Profile
Songbird
| Songbird | |
 [Image] | |
| Biographical Information | |
| Kenku name | A soft and musical birdsong. |
| Alias | Songbird, Song |
| Serial Number | 983016α |
| Character Nicknames | Snowbird, Snow, Song, Bird |
| Player Nicknames and Titles | My Poor Bird, The Adventurer |
| Physical Information | |
| Species | Kenku |
| Sex | Female |
| Skin | Light gray |
| Height | 4'0" |
| Feathers | Soft off-white with a few spots of gray |
| Eyes | Gray |
| General Information | |
| Gender | Female |
| Sexuality | Heterosexual |
| General Alignment | Neutral good/ chaotic good? |
| Soul Colors | Blue and green |
| Status | |
| Dies | Session XIV |
| Age | 13-15? [19-21 human equivalent] |
| Notable Flock mates | Shatter, Coo, Hoot. |
| Party Members | Jules, Harmony, Bard Girl |
| Curse Status | All kenku curses still in play, plus some others as an added bonus: She's a wererat, cracked furnace, and a beholder curse! |
| D&D Specific | |
| Campaign | Mnemonic Dreams |
| Plane | Amphlesia |
| Edition | 5e |
| Level | 6 |
| Classes | Rouge 2, Bard 4 (College of Lore) |
"Weird, huh."
A little kenku rouge-bard setting out on an adventure!
Naive and optimistic, Songbird accepted her quest to safeguard a jewelry box for Lord Aurem, being sent to a strange town called Pheonix Feather. Her knowledge of her origin and increasingly concerning situation steadily grew, but she faced it all head on alongside her faithful party members, Jules and Harmony. Nothing could crush her determination to change her fate. And that fire within her, fueled by a desire for freedom and love of an art form that she can never fully comprehend, was both a blessing, and yet another curse.
My first 'true' D&D character. Her origin comes form the fact that a friend mentioned kenku as a new race lacking creativity and their own voice, and my response immediately being, "I could make a bard outta that." And so, I did. Out of a purposefully flawed concept came this wonderful little bird who is everything I love in a character, all with an awesome background and plot that I can't thank my DM enough for.
Appearance
As a kenku, songbird is a wingless humanoid raven. She isn't especially strong, but is pretty dexterous and light on her feet.
4'0", very short for a kenku, and still short in her shorter-than-average population. Light, not very well built or strong, very agile.
Is leucistic, making her feathers appear white with some light gray patches. Unlike albinism this condition doesn't affect her eyes; hers remain gray.
Complete Appearance: Addresses all additions; will remain up to date.
info
Session __ - __
Some molting feathers on her chest. Surely nothing to worry about... right?
Session __ and onward
Nvm, it was something to worry about, there's an eye in her chest now. Lovely.
Session __ and onward
Cracked furnace messed her up; feathers paling, small useless white demon tail...
Attire
Cloak, scarf, belt w/ potion[s], short sleeved brown tunic with a light blue stripe down the middle, leather armor, wears her lute on a strap, has her bag, purple book on a mythrill chain around her neck hidden behind her scarf.
Cloak: Song's cloak is made up of black kenku feathers that she's gathered. It tends to need mending fairly often, but luckily she's got a spell for that. (Once, a dragon thought her cloak was magic, because why else would she wear a cloak of feathers?)
Scarf: A simple over-sized navy scarf. It is adorned with some feathers of varying colors (From varying sources) and a lock of golden elven hair.
Book: Tiny purple book with golden 'circuitry' engraved into it. The other side is damn near vantablack. It is strung on a mythrill chain.
Personality
Determined, loyal to her friends above all else, fairly optimistic and energetic, somewhat naive, fairly perceptive, and surprisingly charismatic; making for a great leader, kind hearted to a reasonable degree. Too trusting sometimes. Good memory, like most kenku; pattern recognition, never forgets a voice. No creativity, though.
Determined: How else could she have picked up on music, with how difficult it would have been? It purposefully goes against what is standard and would have been discouraged by her flock and bards alike...
Kind; Forgiving: Song tries her best to be a good person. But that isn't always easy, considering her upbringing. Telling right from wrong when such things were never well established is a clear challenge, but even within the context of her flock, she is fairly forgiving. She wouldn't kill an elf unless they're an obvious threat or attacked them first, and she never really wanted to do it anyway. But, orders are orders, and even with her nature, she couldn't just let her flock mates get hurt or anything. At her core, she's a good person brought up by evil forces.
Loyal: Song is undeniably loyal to her flock, who she was raised with... to the hierarchy of power she is so familiar with... and to her party, who are more than willing to follow a kenku of all people seemingly to the end of Amphlesia. Perhaps it was just in her nature to pledge herself to something, and in the end, and no matter the variables, it was always the people she was close to that counted the most. 'Loyal to the very end,' and when her loyalty to Aurem came into question, over her freedom, over her adventuring life... she chose to stand by the people she had come to know, forsaking all that had come before despite the consequences, and despite the difficulty. She is a reliable person, once her trust and respect is earned, and coupled with her determination and kind-hearted nature... she makes for a wonderful adventuring companion.
Under Stress: When stressed, Song slips into kenku tendencies and follows the directions of others. Leadership doesn't come naturally to her, after all. She looses that naive, optimistic aspect of her personality for a time and her determination takes a hit. Once or twice when she was stressed even music failed her; through her temporarily bleak outlook, she recognized the pointlessness of the endeavor. A voiceless bard without creativity, nothing more then a hopeless plagiarist... Luckily, these spells tend not to last long. Her allies can easily bolster her spirits, and when it really gets down to it, she is determined enough to forge through any obstacle.
In comparison to the other iterations of Song:
This 'main' Songbird retains her naive nature and optimism the longest, in the end, fully embracing her idealistic determination. Her adventures in Phoenix Feather simply add fuel to the fire when it comes to her love of music and desire to be a real adventurer, reaffirming her love of the lifestyle.
Voice and Dialogue
Like all kenku, songbird lacks a voice; instead, she mimics sounds and voices to form phrases. She most often speaks in voices she'd heard recently, such as Jules and Harmony, and finds it easier to copy entire phrases than try to piece together words. One of her favorite people to pull phrases from is a female rouge she must have had an extended run in with during her coming-of-age-quest. This rouge is responsible for such favorites as, "It'll make the perfect distraction!"
When telling a story that she can't simply mimic, she ends up putting her all into it; mimicking the exact things people said, acting out movements, and really just... having fun with it. She gets so engages in it that it's hard not to become interested yourself, if you can keep track of what's going on, considering the quick pace and constant swapping of dialogue. Song has certainly found an interesting way to work with story telling and her lack of words and creativity, a method that nearly seems to border on being creative to start with.
Habits
- Twiddling her talons when nervous
- Acting out conversations and actions when telling a story.
- Making animal noises to express emotions; commonly chirping, a dog whimpering, cat meowing, etc.
Hobbies
- Music; both playing and listening.
- Stories: both just to listen, and to mimic later.
Likes
- Adventurer types with all sorts of neat things to say!
- Music! Especially the kind that she can learn how to replicate.
- Shiny stuff. Jewels and treasures... she is still a rouge, after all.
- Stories. She's content to just listen, but is also fond of re-telling ones she's heard, and telling her own- thought that can take a good bit of effort sometimes. Not that such a thing discourages her from trying!
Dislikes
- Heights; to the point of it being a phobia.
- Not having at least one potion on her at all times. It makes her a bit nervous.
- (Session __ and onward) Rats. She will competently overreact to a rat now.
- (Session __ and onward) Sewers. Never again.
Goals
- Become a good bard!
- Make her flock/ party proud!
- (Sessions 0-__): Fulfill her duty! [And avoid the punishment that would come with failure...]
Stats (Level 6 in Session XIV)
Strength: 11 [+0]
Dexterity: 19 [+4]
Constitution: 15 [+2]
Intelligence: 11 [+0]
Wisdom: 10 [+0]
Charisma: 20 [+5]
HP:
Proficiency:
Initiative: +4
AC: 16
Spell save DC (Charisma): 16
Passive Perception:
Languages, tools, proficiency and expertise:
- Thieves tools
- Lute, mandolin
- Common, Auran, and Theives' Cant
- Proficiency: Acrobatics,
- Expertise: Performance,
Spells
Three 'prepared' cantrips, four 1st, three 3rd
Cantrips: (Three 'prepared')
- Mending
- Prestidigitation
- Mage Hand
- Message (From Zeta/ Angel)
- Green-Flame Blade (From Zeta/ Angel)
Level 1 Spells: [4 spell slots]
- Cure Wounds
- Disguise Self
- Dissonant Whispers
- Feather Fall
- Faerie Fire
Level 2 Spells [3 spell slots]
- Invisibility
- Detect Thoughts
Cracked Furnace Curse Abilities
- An augmented misty step:
- Charm person once a day
- Hellfire bolt Cha-mod per day
Knowledge
Languages Known: Common, Auran, Thief's Cant.
Notable Phrases Known:
- "Weird, huh" In a female tavern goer's voice.
- "Dunno." In a casual female's voice. Pairs well with a simple shrug.
- "It'll make the perfect distraction!" In a female rouge's confident voice.
- "Fearna!" In her own voice, to set up Cracked Furnace.
- "PROMOTION!" In a booming male orc's voice (Crimson)
- "I'm too drunk for this." In Jule's voice.
- "Common, do you speak it!?" In an annoyed orc's voice (Crimson)
Notable Sounds Known:
- A pained elephant trumpet.
- An elven battle cry.
- Some didgeridoo sounds.
- The dying screams of a devil.
- An angel's scream... yeah. THAT angel's scream.
- A simple warm up on lute that she picked up during her coming-of-age-quest.
- Some sea shanties she picked up from the boat trip to dragon-island.
- Pieces learned from her book "A beginner's guide... whatever that one was uh
Equipment
Weapons and Armor:
- Studded leather armor
- Rapier
- Short sword
- Hand crossbow [~40 bolts]
- Two daggers
Her Bag of Holding:
- Crowbar, 10 pitons
- 4 candles, a tinderbox
- 10 feet of string, 50 feet of rope
- Water skin, 5 days worth of rations
- Bedroll
- Hooded lantern, 2 flasks of oil
- Thieves tools
- Flask of Greek fire
- 'River's Stone Guidance' a stone book written in dwarven.
- 'Beginner's Soliloquy' a music book for beginners.
Travel Bag
- Black star sapphire
- Sending stone (Jules)
- Flask of Greek fire
- Uncut diamond
- Playing card set
- Assorted feathers
On Her Person:
- Lute [over the shoulder strap]
- 2 potions of healing [At her side, on a belt.]
- Boots of elven kind
- Component pouch
- Coin pouch: 8 pp, 246gp, 1ep, 5cp
Miscellaneous
Fear of Heights: She's a kenku... That's afraid of heights. Because I thought it'd be hilarious. And, it was. Head-cannon is that when she was young an orc picked ehr up and scared the shit outta her.
Cracked Furnace: Damn demons/ devils and their wonky curses that are actually really useful but like is it really worth your SOUL though?
Were-Rat Curse: Full moons mess her up, big time.
Beholder Curse: 'A beholder dreamt an eye into your chest.' yeah eyes don;'t go there. It got more complicated than that, too; Aur'Ku precursor shit.
Story
Mnemonic Dreams [Simplified] [Completed]
Born into hereditary slavery under the beholder Lord Aurem, Songbird was but a cog in the machine, and completely unaware of her role. She was sent out by Aurem to the plane Amphlesia, specifically, to Phoenix Feather, an island town founded by adventurers, for adventurers. Her quest was to safeguard and later ‘find a suitable bearer’ for a mysterious box. Using her knowledge of adventurers gained from the stories of the bards she so admired, she figured that going to the tavern to gather information and get her bearings would be ehr best bet. She made a good impression and was allowed to ‘play for her supper’ despite some initial suspicion over her race which were quickly dispelled by Barkeep, who made the claim that ‘Just one kenku can't cause trouble.’ She was given the nickname ‘Snowbird’ due to her white feathers, and no amount of correcting them was going to change that.
At the tavern and through her initial exploration of the town Song joined (Though she never actually agreed to such a thing until she needed a party for a quest) the party of Jules, a *veldalken artificer suffering from amnesia. Jules had gained the nickname ‘Insomnia’ due to a misunderstanding and the fact that she didn’t sleep for several days when she arrived at Phoenix Feather. Also in their party was Clang, Jules’ loyal robotic companion, and Harmony, a dwarven cleric of Venus with an obvious crush(?) on Jules.
The newly formed party exchanged some background information and decided to try and head to Claircivic, where other *veldalkens live, to try and get information about Jules and her past. In order to do that they would need money for a ship. So, they headed to the sewers to help with Phoenix Feather’s kobold problem.
Turns out, the kobold problem was more of a kobold-demon-cult problem, and one adventure and some failed saved later, the problem was resolved. They even got a mysterious egg out of the deal.
The late king of Pheonix Feather had a reward lined up for any adventurers who assisted the current prince (Who was apparently… unreliable, at best) and so the party was rewarded handsomely. Each were given a beautiful gemstone that counted as a favor, a magical item, and Song, designated as the leader (In spite of kenku tending to make horrid leaders) was gifted with a brilliant star sapphire.
They still lacked the funds for a boat, but Barkeep informed them of The Labyrinth, which could be used to get place to place, though with some caveats. And, one mysterious magic-font-summoning event later, then one labyrinth adventure later, they arrived at Claircivic.
They hated it. Everyone was racist, the rogues tried to steal from a fellow rouge, they were stuck up, Harmony’s divine casting didn’t work right, there was this weird Force wanna-be god dude, they had some festival involving children fighting in an arena…. And, to top it all off, they had wererats in their sewers!
It was during their stay in Claircivic that Song’s curses fully revealed themselves; She had been bitten by a wererat, had attained the cracked furnace curse of a devil, a beholder had dreamt an eye into her chest, her book of identify was cursed, she was geased to hell and back, and inherently, as a kenku, she carried the three curses of her people. The wererats tried to induct he rinto their sewer-cult, but her party managed to save her and get the hell out of there, sadly with no information about Jules’ past.
They decreed then and there; no more sewers.
They went back to Pheonix Feather where they were starting to gain some notoriety, mostly over their sewer-escapades. They received a quest from someone, and some payment up front, as well as a ship pass to get there. Having little other direction, they agreed. And one ship-adventure with a storm and tentacle monster (That can somehow dodge faerie fire while perfectly stationary) later, they were escorted to a wizard’s spire in the middle of the ocean by Feather Rite, an energetic, ditzy, planeswalking aarakocra. Once there, Chi’Ilk, a very old elf-wizard gave them some exposition and a mission; they were to deliver a message to some dragons on an island with the goal of getting one to rescue him from his tower-imprisonment. A tad intimidated but determined, the party agreed and took a trip to dragon-island.
Inevitably, they emt the dragons and passed on the message. One left to help Chi’ilk, but in his absence, they needed someone to help guard their nests.
The woman-of-the-household, ___, a golden dragon who could assume a humanoid form, clearly thought that the party was more capable than they were.
A proud divine caster of Venus, well equipped for any trouble, was more than trustworthy.
A clever artificer with a potent magic item and robotic companion could surely combat any problem head on.
And a spirited bard as their confident leader can surely keep them on track.
Thus, they were tasked with babysitting dragons despite Jules really not wanting any part in it.
So, after many fear-of-heights inducing trips down into the dragon’s lair, several encounters with the mysterious chimera-creatures, one trial of the gods, and one near-death plane walking experience for Jules… things were looking on track.
That was, until the group headed down to the beach for some coffee beans and an aquatic chimera dragged Harmony into the ocean. One grueling watery-rescue attempt later and the party was simply out of options… Harmony had been melded with a fish, nothing more than a mindless creature…..
But Jules consulted with her past life, Verna, who had been awakened during her near-death experience. Verna was an archmage in life, and, breaking several magic artifacts, using Song’s final spell slots, and shifting the book of identify into a crystal…. Harmony's soul had been captured and stored into the book. There was still hope, although fleeting.
They went to sleep.
And then the plot got even more complicated. Each party member, including Verna now, received a message from Zeta warning of Aurem. This message came with the merging of timelines gratning Songbird the hazy memories of her other iterations. This included Zeta/ Angel’s day to day life, up until the speech that brought Aurem to godhood, and the tragic fate of Savior; dream and all.
When they wake they had a complicated predicament; the bard-girl from Zeta’s flock now joined them, Song was going to die of exhaustion due to curses if she didn’t do something, the dragons were pissed about a chimera fucking up a nest, harmony was still stuck in the book-crystal, and Verna could always gain control of Jukes’s body.
One were-rat curse removing deal with a devil and teleportation circle trip later, the party arrived back at Chi’Ilk’s tower were he explained the merging timelines. He informed Song that her curses were… pretty unbreakable at this point, and he couldn’t help with Harmony.
Broken hearted, the party returned to Phoenix Feather. A glimmer of hope presented itself when, through a deal with Verna, Jules enabled Harmony to come back by slaying the creature that guards the font, and in turn opening up the font for use.
But this upturn in luck didn’t last long.
Songbird received a dream from Aurem, and was forced to make a deal; if she didn not return to Aurem by the end of the allotted time period, then Aurem would come and get her, destroying Phoenix Feather if necessary. When she informed the tavern, they all rallied with her. And, one preparation montage, countless terrifying dreams and threats, the kidnapping of Harmony and Clang, and one meeting with who would become Angel later….. It was time for the finale.
Phoenix Feather and it;s allies prepared for battle, confident, ready and willing to defend themselves from this extraplanar threat, taking the form of an army of Aur’Ku outside the town….
And then a ginormous radiant Phoenix was let loose on the town, dashing their hopes in one fell swoop.
Sing’s Party, standing by the font, consisted of: Songbird, Jules, Chi’ilk, Feather Rite, and a group of Force-followers from Claircivic, including one ascended ‘formless.’
The claricivic people bailed.
The remaining group decided that their best option was to planeswalk away.
But Songbird refused. She had brought on this disaster. Thus, she would face it head on, with or without her companions. The others planes walked away, leaving Song to battle one of Aurem’s beholderkin. She fought bravely, giving it her all, but ultimately, she lost the fight.
The others appeared directly in Arrume’s chambers, dragged from their destination by her.
They tried and failed to fight her.
Jules remained, desperate, but her determination shattered when Songbird, or, the unresponsive puppet that remained of her, was lead into the room.
Jules only means of escape was a near death experience to trigger planeswalking; she broguht a gun to her head, and fired.
The moment repeated, over and over, until Aurem grew bored. “Coward.”
Them it stopped. Jules dropped dead.
The adventures remained under Aurem’s control, nothing more than pawns.
Phoenix Feather was wiped off the map.
And any knowledge or items that the party had now belonged to the Divine Eye of Brilliance.
Mnemonic Dreams [Full Story] [WIP]
Songbird was born and raised amid a population of Kenku that for generations have been under the control of a beholder. She lived her life completly unaware of the specifics of her existence; the fact that the kenku were being specifically bred for certain traits- resuktng in a polulation where luekism is common-, that they were knoen across at least a few planes as harbgingers of death and destruction, that every person she had ever known or caed about was just a cog in the machine.
She was blisfully unaware of any of it, content with her life among her flock, if only a little saddned that her love of music and asirations to mimic the bards she had come across during her coming of age quest were, at best, only acepted due to the spell casting she had managed to figure out.
Her life forever changed when she was summoned to meet the beholder, Lord Aurem, and was given a special quest. Like the loyal bird she was, she accepted. Leaving home would be difficult.. but, also exciting! And... sureley, it woildbt be forever. Song was given a few items- A jewlery box, two scrolls, and a book on a chain- and then sent on her way with a ing list of instructions. She arrived in Pheonix Feather, an island town filled with adventerer sorts, as the tavern goers were oh so willing to point out for her. She was allowed to stick around as long as she provided some entertainment, somethign she hapily accepted. Any excuse to play music was welcome!
She was approached by a Jules, a valdalken with a mechanical companion, who attempted to bribe Song with an electrum peic wfor her to 'join her party.' This woman was clearly drunk and exhausted, and ended up being dragged off by some orcs at Barkeep's request. Song pcoketed the electrum peice and planned to explore the town the next day.
And, becaus eof course, her exploration lead her to meet up with Jules ocne more Along with getting a flaks of Greek Fure by testing a crazy alchemists most recent concoctions. It was the result of these cincstions that lead Jules and Song- the former leading the latter- to the temple to buy health potions. There, they emt Hamrony, a dwarven cleric, and friend of Jules. Once again JUes insisted that Song was 'her party' despite Song having never sgreed to such a thing. Seems like Harmony was quick to jump on board the whole 'party' thing too.
Song managed to, in her solo exploring, find a job opportunity! Investigate the sewers for the folks at The Yellow Ruby, a somwhat shady place, but it was promising to have a means of getting some money. The only catch: Song couldnt do it alone. Luckily, she had two people willing to be her 'party'! She picthed the idea to ehr new companions, who eagerly agreed. They explored the sewers, discovered some cobalds, did some exploring, and learned about one another. Turns out that JUles was an dd character; she has amnesia, and only rmebered being in Pheonix Feather with ehr robot companion, and not much else. She also had a strange box of spell storing that interacted with Song's box a tad unusually... and Song heasistantly explained her own quest, convienetnly leaving own some important bits such as 'Lord Aurem is a beholder.'
The group decides to hire some help to hutn down the cobads in the sewer for bounty, in hopes to pay their way off the island to meet the other veldaken, to hopefully lern of Jules past. Song happily helped, seeing as she had no direction anyway. The sewers proved.... exciting. They found the cobolds.... preforming soem sort of rituatl to a devil. In the swers. Battle ensued! Con saves against filthy weapons were made! And failed! (By me.)
Reincarnates: Devotion Epilogue [WIP]
*Ahem* I'm sure you know what's coming.
My poor baby bird.....
Relationships
Jules
Early sessions: Not entirely sold on how useful, reliable, or tolerable she'll be, but at least having a friend in this strange town is nice. And, it seems that some... er, supernatural force is continuously pulling Songbird towards staying with the self-proclaimed engineer.
Harmony
Trivia
- Song has been thrown off cliffs more times than she'd have liked. Damn dragons living in their stupid cave...
- Once, a very intimidating orc (Crimson) picked her up. I asked the DM how tall the orc was, and then he realized why. He had forgotten that Song was afraid of heights. We determined that the orc was, in fact, tall enough to trigger this fear, so my bird freaked the hell out until the orc put her down.
- The wizard needed the party's help to summon a celestial so that Song could make a pact with it. He needed them to donate some spell slots. Okay! So Song put in most of hers, which turned out to be waay overkill, and the celestial they summoned was super powerful. Oops. Apparently he didn't need THAT many...
- She made a pact with a celestial once. It didn't help her in the slightest.
- **Other tidbits from her character sheet:
- Ideals: "People: She is loyal to her friends, not to any ideas, and everyone else can take a trip down the river Styx for all she cares. (Neutral)"
- Bonds: She has an item to safeguard and later deliver to someone.
- Flaws: She is afraid of heights. She is loyal to the very end [The DM gave her that one after she saved Harmony.]
Quotes and Excerpts
[In a frantic male voice:] "Fire!" [In a confident rouge's voice:] "It'll make the perfect distraction!"
Author's notes
- This bird is so silly but I love her.
- Between Songbird and Jules, the two-person party has absolutely awful speaking skills. Songbird's high charisma can only get her so far; it doesn't do anything if she doesn't have the words for it!
- In the first round of combat during session 1, I not only forgot to use bardic inspiration, but I also forgot to use sneak attack!
- She is so, so cursed...
- I have said "My poor bird" So, so many times throughout this campaign...
- I heard about a race that lacks creativity and a voice. So, I decided to make one a bard. Flawless logic. But man did I fall in love with the concept; a character determined to succeed with the odds stacked against her, driven to follow her dreams despite her very nature fighting against it.
- Yeah, I cried when she died. was kind of in denial as it was happening, 'It can't be game, this can't be the end...' there had to be a way out... but, no. There was no way out. We sort of.. lost D&D. But I swear, some other character, in some other campaign will get revenge on Aurem. Someone has to stop her reign of terror...
- It was well within her character to have given up her defiance and gone with Angel in order to spare her friends, but it was also just as likely that she held her ground. In that moment, Jules could have suggested either, and Song would have done it.
Had she reached level 5 bard, she would have picked up the spell sending to be able to chat with folks across planes. And had she reached level 3 rouge, she would ave picked up the swashbuckler archetype. Had she gone beyond that, she would have only picked up more bard levels. And for feats, inspiring leader was looking very tempting.
- Of the four iterations of Songbird, this one, the 'main' one, ended up impacting the world the least. Zeta ascended Aurem to godhood and split into the reincarnates... Savior continues to live and spread her songs and information to those living on her plane, and her children may one day seek to put an end to Aurem's reign of terror... and Angel remains an important part of Aurem's airy indefinitely, becoming perhaps one of the most powerful mortals among the neighboring planes. To quote the DM, 'She could probably punch gods and actually deal damage.'
But Songbird only ever impacted Phoenix Feather and her small party. She got it destroyed and everyone killed, sure, but... there were no acts of grandeur, and no song to be carried on by others. But at least she died and lived by her terms, in the end. She followed Zeta's suggestion and embraced her freedom to the very end, paying the ultimate price for it.
- Of the four iterations of Songbird, this one, the 'main' one, ended up impacting the world the least. Zeta ascended Aurem to godhood and split into the reincarnates... Savior continues to live and spread her songs and information to those living on her plane, and her children may one day seek to put an end to Aurem's reign of terror... and Angel remains an important part of Aurem's airy indefinitely, becoming perhaps one of the most powerful mortals among the neighboring planes. To quote the DM, 'She could probably punch gods and actually deal damage.'
- Info I only learned after the campaign was over:
- Aurem's plan with Song involved the merging of timelines all along. She influenced song so that there would end up being multiple versions of her, and hopefully at least one would be loyal and at least one would be disloyal (Ya know, to run experiments and shit on.) Song was also used to scout that plane, and giving Jules the book of identify really sped that process up.
- Song was 'special' both due to her timeline-merging stuff, and because she was a quirk of genetics, being far closer to Aurem's dream kenku than expected. Initially, she wanted a disloyal bird to be used for breeding purposes, but since Zeta/Angel ascended her to godhood anyway, the breeding program became unnecessary.
- The amulet that Song was to 'give to a suitable bearer' ended up in the hands of a female were rat in Claircivic, who essentially became an agent of Aurem and gained some potent perks.
- Aurem saw letting Song's offspring survive as an act of mercy.
- Info I only learned after the campaign was over:
- If Haixyl "won" D&D, then Songbird seems to have lost it.
- I'm Going With You! (A shell in the Pit, from Wandersong): But really, like the whole damn game. I like bards, okay? And optimism. And determination...
- I Wanna be the Hero (A Shell in the Pit, from Wandersong)
- The Bard (A Shell in the Pit, from Wandersong): The optimism! It's so cute! My poor baby bird deserved better...
- Into the Void: I relate this one to the final standoff with Aurem. The female singer most relates to Song, while the male relates to Jules
- Once Aurem's terrifying radiant phoenix appeared to destroy Phoenix Feather many of the folks who had teamed up with us up and left. (Cowards!) The others decided to planes walk out of there, but Song refused. She stayed and faced off against one of Aurem's beholder kin... and lost. But she held onto her determined hope until the very end. Jules and co. planes walked... and then got dragged into Aurem's lair. Soo... just think of the void as being related to planes walking, and the two character's paths being split.
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