Last Lantern Year turned pretty rough, pretty quickly – but it’s what you get when rolling *REDACTED*. All things considered, the 2 stragglers did manage to deal a decent amount of damage to the irradiated lope, I’d say.
Anyways, with 4 people dead, 2 of which we didn’t even remember how they died, we should be getting 2 endeavors this phase (for Cooking (I) and 15 pop), but the loss condition of the Nukealope removed these 2 in the blink of an eye as well.
Left wholly at the mercy of the upcoming events: Startling Barks did absolutely nothing.
A little later a Bone Witch arrived at the settlement as well, shortly before the red-haired stranger.

A traveling Squire set up to ring the Waiting Bell for the first time in the history of the settlement. Copperhead was randomly nominated to be fascinated by the strange visitor and she watched the Squire day in and day out imitating their daily routine as best she could. Sadly she wasn’t brave enough to steal the fuzzy hat though.
After gaining the Bell of Challenge (I), there wasn’t much else to do but set up a team to fight the Black Knight.
Just before they had to depart I did take the chance for Ys to replace her Indecision (D) with Honorable (D) by interacting with the bell at no cost.

The Chosen Warriors:
Emerald – green (Frogdog Armor, Sharpened Heel)
Frogdos – blue (Black&Red bits, Hyperelastic Sword)
Malleus – red (Leather Armor, Beast Knuckles)
Migi – yellow (Screaming Armor, Bone Club)

All 4 people headed to the fight having 3 understanding was looking promising right from the start, even if all 3 rolls on Insight just vanished into nothingness – thanks, Pariah.
In case you have not fought a Black Knight before: the monster has 10TGH and 4 +1TGH-tokens on top of that. In the special area the fight is held in we can find a piece of interactable terrain which on a 6+ will remove one of the +1TGH-tokens from the monster. If the person using this piece of terrain has 3+ understanding, however, the roll gains a +3 modifier.
Furthermore, the amount of people with high, or at least 3 understanding also factors into the possible rewards gained after the fight.

As the group was ushered to the Mountain Ascent, Migi’s lack of courage got to him during the elevator-basket ride – that -1ACC-token wasn’t great, but what could we do without Song of the Brave (I)?
Emerald spent her time freezing all the way up, but caught the Squire breathing in a certain way to make up for it a little.
Malleus and Frogdos however were having a great time, basking in the grandeur of the moment – both gained the Largesse ability as they felt their destiny approaching.

The Black Knight is one of my favorite fights the game has to offer currently and despite my reluctance due to our non-existent stats, I was looking forward to this encounter at least a little bit.
We would definitely have to actually try and get more Bell Altars activated this time though, compared to what I usually do.

12 cards in the deck, as with most nemesis encounters, the survivors got to go first.
I placed Emerald so she could activate the first Bell Altar right away and surge to reveal the tile behind us – just like that, the first token was gone already!
Migi being joyless was a potential hindrance (he can’t surge), but the newly revealed Bell Altar was going to make for a good first turn anyhow – quickly the 2nd +1TGH-token have been removed as well!
This also gave him a chance to position for a Slam next round.

Frogdos was next to activate, his sword at a terrible 7+ to hit. Luckily, he did still find 1 hit, but the wound failed! The monster jumped onto our starting space, knocking almost everyone down! However Frogdos’ Iron Will had him remain standing, which meant the Hyperelastic Sword‘s effect triggered, for another free hit – and he crit it! Unga-bunga! Spending 1 survival with Frogdos, the Black Knight got knocked down from this! Obviously he surged as well, dealing 1 more wound to the doggo on its back.
Migi then uses 1 survival to encourage Malleus, who walked over to the Bell Altar on the Black Knight’s starting tile, removing yet another +1TGH-token!

Malleus then kept the encourage-train rolling so Emerald also got a chance to attack as well. She hit the prone monster 3 times, one of which was perfect even, but our luck had run out already – it had been a ruse all along – the trap was flipped!
She was luckily only hit once, but that still flung her right over the edge of the citadel! At -4, the 9 she rolled turned into a 5, which meant an arm damage but also her survival.

10 cards left in the deck, and only a single +1TGH-token remained as “armor”, the Black Knight prepared its furious retaliation – Snarling Shove.
The monster picked out Migi as its target and Frogdos tried his best to stop it with a surge! Both his attacks missed as he swung wildely.
Migi on the other hand got hit twice, so not even a dodge could prevent the knockback and he tumbled over the edge with just 1 knock back remaining .. and he rolled a 1. With a last air-less gasp, he was gone and dead.

The monster then picked up Frogdos and Smashed him into the single stature we knew off, but Iron Will (cannot be knocked down & all knockback is reduced to 1) had the effect fizzle out almost completely!
I had to re-check where he got that from and it was the Pariah fight – he dealt a critical blow to its blind-fold, costing him an eye in exchange for the ability.
Through all of this Malleus dashed a few steps to avoid being knocked away by the monster bumping into him.

As our turn finally started Malleus moved over to make way for Frogdos and struck at the monster’s open back, only managing to hit the Tattered Cape, but his katar tore through it, cutting off a basic hide! Which was great – but not quite as impressive as what Frogdos was about to do:
He moved into the back next, so he could dash out after his attacks had been resolved and whilst he failed the first batch of hits, his surge delivered another crits – the Black Knight’s Polished Gorget shattered, giving us not only an Iron but also removing its last +1TGH-token!
Emerald must have been so impressed that she failed all her hit attempts afterwards.

9 cards remaining and 0 +1TGH-tokens. The Black Knight decided it would go for an Overhead Slam next. Malleus was going to be the target, but only after Emerald surged – hoping she would be able to stop it!
Triple 8s for hits were looking good .. and yet she only found the trap again. The monster rolled a triple 9 to style on her and dealt a severe arm injury as well, breaking it painfully (8).

She was flung towards the edge again and just managed to avoid going over .. but my joy about this was short-lived as she had to take another severe arm injury because of it – a Contracture! What a terrible turn of events!

The Overhead Slam then proceeded to miss Malleus (thanks to a dodge), but there was still a basic attack follow-up!

He got hit and Smashed and was flung straight into another statue .. the bounce took him over the edge screaming. Another one, dead.

At this point I was starting to have my doubts as it felt like this fight was going to come down to whether or not Frogdos could kill the doggo on his own as he wouldn’t be getting knocked around.. but he just hits so unreliably!
As if to prove me wrong about my reservations, he attacked and surged and dealt 2 more wounds.

The Black Knight jumping around even gave Emerald an avenue of attack! Running up to the monster she was able to crit the monster’s parry attempt with the Sharpened Heel!
Not missing a beat she did also surge and rolled a perfect hit! This meant the first hit location she chose to attack was going to be an auto-crit as well. This did knock her down, but splintered the monster’s ancient cuirass in the process, gaining us another valuable Iron! Not to mention that she had just dealt 4 wounds thanks to savage!
She turned out to be lethal! No wonder the doggo was keeping its traps for her!

Down to 3 cards remaining in one fell swoop, the monster seemed a little stunned by the sudden outburst. Fetch missed on all attacks!

Frogdos’ turn was resolved just as quickly: without any hits, but Emerald managed to deal yet another crit in the monster’s neck!
2 more wounds added to the tally, she and the monster both hit the floor. She had successfully turned this around!

1 final card remaining – its the terrifying Overhead Slam again. Frogdos could only tank the hit – and he remained standing, of course, .. which wasn’t ideal this time.
He was hit twice more from the basic before he got “flung” away 1 space by the Smash. Whilst he wouldn’t go over any board-edge anytime soon, the damage was going to start to mount eventually.

Emerald was eager to activate first this time .. she only needed 1 more perfect hit to end this!
And she actually got it – 1 singular hit, but it was indeed perfect!
She sliced open the Tattered Left Gauntlet and the monster let out a confused and pitiful yelp before it bounded off into the darkness with its canine reflexes, leaving us the victors for today!

Iron Will on Frogdos as well as the Piercer (FA) & savage combo on Emerald won that fight for us! Unga-bung protects!

Frogdos finally reached his first age milestone (Unbreakable FA) afterwards, and picked up sword proficiency to train in the future.

Making our way through the Darkened Workshop in search for goodies to take home, Emerald hadn’t suffered enough for one day, and she got Aichmophobia (D) benching her until we got rid of it.
We did gain a hand full of resources from looking around at least and headed out with 2 patterns from the Earl Armor set as I have played with that one the least thus far.

Once again, we drew a lot of hide.

Those 2 Iron do look promising though – we might be able to build something fun with those once we get back to the settlement next Lantern Year.
(Maybe – at the time I forgot about the FA requirement of the seed-pattern I was thinking off.)

I have to say though, I did feel a little lonely without the Feline Entity checking up on the settlement this time.

***

At some point, at the end of 2025, I though around this time of the new year, I’d been done with this campaign – well, sucks to suck, I guess, as we aren’t even half way there.
It’s like every time I start thinking about whether or not I should remove DBK from this campaign or if I should just go and hunt one soon, I get slower. And at this point I have made it back to that stage of the cycle where I am thinking I want to wait for the Screaming Goat.
So, we’ll see.
I’m not trying to make excuses, but I felt that I should acknowledge it again.

***

In other distractions: I mentioned elsewhere that I had recently completed a marathoned PotStars campaign – it took me 8 days from the Prologue to the Death of the Dragon King.
A surprisingly taxing experience, but also really, really fun. For Quarries I chose Gorm, Spidicules and Sunstalker (and Lion God) mainly because I had the least experience with them and I do have to say .. I am starting to really like the spooder. A flighty-basterd during the fight and a vindictive race as a whole – I did manage to pay one of them back for all my taken survivors by taking it hostage instead – yes! I managed to cut off all the legs it had during a Lvl3 fight!
Gorm is also great, but for me its mainly because it is just axe-heaven. In that sense that monster speaks to my soul. (And Fullmetal Gormchymist has to be one of the best naming schemes. van Gormheim, Gormunculus, Lady Gormas, Gormvy, Gormvoc, Gormward & Algorm.)
Besides ridiculous survivors, during this campaign I also built a Greatest Gaxe and a Poison Partisan, for both of which I can report that they are great indomitable weapons, should you ever consider picking one up.
The Poison Partisan especially has left a lasting impression with me, because, whilst you do have to plan around the spiderlings it spawns in addition to anything the monster already does, it offers a great trade-off in regards to survivability with the potential -3ACC for the monster if you manage to hit consistently with it. It’s not just a “big stats go brrrr” type of weapon but more a tool to ease a difficult fight for the whole group.
Unfortunately, I did not manage to build the Tyrant based IR weapon, because I couldn’t hold on to a Perfect Organ whilst the Tomb was being built.

Whilst it was a bit of a draining affair, to complete a 25-LY-campaign in little over a week, it was really enjoyable and I did already start a new one – PotSun this time – a couple of days ago.
I’ve also chose to have Aeneas “help out” in both settlements.

And that will be all for today.
As always, thank you very much for your time, do not get jumped by the dog – there is no telling where you might end up.
Amathul