This session was played on 2025-11-15. Claire, Gaia and Maelle have to deal with the very complicated fallout of one Mariette Navia trying to kill Riung.

Immediately following the events of last session, Gaia wanders off thinking of possible ways to actually train her hypnosis skills, and gets in a small discussion with Amanda about consent. Her attempt to recruit someone from the Hunter Guild to be her lab rat is not sucessful so she keeps wandering around.

In the hospital, Iorena Sevel has to leave to attend to the dozen problems that she has to deal daily and leaves Claire behind to monitor the situation. Claire has a talk with Yumiko Kurimoto where they attempt to actually get a grasp on how Mariette's body is supposed to work when healthy. They are getting increasingly confused becase the blood they drew from her is a lot thinner than a regular human should have.

During this conversation, yet another Mariette appears in the Hospital; this one has been travelling outside town lately and did not hear the news about the bullshit going on, but is understandably worried about her alternate version getting killed by well-meaning doctors.

While wandering the streets, Gaia is stopped by yet another Mariette, who knows she has a way into the Umichooan Embassy and is asking to be taken there as a favor. Gaia agrees, but only if the Mariette volunteers as a lab rat for her hypnosis skills. The Mariette is amused by this, and they both shake on it.

In the Kurimoto household, Maelle is keeping the fort and getting Ariyadna and temself dinner. Ariyadna seems to be a bit nervous because she has actually noticed the coming of the Umichooan delegation, and how one of them got hurt, and mentions that something feels very heavy on time.

In the hospital, Claire and Yumiko keep interrogating the new Mariette. Yumiko takes this in stride, decides that the new Mariette counts as both next of kin and a possible way to get a baseline for their health status, and proceeds to interrogate her, but then Claire mentions that the situation started because one of the Mariettes used a giant sword to shank Riung, and the Mariette has a panic attack and drops her bag.

The Mariette with Gaia takes her to a secluded abandoned half-built park and sits down on a pile of bricks to allow Gaia to try to get into her head. Gaia kind of manages it, but then discovers that Mariette's thoughts are very strange, and her perception of the world is not like regular humans, with her having apparently more senses than expected, and being able to feel things at different points in time relative to herself. Gaia does not manage to make Mariette hallucinate anything.

In the Kurimoto household, Maelle has put Ariyadna to sleep when the Sword Mariette, responsible for trying to kill Riung appears in their door, and explains that this her is going to have to leave town to avoid getting erased by the Umichooans. She is understandably frantic but also confused and reveals that none of the Mariettes actually know why Riung scares them so much, or what she's going to do to actually become such a big deal in the Flow of Time.

In the hospital, as Yumiko is dealing with Mariette's panic attack, Claire very carefully takes back her bag and finds a broken glass phial whose faint smell makes them feel dizzy.

Gaia comes out from her attempt to get into Mariette's mind pretty confused and dizzy, but abides by their deal, and brings Mariette to the Umichooan Embassy Island. They meet Oi-See and from the first moment, it becomes obvious that he despises chronomancers with a passion, and refuses to even engage on conversation with Mariette, demanding that Gaia acknowledges that she's responsible for her actions while on the embassy as if she was a dog following her owner. Both Mariette and Gaia grit their teeth and aquiesce.

In the Kurimoto Household, both Ariyadna and Maelle fall asleep while the latter is reading a story to the former.

In the hospital, the traveller Mariette drags both Claire and Yumiko to the unconscious Mariette and starts moving stuff around (changing the position of the instruments measuring her other self's vital signs and ripping off the IV and giving the tube to Claire) with zero consideration for the hospital personnel. She reveals to Claire and Yumiko that Chronomancers come originally from an entirely different universe that's not there anymore, and the human shapes they wear were designed so some of the lower members of their society could infiltrate the local civilizations to keep an eye on local happenings.

In the Umichooan Embassy, Gaia and Mariette are led to the wounded figure of young Riung, frozen in time in the moment of the wound. Gaia notices the similarities to what Claire did to Zach Shpak and Mariette agrees, wondering if her sword-wielding self got the idea there. Mariette then unfreezes Riung, allowing the Umichooan Subtle Machine to start healing her. Oi-See says that for this he might owe Gaia a proportional favor, and unceremoniously dumps the two women back in Zwosta.

And in the Kurimoto Household, Maelle found themself dreaming of meeting Future Riung in their own living room. Riung tells them that the reason that chronomancers are scared shitless of her is something that won't happen for several centuries, but because of this, the Mariette who panicked and attacked her past self is at risk of being killed by the Umichooans, so she's passing a hint to Maelle so she can help. Also a supernaturally delicious piece of dango. And a bit of a hint about dreamwalking, since Maelle asked.

Having had a fire lit under them, Maelle scrambles to the hospital to get everyone else (Claire, Gaia, Yumiko, and the Mariette turning the hospital room on its head) on the plan. They have to argue a bit with Gaia, who thinks that the Mariette who attacked Riung had it coming, but Maelle mentions that Riung herself, or at least her future version, doesn't think Mariette deserves this, so they run towards Zwosta Train Station.

They reach the train station on time, but can't seem to find the Mariette they need, and as they are searching one of the Faceless Umichooan Puppets, this one made of polished silver, enters the building too and starts checking every traveler.

And then it sees the Mariette that came with the party, and approaches her.

Maelle decides to go for broke and tries to cut the thing with their sword, but the Silver Puppet is apparently made of metal, and the sword merely bounces with a “ping” sound; trying to wrestle it has no effect either because it's made of solid metal, and weights more than the entire party combined.

Gaia decides to try to do something new, and dreamsteps to the local version of Riung, who is surprised to be contacted this way by the same girl who saved her life. Gaia tries to argue that since Chronomancers are not considered people by Umichooans, executing one for a crime does not actually make sense, to which Riung actually agrees in theory, but points that the decision of how to handle the situation is on the hands of Ambassador Oi-See and he has decided to kill Mariette. She, as a Keeper of the Subtle Machine, is bound to obey such rulings in all cases.

Claire finally manages to find the right Mariette, who was wearing a quite convincing disguise the whole time, and helps her to get out of there before going back in to grab the glove from Gaia's unconscious body and stop everything at once.

But before Claire manages to find the glove, seeing that they can't do anything to the puppet, Maelle themself tries to recall the way things worked when they contacted older Riung, and it surprisingly works, with their body also dropping to the ground and their echo appearing next to Gaia and Riung. They try to argue further, to no avail, but as Gaia decides to leave to go argue with Oi-See they both notice at the same time that the Puppet did in fact target the wrong Mariette.

On hearing this Riung instantly puts her foot down, and stops the machine in place.

• Claire Dubois
• Gaia Dynko
• Maelle Kurimoto
• Mariette Navia (hospitalized)
• Mariette Navia (tried to kill Riung)
• Mariette Navia (tried to heal Riung)
• Mariette Navia (came back home to find everything on fire)
• Amanda
• Yumiko Kurimoto
• Iorena Sevel
• Ariyadna
• Eliza Baron
• Oi-See Gauda
• Riung

• [Claire] explains to Yumiko that Mariette seems able to travel trough time, and a bunch seem to have come back at this time, one of which attempted to kill Riung. The one in the hospital is another one that also seem to be terrified of Riung but didn't attack them, at least yet.
• Yumiko: Right. that's… interesting, but I was asking about what you know about her health, because we're not sure if the way her body is behaving is normal or what.

• Claire: Maelle told you about my condition?
• Yumiko: Ariyadna did: you let an eight-year-old see; how did you think it would remain secret?

• Mariette: What do you mean not human? I'm totally human, doing human things. I even have a job in the town, for fuck's sake
• Claire: That doesn't prevent it, Mariette. Anyway, were you allowed to leave the doctor, or are you another Mariette that I hadn't met yet today?
• Yumiko: What she said: am I supposed to consider you next of kin? Because if so I have a lot of paperwork for you to fill

• Gaia: I can do that but I want to test something with you in exchange.
• Mariette: Ohh~ it's going to be this timeline. you might not want to do that to me, Gaia.
• Gaia: Huh?
• Mariette: I mean, if you want go on, but it's gonna be interesting; you might learn something from it.
• Gaia: Cool, I like learning. So is that a deal?
• Mariette: Shake on it?

• Mariette: Gaia? Gaia? Testing, testing? Earth-exploration Team to Gaia… I swear I will give you a wet willie if you don't react.
• Gaia: Hi…?

• Mariette: I'm not even supposed to tell you people about anything, or allow you people to check anything. That much I remember.
• Claire: And what can you do then?
• Mariette: Get her home, maybe find some appropriate medication, you know, the usual.
• Yumiko: And what will happen the next time that there's not another you here to take care of you? And people not smart enough to notice that you should be running what for regular humans is a fever? how does your body even react to antipyretics? Hell, what does your allergy chart even look like!?
• Mariette: (at Claire) Please help?

• Claire: I believe we should focus to find the one mariette who attempted the murder, and let that one explain why she did it, and maybe get those Umichooan to do their business as fast as possible, then leave just as fast.
• Mariette: I tried to kill who?
• Claire: Riung. Would you know why one of you tried?
• Mariette blinks. Then the bag slips from her grasp and falls to the ground with a “thud” and a soft “clink” as something inside it probably breaks. And then she lets out a very soft but very felt “fuck”.

• Mariette: Okay, good, coolio, awesome. We are in an Umichooan flying island, where a Riung is. I'm going there, and not die. Please don't let me die.
• Gaia: You're going with me and stay with me because I don't want to another Riung attempt (also I hope you're not on drugs this time).

• Oi-See: Beware, young one, because this is not a human being; it's something else masquerading as one. And it does not have human emotions, merely looks to you as if it does, so you will drop your guard and allow it in.

• Oi-See: Human law is made for humans, by humans. Why would something that is not human even care about it? There's no reason for it to obey the law, since there's no feeling of belonging, or wish to actually partake in a society
• Gaia: My squirrel cares (I think, right Amanda?)

• Maelle: You're a friend, after all
• Mariette: yea, but you know. I just shanked someone… Oh my fuck, I just shanked Riung.
• Maelle: I mean, I did also tell you that I killed a few people in my drunken ramblings so I think we're even on that front.
• Mariette: Even considering all the danger because Riung, the consequences on time might be having us in a very big divergence. I needed to do something, but I don't really know what Riung does, just that it's a huge shadow on time.

• Mariette: That's the thing about things that weight on time. You know that Umichoo broke their timeline, and made a hole?
• Maelle: Know about that, yeah.
• Mariette: That would not have been a big problem, if it wasn't because it was something that every version of Umichoo was geared to do for centuries. It was not just a tiny bit of an error that happened once by chance, it was the end result of they being Umichoo for a long time. Of they doing whatever they wanted with the timeline, and refusing to stop.
• Maelle: So whatever Riung does is just—destined?
• Mariette: There's no destiny, but some trends are basically the same: the sun will rise tomorrow, the Rigasian Confederacy will eventually collapse, we will eventually die of old age.

• Mariette: No, no, you can't do this. Need to plug this in this part of the arm. It's designed to have a stronger signal there…
• Yumiko: The hell you mean designed?
• Claire: Yeah, biesse, what do you mean designed?
• Mariette: Why do you think I look human, sweetiepies? we were not born this way; hell, the way my people were born could not even exist in this universe. So to live around here we had to get creative with our shapes, and in this particular solar system the easiest way to live is to actually look like you.

• Claire: Did they gave you instructions when sending you here, a goal to accomplish?
• Mariette: No, no. told you. I ran away. that much I know. They can stuff their instructions in whatever they're using in place of an ass
• Claire: Good for you, you have my respect for that.

• Mariette: Okay, so, Gaia. I'm going to try to time-un-lock this mess and hope that the… something gets her better? either the Weave or the dude who is trying to kill me by looking angry?
• Gaia: What if she bleeds out?
• Oi-See: Our medical facilities will not allow someone to do something as mundane as bleeding out.

• Gaia: Oh, by the way, I found these potions Somewhere lying around. Do you know what they do maybe?
• Mariette: Those are the ones from under my counter, in case of someone tries to rob me. Did you rob me of the anti-rob stuff, Gaia?

• Maelle: Hey! Guess who I fucking met!
• Gaia: Mariette?
• Claire: Hey Maelle, bondjoû
• Maelle: Fucking Old Riung!
• Claire: What?
• Gaia: Ooh did she tell you what's going on?

• Riung: Silver Hunter: you have put an innocent in danger. your compact is REVOKED.

Rose is thinking Big Thougts lately.

The post mortem for this session was incredibly polarizing. Maelle's player seems to have loved it, and all its infodumps, whereas Claire's player rightly argued that the party split made the story quite boring if you were not the person with the focus on themself at that moment.

Yumiko Kurimoto is chomping at the bit to actually see Claire's ears (she learned of it through Ariyadna) but she's a fucking professional, so she's not even going to mention the kitsune thing while working, thank you very much.

Ariyadna doesn't really know to use chopsticks; she just moves them in a kinda related motion and uses her very well trained telekinesis to actually get the food in her mouth, which is actually adorable.

Also Ariyadna's current means of talking to people is a very complicated Patois of equal parts Valtshoran, Nihonic, Talosian, and Gotthos.

Apparently Mariette has worked on a kind of knockout gas that works for almost every kind of living being in earth, one exception being cockroaches.

The story that Maelle read to Ariyadna seems to be a bit on the vein of Tolkien's “The Hobbit” but of course Tolkien did never exist in the Rigasian Timeline.

Apparently Gaia has decided that she's never inviting Oi-See to her birthday because he's that condescending an racist.

Young Riung is very much in denial about her older self even having talked with Maelle, because apparently that's very much against Umichooan Law, and the penalty is death.