2017-05-19: Puzzles and Traps and Secrets
- Log: Puzzles and Traps and Secrets
- Cast: Corwynt, Elhaym van Houten, Loren Voss, Noah Hawthorne, Rena Lanford
- Where: Sult Ruins
- Date: May 19th 2017
- Summary: On the face of it, it's a totally normal expedition request from a totally normal medical student. The reality of the situation is a wee bit different, as Solaris hires on some Drifters as they explore Sult in search of something. Occurs just before Adlehyde is invaded.
DG: A party led by Loren Voss is now entering Sult Ruins. DG: Party formation is now over. An Entry Challenge will now be drawn and displayed to the party.
======================<* CHALLENGE - Guards at the Gate *>====================== |Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- It seems that whatever mysterious military force is investigating these ruins has deployed guards to keep any stray Drifters from entering the ruins. They are wearing unremarkable clothing with no identifying marks, in no way betraying their identity. While fighting them is an option, it will take far too much time and slow the exploration of the ruins considerably. It would be better to find a way to trick them or lure them from the entrance, thus allowing the party swift entry without raising the alarm. =Dungeon Conditions: Slow=====================================================
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
From his vantage point along the rise, he caps the urge to sigh at the sight of the 'mysterious military' milling around at the entrance to the ruins, straight ahead.
Well, this figures. "...It seems like we're not the first ones here," he comments, more or less to himself as he pushes his glasses up his nose, to all the world deep in thought as he regards the figures guarding the way forward.
Between keeping tabs of events over in Port Timney (during and after the fact, as far as recent events had gone) and gathering intelligence on/reviewing the large amount of information the Captain had passed along on Sult, things had been running shockingly smoothly. Even putting up a notice at the local guild -- simply to state that he, a medical student by the name of Thomas Blackwell, was looking for skilled adventurers as an escort to the area known as Sult Ruins and to leave a message if they were interested -- had gone along with barely a hitch.
Then, of course, he'd made his first mistake: mentioning what he was doing to van Houten.
She'd wanted to assist.
Probably, Loren should have said no. Unfortunately, she'd mentioned it in front of a ranking officer.
And now, standing a distance from the entrance and realizing that there's no way to talk his way past this without blowing his cover, 'Thomas' can already see that things are going /exactly as well as usual/. He furrows his brow as he stares at the entrance, trying to see if there's any weak point he can spot -- formation, unprotected point of advance, whatever. A distraction might be necessary. ...This is going to go so well, he can already feel it.
"I hope someone has a plan," he says, his voice a touch flat. He does not look at Elly.
DG: Loren Voss has used his Tool Etheric Lenses toward his party's challenge, Guards at the Gate.
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
"Storm Fist" Corwynt, Captain of Divine Company, Third Battalion of Althena's Guard, is walking toward a giant ruined hole in the ground with a bunch of people he's never met before. This makes somewhat more sense than it would seem at first; it is the sort of activity that gets him no closer to his mission of destroying the Lord of Calamity, but it does give him additional information on this world and its inhabitants. Also it may help him find his commanding officer, White Knight Leo, who he is pretty sure is hiding behind a bush somewhere waiting for the appropriate moment to leap out dramatically. Let's just say it's in character.
The man from another world is travelling under the guise of Corwynt , a martial artist-cum-Drifter who is basically wandering around the world looking for his old friend Leo. Who is a knight, but not all that white. It's basically foolproof.
He peers at the guards through narrowed eyes from his position behind a small stone, frowning at the lack of identifying marks. Suppressing a sigh, Corwynt slips a small jewel from inside his belt pouch and touches it to his forehead; the Rememberizer gleams faintly as it grants him temporary perfect recall. Corwynt's mind moves quickly through scouting reports on the area - he could swear he saw...
"I think there's a bell off in that direction," Corwynt whispers, pointing about 45 degrees away from the entrance. "If we throw a stone or something at it, it'll make noise. They may go investigate."
DG: Corwynt has used his Tool Rememberizer toward his party's challenge, Guards at the Gate.
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Elly thinks but doesn't say that she could probably just blast all of them or start a forest fire or something to distract them. She looks guilty. She is wearing a tunic dress and leggings, but laying down along a ridge line temporarily, the garter holster of a gunsmoke ARM is pretty clear.
"Um," she says. And then, rolling slightly over, she pulls out a pair of what are probably going to seem like an ARM if a subdued one to most people, and standard-issue shades to 'Thomas.' "We can suggest some kind of signal or something. With these."
She looks at Loren as she says this and attempts to smile. The smile dies, exactly like a kitten in rainy weather.
DG: Elhaym van Houten has used her Tool Officer's Sunglasses toward her party's challenge, Guards at the Gate.
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
Rena was not a skilled adventurer.
In fact, she kind of just came down here in the hopes that maybe she'd learn something about the Sorcery Globe. Maybe it was an ancient artifact with ties all over Filgaia! ...Or maybe it was something else and she had no idea. Spoilers: It's the latter. But our dear, ignorant, bluenette has no idea. So here she is, hhaving joined up with Loren not too long ago.
She's curiously alone today. It's okay. She can defend herself. And there will be others about, right? Right.
Rena peers curiously over at the guards and quirks her brows. "Huh. They don't look like any military I recognize... Weird. Why are they garding the place anyway?" A hand comes up to her chin, head tilting a bit. Oh well. They've got to get in! And so, in all her boundless wisdom, Rena kneels down and picks up a sizable rock.
Then, she stands and rears back, flinging the thing allllll the way across to impact against the ground in hopefully a manner that makes the posted guards go to investigate.
She's helping.
DG: Rena Lanford has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Guards at the Gate. <Pose Tracker> Noah Hawthorne has posed.
Noah Hawthorne is 'the local help.'
Of course, this is debatable for a few reasons, the first being that he's not actually local and the second that he has yet to do anything that might resemble helping. That may have something to do with the collective personality types of the group he's been tapped to assist -- through opaque, labyrinthine channels presumably associated with the Adventurer's Guild. ...Actually, it's not entirely clear how /he/ wound up being the habitual delver of ruins assigned to this merry little band of people who are absolutely definitely without a doubt just common Filgaian citizens. His reputation is solid, though, and at least he /looks/ right for the part.
At the moment, what looks right for the part is a kneeling crouch behind the others and a skeptical knit of the brows as they debate the best way to divert attention from the entrance. "I could always just go /lie/ to th--"
Rena throws the rock.
"Or that."
His accent is peculiar, it bears saying. It doesn't sound like it's from any specific region -- more a mongrel made up of a few, containing a hint of something else underneath all of those borrowed nuances.
DG: Noah Hawthorne has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Guards at the Gate.
======================<* CHALLENGE - Guards at the Gate *>====================== |Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- It seems that whatever mysterious military force is investigating these ruins has deployed guards to keep any stray Drifters from entering the ruins. They are wearing unremarkable clothing with no identifying marks, in no way betraying their identity. While fighting them is an option, it will take far too much time and slow the exploration of the ruins considerably. It would be better to find a way to trick them or lure them from the entrance, thus allowing the party swift entry without raising the alarm. =Dungeon Conditions: Slow=====================================================
DG: The party led by Loren Voss has passed this challenge! The party gained 12 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw. DG: Elhaym van Houten has drawn a new Challenge.
=================<* CHALLENGE - A Brutally Simple Challenge *>================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Brute |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- Some puzzles require wit and skill. Some of them just require a lot of strength and leverage. This is one of the latter. The room itself contains a large pit, upon which floats a huge stone plug. There is a very large ramp leading up to a higher platform. There is a closed door upon this platform. And there is an exceptionally large rock near the top of the ramp. The party merely must decide how to muscle this problem into submission. =Dungeon Conditions: Tire=====================================================
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
"... Lying's not a right thing to do," Elly says in response to Noah, if not with a lot of commitment. She may get a disorder from /all that irony taken internally/, but be that as it may.
bong! sparkle!
The guards are distracted, organizing a detachment to go over there and deal with whatever-it-was. There are a couple of cracks of rifle fire as some local wildlife is found guilty. Meanwhile, everyone sneaks in.
To be confronted with a pit - a plug - a ramp - and a rock.
"Ohhh... mmm. Oh, it's dusty in here." Elly has a minor and sort of pathetic coughing fit, which is actually covering over a couple of clear Solarian words: -do it- -eyes west- -ice- She has to get out a hankerchief by the time she's done, but as she's wiping her mouth, her eyes turn upwards.
The magically sensitive might feel like SOMETHING happened but the real action is that there is now a thin slick layer of black ice off to the far edge of the ramp. Elly stays down to supervise other people, probably on the theory that her noodle arms can't push a rock so good.
DG: Elhaym van Houten has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward her party's challenge, A Brutally Simple Challenge.
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
Rena gets a faint smile from Corwynt when she hurls the rock. "Good idea," he mutters softly before slipping after the others, moving gracefully through the darkness.
--A N D T H E N--
The martial artist's eyes narrow as he feels....something stir the air once Elly begins channeling Ether; he looks around but doesn't seem to spot either her casting nor the actual effects. Eventually he rubs the back of his neck and puffs out a short breath. "Just a chill," he says, then takes a step toward the rock and leaps, gathering strength.
"RAAAAAAH!" he roars, and the magically sensitive will definitely feel like something happened as he flies forward and gives that rock a big'ol jumpkick, boosted by a short puff of wind in his back.
DG: Corwynt has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, A Brutally Simple Challenge.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
"A bell?" 'Thomas' arches one blond eyebrow, briefly glancing in the direction of Corwynt -- that was the name the older man gave, at least. Martial artist, he'd thought, much earlier; not a school he recognized, but martial arts weren't his area of expertise -- self defense was. Now that he looks, though "Convenient. I wonder if they're aware that's a potential liability..."
Here, he finally begrudges Elly a glance. Perhaps she should use that primitive firearm and--
The blue-haired girl -- Rena, that's right -- throws a rock. The soldiers scatter, in hot pursuit. Loren just stares, a touch blankly. "...That actually worked." Shaking his head, he mutters only a, "You would need to /very/ persuasive to get through their heads," as he passes Noah, heading for the entrance without further word.
/All/ of them left their posts.
Once inside, a small (large) problem presents itself. Elly suddenly has a coughing fit. Loren's gaze meets hers, drops down to her lips.
"...What's this, over here?" He points at a section of wall, blindly.
It's a rather blank section of wall. A point of fact that he can see once he looks for himself. "..." Lowering his arm and reaching up for his glasses, he slips them off while looking away. "...Must be dirty," he says, making a show of cleaning them.
Well, that was embarrassing.
Slipping them back on, he approaches the rock alongside Corwynt and stares up at it. "I'll--"
He leans in to try and put his back into it, the effort put on hold as Corwynt leaps into the fray. After staring in apparent disbelief, Loren leans in to give it a shove.
DG: Loren Voss has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, A Brutally Simple Challenge.
<Pose Tracker> Noah Hawthorne has posed.
Lying, Elly says, is not a right thing to do.
The skeptical set of Noah's brows does not ease in the wake of that remark. He stares at her for a long moment, then shifts his focus to the entrance of the site...where the guards are willingly abandoning their posts to chase a sound made by a rock. They deserve, Noah thinks to himself, whatever trouble they get into for having let people slip past them The wildlife, on the other hand, possibly not so much. Loren's remark seems to win agreement out of him, though: not because he's not persuasive, but because those guys were obviously /really dumb./
For a big man he moves quietly, and keeps up with the others as they pass into the space within.
Moments like this are always problematic for Noah, given his natural reluctance to do anything that might damage a ruin site. Forcing things always leaves him...uncomfortable.
He glances aside as Loren draws the party's attention to...
"A...wall."
Now he's side-eyeing Loren, too, with that look of mute skepticism, even as he joins in the shoulder-lean pushing.
DG: Noah Hawthorne has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, A Brutally Simple Challenge.
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
"Ehehe~" Rena giggles and gives Corwynt and the others a victory sign, grinning at the muttered comments. But then she hears a crack of gunfire and the distant moan of local wildlife. She's not so happy after that. Her grin dampens into a more subdued little smile, and her eyes lower. ...Sorry animals, but she can't stop here! She steels herself and marches on with the group.
Inside, they're eventually faced with... "Huh?" Rena blinks a few times at the sight of the painfully simple, yet still annoying looking obstacle before them. Her blue eyes sweep from the pit, to the ramp, to the rock. And then she adopts a thoughtful pose. All the way up until Corwynt decides to just kick the thing, after Elly does her own thing. She could feel that magic being worked up. Curious!
In the end, she decides to help a bit. Heading over, she takes a deeeeeeep breath. Then her eyes snap open and she steps forward into a firm palm strike to the center of the rock. "Hah!"
DG: Rena Lanford has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward her party's challenge, A Brutally Simple Challenge. DG: The party led by Loren Voss has passed this challenge! The party gained 12 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw. DG: Corwynt has drawn a new Challenge.
=====================<* CHALLENGE - Don't Stop Just Run *>====================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- There is a click as the party steps into the hallway following a rather boring and uninspiring room. The mechanical sound is unusual, and a bit different from the normal sounds of ruins that they might encounter. Then the ceiling behind the party drops down, and with a rumble the comically sized large iron orb starts slowly rolling down the long incline into the hallway, picking up speed as it moves. It crashes and careens into the wall, clearly being poorly sized for this sort of trap. It is, however, huge and coming right at the party. Better get moving. =Dungeon Conditions: Injure===================================================
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
"Well, that was easy," Corwynt says as he watches the boulder bounc away and into a pit. "We'll never see that thing again."
//TWO MINUTES LATER//
*click*
The martial artist looks up. "Goddess, I deserved that," he groans, then turns and begins sprinting down the hallway, little breaths of wind (and magic?) swirling around him as he goes.
DG: Corwynt has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Don't Stop Just Run.
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
"Um, I don't think you should call it so easily..." Rena murmurs, folding her arms behind her back. Her ears wiggle and she has a baaaaaad feeling. Oh well. Nothing's jumped out at them yet.
//TWO MINUTES LATER//
*click*
"I KNEW IT!" Rena cries, sprinting down the hallway rather quickly. She pulls out a pair of clunky looking claws after a bit, and then *leaps*, right up to the ceiling and a corner, where she slams those claws in and latches on to hopefully allow the boulder to squeak by her below.
DG: Rena Lanford has used her Tool Grapple Claws toward her party's challenge, Don't Stop Just Run.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Loren stiffens slightly, perhaps sensing Noah's look even as he attempts (and fails) to do much of anything notable to the boulder. Great. Even the Lambs are judging him. Hopefully, they find what they've been looking for in here -- something to make this worthwhile.
For now, 'Thomas' will just have to seethe in silence.
The rock does slide neatly into place.
And then not even two minutes later there is a most ominous click as they tread into a hallway. Loren's gaze slowly slides towards the ceiling. Blue eyes widen. "You've got to be..." he starts to utter, apparently frozen in place for a long series of seconds.
Survival instinct finally gets out and pushes. Turning, the alleged medical student breaks into a run, throwing himself into an all-out dash as if his life depended on it.
(It kind of does.)
DG: Loren Voss has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Don't Stop Just Run.
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Elly looks deliberately innocent. As they all pass upwards, she attempts to smile at Rena and also Noah, possibly because she can sense skepticism from them, while she can't from Corwynt on account of he was just karate-kicking a rock.
Something rumbles.
"oh no," Elly says.
She grabs for Rena on reflex because random chance put her closest to her, but no, Rena is abandoning them to latch onto the ceiling like a ninja. Instead she turns, grasping for Loren's wrist and screeching, "Run!!!!"
Which she proceeds to do, possibly getting knocked over if 'Thomas' flails out of her grip.
DG: Elhaym van Houten has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Don't Stop Just Run.
<Pose Tracker> Noah Hawthorne has posed.
So far, so good. The ice, that was weird; that was definitely /not/ there before they walked in, and that means somebody in the room is something more than they want to seem to be. Not Loren, obviously, and the man might take some slim measure of solace from the fact that once Noah notices the ice underfoot he stops looking at Loren as though trying to determine how much of a liability he could be. He knows a feint when he sees one. ...a bad feint.
So he's just starting to feel better about their odds of getting through this when the boulder tumbles down the hole and into the space behind them, and he takes one precious moment to tilt his head back and close his eyes, heaving a small sigh. Because of course. Of course.
--and then he's sprinting alongside the others, long legs a blur of movement.
DG: Noah Hawthorne has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Don't Stop Just Run. DG: The party led by Loren Voss has passed this challenge! The party gained 12 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw. DG: Noah Hawthorne has drawn a new Challenge.
==========================<* CHALLENGE - A Mysterious Crystal *>========================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 1 | --------------------------------< Challenge Information: >-------------------------------- The next room appears to have no exit, only a strange crystal about two fists long hanging from the ceiling by a heavy chain. The chain itself moves up and down, allowing for a considerable amount of play with the crystal, but keeping it from being removed from the room. The party must discover the nature of this puzzle and solve it to open the door before they can move deeper into the ruins. =Dungeon Conditions: Stupify==================================================
<Pose Tracker> Noah Hawthorne has posed.
The sound of boots thundering down the corridor echoes forward into the the open chamber into which the hall eventually opens up, though not before closing just enough that it will, eventually, choke the boulder's downward momentum.
The awkward shape of it ensures that things go fairly well until someone takes a spill and Noah skids to a stop, reverses gears, and throws said someone /over his shoulder/ in what is not perhaps the most dignified of all ways to move someone out of the way of an onrushing boulder. It is /effective/, though.
"Always," he says, through heavier breaths, ill-gotten bundle of Solarian over his shoulder. "Always, always with the rolling boulders."
The next room is more his speed. His lips quirk, and he sets his passenger down to reach into his back pocket and tug out a journal that appears to have been just about everywhere a journal can go, its pages stuffed with mementos, sketches, addresses, theories -- the works.
He begins to page through it, squinting. "It's either light or sound and I can't remember which..."
DG: Noah Hawthorne has used his Tool Personal Journal toward his party's challenge, A Mysterious Crystal.
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
Corwynt slides into the room ahead of the boulder, which bounds past and keeps on going. "Well, that was exciting," he says happily, then looks up at the next Challenge---
/more frigging puzzles/
He taps the Rememberizer against his head again, searching his mamoery, but... nobody he knows has ever been here. Or at least has never told him. So that's not useful, really. But Noah says something about light or sound, so the stocky little martial artist pads toward the crystal, draws in a deep breath, and then--
"IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIS IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUND?"
He has a pretty loud indoor voice.
DG: Corwynt has used his Tool Rememberizer toward his party's challenge, A Mysterious Crystal.
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
The boulder barrels on down past Rena, who clings to the ceiling like a spider. Once it passes, she releases her grip and flips back down to the floor, landing in a crouch. "Whew! That was close..." She looks down and flexes the claws she's got on a bit. "Good thing I picked these up before I left..." She takes them off and tucks them aside at that point, following the path of shenanigans all the way into the next chamber.
It's.... It's....
She's got no idea what this is supposed to do!
Rena's ears droop a bit, signifying her confusion. "Ummm..." Light or sound, huh? Well then, why doesn't she try and- "ACK!" She squeals once Corwynt decides to start yelling right next to her sensitive ears! Her hands clap over them, and she contibutes exactly nothing to this obstacle!
She's helping!
DG: Rena Lanford has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward her party's challenge, A Mysterious Crystal.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Liability would be better -- at least in regards to long-term plans. Not for the sake of Loren's ego (very few things are).
Maybe if he'd reacted a little more swiftly, or if he'd had the chance to look around himself to seek a safer spot. As it is, there's nothing left but to run.
And then Elly grabs his wrist.
Loren doesn't flail. He downright pulls up short the moment her cool slender fingers wrap around his wrist like a shackle and thus immediately steps on an inconvenient and slippery small stone. He goes down in a heap, medical bag and all, his hand yanked from Elly's grasp. He stirs, attempting to pull himself up. As he lifts his gaze, all he can see is the boulder bearing down upon him.
She pushed him, didn't she?
...So this is how it ends.
And then things are a blur of movement, just before the boulder makes any sort of terminal impact. Loren finds himself rather ungainly splayed over someone's back and shoulders. Absently, he grabs his glasses as they threaten to fall right off his face, craning his neck as he tries to see who just picked him up. He has the expression of someone dazed, his blue eyes somewhat unfocused behind the glasses (now back on his face, sort of).
...Well, it's not Corwynt who grabbed him. That means... that...
If nothing else, it seems to knock Loren out of his stupor. He finally starts to struggle, pushing against Noah. This might be a bad idea since he's not exactly oriented right for any sort of good landing.
"Put me down," the currently somewhat upside-down Solarian says. It's not a request.
DG: Loren Voss has used his Tool Etheric Lenses toward his party's challenge, A Mysterious Crystal.
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Oh no, he fell, Elly thinks.
Inwardly she panicks. She would probably be screaming apologies in her extremely foreign native language if it wasn't for the iron grasp of training and by the time Loren can resolve into things again she is there in the corner of his vision, pulling strange, twisted faces.
Other people can probably tell she is barely restraining - if, in fact, /actually/ restraining - busting into a really disgusting, eye-puffing, snotty sob festival.
Finally Elly puts those glasses back on, probably to hide how her eyes are in fact puffing up. Sniffling, she says, "I - w, wuh, wonder why there's so many... d, do they roll back, do you think, sir...?"
The glasses hide her shame. Slowly, Elly relaxes.
Kind of.
DG: Elhaym van Houten has used her Tool Officer's Sunglasses toward her party's challenge, A Mysterious Crystal. DG: The party led by Loren Voss has passed this challenge! The party gained 22 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw. DG: Rena Lanford has drawn a new Challenge.
=====================<* CHALLENGE - A Slime Most Green *>===================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 1 | --------------------------< Challenge Information: >-------------------------- A slurping, watery sound is the only warning the party receives before a slime erupts from a nearby crevice and attacks the party! The semi-transparent goo lashes about with its entire body, attempting to engulf anyone it can lay itself upon. The acid it uses as a weapon is painful to the touch, leaving anyone struck weakened and sapped of vigor - best to drive it off or slay it before it can do too much damage. =Dungeon Conditions: Weaken===================================================
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
Rena's ears were covered by her ears the entire time and her eyes were shut, so she's not actually entirely sure what happened that actually causes the crystal to react. But it does. It lights up brightly, and then at the far back and to the side, a portion of the wall slides aside in erratic chunks, revealing a new path. Rena's eyes open then, and she looks about. "Oh..." They did it? Well! That's good news.
Corwynt gets a dull pout, and she says, "Please don't yell like that, my ears are sensitive." They wiggle right then as if to make themselves known. Then it's off! The others are given a smile. "Okay, let's go!" She leads the way down the revealed path, and soon enough...
"Oh."
They step out into the next open area to find... monsters. Or well, A monster. A slime. Acidic in the extreme. It looked dangerous to even tough. "Ewwwww....!" Rena grouses, immediately reaching into a pouch and producing a small blue sphere.
She tosses it at the slime, and it bursts on contact, rapidly spreading ice crystals all about its body in an attempt to just freeze the thing!
DG: Rena Lanford has used her Tool Frost Bomb toward her party's challenge, A Slime Most Green.
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
Corwynt blinks at Rena's ears, then relaxes. He didn't know they had elves here on the Blue Star as well as on Lunar, but it makes sense that they might not all have been lifted by Althena's grace. "Ah...yes," he says, coughing into one hand. "Sorry."
The appearance of the slime is a surprise, and it lashes an acidic pseudopod out toward the martial artist, who quick-steps to the right in an attmept to avoid it; the flailing tentacle sweeps around to follow, and wraps around Corwynt's left arm, burning through the sleeve of the gi but stopping at the reinforced vambrace underneath. He grimaces, gathering his strength to pull free... only to discover the creature slowing as a result of the frost attack. Excellently done, he thinks to himself, then channels Althena's Blessing into his right hand. "HIDD--"
Guilty glance at Rena.
"hidden art," he whispers, then drives the right hand forward, sending a shimmering bullet of greenish-white power hurtling toward the semi-frozen slime. "sky dragon's fiiiiiiist" he hisses, just above whisper level.
DG: Corwynt has used his Tool Vambraces toward his party's challenge, A Slime Most Green.
<Pose Tracker> Noah Hawthorne has posed.
Corwynt shouts. Noah 'startles,' and 'accidentally' drops Loren in fine demonstration of the latitudes one can cultivate in the margins of time afforded by quick reflexes. Several things happen at once at that point. He winces, partly because his left ear is ringing and partly in 'sympathy' with the scholarly figure he's unceremoniously introduced to the ground; the crystal ignites, reverberations oscillating on one another until something complicated happens behind the walls and a door opens; he offers a hand down to 'help' Loren get back onto his feet, and he throws Corwynt an appreciative thumbs-up. The direct approach -- he can appreciate that. "Nice job."
There are almost immediately tentacles and pseudopods after that. Noah experiences a moment of eyes-blanked flashback to the last time he ventured into a hole in the ground, when he'd tried to deal with a tentacle monster using a glue trap...
THE HOLLOWS, A WEEK AGO:
/A tentacle rises, almost in slow motion, and descends on a gloriously perfect arc. Noah can see it coming above the angry bearcat and hope kindles in his chest. "Yes," he says, a word lost in the absolute racket. "YES." The tentacle whips downward, dead on target to crush the bearcat into oblivion. "YES!"/
/It hits the bearcat, ensuring that Noah will be one of few people on Filgaia able to say he knows what a bearcat looks like when it is very, very surprised. It momentarily flattens on the stone arch and that puts its head horrifyingly close to Noah's -- close enough that he can smell its carrion breath. And then the tentacle lifts again, and the bearcat isn't dead. The bearcat is stuck to the tentacle, and the bearcat, when it recovers from being dazed -- it does this quickly -- is very, very angry./
/The tentacle monster from hell now has a weaponized bearcat and proceeds to make the most of it and the bearcat, quick to adjust to these unexpected but potentially advantageous circumstances, also embraces its newfound role and turns into a massive, five-pointed star of carnivorous death, flailing and slashing whenever it comes close to one or the other of the humans in the room, which it does with alarming frequency./
/"NO," Noah yells, changing his mind. "NO!"/
NOW:
One of his eyes twitches.
He sloooowly glances down to the array of traps dangling from his bandolier...
And opts to reach for a rock instead, winding up and whipping it at the thing.
DG: Noah Hawthorne has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward his party's challenge, A Slime Most Green.
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
"Ah!" Elly says as Loren gets dumped, although she wavers - as if afraid to reach out and curse him further with her satanic touch.
"I'm sorry," Elly tells Rena even though she didn't do anything wrong. Why is she apologizing?
Oh.
When the slime is revealed and then spot-frozen, Elly hikes up her dress and pulls out her gun, just like the old singer. She sights along it easily, even as Noah whips a rock forwards. Elly's contribution is to squeeze off three rounds into the slime, the fog of gunsmoke clinging hazily around her afterwards.
Something about it tickles her memory obscurely. (Loren may see this as her savoring the perfume of war.)
To Corwynt, she says, "That's an impressive technique..." Reminds her of someone, vaguely.
DG: Elhaym van Houten has used her Tool Sidearm toward her party's challenge, A Slime Most Green.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
'Thomas' shouts, tumbling from an ungainly sprawl across Noah's shoulder and back to land in a most undignified heap on the stone floor.
Dimly, he's aware of Elly's should of alarm -- an act, he's sure.
He twitches, briefly. He seizes Noah's hand with considerable force once the explorer 'helps' him up to his feet, briefly locking his gaze with Noah's once he's back up the right way around again.
It's withering, to say the least.
There are times when Loren thinks that the purge option might not such a hassle after all.
"Try harder next time," he says, flatly.
He doesn't linger. The sooner they can get this finished, the sooner he can put this all behind him. Rena's moved on ahead, and he steps up to join her.
Something's wrong, though.
Slimes.
"Oh, good," Loren comments wearily, stepping back as Corwynt steps up. Hand-to-hand against those? Rummaging for a moment in his kit -- the bag, today -- he produces a bottle. "Here. This should neutralize the worst of it--" he says, tossing it in the air towards Corwynt.
A rock, at that moment, flies past his cheek. Glancing sidelong in reflex, who should he see but Elly? One eye narrows slightly. "..."
DG: Loren Voss has used his Tool Solarian Medical Kit toward his party's challenge, A Slime Most Green. DG: The party led by Loren Voss has passed this challenge! The party gained 22 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw. DG: Loren Voss has drawn a new Challenge.
====================<* CHALLENGE - The Carved Stone Head *>===================== |Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- The deepest chamber of the Sult Ruins contains a mysterious structure - a large stone head that has been painted in much the same way as the entrance to the ruins up above. Its eyes are open and hollow, and its mouth a closed mesh of sharp teeth. Around the room are scattered a number of odd ritual objects - carved stone orbs, wedges, and squares. Gazing between the teeth, one can see the form of a lever of some sort - but the mechanism to cause the head to open its teeth and allow access is an obscure and strange one that the party must unravel. =Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck=================================================
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Rena's icy bomb lands home first, exploding among the bulk of the oozing monsters. Several slimes are frozen into grotesque sculptures, proving easy prey for Corwynt's fists -- they shatter in puffs of ice, shards landing in a shower on the floor.
The escapees are likely easy pickings, especially when an ARM is involved.
As for the rock, well...
Things are over with pretty quickly, regardless. The slimes didn't really stand a chance.
"Don't just stand there." Readjusting his bag, 'Thomas' moves on ahead, kicking a few broken shards of frozen slime out of the way. "There's another area up ahead." There's a doorway, arched and lined with important-looking tilework up ahead. "We must be fairly deep into these ruins at this point."
And still no sign of what they're looking for.
"That's... interesting." To be honest, he's not really sure what to make of this. These ruins date to the Day of Collapse, and were allegedly part of a mine, but...
He stares at it still, halfway across from the toothy blank-eyed sculpture in the depths, and slowly tilts his head to the right, as if attempting to make sense of this.
"Hmm. Maybe..." Turning, he points at Rena, more or less randomly. "Hey, you. Take a look at that object over there, and let me know if you see anything that seems unusual."
He's going to investigate a separate one, crouching to stare at it closely. Pushing his glasses up his nose, he inspects the carved stone orb in front of him closely. "There must be some connection between these objects and that stone head. Perhaps, a way deeper in...?"
DG: Loren Voss has used his Tool Etheric Lenses toward his party's challenge, The Carved Stone Head.
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
"Thanks," Corwynt says as he tosses the now-ruined vambraces to the ground, where the acid continues to burn away. He rolls his wrists and accepts the bottle from Loren, dabbing some of its contents over his flesh. "It's not all that impressive, though. The Master from my home town..."
The Guardsman trails off as he surveys the room. Truly impressive geomancy was involved in the construction of this place, he thinks to himself as he pads around the place, surveying the various odds and ends scattered about. Corwynt leans over Loren's shoulder briefly to peer at the stone head and its mechanisms. He walks around a bit more, then drops into a squat and rolls the Rememberizer in his fingers, letting his body heat warm it, searching through his mind...
"My friend Leo told me about a similar stone head once," Corwynt says. "He mentioned putting the eyes in to activate it... which would suggest the stone orbs." He frowns, deep in thought. "But it can't be that simple, can it?"
DG: Corwynt has used his Tool Rememberizer toward his party's challenge, The Carved Stone Head.
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
Once all is said and done, Rena glances over at Corwynt and smiles. "A bit late, but you're forgiven." And with that, having stayed far back to avoid getting caught up in the slime business, she heads off to follow 'Thomas' further in. "Hmm, I wonder what's up ahead..." She ponders aloud, her arms folded behind her back in a casual manner as she takes steps along.
But eventually, they come to find a... "Huh?" What is this? "This doesn't look like it has anything to do with the Sorcery Globe, I think..." Not that she knows for sure what the Sorcery Globe even is, but still. Rena drifts about the room, examining objects here and there, not really seeing what the use of it all is in total.
She's not going to be a whole ton of help here. She does notice that the stone head appears to be the key to something, but... "Hmm..." She brings a hand to her chin, brows furrowing. If only there were some kind of genius researcher who could figure this out in a flash!
Somewhere in Filgaia, Precis and Leon wind up sneezing and they have no idea why.
DG: Rena Lanford has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward her party's challenge, The Carved Stone Head.
<Pose Tracker> Noah Hawthorne has posed.
It's some dirty caprice of fate that ensures Noah's hurled stone strikes one of the slimes at the precise angle necessary to trampoline the thing back at him. It pegs him in the shoulder having lost little of its momentum and he spins to turn away, palm pressed into the offended patch of muscle and bone, eyes screwed into tight squints of discomfort.
Karma, probably, for dropping 'Thomas' the way that he did.
Scales of the universe successfully rebalanced thus, he rolls his shoulder as they progress to their next obstacle.
Crossing the threshold of that particular chamber draws him to a slow halt. Hazel eyes traverse the stone face, and he reaches around slowly behind him to retrieve his journal a second time. Not to pull information from it, this time, but to commit information /to/ it. He finds a blank page, begins to jot down notes and with a few swift, efficient penstrokes -- that pen seemed to just materialize out of nowhere -- commits the particulars of the face to the page sufficiently that he'll be able to go back later and hatch in the details.
He slants Corwynt a glance, though it's brief. "It does have empty eye sockets. Probably can't hurt to try." Unless it can.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained, though, right?
DG: Noah Hawthorne has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, The Carved Stone Head.
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Don't just stand there, Loren says to her, and Elly complies. She holsters her gun and looks around at this final assembly, even as Corwynt speaks. "Oh! You've seen something similar already?" she asks him, before Rena joins in as well. They're all so deep in thought.
Elly draws out those sunglasses again, although instead of putting them on or anything useful, she fingers one lens, like it had totemic power. Maybe it does. She thinks back to when she was encouraged that one time to reach out and try to make the world better, despite her position.
Did it work? Not quite. But it didn't hurt, either.
Loren's fine, she thinks. They don't suspect anything about us, either.
We can do this. I'll not mention anything about myself in the report, Elly tells herself. Except for the counter-report, of course. And with that she moves ahead - to climb up the front of the head!? "Pass me up whatever you think might go in these," she states.
DG: Elhaym van Houten has used her Tool Officer's Sunglasses toward her party's challenge, The Carved Stone Head.
====================<* CHALLENGE - The Carved Stone Head *>===================== |Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- The deepest chamber of the Sult Ruins contains a mysterious structure - a large stone head that has been painted in much the same way as the entrance to the ruins up above. Its eyes are open and hollow, and its mouth a closed mesh of sharp teeth. Around the room are scattered a number of odd ritual objects - carved stone orbs, wedges, and squares. Gazing between the teeth, one can see the form of a lever of some sort - but the mechanism to cause the head to open its teeth and allow access is an obscure and strange one that the party must unravel. =Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck=================================================
DG: You have overcome the dungeon's trials! This run is a success! DG: The party led by Loren Voss has successfully explored Sult Ruins!
=======================<* CHALLENGE - A Chest of Tomes *>======================= |Type: Discovery |Dungeon Ability: Discovery |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- The chamber the party has found themselves in contains a considerable amount of dust, and a single chest. Within the chest appears to be several scrolls and hide bound tomes written in an ancient Baskar dialect. A cursory examination reveals nothing terribly exciting about them, but the Adventurers' Guild and Ethos are known to pay a generous reward for ancient artifacts of this sort. =Dungeon Conditions: Treasure=================================================
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
'Thanks' says Corwynt. Loren, ever a fount of camaraderie and warmth, shrugs.
There's not much chance that they somehow hit It in here, behind a lock like that. Still, Gebler expects them to be thorough at the very least. The last thing he wants is to be in a bad situation under new commanding officers.
It's not like anything could get worse in here.
"It might be some type of lock. For what, though..." Loren muses aloud. Some cache from the Day of Collapse? Finding something like that could be very worthwhile, even if it's not what they're here for.
A shadow falls over the stone sphere Loren's inspecting. As Corwynt thus leans over his shoulder -- not even touching him -- Loren tenses. Why do people keep getting into his personal space like this? Turning his head slightly, he says, gesturing with his right hand to suggest (strongly) that the warrior should move aside, "You're blocking the light."
Nonetheless, he does glance at the stone head and the empty sockets, then back down at the sphere he's inspecting. "The size does look right."
He briefly rolls his eyes heavenward. No wonder these societies fell. "...What a convoluted lock."
Rising to his feet, he stoops just long enough to pick up the sphere -- which is heavy, but not beyond him. He jerks his head towards Corwynt as he hefts the sphere on over. "Get... the other one. Give her a... gh."
Okay, so maybe he's not /quite/ used to hefting large stones around like that. He leans against the stone head a moment after handing up his sphere to Elly.
Both spheres will, in fact, slide in neatly.
With a slow grind the head unfolds -- prompting Loren to move aside in a hurry -- and in fact slides right into two neat pieces, with a doorway of sorts leading down the middle. Someone passing through the gateway might even note that there's a mural on the inside of both halves of the stone head -- a sort of stylized vision of what lies inside someone's skull.
Furrowing his brow, Loren heads into the darkness beyond the doorway.
Well. It's... definitely a cache. Slowly, the 'medical student' closes his eyes and reaches up to press his hand against his forehead. Great. It's a lot of primitive texts -- even for Lambs.
Once she enters, his gaze briefly meets Elly's. Very slightly, he shakes his head.
As if to say 'not here, either'.
So where /did/ that villager hide it?
<Pose Tracker> Rena Lanford has posed.
Rena looks over the scrolls and texts. ...She can't really make too much sense of it, but it doesn't seem to have anything to do with her mission. She sighs. Oh well, back to the drawing board, right?
She does collect a few of them though. May as well make a few gella for her trouble, right? Right. "Well that was... interesting." She smiles at everyone. "Though not as difficult as I was expecting it to be. I wonder why those soldiers were guarding this place?" The girl ponders aloud for a moment.
Then, she just shrugs and starts heading off! Time to head back. Surely Claude would be glad to know they'd probably make some money from this random excursion, even if it bore no results to their actual goals.
And surely she was not going to find Adlehyde on fire and Metal Demons everywhere.
Surely.
<Pose Tracker> Corwynt has posed.
"Indeed, it was a pleasure," Corwynt says, taking a few of his own. He's glanced at the others and - thanks to the Rememberizer - can draw the other ones out later. Honestly, people back home used to use these to watch short sequences of their life over and over again, he has no idea why they're not more widely used. "I hope to see you all again on the road."
<Pose Tracker> Elhaym van Houten has posed.
Climbing down, Elly has to wipe off her forehead. When she catches up with Loren, she tilts her head - returns the nod - and thinks to herself, quietly: So where WOULD it be?
If I had a black Gear, Elly muses, where would /I/ conceal it?