Dace grabs the nearest vulnerable NPC (Vetch, Bren, or a player who isn't watching him) as a hostage. He has a concealed dagger coated in Essence of Ether (DC 13 CON save or unconscious for 1 minute). He demands safe passage out of the tavern.
+Dace grabs the nearest vulnerable target (Bren or a player who isn't watching him) as a hostage. He has a concealed dagger coated in Essence of Ether (DC 13 CON save or unconscious for 1 minute). He demands safe passage out of the tavern.
 
 **Resolution options:**
 - Let him go — Sevra won't allow it. The guild's justice requires an answer.
@@ -149,14 +149,14 @@ No single clue explains it; the horror is in assembling small wrong things until
 2. **The gestures.** A PC watching Thera greet or part from someone catches the doorframe-touch, the coin turned once, the murmured word (DC 16 Perception; DC 14 Insight to feel it was ritual). She did all three to Dace earlier, "comforting" him. Meaningless now; unforgettable in hindsight.
 3. **The read.** DC 16 Insight: her warmth is real and skin-deep, and underneath she is *appraising* people, gently, like livestock.
 4. **The brand.** Ask her about Orenn's body and she reads the soul-withdrawal fluently — *"That isn't a wound, it's a withdrawal… not our coin, though. Cruder."* She becomes a murder suspect (a dead end — Xarrul did it) and a much larger question (why does she know this on sight?).
-5. **The mark on Dace.** His shadow falls a half-breath late at the candles (DC 15 Perception); true sight / *Veil Dust* / Mags / DC 15 Medicine or Arcana up close shows the grey seam at his throat. He is condemned and doesn't know it.
+5. **The mark on Dace.** His shadow falls a half-breath late at the candles (DC 15 Perception); true sight, Mags, or DC 15 Medicine or Arcana up close shows the grey seam at his throat. He is condemned and doesn't know it.
 6. **The soulcoin** — the proof (below).
 
 ## The Soulcoin (the gut-punch)
 
 The single object that makes the whole thing land. Thera carries at least one. Getting it off her is hard — DC 20 Sleight of Hand and she'll notice — but she may spend one in a fight (**Soulcoin Surge**), and one is on her body if she falls.
 
-A warm coin, faceless on both sides, that whispers when held to the ear in a quiet room — and, held longer, seems to be *listening* instead. It is a person, minted: not destroyed, folded cold and recoverable while it holds charge. Mags smells the necrotic residue and goes grey; a cleric feels the trapped soul; *Veil Dust* shows it glowing wrong; DC 15 Arcana reads a personal, fingerprint-like necrotic signature. Its warmth dates the kill — a warm coin matches a *recent* sealed contract on the guild's rolls, nailing Thera to a specific death. **Destroy it with charge left and the soul escapes** — to thank its liberator, to testify, or to lash out if it died screaming.
+A warm coin, faceless on both sides, that whispers when held to the ear in a quiet room — and, held longer, seems to be *listening* instead. It is a person, minted: not destroyed, folded cold and recoverable while it holds charge. Mags smells the necrotic residue and goes grey; a cleric feels the trapped soul; true sight shows it glowing wrong; DC 15 Arcana reads a personal, fingerprint-like necrotic signature. Its warmth dates the kill — a warm coin matches a *recent* sealed contract on the guild's rolls, nailing Thera to a specific death. **Destroy it with charge left and the soul escapes** — to thank its liberator, to testify, or to lash out if it died screaming.
 
 Full description and mechanics: [the roster entry](../npc/assassins.md#the-soulcoin-the-gut-punch).
 
@@ -185,7 +185,7 @@ There is no clean win here — that's the point. Options, in rough order of how
 - **Let it lie.** Most tables. They feel *something* is wrong with Even-Hand and can't prove it, and she walks out courteous and beloved. The rot continues. Deeply unsettling; entirely valid.
 - **Take it to Sevra.** Run [Sevra's arc](../npc/assassins.md#the-thing-she-cant-name-dm--her-arc): denial → one undeniable physical crack → terrifying thoroughness. Convince her and the loyalists turn — Sevra, and a broken Kael, side with the players. This is the emotional peak: the codex-faithful turning on the thing wearing the codex's face.
 - **Confront Thera directly.** She doesn't panic — she reframes as righteousness ("which of us is the mercenary?"), then withdraws or fights. If Sevra is convinced, the guild fights *with* the party; if Sevra is still in denial, the players face Thera alone, possibly against Kael, who won't believe it until too late. See her stat block for **Soulcoin Surge** — she is hard to kill for good, and even a "failed" kill leaves the players a cracked coin as proof.
-- **Free a soul.** Destroying a charged coin (in the cellar's thin point, or during the fight) releases a spirit — a witness, a thank-you, or a scream. The clearest possible statement of what she has been doing.
+- **Free a soul.** Destroying a charged coin at the tear in the Deep Cellar's Old Work—or breaking it during the fight—releases a spirit: a witness, a thank-you, or a scream. The clearest possible statement of what she has been doing.
 
 ---
 
@@ -207,7 +207,7 @@ There is no clean win here — that's the point. Options, in rough order of how
 | **0 — Ambience** *(free, drop for everyone)* | Just being in the room | Thera's chapel-stillness; Kael checking on her like a dog on its master; a dog that won't settle near her; milk souring by her cup |
 | **1 — First pull** | A PC examines Orenn's body **or** asks about Thera | The **brand-read** (*"a withdrawal… not our coin"*) **or** **Kael's unease** (*"the priest couldn't find him"*) |
 | **2 — Second pull** | A PC watches her closely / presses the thread | The **gestures** (doorframe, coin-turn, whispered word — DC 16 Perception); the **appraising read** (DC 16 Insight); **Dace's late shadow** (DC 15 Perception) |
-| **3 — Proof** | A PC digs for something physical | The **grey seam** at Dace's throat (true sight / *Veil Dust* / Mags / DC 15 Medicine·Arcana), or the **soulcoin** (pickpocket DC 20, her Surge in a fight, or her body if she falls) |
+| **3 — Proof** | A PC digs for something physical | The **grey seam** at Dace's throat (true sight / Mags / DC 15 Medicine·Arcana), or the **soulcoin** (pickpocket DC 20, her Surge in a fight, or her body if she falls) |
 | **4 — The fork resolves** | How the players handle Dace | Expose/kill him → mark runs. Let him slip quiet → Thera reaches for him instead |
 
 **How it ends** (pick by the players' last, hardest choice):
@@ -229,6 +229,6 @@ The assassin subplot feeds the murder mystery and the fiend arc:
 
 2. **Dace's meetings map the wards.** The diagram in the private room was made during a Dace/Haddon meeting. The cult was mapping the wards — which Xarrul was also breaking. The tavern's defences were weakened from both sides at once: Haddon from inside (mapping), Xarrul from the Ethereal Plane (scratching).
 
-3. **The House accidentally freed Xarrul.** The Order sent the fiend into the inner archive to steal the Severance Nail, not kill Sevra. The archive's automatic Final Closure severed every outside claim crossing its threshold, including the Order's command binding. Xarrul caught itself in the Border Ethereal instead of snapping home. Witnesses saw an Order-marked creature near senior rooms, three injured blades, false voices, and then smoke; the House reasonably misread the heist as a failed assassination and the disappearance as banishment. The assassins in the tavern know only hearsay.
+3. **The House accidentally freed Xarrul.** The Order sent the fiend into the inner archive to steal the Severance Nail, not kill Sevra. The archive's automatic Final Closure severed every outside claim crossing its threshold, including the Order's command binding. Xarrul slipped home into the Border Ethereal while carrying the power torn loose from that command. Witnesses saw an Order-marked creature near senior rooms, three injured blades, false voices, and then smoke; the House reasonably misread the heist as a failed assassination and the disappearance as banishment. The assassins in the tavern know only hearsay.
 
 4. **Two hungers, one veil (DM texture, not a reveal).** Orenn died to a fiend crossing the veil; Thera feeds a debt beneath the city. They are unrelated predators — which is exactly why Thera can look at Orenn's brand and say *"not our coin."* The tavern is a thin place, and thin places draw more than one kind of appetite. Let attentive players feel that resonance; don't explain it.

storylines/murder-mystery.md

@@ -3,9 +3,9 @@
 ## Timeline of Events
 
 ### Before the Session
-- **Three weeks ago:** The Order sends bound Xarrul into the House of Scales to steal the Severance Nail. The archive's automatic Final Closure cuts the Order's command binding. Xarrul catches itself in the Border Ethereal instead of being dismissed. The House mistakes the intrusion for a failed assassination and believes the fiend banished; the Order's instruments still show its binding energy and most cultists believe it remains controlled but unreachable.
+- **Three weeks ago:** The Order sends bound Xarrul into the House of Scales to steal the Severance Nail. The archive's automatic Final Closure cuts the Order's command binding. Xarrul slips home into the Border Ethereal while carrying the power torn loose from that command. The House mistakes the intrusion for a failed assassination and believes the fiend banished and gone; the Order's instruments still show its binding energy and most cultists believe it remains controlled but unreachable.
 - **Weeks ago:** Xarrul, now unbound, finds this thin point on the cult's map — a fault already worked thin by the summoners who once denned here — and anchors to it. In the hidden deepest chamber it begins prying open the old, sealed tear from the Ethereal side, night after night, siphoning the summoners' leftover sigils to do it.
-- **Weeks ago, below the Inn:** Xarrul begins speaking through the stone to the caged Guest. The Guest recognizes the Order's missing asset from its infiltration work. It tells Xarrul which keeper is cautious and which will break the emergency lockstone in grief; Xarrul recognizes the old summoners' stone and supplies the occult half of the plan. In return, they negotiate the body-for-house exchange that can become [the Vacancy](the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit).
+- **Weeks ago, below the Inn:** Xarrul begins speaking through the stone to the caged Guest. The Guest recognizes the Order's missing asset from its infiltration work. It identifies the cautious keeper, predicts Mags will break the emergency lockstone in grief, and proposes the useful exit: Xarrul takes a body that can wear any face while the Guest is projected alive into the Astral Plane. Their compact permits Xarrul one death to close the house—Orenn—but forbids it from killing anyone else until the exchange is finished, except in direct defense against binding, banishment, or destruction. The promise does not make Xarrul responsible for violence chosen by others. The Guest secretly intends to recruit outsiders to kill Xarrul during [the Vacancy](the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy), reclaim the empowered body and take the Inn.
 - **Days ago:** Orenn's surveillance turns up a district-wide wrongness he reads as an *underworld* problem — deaths that don't add up, the Order stirring. Uneasy, he buys holy water and ward supplies as insurance and writes the contingency letter he tucks in Mags's apron. He never once suspects the sealed rift under his own floor; that case is closed.
 - **Tonight, before the party arrives:** Tension between the factions is at a breaking point. Kael has evidence that the Merchant Quarter kill — a guild contract — was done by someone else with ritual marks. He's ready to confront the cultists.
 
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@
 #### Act 1 — The Table (calm)
 - The PCs, strangers to each other and to Orenn, share the only free table. Orenn works them personally — business or pleasure, the house rules, the carrot of "references in high places."
 - Faction tension is palpable but contained: Kael glaring at the cultists, Thera still as a chapel, the cultists half-arguing over texts.
-- Bren mutters in his corner while Vetch fidgets near the cellar stairs.
+- Bren mutters in his corner while the factions watch one another across the room.
 - Orenn steps down to storage for supplies. His absence is what lets the next beat run unchecked.
 
 #### Act 2 — The Spark
@@ -37,12 +37,12 @@
 
 - **The brawl lasts 3–5 rounds. Non-lethal — the rules hold.** Fists, bottles, furniture, and shove/gust/thunderclap *throws* that fling PCs around (use them to pull the party in and to position them for the reveal). NPCs keep their lethal kits holstered; save the assassins' real danger for the finale. If a PC would drop, they're knocked out at 1 HP, not killed. (See the [Brawl Toolkit](#the-brawl-toolkit).)
 - **The blackout.** A few rounds in, pressed in the scrum, **Rennt casts Thunderwave** — a legitimate knockback move that also snuffs every candle at once. The room goes black. It looks damning for the cult (they blacked out the room the instant Orenn died) — and they're innocent of the murder. Perfect misdirection.
-- **The murder, under cover of the dark.** Orenn, back from storage, wades in to quell the brawl and takes a knock (a bottle, a chair) — so he's already bruised and bleeding, alive. In the blackout, Xarrul jaunts partially into the Material Plane behind the bar, brands him (Brand of Spite), freezes him (Visions of Spite), and strikes. Xarrul retreats to the Ethereal. Total exposure: seconds. The mundane knock is a **decoy wound** (see the crime scene).
+- **The murder, under cover of the dark.** Orenn, back from storage, wades in to quell the brawl and takes a knock (a bottle, a chair) — so he's already bruised and bleeding, alive. Xarrul spends the one Stored Incursion it charged during the previous night: it manifests behind the bar for three rounds, brands Orenn, freezes him with Visions of Spite, and lands the killing Multiattack before the charge drags it back Ethereal. The mundane knock is a **decoy wound** (see the crime scene).
 - **Only witness:** Bren. He saw a shape reach through the air behind the bar. Skein forces him to stay silent. (Kael also saw Bren go rigid, staring at the bar rather than the fight.)
 - **Mags brings order.** She storms from the kitchen, cleaver up, and quiets the room with her voice. She relights the candles with a ward-focus — and behind her is Orenn's body. What follows — the forced heal, the forced **Revivify** with the diamond from her own necklace (both failing), the shattered ward-crystal that seals the tavern until midnight, and the ultimatum — is scripted in **[Mags — Act 2: The Reveal](../npc/mags.md#act-2--the-reveal-dm)**.
 - Both factions immediately blame each other. Mags, for show, blames the strangers (see her two-layer accusation in the same section).
 
-> **DM — the murder is the plan, not the start of the mystery.** Xarrul didn't kill Orenn for spite or to frame anyone (those are bonuses). It killed him to make **Mags seal the house.** A killing in the Nether Inn is what triggers the lockdown, and the lockstone she shatters is the closed cross-planar vessel Xarrul needs to finish crossing (see [the ward-crystal's true nature](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door)). The Guest identified *Orenn* as the calm one so that the *grieving* keeper would be left holding the stone and would use it on protocol; Xarrul verified the judgment, chose, and struck. The whole "who killed the barkeep" question is the fiend's smokescreen: the answer (a fiend) comes cheap and early. The deeper answers are what it is doing with the sealed house—and who downstairs helped it choose.
+> **DM — the murder is the plan, not the start of the mystery.** Xarrul didn't kill Orenn for spite or merely to frame anyone. It killed him to make **Mags seal the house.** The lockstone trades the internal planar barrier for an exterior cage: Xarrul crosses fully into the Material interior and regains Ethereal Jaunt, but nobody can leave on any plane until midnight. The Guest identified *Orenn* as the calm keeper whose death would make grieving Mags follow protocol, and Orenn became the compact's single permitted victim. The whole "who killed the barkeep" question is the fiend's smokescreen: the deeper answers are what the lockdown admitted, what must happen at midnight, and who downstairs helped choose the victim.
 
 #### The Brawl Toolkit
 
@@ -58,7 +58,7 @@ Don't restat the room. Hand any NPC these non-lethal moves and narrate fast. All
   - **A cultist / Essek — *gust of wind* effect:** no damage, just throws people, papers, and flame.
   - **A blade — disarming shove or a flung tankard:** reposition, don't wound.
 
-As Essek's gust scatters the cultist table, Haddon's restricted research folio opens. During Rennt's blackout, Xarrul steals its two loose extracts from the Ethereal side. See [Haddon's Missing Research Folio](order-of-mending.md#haddons-missing-research-folio). Afterward, Haddon repeatedly searches the debris while pretending to organize his ordinary notes.
+As Essek's gust scatters the cultist table, Haddon's restricted research folio opens and its loose extracts scatter with the ordinary notes. Xarrul's entire pre-lockdown manifestation is spent killing Orenn. In the first minute after Mags breaks the crystal—while everyone watches the failed Revivify and her ultimatum—Xarrul uses its restored Ethereal Jaunt to manifest briefly, steal the two extracts, and retreat. See [Haddon's Missing Research Folio](order-of-mending.md#haddons-missing-research-folio). Afterward, Haddon repeatedly searches the debris while pretending to organize his ordinary notes.
 
 Roll initiative only if your table wants dice; otherwise run it as a narrated montage with a decision point or two, and cut it off with the Thunderwave.
 
@@ -118,8 +118,8 @@ The clues are designed to point at both factions while the truth (the fiend) hid
 | Claw marks behind bar | Bar floor | Investigation 16 | Something partially manifested here |
 | Bren's testimony | Bren (agitated state) | Persuasion/patience | "A hand that wasn't a hand, reaching through the thin place" |
 | Siphoned foundation sigils | Cellar foundation | Arcana 13–15 | Something ethereal has been feeding on the summoners' old work here — points *down* |
-| Vetch's observations | Vetch (if given dust or befriended) | — | Something dark and hungry in the Ethereal Plane |
-| Ethereal trail (timed) | Behind bar → cellar | Detect Magic within 30 min | The killer went *down* — toward the thin point |
+| Mirror sighting | Orenn's silver mirror catches Skein or Xarrul in its reflection | — | An invisible or Ethereal creature is physically present in the reflected space |
+| Ethereal trail (timed) | Behind bar → upper cellar | Detect Magic within 30 min | The killer went *down*; the residue follows the ward-lines toward the concealed Deep Cellar and the tear |
 | Partial manifestation scratches | Private room table | Investigation 14 + Arcana 16 | Someone mapped the wards to *break* them |
 | Orenn's preparations | Storage compartment, bedroom | Investigation 15+ | Orenn feared something not-human was moving — and hedged |
 | Orenn's letter | Mags's apron | — | "If something happens to me in the bar, it came from between." |
@@ -142,14 +142,14 @@ As players dig deeper:
 - Bren becomes agitated if questioned about the murder → partial truths emerge
 - Haddon's journal and the private room connect Dace to the Order through physical evidence
 - The cellar and back rooms reveal Orenn's preparations → fiendish angle opens up
-- Vetch mentions the Ethereal Plane → alternative explanation emerges
+- Orenn's mirror reveals Skein beside Bren or catches Xarrul nearby → an Ethereal explanation emerges
 
 **Expected result:** The fiend theory starts competing with the faction theories. Players have a choice of which thread to pull.
 
 ### Late Phase (60+ minutes)
 If players pursue the fiend angle:
 - The siphoned sigils and the failing seal below confirm long-term ethereal interference
-- Veil Dust trip reveals Xarrul (and Skein, and the thin point)
+- Orenn's mirror can reveal Xarrul or Skein whenever either appears within its reflection
 - Orenn's letter and bestiary confirm he feared something not-human was moving — though he never knew it was under his own floor
 - Essek (if gotten alone) reveals the summoning
 
@@ -163,7 +163,7 @@ These are Xarrul's work — the fiend actively planted or encouraged these:
 
 1. **Xarrul engineered the brawl.** Kael's confrontation with Haddon was real and his anger genuine — but the *laugh* that tipped him over (Rennt's) was amplified in his ears by Xarrul (Voice Thief), which layered a statement only Kael heard beneath it: „Haddon vybral toho šlechtice. Zeptej se ho.” This is true—Haddon selected the victim—but phrased to detonate Kael's existing suspicion. Rennt laughed but never spoke those words. The brawl gave Xarrul its cover without requiring Xarrul to make a false claim.
 
-2. **A cultist component pouch** was left near the bar (Xarrul moved it from the table during the chaos). It contains ritual chalk and dried blood. DC 17 Investigation to realize the pouch was placed deliberately — the blood is old and doesn't match the murder.
+2. **A cultist component pouch** was left near the bar. Xarrul moves it from the scattered table in the first minute after the lockdown begins, when Ethereal Jaunt has returned; its Stored Incursion was fully consumed by Orenn's three-round murder. The pouch contains ritual chalk and dried blood. DC 17 Investigation reveals deliberate placement—the blood is old and doesn't match the murder.
 
 3. **Dace's dagger** under a barstool near Orenn's body. It fell during the brawl — genuinely accidental, not planted by Xarrul — but it's a nasty red herring in its own right: a quality piece with a Scales-guild hilt *and* ritual sigils etched down the blade, so it reads as both an assassin's sidearm and a cultist ritual knife. It's still coated in **Essence of Ether** (a PC who handles it roughly makes a DC 13 CON save or drops unconscious for 1 minute). Its proximity to the body implicates *both* factions and, for anyone who digs, points at Dace himself — the blade's sigils match the second cultist pin hidden in his boot (DC 14 Investigation of his person). A productive dead-end: it cracks open the traitor, not the murder.
 
@@ -174,22 +174,22 @@ These are Xarrul's work — the fiend actively planted or encouraged these:
 The murder can resolve in several ways. None of them are clean.
 
 ### Path A: The Fiend Is Found and Destroyed
-Players identify Xarrul, confront it, and destroy it (see [The Reckoning](the-reckoning.md)). The Brand of Spite fades from Orenn's body. The truth is known. But:
+Players identify Xarrul, cover both planes and reduce it to 0 HP in the Ethereal Plane (see [The Reckoning](the-reckoning.md#scenario-c-ethereal-destruction)). The Brand of Spite fades from Orenn's body and Nessa wakes as the stolen vitality recoils. The truth is known. But:
 - The cultists summoned the fiend → they're complicit
 - The assassins freed the fiend → they're complicit
 - Everyone is guilty. No one is the murderer.
 
-### Path B: The Fiend Is Found but Escapes
-Players discover the truth but Xarrul retreats into the Ethereal Plane and leaves the area. The truth is known but justice is impossible. Mags now has a target — she'll hunt it alone.
+### Path B: The Fiend Is Bound
+Players discover the truth and capture Xarrul before it can complete the Vacancy. They either return it to the Order through Haddon's ritual or seal it neutrally with the binding circle, restored sigils and iron bell. Nessa remains suspended because the invested vitality does not recoil, but her connection survives. The immediate murderer is contained; who owns its chains determines whether this is justice or merely restored exploitation.
 
 ### Path C: The Factions Are Blamed
 Players don't find the fiend. One or both factions are blamed for the murder. This leads to violence — the assassins and cultists fight for real. Mags tries to stop it but she's one woman. Several people die. The fiend watches from the Ethereal Plane, satisfied.
 
-### Path D: Stalemate
-No one is conclusively blamed. The lockdown ends at dawn. Everyone leaves with suspicion and unresolved tension. The thin point keeps growing. Mother Vyre's Phase Two continues. Nothing is resolved — but the players *know* things, and knowledge has consequences.
+### Path D: The Party Does Nothing
+No one enters the cellar or interrupts the escalating accusations. The compact keeps Xarrul from killing again, but it does not protect the factions from one another; the room remains divided and close to lethal violence. Before midnight Xarrul opens Cell One and positions the willing Guest at the Old Work. When the shell lapses, it completes the three-round Vacancy and strands the Guest in the Astral Plane. If nobody witnessed the transfer, Xarrul takes an innocuous face and leaves with the released patrons. If witnesses can identify or bind its new body, the expired compact no longer protects them from Xarrul and it removes them. See [Natural Progression](natural-progression.md#passive-default-nobody-enters-the-cellar).
 
 ### Path E: Negotiated Peace
 Players reveal enough truth to make both factions realize they've been played by a third party (the fiend). Temporary alliance. Joint confrontation. This is the hardest to achieve and the most satisfying — it requires players to have engaged with both faction subplots deeply enough to broker trust between groups that hate each other.
 
 ### Path F: The Vacancy
-Players free the Guest and accept its offer to expose Xarrul during the body transfer. For three rounds the killer, its accomplice and the empty vessel are separate targets. Destroying Xarrul avenges Orenn but pours its power into the Guest who helped choose him; allowing the exchange frees the murderer in changeling flesh and makes the Guest the spectral owner of the Inn. In either branch Mags starts the next confrontation. Solving the murder decides who deserves punishment, not who gets to walk away clean. See [The Vacancy](the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit).
+Players free the Guest and accept its offer to expose Xarrul during the body transfer at the tear in the Old Work. For three rounds the killer, its accomplice and the empty vessel are separate targets. Destroying Xarrul avenges Orenn but pours its power into the Guest who helped choose him; allowing the exchange frees the murderer in changeling flesh and strands the Guest bodiless in the Astral Plane. An empowered Guest later lures Mags below and takes her place. See [The Vacancy](the-reckoning.md#scenario-g-the-vacancy).

storylines/natural-progression.md

@@ -0,0 +1,370 @@
+# Natural Progression and Outcome Map
+
+This is the DM-facing causal map for the night. It describes what happens without player intervention and how increasingly informed intervention changes the result.
+
+## Guiding Principle
+
+> **Doing nothing should generally produce the worst outcome. Engaging with the story should visibly change what survives, what escapes, and what the players learn.**
+
+This is a rule of thumb, not a promise that every action is good. Killing the Guest without understanding the larger situation is allowed to be a plainly bad choice. The important thing is that it still changes the ending.
+
+Solving Orenn's murder is also not enough by itself. The lockdown has already admitted Xarrul to the Material interior. The active threat is the body it intends to take during the midnight resealing window.
+
+---
+
+## Canonical Terms
+
+### The Vacancy
+
+The negotiated transfer between Xarrul and the Guest at the tear in the Deep Cellar's Old Work.
+
+- It cannot begin while the lockdown blocks the Guest's Astral release. Midnight opens its single three-round window.
+- The Guest willingly projects out of the changeling body.
+- Xarrul projects into it.
+- For three rounds, Xarrul, the Guest's projected spirit, and the vacant body are separate targets.
+- If nobody intervenes, Xarrul takes the changeling body and the Guest is projected into the Astral Plane. The Guest does **not** become the spectral Host of the Inn.
+- If the players destroy Xarrul during the transfer, the Guest returns empowered by Xarrul's planar imprint.
+
+### The Hollowing
+
+The forced replacement ritual used if the Guest is dead or otherwise unavailable.
+
+- Xarrul abducts a living humanoid and brings the victim to the tear's containment circle.
+- The ritual resembles the Vacancy visually: victim's spirit, empty body, and Xarrul become separately visible.
+- Unlike the Guest, the victim has not consented and receives no bargain.
+- Xarrul destroys the victim's projected spirit and silver cord, then keeps the empty body.
+- The victim is never promised back. A Hollowing that finishes is murder followed by possession, not a hostage exchange.
+
+The Hollowing gives Xarrul an ordinary mortal body. That is useful, but much less dangerous than a changeling body able to become anyone.
+
+---
+
+## Ending Tree at a Glance
+
+```text
+LOCKDOWN BEGINS
+    |
+    +-- Players do not affect the cellar or the factions
+    |      |
+    |      +-- Guest alive
+    |      |      -> Vacancy succeeds
+    |      |      -> Xarrul takes changeling body
+    |      |      -> Guest is lost in Astral Plane
+    |      |      -> pre-transfer compact expires
+    |      |      -> Xarrul leaves secretly, or kills only exposed witnesses able to stop it
+    |      |
+    |      +-- Guest dead
+    |             -> Xarrul abducts replacement
+    |             -> Mags searches Deep Cellar alone and dies
+    |             -> Hollowing succeeds
+    |             -> Xarrul enters upstairs war in inferior mortal body
+    |
+    +-- Players help only the Guest
+    |      -> destroy Xarrul during Vacancy
+    |      -> empowered Guest returns
+    |      -> Guest secretly cages Mags and takes her identity and Inn
+    |
+    +-- Players provide anti-Xarrul tools but no political solution
+    |      -> loyal cultists try to rebind
+    |      -> everyone else tries to destroy Xarrul Ethereally
+    |      -> cult loyalists die; Xarrul dies if the planar pincer survives their sabotage
+    |
+    +-- Players provide tools and win a political solution
+           |
+           +-- Rebind Xarrul
+           |      -> everyone can survive
+           |      -> Xarrul becomes the Order's weapon again
+           |      -> Nessa remains lost but the connection remains
+           |
+           +-- Bell-and-sigils seal
+           |      -> everyone can survive
+           |      -> Xarrul is trapped between planes
+           |      -> Nessa remains lost but the connection remains
+           |
+           +-- Ethereal destruction
+           |      -> Xarrul is permanently destroyed
+           |      -> Nessa wakes
+           |
+           +-- Deliberately release Xarrul
+                  -> party secures protection after the Guest's compact expires
+                  -> party must fool, frame, or neutralize Mags
+                  -> Xarrul leaves disguised in changeling body
+```
+
+Any political plan can degrade into casualties. If the disagreement consumes too many rounds or kills the people carrying the anti-ethereal tools, Xarrul wins.
+
+---
+
+## Passive Default: Nobody Enters the Cellar
+
+The PCs may investigate nothing, or they may not be present at the Nether Inn at all. In either case, no outsider enters the cellar and no one interferes with Xarrul and the Guest.
+
+### During the Lockdown
+
+- Xarrul guards the Guest, the anti-fiend tools and the midnight transfer site below; there is no crossing progress to tend.
+- Upstairs, it uses stolen voices, true accusations, waking visions, and altered memories to sharpen the existing conflict without killing anyone itself.
+- The assassins and cultists interpret every new incident as enemy action.
+- Mags can suppress individual confrontations, but she cannot restore trust.
+- By the final portion of the lockdown, the factions are exhausted, divided, and one failed accusation away from lethal violence.
+- The compact permits Xarrul to kill Orenn but nobody else until the exchange finishes, except direct defense against binding, banishment, or destruction. It does not protect the factions from one another.
+
+Use this relative clock if the players need visible escalation:
+
+| Time | Default event upstairs | Xarrul below |
+|---|---|---|
+| **T−90 minutes** | A fresh, true accusation is heard in the wrong voice; Kael openly blames Haddon. | Checks Cell One and the tear from the Ethereal Plane. |
+| **T−60 minutes** | A last-minute memory edit makes one NPC sincerely accuse the wrong speaker; Mags prevents the first drawn weapon. | Weakens the cell ward and confirms the Guest is ready. |
+| **T−30 minutes** | Rennt or Kael turns a shove into a lethal attack; Sevra and the cultists choose sides. Mags or the PCs can still prevent the first faction death. | Opens Cell One and moves the willing Guest toward the Old Work. The lower alarm fires, but Mags is occupied upstairs. |
+| **T−10 minutes** | A rescue or retaliation widens the fight. Keep Haddon or Essek able to recognize the danger if the transfer is exposed. | Positions the Guest and watches the prepared transfer site; the Vacancy still cannot begin. |
+| **Midnight** | The shell lapses. Anyone who noticed the lower alarm has one last chance to reach the Old Work. | Begins the three-round Vacancy. Afterward, leaves secretly or removes exposed anti-fiend threats and witnesses. |
+
+Move the entries earlier when the party exposes faction secrets without mediating, and later when they produce credible evidence of the common threat.
+
+The default upstairs conflict is not one neat battle with predetermined sides. It is a sequence of accusations, attacks, rescues, and revenge strikes. Xarrul cannot kill anyone itself before the exchange finishes, but the factions can kill one another. Keep enough survivors for the players' choices and, if the transfer is exposed, the recognition beat.
+
+### The Uninterrupted Vacancy
+
+No PC needs to free the Guest. Xarrul and the Guest planned this together.
+
+The lockdown has already made Xarrul fully capable of manifesting inside the Inn. Before midnight it opens Cell One from the Ethereal side and escorts the willing Guest to the tear. They cannot begin while the shell blocks the Guest's Astral destination. The moment the shell lapses, returning ward-power opens the three-round Vacancy window inside the containment circle.
+
+Without outside hands, Xarrul wins automatically:
+
+1. The Guest leaves its body.
+2. Xarrul takes the changeling body.
+3. The Guest's spirit is pushed into the Astral Plane and abandoned there.
+4. Xarrul retains its own abilities and gains the changeling's Shapechanger ability.
+
+This is Xarrul's best possible result. It can now become Mags, a cultist, a guild blade, a city official, or anyone else whose face it has studied.
+
+### After the Compact Expires
+
+Delivering the Guest Astral completes the exchange and ends its restraint on Xarrul. What Xarrul does next depends on exposure, not a fixed appetite for massacre.
+
+If nobody witnessed the Vacancy, Xarrul chooses an innocuous face, joins the frightened patrons as the doors release, and leaves. Contradictory living witnesses who never saw the new body are better cover than a tavern full of corpses.
+
+If the transfer was exposed, the surviving patrons know too much and may already be moving anti-fiend tools against the new vessel. Xarrul then removes the people who can identify or stop it.
+
+If it enters the hall openly:
+
+1. The remaining cultists feel the old binding react without accepting a command. They finally understand that they never regained control.
+2. Haddon or Essek recognizes Xarrul's signature and identifies it as the thing that killed Orenn.
+3. They tell Mags. The faction fight stops for one brief, terrible moment.
+4. Everyone turns on Xarrul.
+5. They can see pieces of the problem—Essek may perceive it and Mags may ring the bell—but sight alone cannot cross the planar boundary, and they cannot pin Xarrul consistently after the faction war. Mags and Haddon each possess a reserve dose of Oil of Etherealness, but neither has the ten uninterrupted minutes needed to apply it after this revelation.
+6. Xarrul uses Ethereal Jaunt every round, kills the few people who can perceive or hurt it first, and dismantles the rest.
+
+Its cleanup priority is practical:
+
+1. Anyone currently Ethereal or carrying Veilhook Salt.
+2. Whoever reaches for the iron bell or restored sigils.
+3. Haddon, who can identify, bind and later report it.
+4. Essek, who understands its planar nature.
+5. Mags and Sevra, then the remaining witnesses.
+
+The defenders possess fragments of a counter, not the preparation and coordination needed to hold Xarrul in one plane.
+
+### Passive Ending
+
+- Orenn is dead.
+- The Guest is stranded in the Astral Plane.
+- Xarrul has the changeling body and can move through the city wearing any face.
+- If the transfer remained secret, the remaining divided patrons face no further attack from Xarrul; if it was exposed, those capable of identifying or stopping the new vessel may die.
+- Nessa remains lost.
+- Mother Vyre loses one local cell but does not know what left the tavern wearing its faces.
+- Xarrul walks out after midnight with no living witness able to identify its chosen face.
+
+This is the worst ending because Xarrul gains permanent embodiment and maximum concealment; the precise body count depends on whether the party exposed the transfer without stopping it.
+
+---
+
+## Bad Intervention: The Players Only Kill the Guest
+
+This means the players kill the Guest in Cell One and take no effective action against Xarrul, the midnight vessel-working, or the upstairs pressure cooker.
+
+### Immediate Effect
+
+- The Guest's intelligence and testimony are lost.
+- The Vacancy is no longer available as an easy opportunity to attack Xarrul.
+- The Handler's Agent and Mourner fail their objectives; the Executioner succeeds.
+- Xarrul loses the uniquely valuable changeling body.
+- The exchange is now impossible, so the compact's temporary restraint ends immediately. Xarrul can kill directly rather than working through faction violence.
+- The Guest's killer becomes Xarrul's first replacement-vessel target. Its warning to the Executioner was not a bluff.
+- Mercy's call continues and points deeper. The call came from Xarrul and the rift, not from the Guest.
+
+### The Abduction
+
+Xarrul selects an isolated mortal body as a replacement. Prefer, in order:
+
+1. A PC directly responsible for killing the Guest.
+2. A vulnerable but useful NPC separated by the faction conflict.
+3. A cultist whose body will let Xarrul approach the survivors without immediate suspicion.
+
+The victim vanishes during one of Xarrul's manufactured distractions.
+
+### Why Mags Goes Down Alone
+
+- The disappearance is noticed.
+- Twinkle's agitation, a disturbed lower ward, or Mags's private alarm confirms that someone entered the Deep Cellar.
+- Haddon knows enough about the building's original containment to understand the direction, but Mags refuses to let the cultists enter her secret operation.
+- She takes the black key and goes alone, intending to retrieve the missing person and keep the cells hidden.
+- Xarrul kills her before beginning the Hollowing. It will not risk the owner of the house interrupting the transfer.
+
+### The Hollowing
+
+The victim is projected out of their body. Xarrul destroys the projected spirit and takes the body. There is no promise, safe return, or future rescue.
+
+Afterward, Xarrul enters the ongoing upstairs conflict. The conclusion broadly resembles the passive ending, but Xarrul has an ordinary stolen body rather than a changeling body. The choice was bad and caused additional immediate harm, but it denied Xarrul its most dangerous long-term disguise.
+
+---
+
+## Narrow Intervention: The Players Only Help the Guest
+
+“Help the Guest” means freeing it, bringing it to the tear in the Old Work, protecting its projected spirit, and destroying Xarrul during the Vacancy.
+
+### Vacancy Result
+
+- Xarrul is destroyed during the one moment when it cannot escape.
+- The Guest reclaims its body.
+- Xarrul's planar imprint burns out the suppressant and gives the Guest Ethereal Jaunt, Shadow Cloak, Voice Thief, and fragments of Xarrul's memories.
+- Nessa's stolen vitality remains in the empowered Guest rather than returning to her. Nessa remains lost.
+
+### The Guest Takes the Inn Quietly
+
+The Guest is smarter about ownership than Xarrul is about witnesses. It does not challenge Mags in the main hall.
+
+1. It uses Orenn's voice from below to lure Mags into the cellar alone.
+2. It leads her to Cell One under the pretense that Orenn left something there or that the wards are failing.
+3. It ambushes and imprisons her in its old cage.
+4. It takes Mags's form and returns upstairs.
+5. Wearing Mags's authority, it stops or redirects the faction conflict and keeps the Nether Inn.
+
+If the players truly do nothing beyond helping the Guest kill Xarrul, they may leave believing Mags survived and retained the house. Discovering the exchange is a later consequence.
+
+If they continue investigating, they can notice the false Mags, rescue the real one, support the Guest's claim openly, or trigger a succession fight.
+
+---
+
+## Tactical Intervention Without Political Agreement
+
+The players discover or distribute Veilhook Salt, Oil of Etherealness, the silver mirror, the iron bell, or another meaningful defense, but fail to create agreement about what should happen to Xarrul.
+
+When Xarrul appears, the room splits:
+
+- **Haddon and Rennt** want Xarrul alive and rebound.
+- **Sevra, Mags, and most unaffiliated defenders** want the murderer destroyed.
+- **Dalla** supports rebinding until the conduit truth is exposed; afterward she refuses it.
+- **Essek** supports ending Xarrul rather than returning it to the Order, if he believes anyone can protect him.
+
+The cult is therefore not automatically one unified side. “The cultists die” normally means Haddon, Rennt, and anyone still loyal enough to help them sabotage the attack.
+
+If the armed defenders retain an Ethereal attacker and enough strength after that internal fight, they maintain pressure on both planes and destroy Xarrul in the Ethereal Plane. Nessa wakes. If the Ethereal hunter falls or loses access before the final blow, Material defeat only triggers Deathless Slip; Xarrul escapes into the Ethereal interior, heals and turns the fight.
+
+If the argument destroys the tools, their users, or the positioning needed to cover both planes, Xarrul wins instead.
+
+---
+
+## Political Resolutions
+
+These endings require both the necessary tools and enough persuasion to make the room follow one plan. Failed persuasion does not merely close a dialogue option: it creates dissenters who may interfere, die, or hand Xarrul the opening it needs.
+
+### Rebinding
+
+The party convinces Mags, Sevra, Dalla, and the other defenders to let Haddon conduct the ritual.
+
+- Everyone can survive.
+- Xarrul is bound again.
+- The Order regains its weapon and continues toward the Opening.
+- Nessa remains lost, but her connection through Xarrul and Dalla still exists.
+- The cult believes the Opening can eventually return her. That possibility is real; the price of the Opening remains catastrophic.
+
+### Bell-and-Sigils Sealing
+
+The party restores the foundation sigils, traps Xarrul in the binding circle, and rings the iron bell.
+
+- Everyone can survive.
+- Xarrul is sealed consciously between the Material and Ethereal planes.
+- The Order does not regain direct control of it.
+- The energetic connection to Dalla and Nessa remains intact.
+- Nessa can potentially still be recovered later through the Opening or, preferably, through a safer method developed from the surviving research.
+
+This is a genuine alternative to rebinding, not merely “leave Nessa lost forever.” It preserves the possibility of rescue without immediately returning Xarrul to Haddon.
+
+### Ethereal Destruction
+
+The party convinces enough of the room to cover both planes and pursue Xarrul wherever it shifts.
+
+- Everyone can survive if nobody sabotages the planar pincer.
+- Xarrul is permanently destroyed when reduced to 0 HP in the Ethereal Plane.
+- The stored vitality returns through Dalla's conduit.
+- Nessa wakes.
+
+Haddon and Rennt may still resist. If that resistance removes the Ethereal hunter or breaks one side of the pincer, Xarrul can recover and win.
+
+---
+
+## Deliberately Siding With Xarrul
+
+Xarrul does not need a massacre in order to escape. Once it has the changeling body, it can disguise itself and walk out through the front door after the lockdown lapses.
+
+The Guest's compact restrains Xarrul's own killing only until the exchange finishes. If the players want guaranteed survival afterward—especially if their intervention will expose Xarrul's new body—they must secure a separate promise. Xarrul keeps it.
+
+The real obstacle is Mags.
+
+### Mags's Position
+
+Mags will not let the doors open on an unresolved murder, and she will never knowingly allow Orenn's murderer to leave. The party must therefore do one of the following without turning the entire room against itself:
+
+- **Frame someone else** convincingly enough that Mags accepts a false murderer.
+- **Convince Mags that Xarrul did not act alone** and sacrifice the Guest or another accomplice as the actionable culprit.
+- **Neutralize Mags quietly** through imprisonment, incapacitation, or manipulation of her Warden's Mark.
+- **Replace or bypass her authority** long enough for disguised Xarrul to join the people leaving at midnight.
+
+An open attack on Mags normally turns Sevra, Kael, Thera, and any surviving regulars against the party. This path should be a social and covert finale, not simply another combat.
+
+### Successful Escape
+
+- Xarrul takes the changeling body.
+- The Guest is projected into the Astral Plane.
+- Xarrul leaves in the face of someone permitted to walk out.
+- It keeps any explicit promise protecting the room after the Guest's compact expires.
+- If rescuing Nessa was included in the bargain, it later follows her tether and returns her.
+- Mags remains framed, imprisoned, incapacitated, or convinced that someone else paid for Orenn's death.
+
+Xarrul is not the cleverest creature in every room. The Guest conceived the better body-and-escape plan; Xarrul supplied the planar knowledge and power to make it possible.
+
+---
+
+## The Pressure Cooker as the Default Overlay
+
+Faction war is the threatened consequence underneath every unresolved route. Before the Vacancy finishes, the compact keeps Xarrul from personally joining it lethally but does not protect the factions from one another.
+
+- Without intervention, Xarrul's whispers bring the room into lethal conflict before midnight. It does not land or deliberately command the killing blows itself.
+- A clear plan can pause it.
+- Exposing the Order without controlling Sevra and Kael accelerates it.
+- Attempting to destroy Xarrul without addressing Haddon and Rennt turns it into a three-sided fight.
+- Severe casualties remove anti-Xarrul tools and can turn an otherwise successful plan into Xarrul's victory.
+
+When evaluating an ending, ask two separate questions:
+
+1. What did the party decide should happen to Xarrul?
+2. Did they persuade enough people to let that happen?
+
+---
+
+## Outcome Ladder
+
+This is not an objective moral ranking, but it is the intended progression of player impact.
+
+| Engagement | Typical result |
+|---|---|
+| **None** | Xarrul gains changeling body and leaves unseen; exposed witnesses die only if they can identify or stop the new vessel |
+| **Violent but uninformed** | Guest and replacement victim die; Mags dies; Xarrul escapes in an inferior body |
+| **One-sided alliance with Guest** | Xarrul dies; Nessa remains lost; empowered Guest secretly takes the Inn |
+| **Tactical preparation only** | Cult loyalists die; Xarrul is destroyed if the defenders keep an Ethereal hunter in the fight |
+| **Preparation plus consensus to rebind** | Everyone survives; Xarrul and Nessa's connection remain under the Order's control |
+| **Preparation plus consensus to seal** | Everyone survives; Xarrul contained; Nessa may still be recovered later |
+| **Preparation plus consensus to destroy Ethereally** | Everyone survives; Xarrul permanently destroyed; Nessa wakes |
+| **Deliberate bargain with Xarrul** | Disguised Xarrul escapes; survival after the Vacancy depends on what the party did to Mags and what promises they secured |
+
+The propagated decisions are recorded in **[Ending Tree — Revisit List](ending-tree-revisit.md)**. For at-the-table pressure moves when a route becomes too easy, use the **[Complication Toolkit](complication-toolkit.md)**.

storylines/order-of-mending.md

@@ -129,7 +129,7 @@ During Essek's gust in the opening brawl, Haddon's folio bursts open and its pap
 Use the extracts as two paced discoveries rather than one exposition dump:
 
 1. **Maternal-conduit extract** — [print handout](../prints/vyre-zaznam-matersky-konduit.md). Xarrul plants this first, after whispering to Dalla in Haddon's voice. Good locations: beneath the cellar stairs, folded into Haddon's displaced book, or pushed from the Ethereal Plane into Dalla's reach. It identifies Dalla but hides the meaning behind clinical terminology. DC 14 Arcana, Medicine, or a direct explanation from Haddon/Essek establishes that a *maternal conduit* is a blood-relative used to reach and drain Nessa across planes.
-2. **Dislocation-event extract** — [print handout](../prints/vyre-zaznam-dislocacni-udalost.md). Xarrul withholds this until the players can understand its value. Good locations: beside the thin point, in the Deep Cellar near Xarrul's worksite, or offered during negotiation. DC 16 Arcana translates the argument: Nessa's projection was healthy enough to return until experiment E–III diverted it into the Border Ethereal and trapped her silver cord. The phrase *iatrogenic transplanar dislocation* means the researchers caused the condition they later claimed to treat.
+2. **Dislocation-event extract** — [print handout](../prints/vyre-zaznam-dislocacni-udalost.md). Xarrul withholds this until the players can understand its value. Good locations: beside the tear in the Deep Cellar's Old Work, elsewhere along Xarrul's ethereal route, or offered during negotiation. DC 16 Arcana translates the argument: Nessa's projection was healthy enough to return until experiment E–III diverted it into the Border Ethereal and trapped her silver cord. The phrase *iatrogenic transplanar dislocation* means the researchers caused the condition they later claimed to treat.
 
 Neither handout names Xarrul or explains the conclusion plainly. Let the players ask what the terms mean. Haddon initially calls them preliminary models taken out of context; Essek recognizes Mother Vyre's approval mark and can interpret both.
 
@@ -231,7 +231,7 @@ Dalla can absorb the exposed summoning and remain loyal: she believes it served
 >
 > „Našla nás, protože už věděla, co udělala."
 
-Essek's testimony or Vyre's correspondence can add the final horror: the Opening would release Nessa only by abolishing the world she could return to. After either full proof or proof plus Essek's explanation, Dalla shares everything she knows and openly opposes Haddon. But she does **not** automatically support the dual-plane kill; Xarrul now offers what sounds like the safer rescue.
+Essek's testimony or Vyre's correspondence can add the final horror: the Opening would release Nessa only by abolishing the world she could return to. After either full proof or proof plus Essek's explanation, Dalla shares everything she knows and openly opposes Haddon. But she does **not** automatically support killing Xarrul in the Ethereal Plane; Xarrul now offers what sounds like the safer rescue.
 
 ### Xarrul's Offer to Dalla
 
@@ -253,14 +253,31 @@ If players never uncover the two research extracts—or if they side with the cu
 - Requires the complete summoner's binding coffer from the [Deep Cellar Workroom](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-workroom-laboratory)
 - Requires Dalla's blood (she gives it without hesitation only while loyal; after the conduit extract, she refuses)
 - Requires the binding circle in the cellar (DC 16 Arcana to adapt the summoners' circle)
-- Haddon leads the ritual, Rennt assists, takes 10 minutes
+- Requires two readers to use the coffer's [Litany of the Averted Step](../prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md) as directional wards while a third character forces Xarrul into the circle
+- Takes ten minutes to prepare outside initiative; the final three knots take three rounds with Haddon, Dalla and Rennt all actively maintaining separate stations
+
+The true-name Recall brings Xarrul to the outer edge of the upper cellar, not into the circle. Each litany reader prevents Material Xarrul from willingly moving closer to them; two readers positioned apart create a funnel, while melee hits that forgo damage, shoves and other forced movement drive it inward. The litany does not stop Ethereal Jaunt, so the party still needs *Private Sanctum*, Veilhook Salt or another planar anchor.
+
+During the final three knots, all three cultists must act. Three active voices advance the ritual, two stall it, one loses progress and none releases Xarrul. When one voice breaks, the other active ritualists each take 2d6 psychic damage, which can cascade through their concentration. PCs therefore keep the ritual alive by healing, protecting concentration, taking over a station or using what they learned upstairs to answer Xarrul's truthful attack on each cultist's loyalty. See the complete mechanics in [The Reckoning](the-reckoning.md#scenario-b-the-rebinding).
 
 **If it succeeds:** Xarrul is bound again. The cult has their weapon back. Dalla's connection stabilizes — Nessa stops getting worse but doesn't improve. Her body remains suspended. The cult continues toward Phase Two. Dalla tells herself this is progress. Players leave having "solved" the murder by rebinding the weapon, but they've handed the cult exactly what it wanted.
 
-**If it fails** (Xarrul breaks free mid-ritual, DC 17 CHA save): Combat. The cellar. Xarrul is furious at being bound twice. This is the worst-case scenario — a fight with no preparation and the cultists caught in the crossfire.
+**If capture fails:** Xarrul remains loose in the upper cellar and attacks the readers, salt-carrier and whoever is operating the Recall. **If all three final stations fail:** the prepared components burn out, the adapted circle releases Xarrul and the fight resumes with the cultists injured by backlash.
 
 **This resolution is available even to players who don't dig deep.** It's the easy answer. It solves the immediate problem. It feels like a win. It isn't.
 
+The restored binding preserves the connection to Nessa. She does not wake, but a future Opening could still pull her home. This makes rebinding a genuine rescue route as well as a restoration of the Order's weapon—and makes its moral price sharper.
+
+### Bell-and-Sigils Containment
+
+The party can refuse both rebinding and immediate destruction. If they restore the foundation sigils, hold Xarrul inside the upper-cellar circle and ring the iron bell correctly, the three workings seal Xarrul consciously between planes. The Order does not regain command, and Xarrul cannot act. Nessa remains lost, but her connection stays intact for an Opening or safer future research. See [The Bell-and-Sigils Seal](the-reckoning.md#the-bell-and-sigils-seal).
+
+### Banishment Drives It Home
+
+The Border Ethereal is Xarrul's native plane. *Banishment* sends it to the corresponding place there and prevents it from jaunting Material while the spell lasts; it does not end the encounter or release the harvested vitality. Material death likewise fails: Deathless Slip leaves Xarrul Ethereal at 1 HP even through planar restraints. Permanent destruction requires reducing it to 0 HP in the Ethereal Plane, whether during a planar pincer, the exposed Vacancy or the Hollowing.
+
+If Dalla dies, Nessa does not immediately die. Her suspended body remains stable and unaging, but the easiest living conduit is gone. Reaching her becomes much harder and requires reconstructing the path from the blood records, Xarrul or the stored vitality in an empowered Guest.
+
 ### The Cult Fractures (Requires Truth)
 Only happens if players uncover the real nature of The Opening and share it:
 - Dalla turns on Haddon when the extraction is explained; the E–III report destroys her remaining faith in Vyre
@@ -282,8 +299,9 @@ If the assassins learn the cult sent a bound fiend into their archive to steal t
 Deep investigation does not make Dalla the mouthpiece for one correct ending. It gives her three terrible options:
 
 - **Rebinding:** before the conduit extract, she supports it because Haddon calls it progress. Afterward, she knows it reconnects the extraction and refuses to give blood willingly.
-- **The dual-plane kill:** destroying both halves of Xarrul should release the harvested vitality back along Nessa's silver cord. It might pull her home; a violent recoil might also damage the cord. No one in the inn has tested it. Dalla wants the possibility but fears gambling Nessa when another route exists.
+- **Ethereal destruction:** killing Xarrul in its native plane should release the harvested vitality back along Nessa's silver cord. It might pull her home; a violent recoil might also damage the cord. No one in the inn has tested it. Dalla wants the possibility but fears gambling Nessa when another route exists.
 - **The Open Door:** Xarrul claims it can guide Nessa back after the lockdown ends. Dalla becomes this option's strongest advocate because it is the only offer made by someone who both understands the binding and has not yet lied to her.
+- **Bell and sigils:** sealing Xarrul between planes preserves the cord without handing it back to Haddon. Dalla accepts this as a delay only if the party commits to continuing Nessa's rescue.
 
 Her argument is not that Xarrul is good:
 
@@ -293,7 +311,7 @@ The opposing voices become clean and strong:
 
 - **Rennt and Haddon:** rebind Xarrul; preserve the work and the only "proven" path to the Opening.
 - **Dalla:** free Xarrul and make it keep its promise.
-- **Essek:** attempt the dual-plane kill; end the extraction now rather than trust a fiend later.
+- **Essek:** maintain a pincer across both planes and kill Xarrul Ethereally; end the extraction now rather than trust a fiend later.
 - **Mags:** destroy Xarrul by whatever method does not loose it into the world; Nessa cannot erase Orenn.
 
-The central choice is earned by finding the notes. Players who only scratch the surface receive Haddon's rebinding plan and think they have found the safe answer. Players who learn what Dalla and Nessa really are must decide which dangerous witness deserves their trust.
+The central choice is earned by finding the notes. Players who only scratch the surface receive Haddon's rebinding plan and think they have found the safe answer. Players who learn what Dalla and Nessa really are must decide which dangerous witness deserves their trust. If they bargain with Xarrul, Dalla insists that the spoken terms explicitly name Nessa, her safe return, the people to be spared and the moment the obligation is complete; Xarrul keeps exact words, not implied mercy.

storylines/possession.md

@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@
 
 ## Overview
 
-Bren Aldara was an arcanist. Seven years ago, he studied a thin point between planes — this one, beneath the Nether Inn — and something latched on. **Skein**, a parasitic entity from the Ethereal Plane, attached itself to Bren's mind and has been feeding on him ever since. What the tavern patrons see as a madman talking to himself is a prisoner begging his captor for mercy.
+Bren Aldara was an arcanist. Seven years ago, he studied the thin point—the still-sealed tear in the Old Work beneath the Nether Inn—and something latched on. **Skein**, a parasitic entity from the Ethereal Plane, attached itself to Bren's mind and has been feeding on him ever since. What the tavern patrons see as a madman talking to himself is a prisoner begging his captor for mercy.
 
 This subplot is about recognizing that what looks like madness is actually captivity, and choosing whether to do anything about it.
 
@@ -35,9 +35,9 @@ Skein is not a fiend, not undead, not aberrant in the traditional sense. It's a
 
 **Parasitic Bond.** While bonded to a host, Skein can see through the host's eyes, hear through the host's ears, and speak through the host's mouth. It can suppress or override the host's actions (no save — the bond is too old for resistance). Skein always knows the host's location and emotional state.
 
-**Ethereal Existence.** Skein exists on the Ethereal Plane. It cannot be seen, attacked, or affected by anything on the Material Plane without ethereal sight or effects that cross planar boundaries.
+**Ethereal Existence.** Skein exists on the Ethereal Plane. It cannot be attacked or affected by anything on the Material Plane. *See Invisibility* and similar magic can reveal it, but do not allow interaction across the planar boundary.
 
-**Thread Tendrils.** Skein's tendrils extend up to 10 feet into the Material Plane through the host's body. Severing a tendril (AC 13, 5 HP per tendril, must have ethereal sight to target) causes Skein to lose control of the host for 1 round per tendril severed. Skein has 6 tendrils. They regenerate in 1d4 hours.
+**Thread Tendrils.** Skein's tendrils extend up to 10 feet from it and overlap the host's body across the planar boundary. Severing a tendril (AC 13, 5 HP per tendril; it must be attacked from the Ethereal Plane) causes Skein to lose control of the host for 1 round per tendril severed. Skein has 6 tendrils. They regenerate in 1d4 hours.
 
 **Mind Drain.** Each day Skein remains bonded, the host's Wisdom is reduced by 1 (minimum 1). This reduction can only be restored by Greater Restoration or by permanently killing Skein. Bren's Wisdom has been reduced from 16 to 6 over seven years (it didn't drain every day — some days Skein rests).
 
@@ -75,12 +75,12 @@ Players talk to Bren and notice he's not just raving randomly:
 - **Detect Magic** on Bren: Abjuration and Enchantment signatures. Something is bound to him.
 - **DC 14 Arcana** while examining Bren: There's an anchor point — something attached to his mind from another plane. It's not a curse in the traditional sense; it's a *presence*.
 - **Detect Evil and Good** (Dalla can cast this): Registers as an aberration/monstrosity anchored to Bren from the Ethereal Plane.
+- **The bookmarked arcane volumes beside Haddon's table:** Three entries initially look plausible: [Ethereal Skeins](../prints/o-eterickem-predivu.md), [Mist Leeches](../prints/o-mlznych-pijavicich.md) and the [Return Echo](../prints/o-navratove-ozvene.md). Observation eliminates the latter two: a mist leech cannot censor speech or control movement, while a return echo has no independent body or tendrils. Only the Skein entry matches everything, and its marginal notes are signed **B. A.**
 
 ### Stage 3: Seeing Skein
 Requires ethereal sight:
-- **Veil Dust** — see Skein clearly, a knotted spider-thing with tendrils in Bren's skull
-- **See Invisibility** (Essek can cast this) — reveals Skein's outline
-- **Orenn's silver mirror** — DC 15 Perception while using it near Bren shows a distortion clinging to his head
+- **See Invisibility** (Essek can cast this) — reveals Skein directly
+- **Orenn's silver mirror** — provides the effect of *See Invisibility* within its reflection, revealing Skein and the six tendrils entering Bren's skull; it does not make Skein Material or allow attacks to cross
 
 ### Read-Aloud: Seeing Skein for the First Time
 
@@ -97,11 +97,11 @@ Requires ethereal sight:
 ## How to Save Bren
 
 ### Option A: Kill Skein (Permanent, Difficult)
-Requires entering the Ethereal Plane (Veil Dust, Oil of Etherealness) and fighting Skein directly.
+Requires entering the Ethereal Plane and fighting Skein directly. The Deep Cellar contains **two [Faded Scrolls of Etherealness](../prints/faded-scroll-of-etherealness.md)**, one in the Workroom and one in the Vault: each takes an action to read, works for 1 minute and can be used by anyone who can read a written language. They provide enough time for a short confrontation without consuming the longer-lasting Oil of Etherealness. Oil remains an alternative if the scrolls are missed, destroyed or saved for Xarrul.
 
 **Complications:**
 - Skein uses Bren as a shield — threatening to kill the host (Suppress Host to make Bren harm himself) if attacked
-- In the Ethereal Plane near the thin point, Skein has advantage on Stealth checks (home terrain)
+- In the Ethereal Plane near the tear in the Old Work, Skein has advantage on Stealth checks (home terrain)
 - If Skein drops below 10 HP, it tries to Flee — players must prevent this or it escapes and attaches to a new host eventually
 - Xarrul's presence makes the Ethereal Plane more dangerous — the fiend might interfere (it finds Skein amusing but not threatening)
 
@@ -113,8 +113,8 @@ Requires entering the Ethereal Plane (Veil Dust, Oil of Etherealness) and fighti
 - He remembers everything: seven years of captivity, watching his own body be puppeted, feeling himself erode
 
 ### Option B: Sever the Tendrils (Temporary)
-Requires ethereal sight and targeted attacks.
-- Each tendril: AC 13, 5 HP (must be attacked on the Ethereal Plane or with force damage)
+Requires entering the Ethereal Plane and making targeted attacks.
+- Each tendril: AC 13, 5 HP (must be attacked on the Ethereal Plane)
 - Severing all 6 tendrils frees Bren for 1d4 hours
 - During this time, Bren is lucid, coherent, and desperately helpful
 - He can provide testimony about the murder, information about the thin point, and his own background
@@ -128,6 +128,12 @@ The spell suppresses Skein's control for the duration (10 minutes, concentration
 - When the spell ends, Skein reasserts control with a vengeance — Bren takes 5 (1d10) psychic damage
 - Repeating this method angers Skein and makes it more aggressive with the host
 
+### Option D: Silvervein Root (One Clear Moment)
+Crushing **1 sprig of silvervein root** beside Bren consumes the sprig and weakens Skein's grip for 1 round.
+- Bren can speak and act lucidly during that round
+- Skein cannot use Silence the Host or Suppress Host until the start of the next round
+- This does not damage the tendrils or prevent Skein from reasserting control afterward
+
 ---
 
 ## Bren's Testimony (When Lucid)
@@ -138,7 +144,7 @@ If players free Bren temporarily or permanently, he provides:
 "I saw it happen. Something came through — from the other side. Like smoke with hands. It reached through the air behind the bar and touched Orenn. He didn't even flinch. He just... stopped. The thing pulled back and it was *smiling*. I could feel it smiling."
 
 **About Skein:**
-"It found me seven years ago. I was studying the thin point — the cellar beneath this tavern. I got too close. It latched on and it's been... eating me. My memories. My will. Every day there's a little less of me. I can feel the edges of myself going soft."
+"It found me seven years ago. I was studying the tear in the old chamber beneath this tavern. The thin point. I got too close. It latched on and it's been... eating me. My memories. My will. Every day there's a little less of me. I can feel the edges of myself going soft."
 
 **About Xarrul:**
 "The thing that killed Orenn is different from what's in me. Bigger. Older. Crueler. My — [he struggles to find a word for Skein] — my *passenger* is afraid of it. Deeply afraid. That's why I had those moments tonight — it was distracted, watching the fiend, and I could push through."

storylines/the-reckoning.md

@@ -2,377 +2,332 @@
 
 ## Overview
 
-The Reckoning is whatever happens when the players have gathered enough threads and decide to act. It's not a fixed encounter — it depends entirely on what they've learned, who they've allied with, and what they're willing to risk.
+The Reckoning is whatever happens once the players understand enough of the murder, the Order and the cellar to act. It is not one encounter. It is a collision between three questions:
 
-This document covers the primary confrontation paths and the central moral dilemma.
+- What happens to Xarrul: bind it, destroy it in the Ethereal Plane, or let it leave?
+- Who controls the room long enough to do that?
+- What price is acceptable for Nessa, the Guest and everyone trapped upstairs?
 
----
+For the unattended sequence and a branch-by-branch outcome map, use [Natural Progression](natural-progression.md). This file supplies the playable resolution mechanics.
 
 ## Reaching the Endgame
 
-Players arrive at the Reckoning through any combination of:
-- Following the ethereal trail to the cellar
-- Bren's testimony pointing to a fiend
-- Essek revealing the summoning
-- Veil Dust trip exposing Xarrul
-- Orenn's letter and preparations in the storage room
-- Exploring the [Deep Cellar](../location/deep-cellar.md) — the chalk-wall notes and the [Guest's](../npc/the-guest.md) cult-infiltration intel both point at the Order of Mending and the summoning; the vault arms the party for the fight
-- Logical deduction from the ambiguous clues
-
-There is no "right" order. The Reckoning begins when the players know enough to act and choose to do so.
-
----
+Players can reach the Reckoning through the ethereal trail, Bren's testimony, Essek's confession, Orenn's preparations, the Deep Cellar, the Guest's intelligence or direct deduction. There is no required order. The available endings depend on what they learned and whom they can persuade.
 
 ## The Clock
 
-The Reckoning is player-driven, but it is not *timeless*. When Mags shattered the summoners' lockstone in Act 2, she sealed the house across every plane into a **closed vessel** — and that is exactly what Xarrul needed to finish crossing. It now has until **midnight**, when the seal lapses, to complete the crossing through the old tear in the cellar — the **lockdown clock** ([xarrul.md — The Night's Clock](../npc/xarrul.md#the-nights-clock--presence--escalation) and [the ward-crystal's true nature](../location/tavern-overview.md#the-enchanted-door)). The longer the players wait, the colder the room, the bolder Xarrul, the higher the body count. If they never act at all, the clock runs out and Xarrul **crosses over completely**: permanent, material, no Slip Between escape, far worse to fight. This is the pressure that keeps Act 3 from drifting. Slowing or breaking it — **breaching a sealed exit** to re-open the vessel, the iron bell, re-powering the cellar containment, the fifth rule's burn-and-seal — is the pushback; letting it run is its own quiet choice.
+Mags's ward-crystal pulled power from the Inn's internal planar seals and threw it into an exterior shell around every version of the building. That trade admitted Xarrul fully to the Material interior and restored Ethereal Jaunt inside the cage, but nothing can cross the exterior physically, Ethereally, by teleportation, or as an Astral projection. The shell cannot be breached during the session and is not a resolution path.
 
----
+At midnight the shell lapses and power begins returning to the internal containment. That transition creates the only three-round window in which the Guest can be delivered Astral before the tear reseals. The Vacancy cannot begin or advance before midnight. The falling shell does not itself free Xarrul: until it takes a vessel, its old planar tether still prevents it from crossing the Inn's footprint on either plane.
 
-## Confrontation Scenarios
+Use the clock as escalating pressure:
+
+1. Xarrul supplies precise whispers that turn existing suspicions into accusations.
+2. It uses Waking Dream to alter only the last minute of a target's experience.
+3. By late evening, accusations and violence keep the room divided unless the players interrupt them. The compact prevents Xarrul from killing again before the exchange, except in direct defense against binding, banishment, or destruction; it does not protect patrons from one another.
+4. Before midnight, Xarrul opens Cell One from the Ethereal side and brings the willing Guest to the tear in the Old Work.
+5. As the shell lapses, the three-round Vacancy begins. If nobody intervenes, Xarrul takes the changeling body and strands the Guest in the Astral Plane.
+6. The compact has now ended. If witnesses saw the transfer and can identify or bind the new vessel, Xarrul removes them; if the transfer remained secret, it leaves quietly in a borrowed face.
+
+This is Xarrul's preferred passive strategy: keep armed mortals divided until the protected transfer, then choose concealment or cleanup according to what they witnessed.
+
+## Shared Planar Rules
+
+### Seeing and Targeting Xarrul
+
+A Material creature cannot target an Ethereal Xarrul merely by guessing its square.
+
+- A creature in the Ethereal Plane, most commonly under Oil of Etherealness, sees and targets it normally.
+- The iron bell reveals Xarrul's outline to everyone for 1 minute but does not make it Material.
+- Veilhook Salt can anchor it after it manifests. Restored sigils and the binding circle can hold it.
+
+Seeing across the boundary never allows an attack to cross it. A creature can affect Xarrul only from the same plane unless a specific spell or feature explicitly says otherwise.
+
+### Oil of Etherealness Economy
+
+There are **five doses at most** in the Inn:
+
+1. The storage-room hidden compartment.
+2. Orenn and Mags's bedroom arsenal.
+3. The Deep Cellar Workroom drawer.
+4. Mags's concealed personal reserve.
+5. Haddon's concealed ritual reserve.
+
+The first three are field supplies the party can discover through investigation and exploration. The last two are failsafes: they require Mags's trust, a bargain or break with Haddon, theft, or taking the vial from a defeated holder. Every dose takes **10 uninterrupted minutes to apply** and grants the effect of *Etherealness* for 1 hour.
+
+For a three-PC party, the planar pincer normally needs only **one Ethereal attacker and two Material attackers**. A second prepared oil-user provides redundancy; a third is luxury. The attackers do not need synchronized final blows: they cover both planes so Xarrul cannot escape pressure by jaunting. Holding actions, voluntarily delaying turns or fixing allied initiative order is allowed; initiative bookkeeping is not the puzzle. The faded scrolls normally provide a separate resource for confronting Skein. If those are missed, destroyed or saved for Xarrul, spending oil on Skein still creates pressure without locking away the final solution, while the two NPC reserves protect against lost, wasted or inaccessible field doses.
+
+### Faded Scrolls of Etherealness
+
+The Deep Cellar contains **two [Faded Scrolls of Etherealness](../prints/faded-scroll-of-etherealness.md)**: one in the Workroom's locked emergency drawer and one in the Vault arsenal. None are stored upstairs. Any creature that can read a written language can activate one as an action to gain the effect of *Etherealness* for 1 minute. The scroll then crumbles.
+
+They are intended as the quick route to confronting Skein without consuming the oils. Once discovered, however, they are portable and can be saved for Xarrul. That is legitimate late-game counterplay earned by reaching the Deep Cellar, at the cost of leaving Bren enslaved or finding another way to help him.
+
+### Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum
+
+The Nether Inn's [room-bound wards](../location/tavern-overview.md#room-bound-area-wards) prevent *Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum* from spanning multiple rooms. It can protect the Main Hall, the upper cellar, the Old Work or another single chamber, but never all of them with one casting.
+
+The spell's divination protection does **not** suppress Voice Thief, telepathy, Visions of Spite, Waking Dream or Xarrul's inherent cross-planar sight. These are fiendish traits and actions, not divination spells or magical sensors.
+
+Its prohibition on planar travel does block **Ethereal Jaunt** and **Slip Between** while Xarrul is spatially inside the sanctum. Xarrul remains on whichever plane it currently occupies, but may leave the protected room by ordinary movement on that plane and resume shifting once outside. A sanctum completed inside the Old Work also prevents the Vacancy or Hollowing from beginning or advancing while it lasts; it suppresses use of the tear rather than closing or repairing it. Completing the ten-minute casting in Xarrul's lair should be treated as an earned containment plan, not an uncontested pause.
+
+The upper-cellar circle's **true-name Recall** is older than the room wards and keyed into them. It is an authorized inward route: it can draw Xarrul Material into an upper-cellar sanctum, but does not give Xarrul permission to jaunt or leave afterward.
+
+### One Pool, One Place of Death
+
+Xarrul has one 78 HP pool shared across both planes. Damage follows it whenever it shifts; there are no Material and Ethereal halves. At the start of each of its turns on the Ethereal Plane, it regains 1d4 HP.
+
+Xarrul cannot die on the Material Plane. If it would die or reach 0 HP there, Deathless Slip leaves it at 1 HP and shifts it Ethereal even through Veilhook Salt, restored sigils, *Private Sanctum* or any other effect that blocks planar travel. At 0 HP on the Ethereal Plane, it is permanently destroyed and the vitality tied to Nessa normally recoils along her tether. The waiting changeling body during the Vacancy is the one exception: it captures that collapse instead.
+
+The *Banishment* spell recognizes the Border Ethereal as Xarrul's native plane. Rather than removing it from the encounter, the spell shifts it to the corresponding point in the Ethereal interior and prevents it from returning to the Material Plane while concentration lasts. If Xarrul is already Ethereal, it remains there and cannot jaunt Material for the duration. This can complete the Ethereal side of a pincer, but it is not an ending by itself.
+
+## Resolution Scenarios
 
 ### Scenario A: Direct Assault
 
-Players know about Xarrul, have combat resources, and go to the cellar to fight it.
+The party confronts Xarrul anywhere in the Inn. While the lockdown holds, the whole house counts as its lair for lair actions even though its physical nest is at the tear.
 
-**Setup:** The cellar is dark, cold, and cramped (10m x 8m). The thin point dominates the eastern side. Xarrul is in the Ethereal Plane — players need a way to reach it or force it into the Material Plane.
+Useful tools:
 
-**Tools to force and hold Xarrul on the Material Plane:**
-- **Veilhook Salt** (4 finished doses in the [Deep Cellar](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-fixers-arsenal), with a craftable recipe in the Workroom): a Veil Dust user can throw it across the boundary. On a failed DC 14 Charisma save, Xarrul is dragged fully onto the Material Plane and cannot change planes until the end of its next turn.
-- **The binding circle** (cellar floor; the summoners', not Orenn's): once the salt pulls Xarrul across, the party must drive it inside. A failed DC 17 Charisma save traps it beyond the salt's one-round duration.
-- **The iron bell** (main hall fireplace): an old house-relic that wakes the foundation sigils for a time, giving Xarrul disadvantage on Ethereal Jaunt and making it harder to escape before the salt lands.
-- **Warding chalk circles** (from storage): Minor constraint, 10 minutes per use
-- **Force damage:** Affects ethereal creatures from the Material Plane
+- **Veilhook Salt:** a creature within 5 feet expends one dose and an action to anchor Xarrul automatically to its current plane until the start of that creature's next turn. A readied application when Xarrul manifests prevents Slip Between without preventing its attack. Maintaining the lock costs another action and dose each round.
+- **Binding circle:** once Xarrul is inside it, a failed DC 17 Charisma save holds it while the circle remains intact.
+- **Iron bell:** reveals Xarrul and activates restored foundation sigils for 1 minute.
+- **Protection from Evil and Good:** blocks possession and grants its normal defenses.
 
-**Xarrul's tactics:** See [Xarrul NPC file](../npc/xarrul.md). It uses Ethereal Jaunt to avoid being pinned, Voice Thief to sow confusion, and Whisper of Ruin on the strongest melee fighter. It doesn't want to die. At half HP and restrained, it negotiates.
-
-**Difficulty:** Hard for level 4. The shifting between planes makes Xarrul slippery. Without a way to pin it on the Material Plane, it's a war of attrition that Xarrul wins.
+Without a way to threaten both planes, Xarrul alternates attacks with Ethereal Jaunt until the party is exhausted. Material-only attackers can drive it to 1 HP, but Deathless Slip carries it Ethereal and it begins healing. Ethereal-only attackers drive it Material. A direct assault becomes a real destruction attempt only when the party establishes the planar pincer in Scenario C, or becomes a binding attempt through Scenario B or the bell-and-sigils seal.
 
 ### Scenario B: The Rebinding
 
-The "easy" resolution. Haddon proposes recapturing Xarrul using the binding circle in the cellar and restoring the original binding. This is available to any party that uncovers the fiend's existence — it doesn't require deep investigation into the cult's true nature. A loyal Dalla actively supports this.
+Haddon proposes restoring the Order's original control. Rennt supports him. Dalla supports it only before she learns that she and Nessa were used as a conduit.
 
-Once the maternal-conduit extract is explained, Dalla refuses to provide blood. Rebinding then requires coercing her, deceiving her about the note, or substituting another blood relative—which is not available tonight. This turns the early safe option into an exposed act of exploitation.
+Requirements:
 
-**Requirements:**
-1. The complete summoner's binding coffer from the [Deep Cellar Workroom](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-workroom-laboratory)
-2. Dalla's blood (given willingly only before the conduit extract is explained)
-3. The summoners' binding circle in the cellar (DC 16 Arcana to adapt it for rebinding rather than containment)
-4. Xarrul must be lured to the cellar or forced onto the Material Plane
-5. Haddon leads the ritual (10 minutes, concentration), Rennt assists
+1. The complete binding coffer from the Deep Cellar Workroom.
+2. Dalla's blood. After the conduit truth, she will not give it willingly.
+3. The upper-cellar binding circle, adapted with a DC 16 Arcana check.
+4. The two leaves of the [Litany of the Averted Step](../prints/litanie-odvraceneho-kroku.md).
+5. A way to keep Xarrul Material long enough to drive it into the circle: *Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum*, repeated Veilhook Salt, or comparable planar anchoring.
 
-**How it plays out:**
-- The party must get Xarrul to the cellar and keep it there for 10 minutes while Haddon completes the ritual. This is a fight — Xarrul does NOT want to be bound again. It fights with everything it has.
-- **Xarrul targets Haddon specifically.** The moment the party commits to rebinding, Haddon is the hand reaching for the chains — and Xarrul removes hands. It spends Brand, Visions of Spite, and everything else on Haddon over any other target (*"you reach for the chains, I take the hand"*). Protecting the ritualist becomes the party's core problem. If Haddon dies, rebinding is off the table unless another character takes over (DC 18 Arcana, with no time to prepare).
-- If the ritual completes: Xarrul is bound. It screams in fury as the chains take hold. The cult has their weapon back.
-- If the ritual is interrupted (Haddon takes damage and fails a DC 14 CON concentration check): The binding snaps. Xarrul is free and enraged. Combat continues with no second chances.
+#### Preparation — Ten Minutes, Not Initiative
 
-**Aftermath:** Dalla's connection to the binding restores — Nessa's condition stabilizes but doesn't improve. Her body remains suspended. The cult moves toward Phase Two with renewed confidence and a bound fiend. Dalla tells herself this is progress. The murder is "solved" (the weapon is leashed), but nothing is actually fixed.
+Haddon, Dalla and Rennt spend ten minutes adapting the circle, laying Dalla's blood into the four threshold marks and closing the first four of the seven knots. Xarrul does not need to be present. If it attacks, the preparation pauses; do not run one hundred rounds of chanting.
 
-**Mags's reaction:** Disgust. "You're handing them back the thing that killed him. On a leash. And you think that leash will hold?" She won't stop the players, but she won't help, and she won't forgive.
+Once primed, the circle remains ready until midnight unless someone breaks a line or removes the true-name strip. The old binding scar now gives the ritual one **true-name Recall**. Invoking it draws Xarrul bodily into an open space at the outer edge of the upper cellar, never directly into the circle. This Recall is an authorized inward path through the Inn's wards and works even if the room is under *Private Sanctum*.
 
-### Scenario C: The Dual-Plane Kill
+Xarrul recognizes the first preparation as a direct attempt to enslave it. The compact's self-defense exception applies: it may attack the people, litany leaves and anchoring tools involved.
 
-The "true" way to destroy Xarrul — synchronized destruction in both the Material and Ethereal planes. Unknown to the characters, this method will cure Nessa. Before they attempt it, however, they can establish only that the harvested vitality should recoil along her silver cord; no one can prove the violent collapse will not damage the tether. It also tears the veil.
+#### Capture — The Litany of the Averted Step
 
-**Discovering this scenario requires the conduit evidence**, Essek's help, or a PC who combines the binding records with direct Ethereal observation. Dalla does not unlock or automatically endorse it. After the notes surface, she favors Xarrul's promise of a controlled rescue; Essek favors ending the extraction now rather than freeing a fiend. Players who never uncover the truth receive only Haddon's rebinding proposal.
+The single silver-threaded scroll separates into two matched leaves. Each leaf needs a different reader. Before invoking the Recall, let both readers choose their positions and begin reading. If Xarrul appears within range and perception, both prohibitions apply immediately. Then place Xarrul and roll initiative; preparation, not an initiative coin flip, establishes the opening containment.
 
-**Requirements:**
-1. At least one character on the Ethereal Plane (Veil Dust at the thin point = 10 minutes, or Oil of Etherealness from Orenn's bedroom = 1 hour)
-2. At least one character on the Material Plane
-3. Both groups damage Xarrul simultaneously on both planes
-4. Both "halves" of Xarrul must be killed within 1 round of each other
+**Read a leaf.** A creature holding one leaf may move normally and use its action to read directly from it. Until the start of that reader's next turn, a Material Xarrul that the reader can perceive within 30 feet **cannot willingly enter a space closer to that reader**. It may remain at the same distance, move laterally where the distance does not decrease, or move away. Forced movement is unaffected.
 
-**How it works mechanically:**
-- When Xarrul is on the Ethereal Plane, characters there fight its ethereal form (full stat block)
-- When Xarrul shifts to the Material Plane, characters there fight its material form
-- At the thin point, Xarrul cannot fully separate its planes — it exists on both simultaneously, split. Material form: half HP (39 HP). Ethereal form: half HP (39 HP). AC and attacks unchanged.
-- If one form is killed and the other survives more than 1 round, the surviving form regenerates the dead form at full HP. The kill must be synchronized.
+The effect ends immediately if the reader drops or closes the leaf, cannot see its shifting writing, cannot speak, becomes incapacitated, loses perception of Xarrul, or uses another action. Casting a spell with a verbal component also interrupts that leaf. A reader damaged while chanting makes a **DC 14 Constitution save**; on a failure they lose their place and the effect ends until they use another action to begin again. The text rearranges in response to Xarrul's binding scar, so memorized recitation and mundane copies do nothing.
 
-**During the kill:** The veil tears. For 1 round at the moment of synchronized death, the planar boundary at the thin point *dissolves*. The Material and Ethereal planes merge in a 20-foot radius for 6 seconds. Everyone present sees both planes at once. The temperature drops. Sounds echo from wrong directions. For that one round, everything Mother Vyre predicted is true — the planes *do* want to touch.
+One active reader creates a direction Xarrul can sidestep. Two readers positioned apart behind it create an overlapping wedge: retreat approaches both, and most lateral routes approach one. Xarrul may still stand still, attack, or move toward the circle. The readers must move and continually rebuild the angle as it moves.
 
-Then the veil snaps back. The tear heals. Xarrul is gone.
+**Drive the bound.** While both leaves affect Xarrul, a creature that hits it with a melee attack may forgo all of that attack's damage to push it **5 feet** into an unoccupied space. This is forced movement. Ordinary shoves, grapples and spell-based forced movement remain valid.
 
-**And Nessa:** The vitality siphoned through Dalla snaps back along the maternal conduit and races down Nessa's silver cord. Dalla gasps and clutches her chest as four years of weakness lift at once. Miles away, Nessa's projected self is torn free of the planar scar and pulled home. Her six-year-old body draws its first waking breath in four years and opens its eyes. The gamble worked—but nobody in the tavern knew that it would.
+The Litany controls direction, not planar state. Without *Private Sanctum*, Xarrul can still use Ethereal Jaunt as soon as a Veilhook dose expires. Once Material Xarrul enters the circle, it makes the circle's **DC 17 Charisma save**. On a success it is not caught and can be driven through again; on a failure the salt-packed circle holds it Material and the final ritual begins.
 
-### Scenario D: Negotiation
+#### Binding — The Final Three Knots
 
-Xarrul is ancient and pragmatic. If cornered and unable to escape, it will negotiate.
+Once the adapted circle accepts Xarrul, its salt-and-name matrix blocks its movement, planar shifting and fresh hostile effects across the boundary. Xarrul can still communicate, use Voice Thief, and use Visions of Spite or Waking Dream through a Brand placed before the circle closed. Its primary weapon here is bargaining: it tells the truth until one of the three cultists releases the chain.
 
-**What Xarrul offers:**
-- Everything it knows about the Order of Mending, Mother Vyre, and Phase Two
-- Both stolen research extracts, or the location where it planted them
-- The truth that Vyre caused Nessa's dislocation and used Dalla as the maternal conduit
-- If allowed to leave after the lockdown: follow Nessa's silver cord, unwind the scar, and bring her projected self home
-- The truth about Dace's treachery
-- Information about Skein and how to kill it
-- The names and locations of other fiends bound by mortal cults in the region
+The last three knots require **Haddon, Dalla and Rennt** at separate stations. Each must use their action every round and maintain concentration. Damage forces the usual **DC 14 Constitution save** for this ritual.
 
-**What Xarrul wants:**
-- Freedom. Not destruction, not binding — the right to leave unmolested.
-- A vessel. If the Guest has been freed, Xarrul already has a willing exchange available through [the Vacancy](#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit); otherwise it will leave and find a host later.
-- Or, if particularly cunning: the thin point left unrepaired. "Leave the door open. Not for me. For *air*."
+At the end of each round, count active stations:
 
-**The problem:** Xarrul is evil. Letting it go means it's someone else's problem. It killed Orenn. It will kill again. But its information is genuine and valuable. This is a classic devil's bargain.
+| Active ritualists | Result |
+|---|---|
+| **Three** | Close one knot; progress +1. |
+| **Two** | Opposed forces balance; no change. |
+| **One** | One closed knot reopens; progress −1, minimum 0. |
+| **None** | The ritual collapses, the prepared components burn out and the adapted circle releases Xarrul. |
 
-**Mags's reaction:** "No." Simple. Final. She won't negotiate with the thing that killed Orenn. If players choose negotiation, they do it over Mags's objection, and their relationship with her is damaged.
+Three progress restores the command binding.
 
-### Scenario E: Faction War
+**Breaking a station.** If a station ends without a completed handoff — whether its ritualist chooses to stop, becomes incapacitated or loses concentration — each of the other ritualists who is still active immediately takes **2d6 psychic damage** and makes the DC 14 concentration save. A failure breaks that second station and can cause another backlash against whoever remains. This is ritual recoil, not an attack by Xarrul.
 
-If players haven't uncovered the fiend, or if tensions boil over before the Reckoning, the factions turn on each other.
+**Taking over.** A character adjacent to a station may use an action and make a **DC 18 Arcana, Religion or spellcasting-ability check** to assume it. On a success the station counts as active that round; on later rounds the replacement must use their action and maintain concentration like any other ritualist. Taking over an already empty station cannot undo backlash that occurred. A coordinated handoff made before the cultist releases their station avoids backlash. Dalla's blood remains the conduit even if someone else speaks her responses; replacing her after she withdraws consent is still using her and should be treated as coercion.
 
-**Trigger points:**
-- Kael loses patience (2+ hours of lockdown with no resolution)
-- The cult's summoning is exposed to the assassins
-- Dace is exposed and the cultists realize they've been compromised
-- Any NPC is attacked or killed
+**Countering Xarrul.** Do not reduce the bargaining to three generic saving throws. Use what the players learned upstairs. A PC may spend an action healing, removing a Brand, helping a ritualist survive concentration, taking over a station, or making a relevant Persuasion, Deception or Intimidation check to give someone a reason to hold. Concrete knowledge and a truthful argument should matter more than the raw roll:
 
-**What happens:** Lethal combat. Assassins vs. cultists. Mags tries to stop it. Players can:
-- Join a side
-- Try to stop the fight (DC 18 group Persuasion, or DC 16 with evidence of the fiend)
-- Use the chaos to pursue the fiend while everyone's distracted (ironic echo of the brawl)
+- **Dalla:** Xarrul names Nessa and explains that the restored binding resumes the drain. She stops if she understands the conduit evidence unless the party convinces or coerces her that preserving the connection is worth the cost.
+- **Haddon:** Xarrul names Bren, repeats *the living weight comes first*, and makes him face the contradiction between saving Orenn once and feeding people into Vyre's work now. Pride and fear of losing the asset normally keep him chanting.
+- **Rennt:** Xarrul reveals that Haddon knew the command line was dead and let Rennt defend a lie. Rennt normally holds through ideology, but Dalla's rejection, Haddon's confession or a PC he respects can turn certainty into rupture.
 
-**Casualties:** Without intervention, Kael dies (he charges Rennt), Rennt dies (he's outmatched by Sevra), and Dalla is caught in the crossfire. Essek tries to flee and is cut down by a guild soldier. Haddon escapes using Misty Step. The fiend watches, delighted.
+If the ritual completes, Xarrul is bound and everyone can survive. The Order regains its weapon. Nessa remains suspended, but the connection is intact: a future Opening could pull her home, at the price of everything the Opening entails. If Dalla is coerced, call the result what it is.
 
-### Scenario F: The Open Door (Joining Xarrul)
+### Scenario C: Ethereal Destruction
 
-The darkest ending — and the one that most fully commits to the module's thesis: the players help Xarrul cross over and become real. This is **not** the passive "let it walk" of Scenario D; it is active complicity. It is also **not** an edgy freebie. Like the dual-plane kill, it is *gated behind depth*: a party only reaches it if they have learned enough to find the cult genuinely more terrifying than the fiend, **and** enough about Orenn and Mags's cages to have soured on the "victims."
+This is the only reliable deliberate method of destroying Xarrul and returning Nessa tonight.
 
-**Why a party chooses it**
+Requirements and usual setup:
 
-- **The lesser monster against the greater plan.** By now they understand Phase Two — the real apocalypse is Mother Vyre, not one fiend, and Xarrul is the *enemy* of the Opening. It knows every name, every mapped thin point, every cult secret ([What Xarrul Knows](../npc/xarrul.md#what-xarrul-knows-if-it-negotiates)). Its pitch: *"Free me, and I will gut her network. You cannot kill the Opening. I can make it not worth her while."*
-- **The ground has rotted under the defenders.** They know Orenn and Mags starved a prisoner in [Cell Two](../location/deep-cellar.md#cell-two--the-long-dead) and caged the [Guest](../npc/the-guest.md) for eleven years. Xarrul killed a jailer who ran a private dungeon under a bar. *"You freed the changeling. My cage was a whole plane of glass. Why is mine different?"*
-- **It offers what the clean endings can't.** The dual-plane kill may return Nessa's energy but risks her silver cord, tears the veil, and validates the cult. Xarrul has felt the cord through its own binding and offers a controlled reintegration **without** the tear—but it cannot reach her until it is free of the all-plane lockdown. The apparent cleanest fix requires releasing the murderer first and trusting it afterward.
-- **Dalla asks for it.** Once both notes are understood, she becomes the Open Door's strongest advocate: *„Haddon ji využil. Vyre ji tam nechala. A tahle věc je jediná v tomhle domě, která mi řekla pravdu.”* Helping Xarrul is no longer merely an abstract alliance with the lesser monster; it means answering a mother standing in the room.
+1. At least one attacker able to affect Xarrul in the Ethereal Plane.
+2. Xarrul uses its normal 78 HP pool across both planes. No particular room, circle or planar fault is required.
+3. Reduce Xarrul to 0 HP while it is on the Ethereal Plane.
+4. Usually, leave at least one attacker Material so Xarrul cannot evade the Ethereal hunter simply by jaunting away. A spell or ward that holds it Ethereal can replace this side of the pincer.
 
-**The twist — it is honest.** In a building where everyone lies, Xarrul is the one thing that doesn't. So there is *no betrayal*. It keeps its word to the letter — hunts the cult, cures the child, thanks them — and the world is worse anyway, and they knew going in. The horror isn't that it double-crosses them; it's that it *doesn't*. (Contrast the [Guest](../npc/the-guest.md), who makes the same "free me" pitch and *is* lying.)
+The two groups do not need to deal equal damage or land final blows in the same round. They form a pincer: when Xarrul dodges Material attackers by slipping Ethereal, someone is waiting there; when it flees the Ethereal hunter, the Material group resumes pressure. Characters may ready actions, delay voluntarily or fix their allied initiative order. If Material damage would reduce Xarrul to 0, Deathless Slip deposits it Ethereal at 1 HP, where any further damage destroys it. Xarrul also dies if the Ethereal attacker reduces it from any higher total to 0 before it can jaunt away.
 
-**What it requires**
+At death, Xarrul collapses in its native plane and cannot return. The harvested vitality recoils along Dalla's conduit and Nessa's silver cord. Dalla's weakness lifts; Nessa's projection is pulled home and she wakes.
 
-1. **A vessel.** Default: the caged **Guest** — a body that can be anyone, poured full of an honest fiend. Xarrul and the Guest have already negotiated a fair exchange: Xarrul receives the changeling body; the Guest's silver cord is re-anchored into the Inn's wards, making it the spectral Host. The Guest intends to betray that bargain with the party's unwitting help; if the transfer begins, run **[Scenario G: The Vacancy](#scenario-g-the-vacancy-the-guests-gambit)**. *(Alternatives: a PC volunteers as host — the most personal; that character leaves the party. Or simply leave the door open — Xarrul crosses as itself, weaker, and finds a host later.)*
-2. **The crossing.** Let the [lockdown clock](#the-clock) run — keep anyone from breaching the seal or waking the sigils — or complete the crossing at the rift, while holding off anyone who tries to stop it.
-3. **Getting past Mags.** She will not accept this. With another vessel or the open crossing, she is the obstacle before completion. If the Guest begins the Vacancy without her knowledge, she becomes the initiator of violence immediately afterward instead.
+The party cannot know with certainty beforehand that Nessa will survive the recoil. They can establish only that this is the one ending that sends the stored vitality back along her tether.
 
-**Mags, and the shape of the finale.** Mags says *"No"*—simple, final. Siding openly with Xarrul means going through the widow of the man it murdered. So Xarrul triggers the [Warden's Mark](../npc/mags.md#the-wardens-mark-dm)—its first favor to its new allies—and Mags fights *compromised*, grief-broken and half-frozen in a vision of Orenn's death. This is not a slugfest but a **desperate holding action**: complete the crossing while a diminished Mags throws everything she has left at the objective. Winnable, tragic, and *the players'* to win. If the Guest supplies the vessel through the Vacancy, replace this pre-transfer fight with [the Succession](#the-succession--mags-refuses): Mags attacks only after the body has an owner. (For a bigger fight, add **Sevra** at her side.)
+### Scenario D: Conventional Negotiation
 
-**Aftermath.** Xarrul keeps every promise (see [After the Reckoning](#after-the-reckoning)). If it uses the Guest, the fiend does not betray the bargain; the Guest is the one concealing a second intended outcome. No broken word. Just competing knives.
+When cornered, Xarrul offers genuine information, the stolen extracts, the truth about Nessa, and exact knowledge of the Order. It wants freedom and a body. The Guest's compact restrains Xarrul's own killing only until the exchange finishes; the party may bargain for protection afterward.
 
----
+An agreement with Xarrul is literal, not friendly. Require the players to name the terms aloud: who must live, whether Nessa must be returned, whether the Guest is included, and when Xarrul may leave. Xarrul repeats the terms exactly before witnesses. It will keep those words and exploit everything omitted.
 
-### Scenario G: The Vacancy (The Guest's Gambit)
+Mags will not permit Orenn's murderer to leave merely because it promised something. Negotiation therefore leads into Scenario F unless the party abandons the bargain.
 
-This is the Guest's ending and the mechanically easiest opportunity to destroy Xarrul. It becomes available if the party frees the Guest, learns that Xarrul wants its body, and brings it to the **binding circle at the cellar thin point**. Do not run the transfer at the rift in the Deep Cellar; that tear is too unstable. The old circle upstairs is where one body can briefly be made into a closed vessel.
+### Scenario E: The Upstairs Pressure Cooker
 
-The Guest's pitch is exactly true:
+This is the default pressure behind every ending, not a separate optional finale. Xarrul's whispers turn the cultists and assassins against one another by midnight unless the players produce a stronger common threat or control the room. Faction war is the compact's loophole: Xarrul cannot kill again before the exchange, but can expose real grievances, corrupt fresh memories, and steal voices until mortals choose to kill one another. If the Guest dies, the exchange becomes impossible and this restraint ends immediately.
 
-> *„Xarrul chce tohle tělo. Až si mě vezme, nastane okamžik, kdy už opustil druhou stranu, ale ještě nedorazil na tuhle. Pusťte mě ven a já vám ten okamžik dám.”*
+Likely first violence:
 
-It omits the result it actually wants: destroy Xarrul during that moment, let the fiend's embedded planar imprint collapse into the vacant body, then reclaim the body with Xarrul's ability to cross the veil.
+- Kael attacks Rennt or Haddon.
+- Rennt answers lethally once blood is drawn.
+- Sevra protects Kael but redirects toward Xarrul if shown convincing evidence.
+- Mags tries to halt the fight and preserve witnesses.
+- Dalla changes sides when the conduit evidence becomes undeniable.
+- Essek supports ending Xarrul, but his eldritch blast needs someone to track the Ethereal target.
 
-#### Why Xarrul Commits
+Without intervention, Kael and Rennt are the likely first faction casualties, while Dalla and Essek remain at grave risk. None of those deaths is Xarrul's direct act, though it benefits from the division. If the Vacancy is exposed, Haddon or Essek recognizes Xarrul's signature in the new vessel and the room finally understands that the same creature killed Orenn and used their feud as cover. Once the exchange finishes, Xarrul itself is free to become lethal.
 
-Xarrul understands that the Guest would consume it if it could. That is not the deception. The Guest has truthfully consented to vacate the body and genuinely accepts becoming the Host if its betrayal fails.
+If the party supplies anti-Xarrul defenses but no political agreement, the argument becomes **rebind versus destroy**. Haddon and Rennt attempt to preserve the asset; Mags, Sevra and the unaffiliated want it gone. Dalla joins the latter after learning the conduit truth. The disagreement can cause casualties and, if allowed to consume the room, give Xarrul the win.
 
-Xarrul enters because the contest is hopeless **without outside hands**. The Guest cannot attack during the transfer without forfeiting its cord, ordinary mortals cannot touch a projected fiend, and Xarrul's will overwhelms a drug-weakened changeling. Once Xarrul places its essential anchor into the vessel, however, withdrawal would tear it across both planes. The transfer must finish. Xarrul underestimates which anti-fiend tools the Guest has steered into the party's hands.
+### Scenario F: Deliberately Side with Xarrul
 
-> **Xarrul:** *„Jakmile budu uvnitř, hodláš sklapnout čelisti.”*
->
-> **Host:** *„Hodlám ti dát své tělo.”*
->
-> **Xarrul:** *„Obě tvrzení mohou být pravdivá.”*
->
-> **Host:** *„Pak si rozumíme.”*
+This ending works because Xarrul does not need to conquer the room. With the Guest's body it can become anyone and walk out when the lockdown ends. The compact already prevents Xarrul from killing anyone except Orenn until the exchange finishes; a separate bargain is needed to restrain it afterward.
 
-#### The Spectacle
+The obstacle is Mags. She will not release a known murderer, and attacking her openly turns the room against the party. The players need one of four workable routes:
 
-The Guest steps into the circle and willingly opens the way. Its body goes slack. Every borrowed feature runs off it like wax until a pale, unfinished changeling shell remains standing or kneeling at the circle's center.
+- **Frame another culprit:** give Mags evidence strong enough to make someone else actionable until midnight. The frame must explain Orenn's inaccessible soul and the fiendish brand; a loose dagger is not enough.
+- **Expose a real accomplice:** prove the Guest selected Orenn and persuade Mags that containing the Guest takes priority while Xarrul departs. This buys time, not forgiveness.
+- **Quietly neutralize Mags:** isolate, restrain, drug or imprison her without the main hall seeing an attack. Her Warden's Mark can create an opening, but Xarrul triggering it in public reveals the alliance.
+- **Bypass her authority:** win Sevra and enough of the room to a witnessed bargain so Mags cannot start a fight without standing alone.
 
-In rules terms, Xarrul is performing a bespoke form of **Astral Projection** through the Inn's sealed Ethereal overlay. The technique exposes both silver cords without sending either spirit beyond the lockdown, so Ethereal tools can still perceive and harm them. This is ritual knowledge Xarrul acquired through Nessa's binding, not the standard spell for PCs to cast or dispel wholesale.
+Once Mags is contained, prepare the Old Work and wait for the shell to lapse. At midnight, run the Vacancy and protect Xarrul for three rounds. Xarrul takes the changeling body, the Guest is stranded Astral, and Xarrul chooses an innocuous face and leaves by the front door. It keeps every explicit post-exchange no-killing and Nessa promise. The horror is that the bargain succeeds.
 
-Two spirits rise from it. The Guest is silver-white, its outline cycling through every face it has worn. Xarrul is amber-black, gaunt and precise, joined to the empty body's chest by a burning cord. The Guest's own silver cord still runs into the same chest. Over three rounds, Xarrul unthreads that cord from the flesh and knots it, strand by strand, into the glowing foundation sigils.
+#### Building a Frame
 
-For those three rounds, **neither creature occupies the body**. The body, the Guest and Xarrul are three separate targets.
+Mags's Fixer's Read defeats a convenient single clue. A workable frame needs a **hand**, a **motive** and an explanation for the fiendish evidence.
 
-#### Running the Vacancy
+- **Haddon** is the strongest principal: his journal proves he summoned Xarrul, he hid the loss of control, and he has a motive to remove Orenn. The party can claim the fiend acted under his order. Haddon can disprove continuing control if allowed to demonstrate the dead command line.
+- **Rennt** caused the blackout and handled the binding components. He is an easy visible culprit but a poor mastermind; Sevra accepts him faster than Mags does.
+- **Dace** supplied the Order with dossiers and his poisoned dagger lay near the body. This proves conspiracy, not the brand or missing soul. Pairing him with Haddon makes the story stronger.
+- **Thera** understands missing souls and can explain why Revivify failed. Her magic does not match the ethereal claw marks. Framing her works only if the party also suppresses the crime-scene comparison.
+- **The Guest** truly selected Orenn and predicted Mags's response. Presenting it as the architect gives Mags an actionable accomplice below, but does not erase Xarrul as the hand that killed him.
 
-The transfer settles at the end of **round 3**. Roll initiative normally.
+Xarrul can move objects, imitate voices and alter one branded witness's memory of only the **last minute**. It cannot manufacture an earlier blackout memory or speak a false accusation itself. Have the party assemble and voice the lie. Use a DC 18 group Deception check, reduced to DC 16 with two independent pieces of real evidence; Mags's Fixer's Read gives her advantage on her opposed read. Failure makes her test the weakest physical claim immediately.
 
-**The vacant body:** AC 10, 52 HP, unconscious, automatically fails Strength and Dexterity saves. Damage remains when someone finally occupies it. If it dies, the Guest's cord snaps and Xarrul is expelled into the Ethereal Plane with its current Vacancy HP; the bargain fails and the normal fight resumes.
+#### Quietly Removing Mags
 
-**The projected Guest:** AC 14, 26 HP, fly 30 ft. (hover), resistance to nonmagical damage, cannot move more than 15 feet from the body. It may speak, Read Thoughts and take the Help action, but **cannot damage Xarrul**: a hostile act from it forfeits its bodily claim and completes its projection into the wards. If reduced to 0 HP, its silver cord snaps; Xarrul takes the body immediately and no Host remains. This is the Executioner's cleanest shot and the Handler's Agent's last chance to defend the asset openly.
+- **Drug her:** Essence of Ether or feyspitter venom works if hidden in something she accepts from a trusted person. Her Fixer's Read spots nervous handling; discovery exposes the alliance.
+- **Use the Warden's Mark:** Xarrul can freeze her for a round while PCs move her out of sight. Triggering it in the hall recreates Orenn's murder in public and turns Sevra against them.
+- **Put her in Cell One:** the black key, Grey Step or a successful ambush can bypass the ward. Twinkle reacts to violence in its territory, and an uncaptured Mags knows every escape weakness below.
+- **Impersonate authority:** after the Vacancy, changeling-bodied Xarrul can copy Mags, but the real Mags must first be isolated. Orenn's voice can lure her below; a missing black key, wrong private memory or shapechanger detection exposes the replacement.
+- **Replace her politically:** a witnessed bargain plus Sevra's support can make the room refuse Mags's order to attack. Mags survives and remembers exactly who overruled her.
 
-**Vacancy Xarrul:** AC 15, **39 HP**, fly 30 ft. (hover), its normal resistances and immunities, and it cannot move more than 15 feet from the body. It cannot use **Ethereal Jaunt, Slip Between, Multiattack or Waking Dream**. On its turn it may use one Claw, Voice Thief, Whisper of Ruin, or Visions of Spite against an already branded target. It cannot abandon the transfer. At 0 HP, it is destroyed on both planes at once.
+### Scenario G: The Vacancy
 
-Xarrul's spirit is visible to everyone but remains half out of phase. It can be damaged normally by an Ethereal creature, a Veil Dust or Oil of Etherealness user, force damage, or a creature using Veilhook Salt. Ringing the **iron bell** while the foundation sigils are active makes it fully tangible to all attacks until the Vacancy ends. *Protection from Evil and Good* cast on the empty body **after** the transfer begins gives attacks against Vacancy Xarrul advantage; cast beforehand, it prevents the transfer entirely. Reward any comparable anti-possession or anti-fiend preparation with the same effect.
+The Vacancy is the negotiated exchange between the Guest and Xarrul. It requires the exposed tear and takes place inside the failing containment circle in the [Old Work](../location/deep-cellar.md#the-old-work). The upper-cellar binding circle cannot substitute for the breach. The lockdown prevents the Guest's Astral release, so the ritual cannot begin or advance before the exterior shell lapses at midnight. Returning ward-power then begins resealing the tear, making the ritual's three rounds the whole available transfer window.
 
-This is deliberately the easiest Xarrul fight. The party has traded the fiend's mobility and full HP for a choice about what inherits it.
+The Guest devised the useful part of the plan: a mutable body lets Xarrul leave unnoticed, while the transfer creates a moment in which outsiders can destroy it. Xarrul understands the risk but believes the Guest cannot recruit enough capable hands. The Guest is the sharper conspirator; Xarrul is still dangerous and pragmatic.
 
-#### Xarrul Defends Itself With Truth
+The Guest willingly leaves its body. Xarrul projects into the opening. The body, Guest and Xarrul become separate targets.
 
-The fiend knows the Guest's best weapon is the party's incomplete understanding. It spends the transfer telling them the missing half:
+**Vacant body:** AC 10, 52 HP, unconscious, automatically fails Strength and Dexterity saves. Damage remains after occupation. If it dies, the Guest's cord snaps, Xarrul is expelled Ethereal at its current Vacancy HP, and the planar fight resumes.
 
-> *„Orenna vybral on. Já vykonal vraždu.”*
+**Projected Guest:** AC 14, 26 HP, fly 30 ft. (hover), resistance to nonmagical damage, cannot move more than 15 feet from the body. It may speak, Read Thoughts and Help, but cannot damage Xarrul without forfeiting its claim. Xarrul never targets it: the original promise not to kill the Guest remains unconditional even during and after the exchange. At 0 HP from another source, its spirit is destroyed and Xarrul takes the body immediately.
 
-> *„Nežádal vás, abyste ho zachránili. Požádal vás, abyste do něj přelili to, čím jsem.”*
+**Vacancy Xarrul:** AC 15, 39 HP maximum, fly 30 ft. (hover), normal resistances and immunities, cannot move more than 15 feet from the body. The transfer exposes its Ethereal essence and temporarily lowers its hit point maximum to 39; if its current HP is higher, reduce it to 39, otherwise keep its current total. This is still the same pool, not a second form or a simultaneous pool. It cannot use Ethereal Restoration, Ethereal Jaunt, Slip Between, Deathless Slip, Multiattack or Waking Dream. It may use one Claw, Voice Thief, Whisper of Ruin or Visions of Spite. At 0 HP it is permanently destroyed because it is exposed on its native plane.
 
-> *„Zničte mě teď a dítě zůstane tam, kde je Vyre zanechala. Moc spojená s jejím vláknem vstoupí do tohoto čekajícího těla.”*
+The iron bell plus the active ward lattice makes Vacancy Xarrul tangible to all attacks even at the bottom of the Deep Cellar. *Protection from Evil and Good* on the body before the Vacancy prevents it; cast after the ritual begins, it grants advantage against Xarrul.
 
-> *„Udeřte, jestli je to váš rozsudek. Ale rozumějte tomu, koho vyzbrojujete.”*
+#### Vacancy Outcomes
 
-Every statement is true. The Guest does not deny them. It answers only:
+**Nobody interferes:** At the end of round 3 Xarrul takes the changeling body. The Guest's former silver cord is severed from its body and its coherent spirit is projected into the Astral Plane. It is alive but bodiless and cannot return tonight. A future *Plane Shift*, astral expedition and new vessel could recover it. It does not become the Inn or control its wards.
 
-> *„Přišli jste zabít Orennova vraha. Konečně stojí na místě.”*
+The original compact—Xarrul may kill Orenn but nobody else until the exchange is finished—expires at this moment. If the transfer was witnessed, Xarrul may attack those able to identify or bind its new body. If it remained secret, disguise and a quiet departure are safer. Any separate promise made to the party still binds it.
 
-#### Outcomes
+**The party destroys Xarrul:** Its planar imprint and stolen vitality collapse into the waiting body; the Guest reclaims it. The suppressant burns out. It gains Ethereal Jaunt, Shadow Cloak and Voice Thief and fragments of Xarrul's memories. Nessa remains stranded because the vitality entered the Guest instead of recoiling along her tether.
 
-**The party destroys Xarrul.** Xarrul's amber cord recoils into the vacant body, carrying the stolen vitality with it instead of releasing that energy down Nessa's distant tether. The Guest's silver cord snaps home an instant later. The transfer burns the trim-dose suppressant out of its blood. It wakes with its full stat block plus **Ethereal Jaunt, Shadow Cloak and Voice Thief**, fragments of Xarrul's memories, and no intention of being caged again. Nessa remains trapped and Dalla remains drained. The Guest thanks the party, takes the black key and claims the Inn as eleven years' payment. Mags refuses; proceed to **The Succession** below.
+**The party destroys the projected Guest:** Xarrul takes the body immediately. The Guest's death makes the exchange impossible and ends the temporary restraint at once, so changeling-bodied Xarrul may turn lethally on the party in the same encounter. Killing the Guest is a plainly bad choice unless the party values the contract above every consequence.
 
-**The party waits or protects the bargain.** At the end of round 3, the Guest's cord knots into the foundations. Xarrul enters the changeling body, using its own stat block and gaining Shapechanger. The Guest becomes the **Host**: it perceives every room, speaks through walls and reflections, and controls the Inn's doors and active wards, but can never cross the threshold. Xarrul intends to keep its promises and leave. Mags attacks Orenn's murderer; proceed to **The Succession** below.
+**The party destroys the body:** The Guest dies, the temporary restraint ends, and Xarrul is expelled Ethereal into a planar fight with no remaining limit on whom it may kill. If Xarrul survives or wins, it proceeds to the Hollowing.
 
-**The party destroys the projected Guest.** Xarrul takes the body immediately; the Guest is gone and the Executioner's contract is complete. Mags attacks. Xarrul owes the dead Guest nothing further.
+#### The Empowered Guest's Quiet Succession
 
-**The party destroys the vacant body.** The Guest dies as its cord snaps. Xarrul is expelled, wounded but free, and the encounter returns to a conventional fight. If it survives, it abducts a replacement vessel.
+The Guest does not demand the Inn in front of armed witnesses. It goes upstairs wearing a harmless face, uses Orenn's stolen voice to tell Mags that the cellar has opened, and lures her below alone. It ambushes her, locks her in Cell One, takes her appearance and returns to the bar as Mags. It keeps the Inn by letting everyone believe the old proprietor survived the night.
 
-#### The Succession — Mags Refuses
+Counterplay should remain possible:
 
-The Vacancy resolves Xarrul's body, not ownership of the Nether Inn.
+- A PC follows Mags or refuses to let her go alone.
+- Twinkle or the lower alarm reacts to the wrong scent and movement.
+- The false Mags lacks the black key, gets a private memory wrong or handles Orenn's body without genuine grief.
+- Mags escapes Cell One or leaves a message in the scratched door.
+- A PC with truesight, Moonbeam or comparable shapechanger detection exposes it.
 
-If the **empowered Guest** returns, it takes the black key and demands the house as payment. It may wear Orenn's face behind the bar, not as a joke but as a claim: half his intelligence, half his work, and now his place. Mags will confess the imprisonment, offer coin, or permit the Guest to walk free. She will not surrender the Inn or enter Cell One. If the Guest presses the claim, she fights. The party must decide whether freeing a prisoner includes helping it become the keeper.
+If caught, the Guest bargains from strength. If not, the Inn has a new keeper before dawn and almost nobody knows.
 
-If **Xarrul takes the body**, Mags attacks before it can leave. The new spectral Host uses the Inn's locks and wards to protect Xarrul's paid passage: not out of affection, but because its first act as proprietor is to enforce a completed bargain.
+### Scenario H: The Hollowing
 
-**Host house actions.** On initiative count 20 (losing ties), the Host takes one action while the foundation sigils remain active:
+The Hollowing is Xarrul's forced substitute when the Guest is dead, repudiates the exchange, becomes unreachable, or the changeling body is destroyed. Xarrul's unconditional promise not to kill the Guest prevents using the Hollowing on it: forced separation destroys the projected spirit. If the Guest itself repudiates the bargain, or another hand makes the exchange impossible, the temporary restraint on Xarrul's killing dissolves immediately. It may kill directly and abduct an ordinary replacement, preferring the person responsible for killing or denying the Guest. Like the Vacancy, the Hollowing can function only at the tear inside the Old Work's containment circle, but there is no exchange and no promised return. Because it destroys the victim's spirit locally instead of projecting it Astral, it can begin during lockdown; a completed vessel still cannot cross the exterior shell before midnight.
 
-- **The House Shuts.** One door, shutter or trapdoor slams and Arcane Locks. A creature in its threshold makes a DC 14 Dexterity save or is pushed to the Host's chosen side and knocked prone.
-- **The Wards Bite.** One creature touching the floor or walls makes a DC 14 Dexterity save, taking 7 (2d6) force damage on a failure or half on a success.
-- **A Voice Behind You.** The Host speaks in a trusted voice from the target's own shadow. One creature has disadvantage on its next attack before initiative count 20.
+**Target priority:** the PC most responsible for killing or denying the Guest; otherwise a vulnerable humanoid with a useful identity; otherwise a cultist Xarrul can isolate.
 
-A creature adjacent to an active foundation sigil can suppress these actions for one round with an action and a successful DC 15 Arcana check, or by defacing the sigil. Suppressing the Host does not evict it; removing it permanently requires destroying or rewriting the house's ward lattice after the night.
+The victim is dragged into the Deep Cellar and down toward the Old Work. Twinkle's webs and the disturbed ward alert Mags. Haddon recognizes the direction and understands that Xarrul needs a vessel, but Mags bars the cultists from her secret level and goes alone. Unless followed, she reaches the tear before the ritual and Xarrul kills her. The Hollowing then begins inside the containment circle.
 
-> **Mags:** *„Zavraždil Orenna.”*
->
-> **Hostinský, ze všech stěn:** *„A zaplatil mi.”*
->
-> **Mags:** *„Uhni.”*
->
-> **Hostinský:** *„Dluhy se ctí. To jste mě naučili.”*
+Roll initiative. It completes at the end of round 3.
 
-Either version makes Mags—not the winner of the Vacancy—the initiator of the final violence. The easy fiend fight leaves the party with the harder question: who has the right to hold the keys?
+**Victim's body:** use the victim's AC and current HP; it is unconscious and automatically fails Strength and Dexterity saves. Damage persists.
 
----
+**Projected victim:** AC 12, HP equal to half the victim's maximum, fly 20 ft. (hover), tethered within 15 feet. On its turn it can speak, Help, or make a DC 15 Wisdom or Charisma save to delay the next ritual step until the following round. Each creature can cause only one delay.
 
-## The Central Dilemma: The Choice
+**Hollowing Xarrul:** AC 15, 39 HP, same restrictions as Vacancy Xarrul. Its essence is exposed Ethereally; reducing it to 0 permanently destroys Xarrul, returns the victim to the body and sends the stolen vitality recoiling toward Nessa.
 
-Once the notes surface, the finale is no longer simply whether to kill Xarrul. It is which compromised source the players trust with Nessa and the planar fault.
+At the end of round 1, Xarrul pins the victim's cord. At the end of round 2, it begins severing the spirit from the flesh. At the end of round 3, it destroys the spirit, keeps the body and all hope of restoring that victim ends. If the projected victim reaches 0 HP, round 3 resolves immediately.
 
-### The Case For
-- If the energy returns safely, Nessa wakes and Dalla regains the vitality taken from her.
-- Xarrul is permanently destroyed. The murderer is dead.
-- Justice, in a form.
+*Protection from Evil and Good* cast before the ritual prevents it. Cast during it, the spell gives the projected victim advantage on its delay save and attacks against Xarrul advantage. Destroying the body kills the victim and aborts the ritual; Xarrul returns Ethereal and the planar fight resumes.
 
-### The Case Against
-- The method requires thinning the veil — a micro-Opening. It validates Mother Vyre's core theory.
-- The recoil along Nessa's silver cord has never been tested. The characters cannot know beforehand that she will survive it.
-- Haddon is watching and taking notes. He now has empirical data for Phase Two.
-- Rennt and Haddon will actively resist the destruction of their bound asset.
-- Even if the tear heals, the thin point is *weaker* afterward. Future attempts at the Opening are easier here.
+The resulting ordinary vessel cannot shapechange. Xarrul can still imitate voices and use magic, but it cannot simply become Mags and walk away. This is worse for the abducted victim and tactically worse for Xarrul than obtaining the Guest.
 
-### NPC Reactions During the Choice
+## The Bell-and-Sigils Seal
 
-| NPC | Reaction | Why |
-|-----|----------|-----|
-| **Dalla** (fractured) | „Xarrul ví, kde je. Nechte ho, ať ji přivede zpátky, aniž bychom museli roztrhnout ještě něco dalšího.” | She will not gamble Nessa's cord while a controlled rescue appears viable. |
-| **Rennt** | Openly hostile. „Nezničíš celé dílo jen proto, že tě vyděsila jeho zbraň.” | The kill wastes the sacrifice and betrays Vyre's ordained plan. |
-| **Essek** | Supports the kill despite the risk. „Když tomu uvěříme, jen přeneseme nebezpečí za tyhle zdi.” | Better an uncertain release now than a free fiend holding the only promise. |
-| **Haddon** | Opposes it, then takes notes if overruled. | He wants the asset rebound; if it dies, he will salvage the data. |
-| **Mags** | Conflicted. She wants Xarrul dead. But not like this. "That tear's been sealed under my feet for fifteen years and I slept fine. You want to rip it *wider* to kill one fiend?" | She respects the sacrifice but fears the consequence. |
-| **Sevra** | Pragmatic. "Does it work? Then do it. Worry about theory later." | Results-oriented. |
-| **Bren** (if lucid) | "The thin point has been growing for years. One more tear won't matter." (This might be true. Or it might be exactly what Skein wants him to say.) | Unknown — is this Bren's genuine assessment or Skein's manipulation? |
+This is an alternative to rebinding, not an exterior breach.
 
-### There Is No Right Answer
+Requirements:
 
-If the players attempt the dual-plane kill, they gamble Nessa's tether, tear the veil, and arm the cult with proof—but destroy her exploiter. If they rebind the fiend, the cult gets its weapon and power source back. If they join Xarrul, Nessa is rescued without a tear and the Opening loses an enemy—but an honest murderer walks free, over Mags's objection. If they destroy Xarrul during the Vacancy, the fight is easier but the stolen vitality pours into an empowered Guest who means to take the Inn. If they destroy it conventionally, the stored vitality dissipates and Nessa remains trapped. If they never find the notes, they receive the rebinding and may think they won.
+1. Restore the cellar foundation sigils with the Workroom materials and a DC 16 Arcana check.
+2. Drive Xarrul into the binding circle.
+3. Ring the iron bell correctly while the circle remains intact.
 
-Every choice costs something. The depth of investigation determines which choices are even on the table. That's the point.
+The bell reveals Xarrul; the sigils prevent Ethereal Jaunt inside the circle; the circle closes around both of its planar states. Xarrul becomes sealed consciously **between** planes. It cannot act, bargain beyond whispers, or be moved without reopening the working.
 
----
+This preserves rather than breaks the conduit. Nessa remains lost tonight, but can potentially be recovered by a future Opening or by slower research into her silver cord. The option avoids returning Xarrul to the Order while keeping the dangerous connection available.
+
+## Nessa Outcome Reference
+
+| Ending | Xarrul | Nessa |
+|---|---|---|
+| Rebinding | Bound to the Order | Lost; connection stable; Opening could return her |
+| Bell-and-sigils seal | Trapped between planes | Lost; connection preserved for future rescue |
+| Ethereal destruction | Permanently destroyed | Wakes immediately |
+| Xarrul destroyed in Vacancy | Destroyed; imprint enters Guest | Lost; vitality remains in empowered Guest |
+| Xarrul destroyed in Hollowing | Destroyed; victim restored | Wakes immediately |
+| Xarrul leaves under bargain | Free in changeling body | Returned only if the promise was stated explicitly |
+| Dalla dies | Any | Remains suspended and stable, but the easiest conduit is gone; recovery becomes much harder |
 
 ## After the Reckoning
 
-### The Lockdown Ends
+At midnight the exterior shell lapses and the three-round Vacancy window opens. What leaves the Inn afterward depends on the chosen ending: survivors, a bound weapon, an empowered changeling wearing Mags, or Xarrul wearing anyone.
 
-Dawn comes. Mags opens the doors. People leave. The night is over.
+The local Order may collapse, but Mother Vyre and Phase Two remain. If Nessa is still suspended, her body does not age or fail tonight. If the Guest carries Xarrul's vitality, safely extracting that power is a new ritual or a future adventure—not a spell cast before breakfast.
 
-**What follows depends on what happened:**
-
-**If Xarrul was destroyed (any method):**
-- The Brand fades from Orenn's body. Mags closes his eyes.
-- The thin point remains — weaker if the dual-plane kill was used, stable if not.
-- The cult's cell is fractured or exposed.
-- The guild's mole is found or still hidden.
-- Mother Vyre's Phase Two continues elsewhere. The players know about it. That's something.
-- If it died during the Vacancy, its power and Nessa's stolen vitality remain in the Guest, and ownership of the Inn may still be violently unresolved.
-
-**If Xarrul escaped:**
-- The fiend is loose in the city. It will find new entertainment.
-- Mags hunts it alone. Her chances aren't good.
-- The thin point continues to grow.
-
-**If the players sided with Xarrul (The Open Door):**
-- The fiend is real and walking the city, wearing a borrowed face — and it keeps its word. The cult's local cell is gutted; Mother Vyre has a new, patient enemy who knows all her secrets.
-- Nessa is cured — cleanly, no veil torn.
-- Mags is dead, defeated, or gone: walked into the dawn without a word, and she is not the kind to let it lie.
-- If the Guest supplied the vessel, it is now the spectral Host bound to the Nether Inn—unless another player destroyed its projection during the Vacancy. If the party used another vessel, the Guest remains caged below or loose.
-- The players *won*. That is the worst part.
-
-**If the Guest took Xarrul's imprint (The Vacancy):**
-- Xarrul is dead and Orenn is avenged, but Nessa remains trapped; the power that could have returned to her now armors the Guest.
-- The Guest owns the keys, or is fighting Mags and anyone who denies its claim.
-- If Mags survives without the Inn, she begins hunting the thing the party created. If she retains it, the Guest has gained every tool needed to return.
-- The Nether Inn's promise of neutral ground is broken either way. Everyone present saw what its keepers kept below.
-
-**If the faction war happened:**
-- Bodies. Regret. A tavern full of the dead and dying.
-- Mags survives (she's the most dangerous person in the room).
-- She locks the door again. From the outside. She doesn't look back.
-
-### Loose Threads (For a Potential Follow-Up)
-
-- **Mother Vyre and Phase Two.** The Opening is still coming.
-- **Nessa.** Awake, still suspended, or awaiting Xarrul's promised return.
-- **Bren.** Free or still possessed. If free, he has knowledge that many people would kill for.
-- **Essek.** Escaped the cult or still trapped. His brand might still burn.
-- **Dace.** In guild custody, escaped, or dead.
-- **The thin point.** Growing, stable, or weakened further. It will attract more entities.
-- **Orenn's letter.** "If the veil tears, burn the cellar stores and seal the door." Mags hasn't done this yet. Maybe she should.
-- **Xarrul, if it crossed.** A fiend at large that owes the party a debt — and, being honest, pays it. Their most unsettling asset, and someone's unfinished business. If Mags lived, she is already hunting it, and them.
-
----
-
-## Read-Aloud: Dawn
-
-> *Světlo. Pod dveřmi hospody se objeví tenký, bledý proužek — první ranní světlo, šedé a studené a krásné tím způsobem, jakým jsou krásné věci, o kterých jste nebyli jistí, že je ještě uvidíte.*
->
-> *Mags stojí u dveří. Chvíli na ten proužek světla jen hledí. Pak sáhne na závoru. Kov skřípe. Dveře se otevřou a do místnosti vpadne vlhký ranní vzduch, který chutná po dešti a po městě, které se probouzí, aniž by vědělo, co se tu v noci stalo.*
->
-> *Otočí se. Podívá se na vás. Neřekne děkuji — možná proto, že pro to, co se tu stalo, to slovo nestačí. Možná proto, že ještě neví, jestli je na místě.*
->
-> *"Jděte," řekne tiše. "Je ráno."*
->
-> *A vy vyjdete po těch třech kamenných schodech nahoru, do světla, do dne, do světa, který vypadá přesně stejně jako včera — a vy víte, že to tak není. Že pod povrchem, za tou tenkou vrstvou, kterou většina lidí nikdy neuvidí, se něco pohnulo. A už se to nezastaví.*
-
----
-
-## Alternative Ending: The Bell
-
-If players **rekindled the foundation sigils** AND rang the iron bell AND have Xarrul trapped in the cellar's binding circle:
-
-The old sigils flare to life. The thin point *contracts*. Xarrul, caught between the binding circle and the woken sigils, is crushed between planes — not killed, but *sealed*. Trapped in the space between Material and Ethereal, conscious, unable to move, unable to escape. A fate some would call worse than death.
-
-Nessa is not cured (the binding energy isn't released). But Xarrul is contained. The thin point stabilizes. The tavern is safe again.
-
-Mags looks at the cellar floor where the fiend is imprisoned. "Orenn would have done it this way," she says. "Clean. Contained. No loose ends." She pauses. "I hate it. But it's right."
-
-This ending costs the least and gains the least. It's the safest choice. It's also the one where a six-year-old girl remains suspended, and a fiend spends eternity screaming silently between worlds.
-
-Safety is not the same as goodness. That's the last thing the players learn.
+Use the exact branch consequences in [Natural Progression](natural-progression.md) and the pressure beats in the [Complication Toolkit](complication-toolkit.md).