2017-12-13: Different Breed of Sin
- Log: Different Breed of Sin
- Cast: Ida Everstead-Rey, Seraphita, Loren Voss, Gwen Whitlock, Kahm Yugh
- Where: Hadal Temple
- Date: December 13th 2017
- Summary: A search ensues in the depths of what has opened up within the wellspring; Gebler involves a couple of Drifters in their search for Lieutenant Van Houten. Seraphita is perfectly fine. Gwen finds a winter wonderland. Ida has a bad day. Kahm has a realization. Loren loses SAN.
DG: A party led by Ida Everstead-Rey is now entering Hadal Temple. DG: Party formation is now over. An Entry Challenge will now be drawn and displayed to the party.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== =======================<* CHALLENGE - Rise of the Deep *>======================= |Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- A primordial scream rings through the air the instant you enter the Hadal Temple. Reclaim the land of the fallen in my name... Something moves. Creatures emerge from the darkness, moving with an eerie, undulating grace. They're humanoid, barely, and their bodies are still clothed in patchwork armor and the tattered remains of uniforms. Bits of shell and scale and bone obscure their faces. These are Deep Soldiers, and they have broken through one of the cistern gates. Looking back towards the dig site, you spot an iron switch that could be lowered to halt the swarm's advance beyond a maw of bloody spikes and spears. It's quite far -- you'll have to be fast if you hope to reach that gate in time. (INFO: In this dungeon, certain statements will be marked in Blue. These Blue Statements can only be seen by the one posing the Dungeon Round (or a volunteer if agreed upon), and represents both the speech and the corruptions of the Temple. The drawer is free to believe or disbelieve, but the rest of the party won't be seeing or hearing anything in Blue!) =Dungeon Conditions: Overwhelm================================================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Fortunately for Ida, the area around Wayside is chaotic enough for her to get to the entrance that its people dug into the rock. One perilous descent later, and she was back where everything started--or ended. She came alone, hoping to search the immediate grounds for some sign of what happened to Elly, or Lily, or Fei--but a thorough inspection of the area turned up nothing beyond unidentifiable battle detritus. (Kahm may have gotten there before her, and retrieved what Elly left behind.) Gwen showed up not too long after, bringing... friends. Friends that Ida does not recognize. With few options available to her, Ida joined them without so much as a word.
She's wearing simple linen clothing, with a military-surplus overcoat to protect against the chill, and combat boots to help her keep traction on the slippery rocks. Her right arm is encased in a rough, almost exoskeletal gauntlet of some kind, with a line leading to a spool of rope at her belt. There's a clamminess in the air that only gets worse as the group moves on. Ida is quiet. She hasn't even introduced herself, and doesn't say a word--
Until the gates open wide. Then she clutches her temples with both hands, her face twisting into a grimace for no apparent reason. "Granas," she whispers, and her breath starts to quicken. The things start to emerge from the shadows before she can clarify, things that look like they've been dead and drowned on the seabed for centuries. They might have been human, but there's no way to tell--they're too encrusted with coral and shell and other marine detritus. Fear shoots down Ida's spine, jolting her to urgent, wakeful action. The switch! It looks like it could--
Ida stares at nothing, swallows, and raises her hand. She presses something she's holding between her fingers--a trigger of some sort?--and an iron grapnel fires from a short barrel on the gauntlet's bracer. She reels herself in, waiting just a moment or two for Gwen (or someone else) to grab hold as well.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has used her Tool Line Launcher toward her party's challenge, Rise of the Deep.
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
There is a Seraphita here. Kahm had no doubt understood firepower would be useful here. Not knowing what threats they're facing, the skills and powers of an Element might give them an edge when it comes to combat and destruction. Just don't rely on the rabbit for puzzle-solving.
Those dull green eyes seem unimpressed by the decor the old gods have chosen - or maybe there's just not enough of her left to understand she should be terrified right now. No, instead she's smiling, advancing as carelessly as a child on a playground.
The drowned solders attract her attention, but for all the wrong reasons. "Ooooh, they're pretty... hey do you think if we pluck those nice seashells off them we can hear the sea from them?" She'd never actually held a seashell before, or gotten to try it! Corpse-encrusted seashells should still work, right?
Suddenly Ida has a grappling hook.
"Whoa, cool! I wanna have one of those but Tolone says I'd just leave it lying around and people would trip all the time!" She's not wrong. It's also why Seraphita can't have a skateboard.
The bunny leaps, grabbing onto the iron rope Ida hangs from. She's almost weightless, and she twirls, spinning onto the rope with her momentum and then launching herself for another platform up ahead. Then she hops to another, and another...
"Come on, come on! I don't like dark places so let's hurry up! Then we can leave with our seashells and go get something to eat!" Cake would be nice, she thinks.
DG: Seraphita has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Rise of the Deep.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
It's gone from bad to worse, if he's being honest.
First there was the business at Seven Sages, and that whole potential can of worms he wants absolutely no part of. Then he'd gotten a message from Kahm. The situation at Wayside, it seemed, had gone south after all.
And then he'd mentioned that he was heading out to Wayside and Gwen had insisted on coming along with.
Though technically speaking, it was probably good tactical thinking -- something had apparently opened up in the depths of the waterway, and while the courier was better used towards other means, there's something to be said for physical labor.
Getting down into the depths is perhaps not the easiest trek he's had -- but it's clear that the situation has taken a turn for the worse. "The statue broke?" he asks, glancing over his shoulder.
A number of things happen at once, more or less. The gates slip wide as something squirms loose, and Loren draws up short at the sight. "What..." In the next heartbeat, he glances about in search of something -- the rest of the team they were gathering, or maybe just an exit, given the situation. And instead spots Ida. And Seraphita. He pauses again, for just a moment.
"--Wait!"
Then, shaking his head and urging Gwen to following, runs towards Ida and Seraphita -- or where she was -- anyway.
This is going to end badly, he thinks.
DG: Loren Voss has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Rise of the Deep.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
It only took a snippet of conversation, but that's all that was needed. Loren soon found Gwen insisting on coming along.
For once, it was for a logical reason: Gwen had just came from there, having been out with Jean in a bid to recover from the events that recently happened there. She knew a direct way in, which would certainly save Loren precious time, and while she was still not entirely sure she was up for it (not that she would admit aloud), the events surrounding the new 'find' was something she could at least inform him about, and in turn, inform Kahm. "Yeah. I had heard a rumor that there was somethin' possibly sealed underneath the ruins there," she says, leading Loren further in. "It's why we weren't all just runnin' over to renew the seal, or whatever was needed. When the Metal Demons attacked, it just kinda forced the situation, and all hell broke loose."
There were other details she filled Loren in on, while others, such as the personal battles between Riesenlied and her younger former comrade, as well as the matter concerning Ida, were never touched on. They weren't necessary for him to know about, even if he by chance knew who Ida was.
Which is likely why Gwen may be the only one showing surprise at Ida being there. She doesn't, however, say a word about the young woman joining her party. The other surprise is Seraphita, a face Gwen hadn't seen since that battle over in Aveh. Kahm and Loren may see that layered look of mute shock and confusion, followed by looks to every party member in turn. She's-- she is, right? She's-
.... Talking about seashells and may possibly be an Element, whatever those are, but Gwen'll *definitely* allow her to come along. The level of cheery denial may be far beyond anything Gwen can provide, party-wise. "Uh, um, hey! This is Thomas Blackwell! And Marcus Rider's around here someplace! Everyone, this is Ida Everstead-Rey! And that's... uh. Hey, I can't remember your name!"
Gwen's doing all this while grabbing ahold of Ida. "Wait what, Thomas?"
DG: Gwen Whitlock has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Rise of the Deep.
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
The 'deep things' didn't quite resemble anything Kahm had seen before. Wels were perhaps the closest thing he could call kin...they had the same sense of anatomical wrongness about them, but beyond those vague symmetries it was clear these beings descended from a wholly different breed of sin.
The Major was getting quite tired of the surface's unceasing ability to surprise him.
Although he'd arrived first before anyone, Kahm's first step into the temple had proven the wisdom of radioing for back-up first, and before any of the shambling things could see him (and even if they had), the officer had managed to scurry up the stony crenelations adorning a support pillar until he found a convenient perch from which to dim his light and wait, with only the sounds and imagination of the things below to keep him company.
Thank the Emperor for standard rations, which Kahm was chewing on as Ida, then Seraphita, and then the rest all filtered in one by one before making a dead break for the other end of the room. He waiting for an opportune moment before leaping from his spot to the platform Seraphita had just touched on, following to the group the landing.
"Good timing. Any longer with those things and I might've lost my mind." He said on the tail of Gwen's exclamation, nodding at Loren and Seraphita respectively, "Blackwell. Ma'am. I see you brought more company."
Ida gets a more discerning look, but sufficiently brief for their task, "We've not met, but introductions can come later, after someone hits that blood switch."
DG: Kahm Yugh has used his Tool Field Rations toward his party's challenge, Rise of the Deep.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== =======================<* CHALLENGE - Rise of the Deep *>======================= |Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- A primordial scream rings through the air the instant you enter the Hadal Temple. Reclaim the land of the fallen in my name... Something moves. Creatures emerge from the darkness, moving with an eerie, undulating grace. They're humanoid, barely, and their bodies are still clothed in patchwork armor and the tattered remains of uniforms. Bits of shell and scale and bone obscure their faces. These are Deep Soldiers, and they have broken through one of the cistern gates. Looking back towards the dig site, you spot an iron switch that could be lowered to halt the swarm's advance beyond a maw of bloody spikes and spears. It's quite far -- you'll have to be fast if you hope to reach that gate in time. (INFO: In this dungeon, certain statements will be marked in Blue. These Blue Statements can only be seen by the one posing the Dungeon Round (or a volunteer if agreed upon), and represents both the speech and the corruptions of the Temple. The drawer is free to believe or disbelieve, but the rest of the party won't be seeing or hearing anything in Blue!) =Dungeon Conditions: Overwhelm================================================
==========================<* Hadal Temple - Round 1 *>========================== =========================< Results - Rise of the Deep >========================= Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Line Launcher 2 Agility Effects: Quicken -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Loren Voss 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seraphita 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kahm Yugh 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Field Rations 1 Agility Effects: Cleanse -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gwen Whitlock 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 0 --(20)--> 20 Pass Conditions: Overwhelm Effects: Cleanse|Quicken(1) ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================
DG: The party led by Ida Everstead-Rey has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 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.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida tenses up a little as Seraphita grabs ahold of her, and then Gwen--she's clearly not in the mood to be touched, but she's also not in the mood to be eaten by shambling abominations from beyond the grave. The grapple line reels itself in, the springs and clockworks built into the gauntlet's sides pulling the rope backwards. Three people on the line is a big load for it to carry, but the ARM performs admirably under the strain. Ida closes her eyes as the three of them pass through that horrible, gnashing maw, but her timing was perfect. None of them are so much as scratched.
Ida yanks the hook out of the wall, and slams a clenched fist down onto the switch. The cistern gate opens, giving Thomas and the mystery man the perfect chance to escape, followed by the rest.
DG: Loren Voss has drawn a new Challenge.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== =======================<* CHALLENGE - Wail of the Wall *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Brute |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- This blue walkway ends at a massive ancient gate of thrumming leyline patterns. The gate spans the entire hallway, blocking the way forward. There is a mechanism upon the other side, but the only way for you to proceed from this side would be to lift or destroy the gate, but beware, as it will wail in agony as it is damaged, bleeding a viscous blue blood as if it were flesh. =Dungeon Conditions: Overzealous, Tire========================================
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
"That's what I heard," the 'ex-medical student' replies, readjusting his glasses. "Of course, no one could even give me an account of what they thought was down here." He's derisive, as usual. "Possibly some monster nest."
Some monster nest, if the monsters in question number abominations, he considers a moment later.
Under normal circumstances -- ie, when they weren't attempting to slip past a whole horde of the things, whatever they were -- Loren would be more inclined towards sample-gathering.
Right now, he has other things, such as his immediate survival and linkup with other members of the team. Which would appear to consist of, at the moment, Seraphita and...
Whatever her name is.
Introductions come a moment later. "Everstead-Rey, is it?" If that's her real name, she's wandered a bit of a ways, he considers to himself. Speaking of 'Marcus', though...
Kahm lands approximately right behind him as he makes contact with Ida, which nearly causes him to jump out of his skin.
"I thought it might be a good idea under the circumstances." Also she insisted, but he's not about to admit that he got pushed around by a Lamb. Even if it was only briefly.
The time for chatter is lost moments after, as the switch is hit; Loren doesn't waste time. He runs, allowing the gate to cut off pursuit the moment it drops with a heavy thud.
Nothing stretches ahead but a blue walkway for a distance. The way is silent in here, save for the deep bass thrum that's felt rather than heard. It's almost as if the place is alive.
"Another gate," Loren notes, approaching the thing that blocks their path. A quick glance turns up no obvious switches or levers... and, as he kneels before the closed gate, there's no obvious catches. "This one looks as if it's stuck," he comments, one hand resting on the gate
introducing a pulse of abrubtly released mechanical stress into the obstacle with an expenditure of ether
only to suddenly back away as if he's seen a ghost, recoiling in exactly the manner someone would if they heard fingernails drawn across a blackboard.
What in the Emperor's name?
"Why is it bleeding?"
No one else will see anything amiss.
DG: Loren Voss has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Wail of the Wall.
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
"Hiiiii!" Seraphita shouts back, as introductions happen. "I'm incognito!" Tolone yelled at her and had to explain 'Not Seraphita' isn't a good disguise name. Kahm or Loren may have used the word incognito at some point and Seraphita got it confused for a name. It's the perfect disguise now.
"But shhhhh, you can't tell anyone!"
Yep, perfect.
Oh, a door. They can't go any further.
Seraphita claps her hands together, jumping up and down in place. "Oh oh oh oh OH OH OH OOOOH! Me me me mememememe! I wanna open the door, I wanna, stand back, stand back!" Is it bleeding? She can't see any of that. She assumes Loren is talking about something else.
Which is why Seraphita suddenly flashes red, fiery Ether gathering around her and then firing forward. There's a big great arc of red and orange light, but it's not lightning, it's just the air superheating in irregular patterns.
And, probably, melting streaks through the gate.
DG: Seraphita has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Wail of the Wall.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
"Mhm," says the young woman. Ida, she thinks. Ida. She busies herself by making sure that the horde is well behind them--it is, the gate is down, and they're not getting out any time soon. Then she checks the mechanisms on her gauntlet, ensuring nothing is broken. It gives her some time to collect herself, and to try and figure out how to best approach these strangers that seem to know Gwen.
Another gate. This place is well-secured, and Ida is fairly sure that this is to keep things in rather than to keep things out. Fat lot of good it did, though, she thinks, bitterly. She grabs one of the gate's crossbars and tries to push against it, using the support struts and mechanical systems in her gauntlet to help. It wasn't designed for that, though, so all it really does is keep her from setting too much weight on her bad arm. Thomas suddenly shrinks back, and Ida blinks.
Did he--?
Ida looks at the young man for a moment, trying to figure out what happened there. It hasn't yet occurred to her that none of the others may have seen the gate.
Either way, she quickly gets out of the way as the strange, entirely-too-cheerful Beastwoman gets to work.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Wail of the Wall.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
There is ugliness in the world, that is for certain. It's what makes the world imperfect, and perfect at the same time. Then there are things like this, defting explanation. Somehow, the shambling, dead(?) creatures lurking about seemed not entirely an unbelievable sight to Gwen, who just shoves it in a messy dark little corner of her brain that's become a home for all the appalling things of the world that threaten to overpower any sense of wonder she held on the ever expanding world.
'Why is it bleeding?' Rocks that bleed wouldn't be new, as long as they had a logical, but still sufficiently amazing explanation for why they weren't actually bleeding.
This is not one of those cases.
Gwen's attention goes from the gate Loren just had his hand on, to Loren's face, then back again to the gate. "Nah, nah, it ain't bleedin'," Gwen says with an air of assurance, waving one hand. "Maybe you just saw some water? I mean, if there's iron down here, sometimes the water and the air do things, n'... yeah."
There's no water down here, or iron. Loren's just suffering the indignity of being comforted by a Lamb. "Anyway, I can handle th-" Seraphita's enthusiasm prompts Gwen to graciously move away to allow the... Gebler? Element? Soldier? Mercenary? Really, really really strong bunny girl just plow on through.
Fire. If there was an Element Seraphita had to be of, it had to be fire. Or 'Hot Things'. Gwen whistles appreciatively. "Way t'go, Incognito!" Yes, Gwen's sure that isn't Seraphita's name.
Gwen's just kind of used to calling people by whatever name they choose to define themselves by, nowadays. "I'll take care of the rest, then." She begins punching into the wailing stone, chipping off any parts that may be left behind by Seraphita's heated ether, probably only adding to what may be a bizarre display for Loren.
DG: Gwen Whitlock has used her Tool ARM-ored Fist toward her party's challenge, Wail of the Wall.
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
Everstead-Rey. A big name that was a very long way from home, but Kahm also kept this fact to himself. Hadn't the Lieutenant Commander once mentioned such a woman to him...?
(Haha, no. Myyah never told Kahm anything.)
Seraphita's introduction he'll...just quietly take on the nose, offering Gwen a helpless (if somewhat strained) smile as if it ought to explain everything. Sometime it was best to let the surface-dwellers develop their own explanations than try to feed them lie upon lie. The door swung open, and he'd follow the rest of them into the unknown, adjusting his hat and laying out a thinly veiled operational directive for the Lieutenant and the Element.
"I'm pretty sure Miss Elly got involved in the struggle outside, and came in here before us. I fear she may have gotten in over her head. Let's hurry."
Then a wall had the temerity to go and exist in front of them right as he said that. The black-dressed will cock his head at Loren when the younger man takes a go at it and reels back, as if struck. "Are you alright, Blackwell? There's nothing bleeding at all?"
And yet, the thought had his guard up even more than normal. It reminded him of the grotto.
Eyes narrowed, he'll take Seraphita's initative as an example to follow, unleashing a salvo of electric missiles with a flick of his hand to help better the door down where flame might make it weak.
DG: Kahm Yugh has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Wail of the Wall.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== =======================<* CHALLENGE - Wail of the Wall *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Brute |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- This blue walkway ends at a massive ancient gate of thrumming leyline patterns. The gate spans the entire hallway, blocking the way forward. There is a mechanism upon the other side, but the only way for you to proceed from this side would be to lift or destroy the gate, but beware, as it will wail in agony as it is damaged, bleeding a viscous blue blood as if it were flesh. =Dungeon Conditions: Overzealous, Tire========================================
==========================<* Hadal Temple - Round 2 *>========================== =========================< Results - Wail of the Wall >========================= Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 5 --(13)--> 18 Fail Force 0 Brute Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Loren Voss 5 --(13)--> 18 Fail Force 0 Brute Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seraphita 5 --(8)--> 13 Pass Force 0 Brute Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kahm Yugh 5 --(13)--> 18 Fail Force 0 Brute Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gwen Whitlock 5 --(8)--> 13 Pass ARM-ored Fist 2 Brute Effects: Strengthen -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 20 --(20)--> 40 Pass Conditions: Overzealous(2)|Tire(2) Effects: Strengthen(1) ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================
DG: The party led by Ida Everstead-Rey has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 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.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Seraphita shouts that she's incognito. Loren's left eye twitches, involuntarily.
Well, he supposes distantly, at least she's only drawing suspicion to herself so far.
So far.
Sidelong, he glances Ida's way as she tests out the gate herself. Hm, not much in the way of physical strength, he considers in silence, before making his attempt to destabilize the obstacle before him.
Before things go wrong, that is. Distracted, his attempt to weaken the gate doesn't go very far at all.
'It ain't bleeding', Gwen assures him. He glances back over at the gate, which is still oozing a sluggish blue. The gate, to him, seems to whimper. He shakes his head. "No, look again. It's blue. Is this thing alive?" A touch, his shoulders tense, as if he's sensing that he's on the receiving end of some sort of pity. Even the Major's checking in on him. "I'm fine," he insists, still staring at the gate. "Can't you see..."
"I wanna open the door!
Loren sidesteps in a hurry, as if in anticipation of what's about to be flung at the gate. A gout of fiery ether looses at it seconds later, followed by Kahm's volley of electrical force. The room grows a little too warm in certain points... and blindingly hot in others.
The display could be called bizarre. Or maybe grotesque, to his point of view. The medic stands to one side, posture rigid, watching as if transfixed in horror. The gate screams in agony, its cry ringing out through the halls of the temple.
Can they really not hear or see any of this? Or is he losing his damn mind?
And then, all goes silent to his ears. The gate shudders and falls to pieces. The way is clear, or at least clear enough.
DG: Seraphita has drawn a new Challenge.
================================<* Hadal Temple *>================================ ===================<* CHALLENGE - Even The Gates Have Teeth *>==================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 2 | ----------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------- At some point, the ancient mechanisms that control the sluice gates here have clearly broken down. The gates are now rapidly shuttering, a problem due to the painful-looking spikes on their ends, which gnaw and mash like a carnivorous, hungry beast... Past the gates, you spot a mechanism that may still function -- but you'll need to be quick to dodge these spiked gates. =Dungeon Conditions: Injure===================================================
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
"Yeah, yeah! See, I can open doors! You too miss, you're super strong! I wish I could punch like that!" Seraphita has poofy gloves, but they're not for punching people.
What is this hellish grinding sound, though?
No, it isn't Loren's teeth.
Although it does sound a lot like that, just... bigger.
The torn and half-molten gate shudders and creaks, and past it countless more gates begin closing. Heavy spikes cover the doors, but the damage caused by Seraphita and Gwen's stunts have torn holes into the plating(?) covering the various mechanisms in charge of closing and opening the massive gates.
Gears grind visible through those holes. Sparks fly. Chunks of steel occasionally crash inches away from someone's feet as everything starts breaking down.
To Seraphita, it looks like the gates are maws. Torn open, half-skeletal, gnashing and trying to lure the drifters into their singular throat.
That's fine.
It's not the first hellish conveyor belt she's on.
The Commander's nowhere to be seen this time, sadly, but the familiarity of the situation makes her run that much faster towards the end of the hall, past the hungry gates.
DG: Seraphita has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Even The Gates Have Teeth.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida looks at Blackwell again, a flicker in her eyes betraying her concern. "Did you see anything protecting that switch?" she says. "Beyond the monsters."
The group advances. "Elly," Ida says. She's not looking at Kahm when she says it, nor is she prompt in her answer--the previous gate is already a mass of cooling slag and rubble by the time she does. "I'm looking for someone with that name, too. Red hair? I don't remember what she was wearing, but I didn't see her leave." Was she one of those... things? Ida thinks, a moment later. What about Fei and Lily? She swallows.
More gates, then. Ida watches the others carefully as they advance, all the while reloading her grappling ARM. "Hook out," she says--only a little louder than a whisper--and fires. She barely allows the grapple time to catch before she reels herself in at top speed.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has used her Tool Line Launcher toward her party's challenge, Even The Gates Have Teeth.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
He meets Ida's gaze, if briefly, and shakes his head. "No. I didn't see anything."
Upon reflection, perhaps a few minutes later, he's going to wonder after that statement a little.
Kahm's initial report had mentioned that Van Houten had ended up down here, but there hadn't been much detail otherwise. She had been on duty here to watch the situation -- that, he knows -- but anything more...
So he's listening, once they're past that gate that screamed and bled in the midst of pyrotechnics and, of course, Gwen's powerful artificial arm. He's wondered about that one before, particularly who was involved with the installment.
Red hair, Ida mentions. A lot of it, too, Loren thinks to himself. According to medical records, it's just a somatic mutation.
There had been rumors, naturally.
"...More of them?" These, at least, aren't bleeding or screaming. "What is this place, some lost ruin?"
He's put in mind, oddly, of Rujm el-Hiri.
"...They're closing. Come on!" Here, he doesn't linger towards the back any longer, lest he get left behind. He's going to make a break for it, hauling his kit -- previously slung over a shoulder -- up under one arm.
DG: Loren Voss has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Even The Gates Have Teeth.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
"Guess I don't have the eye for detail you do." Gwen gives 'Thomas' a wide grin, the compliment probably feeling more like a slap in the added context Loren has than Gwen would have realized.
The problem with using the Mockingbird at the amount Gwen has is that, after a while, you forget to remember that it's supposed to be a secret. At least, to a normal person out and about on the lands below. Solaris's reports are a different matter entirely.
Maybe Miss 'Incognito' isn't the only one who just forgets the finer details of laying low. The ARM may be covered, but no human could pull off stunts like that without some added tool.
"Miss Elly..." Gwen trails off, suddenly remembering the odd way the young red-haired woman acted near the end of when Gwen last saw her. It didn't really strike Gwen as 'odd' at the time, considering the level of stress they were all at, but-
Nope, can't worry about that, there's more pressing things to pay attention to! She follows Seraphita down the gates, none the wiser to the hellish sights Seraphita is seeing herself.
DG: Gwen Whitlock has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Even The Gates Have Teeth.
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
"That'd be her." Kahm said, nodding in the affirmative to Ida's question. "I'm acquainted with her father, so I feel a bit responsible for her."
That was oddly specific-the Major wasn't that good a liar under pressure.
Even so, they've got more ground to cover. He'll push ahead, behind Seraphita but not outpacing her.
DG: Kahm Yugh has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Even The Gates Have Teeth.
================================<* Hadal Temple *>================================ ===================<* CHALLENGE - Even The Gates Have Teeth *>==================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 2 | ----------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------- At some point, the ancient mechanisms that control the sluice gates here have clearly broken down. The gates are now rapidly shuttering, a problem due to the painful-looking spikes on their ends, which gnaw and mash like a carnivorous, hungry beast... Past the gates, you spot a mechanism that may still function -- but you'll need to be quick to dodge these spiked gates. =Dungeon Conditions: Injure===================================================
===========================<* Hadal Temple - Round 3 *>=========================== =====================< Results - Even The Gates Have Teeth >====================== Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 18 --(8)--> 26 Pass Line Launcher 2 Agility Effects: Quicken ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Loren Voss 18 --(8)--> 26 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seraphita 13 --(8)--> 21 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kahm Yugh 18 --(8)--> 26 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gwen Whitlock 13 --(18)--> 31 Fail Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC ------------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------- Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 40 --(20)--> 60 Pass Conditions: Injure(2)|Overzealous(1)|Tire(1) Effects: Quicken(1) ================================< Dream Chasers >=================================
DG: The party led by Ida Everstead-Rey has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 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.
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
It's quite the race. The gates close one after another as the party runs through each, and it seems, the ones ahead are closing faster with each gate passed, and the gates behind seem ever closer and louder when they snap shut.
The final gate slams shut, finally, Gwen lagging behind just enough that she gets clipped by some of the nasty spikes covering the gate. It's over, though! The gates are closed.
That also means you can't go back the way you came.
DG: Gwen Whitlock has drawn a new Challenge.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== ======================<* CHALLENGE - Reach of the Pale *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 4 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- A beautiful landscape of ancient ice lies ahead, a field crossed by snowy paths and dotted with chalky crystal trees. It's beautiful, in an eerie, sterile way. There is no time to admire, however -- a filmy, inhuman stares at you from beneath the icy floor. I have you now... Writhing tendrils burst outward from beneath the frozen lake, dripping with primordial taint -- you are in the presence of the Primarch of this twisted temple! You'd best fight its limbs off before it drags you down into the depths! =Dungeon Conditions: Secret===================================================
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed. <SoundTracker> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7yNyhLOIa4
Blood drips on the ice as Gwen follows behind the group, coming from the spot where Gwen was clipped by one of those pointy spikes by the gate.
Catching her breath in the quiet space afterwards, the redhead looks around, continuing to stray behind. ".... Never thought I'd see something so amazing down here..." There's a soft cadence to Gwen's normally upbeat words, a soft chuckle of awe at the chalky crystal trees and the way her breath sparkles in the air.
Then, that tiny moment of wonder collapses in on itself. There's an odd, disturbed look to Gwen's expression. Her body sways. She feels those eyes on her from below her boots.
Ah. The blood.
She doesn't alert the group, just yet. Let them get a distance away. The very moment she speaks, the spell will be over.
Give her a few seconds. She'll just uncover her ARM and load some bullets, her gloved hands shielded from the cold. She could do this by now with her eyes closed, her breath held like she simply out hunting for her next meal.
.....
The ice cracks. Ten, maybe eleven seconds tops. That's all she got them. Her lips purse. "... Guys-"
----SOUNDTRACK CHANGE----
An explosion of tentacles burst through the lake's surface, the air suddenly cold and wet with disrupted ice and brutally cold water. In the air is Gwen, her ARM displayed as she shoots at the coils attempting to drag her and the others down.
At least they have a few moments to prepare before those tentacles get them.
"My time ain't over yet!!"
DG: Gwen Whitlock has used her Tool Full Metal Courier toward her party's challenge, Reach of the Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
"Oh wow!!! This is awesome!" Seraphita declares, although looking at her feet, she pouts. "Darn, and we didn't bring any skates. Oh, oh, but maybe if it's clean enough we can just..."
Experimentally Seraphita lets herself slide onto the ice, going WHEEEEEE. This is a nice change from angry, hungry gates trying to eat them.
"We should get a place like this in Bledavik!!" There are many problems with this idea, although if Elly goes all-out she can probably produce an instant skating rink that'll last however long the desert heat allows it to. Maybe if Kelvena was around...?
Then tentacles. So. Many. Tentacles.
"Whoa! Bad touch, bad touch!"
The green gemstone on Seraphita's collar shines brightly. "C'mon everyone, be strong! We'll teach it to ruin our awesome ice field!!" COURAGE turns Ether into MORE ETHER. That is to say that collar is an Ether amplifier of some kind.
And then there's fire everywhere. Absolutely everywhere. A great whirlwind of fire that attempts to consume all. Seraphita hasn't yet realized she's going to ruin the ice harder than the tentacles have been.
Much sad, very shame.
DG: Seraphita has used her Tool G-Stone toward her party's challenge, Reach of the Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida takes a moment, once everyone is through, to twist the grapple line back into a neat little coil. She looks up, her gaze sweeping across the great, frozen expanse--she's gone completely silent, as if admiring the tranquil, sterile scene before them. Like Gwen, there's a sense of wonder to her gaze, but it's dulled, and almost sad--as if expecting it to sour at any minute. She looks at Seraphita a moment as the Beastwoman goes skating, though that was certainly an odd... place to put some sort of ice pond.
And then, it sours, just like Ida knew it would. "GWEN!" Ida screams, jarred into action as those horrible tentacles return.
In her mind's eye, she sees the Statue shatter. Something snaps.
Ida's eyes narrow, her pupils constricting in sudden rage. She charges across the ice, past Seraphita, trying to close into melee range. She's not carrying any ARMs, though, aside from the gauntlet--which is odd, considering her likely point of origin. Instead, she curls her hand into a tight, white-knuckled fist, and strikes.
It's ridiculous. The monster is many times her size, and human fists can barely hope to scratch it. Ida tries anyway, venting her rage in a flowing whirlwind of punches, kicks, and knee and elbow strikes.
Seraphita unleashes fire. Ida bares her teeth, and strikes for a flailing, recoiling tentacle with a knife-hand. Her fingers dig into the pulpy flesh; Ida uses the appendage as an improvised handhold, even as she digs into it with main strength alone.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Reach of the Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
Seraphita had been unusually silent for a second there. Kahm noted this, but beyond that he wasn't sure what to think. Something about this place was clearly effecting everyone in their own ways...when would it be his turn?
It had also dawned on him that their incessant progress could be a liability. "Each gate that closes behind us is another way shut. We won't be getting back the way we came."
If they could go back at all, went the unspoken part. They knew nothing whatsoever about this place, and had semi-recklessly charged through. The Major couldn't help but wonder when and how their luck would change, but even he hadn't expected what came next.
"Hm." Kahm said, looking out over the ice suspiciously as Gwen tread with caution while Seraphita chose wild abandon. "I don't think..." He spoke to the Element, then trailed off as a preternatural chill rose up his spine.
Something had moved beneath them.
"Get off the ice!" He shouted, a half-second before Gwen uttered her own warning, and just as late to prepare anyone to do more than have half a breath in their chest when swirling tentacles crashed through the surface like broken glass. Kahm was already in the air by the time tendrils swarmed the spot of ice he'd been on, hurling an armed sonic grenade into the midst of the nearest clutch.
There'd been something like this outside the entrance, he realized. Something smaller, but similar.
"We don't have time for this!" Kahm yelled, charging his body with electric potential and letting it soar mostly unchecked. Violent whiplashes of arcing blue energy tore all around him, slicing and dicing any organic matter unfortunate enough to be in their way.
DG: Kahm Yugh has used his Tool Sonic Grenade toward his party's challenge, Reach of the Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
Gwen just gets a look, well before they then bolt through the gates. Great, just more of what he's always wanted.
The last one slams shut with a weighty boom. He glances back at it just once, as Kahm comments on their unusual progress and its possible pitfalls. "Like a baited trap," he mutters. Well, there's nowhere to go but foward.
It's noticably cold in here, a stark change from the temperature predominant in the wastes, from even the caves of the wellspring. His boots crunch on ice as he moves. He's read about the terrain on some regions of the surface world, but for an instant, Loren can't help but be struck by some of the delicacy taken in the trees, the way the frozen lake surface extends on for what seems ages--
And then he remembers where they are and stops short. Winter wonderlands don't just happen in a temple ruin, locked deep in the grasp of the earth.
...Did he just see something move?
He undoes the straps of his bag, already fishing in its depths. "--Ma'am, wait a moment--"
The ice cracks.
Loren backpedals quickly as tentacles erupt from the frozen lake below, Gwen in their sights. Changing tack, he shifts his hand from the vial he'd been about to select and choose another. He doubts a creature that size would just be sated with Gwen. ...Or with Gwen and Ida, as the latter moves to melee combat with a monster several times her size. What is she thinking?
"Get back!"
Isopropyl alcohol is not normally used as a grenade, but they're under duress, and guess what, it's super flammable.
But just in case, he retrieves a handful of vials anyway.
DG: Loren Voss has used his Tool Solarian Medical Kit toward his party's challenge, Reach of the Pale.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== ======================<* CHALLENGE - Reach of the Pale *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 4 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- A beautiful landscape of ancient ice lies ahead, a field crossed by snowy paths and dotted with chalky crystal trees. It's beautiful, in an eerie, sterile way. There is no time to admire, however -- a filmy, inhuman stares at you from beneath the icy floor. I have you now... Writhing tendrils burst outward from beneath the frozen lake, dripping with primordial taint -- you are in the presence of the Primarch of this twisted temple! You'd best fight its limbs off before it drags you down into the depths! =Dungeon Conditions: Secret===================================================
==========================<* Hadal Temple - Round 4 *>========================== ========================< Results - Reach of the Pale >========================= Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 26 --(10)--> 36 Fail Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Loren Voss 26 --(5)--> 31 Pass Solarian Medical Kit 1 Combat Effects: Cleanse -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seraphita 21 --(5)--> 26 Pass G-Stone 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kahm Yugh 26 --(5)--> 31 Pass Sonic Grenade 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gwen Whitlock 31 --(5)--> 36 Pass Full Metal Courier 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 60 --(20)--> 80 Pass Conditions: Injure(1)|Secret(2) Effects: Cleanse|Embolden(1) ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================
DG: The party led by Ida Everstead-Rey has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 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.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
While Seraphita's firey blasts wear away at the remainders of their beautiful ice rink, it has an unintended side benefit of turning the frigid waters underneath up to a temperature not as likely to quickly drive all sense of warmth and touch out of any uncovered skin laid bare to it. The vials of isopropyl alcohol add insult to injury, splashing flammable liquid onto the tentacles, which promptly burst into flame. The owner of the tentacles below somehow give a burbled, crackling shriek at the presence of the element.
Ida inflicts her rage on one of the tentacles, causing the writhing tentacle holding onto Gwen to spasm and flings the courier helplessly through the air and onto some ice beyond as it tries to do the same to Ida.
Kahm's electricity is the necessary push needed to seal the monster's fate, the current slipping to the Primarch and causing her/him/it/they to retract their many limbs back into the deep depths of the lake.
It would only be moments afterward, when they gather all wet and miserable at the bank beyond, that Gwen would realize something crucial: She was the only one to hear that voice. It felt so personal, at the time that she failed to recognize that factor. Of course they didn't hear it. They couldn't have known what she felt like. It was Death, after all, coming back---
No, she realizes. The only one who made it personal was her.
DG: Kahm Yugh has drawn a new Challenge.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== ======================<* CHALLENGE - Fall of the Dragon *>====================== |Type: Climax |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 4 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- You are at the top of a flowing waterfall, broken by the roots of the chalky trees that have oft dotted the Temple's landscape. Below, eyes and tendrils break the surface of the icy lake like waves -- the nest of the Detestable is close at hand. The Detestable Pale draws near... The water's surface breaks and lashes. A bone-chilling shriek splits the air, and something massive rushes at you from above. A fifty-foot Metal Dragon, perhaps the same one as before, throws itself at you. Its flesh is riddled with tears and rents, and it is clearly dead, but it still moves. Tendrils of lashing water stress at its shaven metallic flesh. Bulbous, distending eyes burst from the cracks within its bones, dripping with mercurial blood. You've no way forward but down the waterfall -- but be careful you do not slip, for it may not be mere water at the bottom of the basin! =Dungeon Conditions: Save Point===============================================
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
Before that onerous tentacle can strike, someone rushes by Ida and brusquely pulls/pushes her out of the way.
Should she get a chance to open her eyes, she'll see Kahm's grim face as the man leads her on urgently by the arm. "Don't be a fool, woman!" He admonished, just long enough to dwell on it before their next trial.
The natural path took them off the frozen lake and along it's snowy borders, progressing until it terminated at the waterfall which formed an uncertain, ladder-like network of tree roots towards the bottom. With no other path, there seemed little other option but for them to risk it.
Kahm's eyes did not leave the water.
"We..." He spoke carefully, stepping slowly to the edge, "We are close to something."
The air was still, like the breath sucked in before a scream.
"And something is close to us." He realized, instinctively ducking as a terrible, undead dragon of the metal breed swooped out of the sky at them. "Quickly! There's no time to fight it!"
Kahm leapt first, ducking beneath rusted, grasping talons to grab hold of a hopefully sturdy tree root, swinging and hurling himself in haphazard negotiation across that woody network of uncertain rungs, ever mindful of the babbling horror that awaited him at the bottom upon one false step.
DG: Kahm Yugh has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Fall of the Dragon.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida skids back, across what's left of the frozen lake, but someone has a grip on her arm--and she's tugged out of the way. She wonders if it might be Gwen, but the voice tells her otherwise, and her eyes snap open.
The look on her face is one of helpless, boiling fury. She's sopping wet. The monster's ichor still drips from the clenched fingers of her right hand. And then--
Ida's face goes pale, the fury lingering for a moment before Ida forces it beneath the surface, just like they forced the monster back beneath that frozen lake. The Dragon. Focus on the Dragon. Don't be a fool, you stubborn idiot girl.
Ida follows Marcus, clambering hand over hand as she rushes down the waterfall. She's close enough to the Dragon to see the horrible, gaping rents in its flesh, and the layers of metal-laced tissue beneath.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Fall of the Dragon.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
There are more than a few things that alcohol is good for, it seems.
The ice is unstable beneath his feet; Loren doesn't linger, pulling back to the somewhat more stable shore.
Then glances Ida over, as if assessing her condition for the first time. Most of the vials, he returns to the depths of his bag.
And wordlessly flips the last towards her.
"'Something'?" Loren voices, as they reach the end, as water cascades down in a perilous stream.
He has a terrible sense of foreboding, in the same way someone saying 'it's too quiet' presages immediate doom.
...Yeah. There's the doom.
Ducking -- for all the good it will do him -- the first thing Loren does otherwise is close and seal his bag. "Don't fall behind!" he shouts, gesturing sharping as he glances back over his shoulder. ...That's a big metal dragon.
After that, there's no time for anything but to leap for one of the tree roots and hope it's enough to hold him as he makes a hasty descent.
Or that he doesn't miss. It's a long painful way down.
DG: Loren Voss has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Fall of the Dragon.
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
Seraphita splashes in the water following setting tentacles on fire. Luckily, the water is hot due to her stunt, at least until the cold catches back up. Unluckily this means Seraphita now smells like wet bun instead of just bun, as she crawls out of the water and back onto solid ground.
Her body coats itself in the idle red light of her Ether, keeping her warm and from freezing over. She shakes her head, splashing everyone as she gets the water out of the big ball of pink fluff on her head.
Then dragon. No time to rest. Or even whine.
"Whoa! It's a dragon! Guys it's a real dragon like in the storybooks! Ohno, we don't have a dashing knight!" That's right, Leo isn't here. He told Seraphita he could save princesses from dragons that one time. But he's NOT HERE. No one here is a knight.
"We gotta hide, you can't beat a dragon without a knight!!"
It's how it works.
Seraphita hops down, following after Loren, avoiding as best as she can the angry descent and ire of the beast. Also hopefully making sure Loren doesn't fall. That'd suck.
DG: Seraphita has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Fall of the Dragon.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Gwen doesn't have the heart to thank Ida immediately; she waits until Kahm is facing away before, if Ida allows for it, she places her left hand on the woman's shoulder, solidly gripping it for a moment while her blue-grey eyes lock with Ida's own. Her lips curl in a small smile, the sort that's easily missed in conditions like these. Like a blue ephemeral flower, blooming on a rocky bone-dry crag.
So easy to miss, to forget, as they move through this chillingly beautiful landscape.
Kahm speaks, and Gwen turns her attention to him. He doesn't need to explain himself, as she's already preparing herself. "... So it's talkin' to you now." It's obvious, but she feels the need to state it, even so. Firing a few charged beams of electric energy to try to slow the beast down, Gwen tries to manage her way down the freezing water, barely feeling the weight of her hands against each rock, even as covered as she is.
If they survive, she is *so* going to hug Seraphita- both in gratitude for helping them, as well as to keep herself from loosing *another* appendage.
DG: Gwen Whitlock has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Fall of the Dragon.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== ======================<* CHALLENGE - Fall of the Dragon *>====================== |Type: Climax |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 4 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- You are at the top of a flowing waterfall, broken by the roots of the chalky trees that have oft dotted the Temple's landscape. Below, eyes and tendrils break the surface of the icy lake like waves -- the nest of the Detestable is close at hand. The Detestable Pale draws near... The water's surface breaks and lashes. A bone-chilling shriek splits the air, and something massive rushes at you from above. A fifty-foot Metal Dragon, perhaps the same one as before, throws itself at you. Its flesh is riddled with tears and rents, and it is clearly dead, but it still moves. Tendrils of lashing water stress at its shaven metallic flesh. Bulbous, distending eyes burst from the cracks within its bones, dripping with mercurial blood. You've no way forward but down the waterfall -- but be careful you do not slip, for it may not be mere water at the bottom of the basin! =Dungeon Conditions: Save Point===============================================
==========================<* Hadal Temple - Round 5 *>========================== ========================< Results - Fall of the Dragon >======================== Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 36 --(20)--> 56 Fail Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Loren Voss 31 --(20)--> 51 Fail Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seraphita 26 --(20)--> 46 Fail Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kahm Yugh 31 --(20)--> 51 Fail Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gwen Whitlock 36 --(20)--> 56 Fail Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 80 --(0)--> 80 Fail Conditions: Save Point(1)|Secret(1) Effects: ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================
DG: The party led by Ida Everstead-Rey has failed this challenge! The party gained 0 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. <Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
It so often happens that best of ideas triggers an unexpected cavalcade of responses. Gwen's ARM usage disturbs the snow enough to force a minor avalanche of snow crashing down the cliff face, showering the group with snow and denser clumps of ice. The next root Kahm grabs it too brittle and snaps, sending him crashing into Loren (And taking Ida for a ride as well, since she's along with him). The cascading half-climb, half-fall continues until they nearly plunge into water.
Kahm saw it, felt the slither of tendrils along his shoulders and eyes bearing down his soul before instinct alone managed to twist his torso so that he landed face down in a snow bank.
His mind suddenly shifted back to the battle in Bledavik, when that girl had conjured the spirit of death on him. He felt it's touch all too keenly down here.
"Ugh..." Kahm groaned, lifting himself up to his feet. "That could have gone better."
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has drawn a new Challenge.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>===============================
================<* CHALLENGE - Thrall of the Detestable Pale *>=================
|Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 3 |
---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
Your descent downwards has finally taken you to the edge of the basin, to a
hideous mass of bulbous eyes and writhing, tainted tendrils. In the center
of the mass is a brilliant blue-white light, a pinprick of primordial energy
that threatens to shear away at your very being.
Those of Filgaian sorcerous inclinations may know that this is a Leyline...
and being exposed to it for long periods of time is in no way healthy.
The voice of the Primarch is audible to all:
Immerse thyself...
...within the Pale...
...Call upon my name...
...and walk beyond the Ley...
The undead Dragon lands at the centre of the nest, gazing down towards you.
The tendrils lacing its body flail, eliciting a tortured hiss from its
throat, and the many bulbous eyes bursting from the cracks within its bones
gaze towards you. It bleeds with viscous white mercury, liquid even at this
temperature. Its eye-sockets are threaded through with tendrils, but it
looks like it's pleading.
It rushes forward, wreathed in the shadow of the Primach. End this.
=Dungeon Conditions: Suffer===================================================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
An avalanche. Down they all go, with the Dragon still circling, vulture-like above. Ida's world is pain and terror for a few minutes, but then she hits something that arrests her fall. 'Something' is both Loren and Kahm, and she scrambles to her feet alongside them, scrabbling blindly at the cliff for handholds. Ida blinks frost off her eyelashes, and glances up at the monster above...
That voice. That horrible voice, like a razor drawn across raw nerves. It's something that reaches into the back of Ida's brain, bypassing rational thought, gently touching the part of her that processes matters of personal safety. She wants to run. She looks back up at the cliff face, but there's no way to climb it, and the Dragon's wheeling overhead--
Still no sign of Elly, too--unless she's already dead, and they didn't find her body.
The Dragon descends--
ONE THOUSAND YEARS AGO
A Dragon that looks very much like this one descends in front of a lone woman with eyes the same color as Ida's, and a gauntlet encasing the same arm from shoulder to hand. "I figured it would be you," the woman says, her voice low and dangerous. Chi coils in tendrils around her gauntleted hand. "Either you, or him. Such a crushing loss cannot go unanswered, correct?"
The Dragon roars with enough force to blow the woman's hair back. She grins, and it is the smile of someone who has nothing left, and no longer fears death.
NOW
The Dragon lands with enough force to crack the ice. Ida glances back at Marcus, and then at Gwen. Gwen, who is probably going to die here alongside the rest of them, who deserves better--
Chi coils in tendrils around Ida's gauntleted hand. She remembers what she learned from a vile-tempered old man who lives in a junkyard in Little Twister. She remembers what Agatha and Id told her about limits.
Ida all but rockets across the ice, chi speeding her steps. The Dragon swipes at her, tendrils lashing out like barbed whips to accompany its scythe-like claws. Ida springs over the limb, draws back a fist, and throws everything she has into a punch to the monster's throat. A tendril grabs for her, but she grips it between armored fingers, squeezing it, using it as a makeshift rope as she drops to the ground. She balls up both fists, and then brings them down on the Dragon's right front knee with enough force to shatter stone. Will it be enough?
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Thrall of the Detestable Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Seraphita has posed.
Seraphita ends up on top of Loren, because of course she would. It's an embarassing position, for him at least, because of course it would be. She doesn't seem to notice, or care, which is about as expected.
"Owie, we should hire a knight next time..."
This is why the Elements have Dominia.
She's KIND of like a knight.
The Commander, too.
Back up, then. The rabbit rises, helping Loren up if he'll accept her hand, even! Sadly this moment doesn't last. Once again, the cause is a dragon.
Seraphita huffs, and decides maybe they don't need a knight after all. Ida certainly seems to think so, going in for the kill wordlessly like that. That gauntlet is no sword but it'll have to be, today.
"Well, gosh! Fine! Maybe if we kill this jerk dragon the rest of this place will leave us alone!" She doesn't like dark places, anyway. Not that it's especially dark when she gets going. That Ether of hers is making her shine like a tiny sun right now.
"Thermo Bunny! Gooooo!"
Her collar shines, focusing the Ether into a large... rabbit. A rabbit made of plasma and fire. The size of the dragon. It hops straight for the dragon.
Behold the mightiest of metamagic feats: embun spell.
DG: Seraphita has used her Tool G-Stone toward her party's challenge, Thrall of the Detestable Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Loren Voss has posed.
There have been better landings. It's a long painful way down, after all. Loren squints dazedly up above him, glasses askew across his face. Someone's lying on top of him. ...Oh, of course it's her. His gaze shifts pointedly away.
It's just in time to see a shape descending down after them. Oh good, he thinks dimly as he rises to his feet with a wince, grasping ahold of someone's (Seraphita's) hand absently when it's offered. The dragon's here, too.
Some or perhaps all of them are about to die here. Still, rolling over and letting it happen isn't how you get any kind of commendation. One hand lifts to readjust his glasses as the other undoes the clasps on his bag and digs for the vials he'd replaced earlier.
Surface-dweller medication. To fit in. Not as good as proper supplies, but easier to obtain, easier to explain. With just a glance towards the others around him, he starts handing them out.
Well, most of them.
"--You idiot!" he shouts after Ida, as she races towards the dragon, chi burning around here. "You'll get yourself killed!" He hurls the final vial towards her with an underhand arc, before glancing over at the etheric manifestation Seraphita's created and...
Sighing and retrieving a rosesol next, which he flips her way.
DG: Loren Voss has used his Tool Solarian Medical Kit toward his party's challenge, Thrall of the Detestable Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
So, it's come to this.
Gwen had said something earlier to him, about all of them hearing or seeing something the others could not. Something was trying to reach them, or trick them, but was only doing so one by one. Was this tortured beast the source?
Ida seemed to think she. Kahm barely had time to get a word in before the martial artist when rushing forth to meet the beast's ravenous jaws, driven by something the major could scarcely comprehend. The chi running up her arm...that wasn't...the way 'he' fought, was it?
For a moment, the man is tempted to watch. To observe and analyze, as was his privilege.
But the present was no time to stay on the sidelines, as Seraphita's brilliant ether reminded him. Kahm does not engage at melee range alongside Ida, preferring instead to hold back and lift another one of his sonic grenades up, wrapping this one with an extra punch. The device begins to beep furiously as it is armed, surrounded by a crackling blue aura the Major conjures from his ambient will. When he hurled the grenade, it flew in the center of a of an electric spear, incandescent tip aimed straight for the beast's breast.
The air parted and roared with peal of thunder as the strike sailed overhead, and Kahm's blue eyes burned with cold fury.
DG: Kahm Yugh has used his Tool Sonic Grenade toward his party's challenge, Thrall of the Detestable Pale.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Well. Damn.
Gwen's bright idea is met with snow and ice, sending her and the others tumbling against the unforgiving roots and stones below. At least, with the snow that's fallen down (as well as some bodies), Gwen's landing isn't deadly. ... Just very, very painful, because she nearly landed on her ARM.
Stumbling upwards, Gwen's ARM crackles with small arcs of lightning as she gets up, pain shooting through her face. "H-hold on, think I can-" She's mostly talking to herself, coaxing her body to endure the pain for just a little while as she adjusts her ARM with quick, if not precise, twists and turns of her left hand. WIth a final twist, Gwen falls back into the snowbank, a lone whine of 'owwww...' destroying any sort of dignity she may have had.
She doesn't have long to bask in her misery.
It's coming to claim them.
Pushing herself back up, Gwen gets back up, easing the wet remains of her sleeve to allow for better movement. It's okay. Ida's seen her scars. There's not much that would be shown, anyway.
It somehow makes it all okay. At least it's not what like what's in front of them, the holed flesh of the Dragon as much a thing of Death as her scars a thing of Life.
Riesenlied's revealing to Gwen of her ARM's heritage filters into her mind as the undead Dragon lands. A thread of odd sympathy filters into Gwen's mind as she gazes onto its empty eye sockets.
She wants to think her ARM had some current or pathway that still held an inkling of the former Metal Dragon it was a part of.
"Shhh.... it's okay. There, there." There's an odd similarity to how Gwen speaks to the dragon, maybe to people like Loren and Kahm, who have seen her do the same to Loren's own horse. Like the Draggon itself was just a feral horse.
Or a horse with a fatal injury, judging by how she's drawing up her ARM. Charging. Speaking. Quietly, carefully. Too tired to fully comprehend the danger she's in, or the yellow zigzags of energy wildly jumping from the Mockingbird. "I'm here."
The Dragon charges.
Wreathed in electricity, some of it possibly feeding from and into Kahm's own field, Gwen fires, taking advantage of the possible opening Ida's careless(?) attack may have opened, timed to coincide with Kahm and Seraphita's attacks.
DG: Gwen Whitlock has used her Tool Full Metal Courier toward her party's challenge, Thrall of the Detestable Pale.
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>===============================
================<* CHALLENGE - Thrall of the Detestable Pale *>=================
|Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 3 |
---------------------------< Challenge Information: >---------------------------
Your descent downwards has finally taken you to the edge of the basin, to a
hideous mass of bulbous eyes and writhing, tainted tendrils. In the center
of the mass is a brilliant blue-white light, a pinprick of primordial energy
that threatens to shear away at your very being.
Those of Filgaian sorcerous inclinations may know that this is a Leyline...
and being exposed to it for long periods of time is in no way healthy.
The voice of the Primarch is audible to all:
Immerse thyself...
...within the Pale...
...Call upon my name...
...and walk beyond the Ley...
The undead Dragon lands at the centre of the nest, gazing down towards you.
The tendrils lacing its body flail, eliciting a tortured hiss from its
throat, and the many bulbous eyes bursting from the cracks within its bones
gaze towards you. It bleeds with viscous white mercury, liquid even at this
temperature. Its eye-sockets are threaded through with tendrils, but it
looks like it's pleading.
It rushes forward, wreathed in the shadow of the Primach. End this.
=Dungeon Conditions: Suffer===================================================
==========================<* Hadal Temple - Round 6 *>========================== ==================< Results - Thrall of the Detestable Pale >=================== Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 56 --(10)--> 66 Fail Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Loren Voss 51 --(5)--> 56 Pass Solarian Medical Kit 1 Combat Effects: Cleanse -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Seraphita 46 --(5)--> 51 Pass G-Stone 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Kahm Yugh 51 --(5)--> 56 Pass Sonic Grenade 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gwen Whitlock 56 --(5)--> 61 Pass Full Metal Courier 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 80 --(35)--> 115 Pass Conditions: Suffer(1) Effects: Cleanse|Embolden(1) ===============================< Dream Chasers >================================
DG: You have overcome the dungeon's trials! This run is a success! DG: The party led by Ida Everstead-Rey has successfully explored Hadal Temple!
===============================<* Hadal Temple *>=============================== ============================<* CHALLENGE - Log 04 *>============================ |Type: Discovery |Dungeon Ability: Conclusion|Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- With a thunderous roar, the Primarch departs, its mass pulling deeper into the earth like water being sucked down a drain. Within a minute, it's gone, and its departure reveals a path in the wreckage around its nest. It leads to a cliff-face, overlooking a cavern saturated with a thick haze. Sitting inside, half-buried in the earth, is the hull of a massive, derelict skyship. Between the mist, the sheer drop, and your own exhaustion, you'll have to wait another day to get there. A piece of the skyship's hull has been threaded through a nearby cliff, like blood vessels. Attached to them is some sort of terminal, which activates easily enough, despite its age, and the damage it's sustained. The only accessible file is a recording of a woman's voice Someone else is speaking to her, but the audio is corrupted. "Log 04-113AE: Of course it's tied to those damnable Guardians. How could it not be? Silence. It's not like those things their elites conjure up, though. This is different. It's not something that appears once, vents its wrath, and is gone. This is autonomous. Silence. Of course, sir. Silence. Of course Alhazred wants his samples. We will give them to him once we carve them from its corpse. Silence. Understood. Astrid, out. =Dungeon Conditions: Treasure=================================================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida remembers what Jackie told her--that as far as his style reckoned, parts of it were meant to make you a target if you were fighting something this big. Reckless, but useful if you were inclined to protect someone. Ida's headlong charge makes the Dragon, and what ever foul presence is puppeteering it, focus on her. Its rusting, rotting teeth snap shut just behind her as Kahm's spear hits home; lightning courses through the beast's chest, and it reels back, the visible tendons in its neck twisting and convulsing. Ida snaps Loren's thrown Sol out of the air and downs it without a second thought, taking advantage of the burst of energy to run back around the creature's flank. Gwen's round slams into its right thigh, and bone breaks with a sound like a steel girder snapping. Tendrils twitch and convulse. Eyes roll back in agony.
Seraphita's bunny hops onwards, inexorable. One last hop, and it erupts in a cataclysmic blast of light that erases both it... and the Dragon.
Perhaps. It's difficult to tell what happens at that last second, but when the light fades, there's no sign of the creature's body. The roiling mass of tendrils is gone, too, revealing a path. And beyond...
Beyond is something that catches Ida's eye, through the pain and exhaustion and worry and self-hatred. She picks herself up, dusts herself off, and walks towards the cliff face to stare at the corpse of the great, crashed ship. Beneath Wayside. It was here, all along--the design reminds her of the other Demon ruins she's seen. Did Riesenlied know?
Ida's stomach knots itself in disgust. Of course. Of course she'd be so lucky as to just settle atop the find of the century.
Ida almost misses the device threaded into the cliff. Like the ship, it looks like it was grown rather than made, and the runes on it are Hyadean. Ida reaches out, tentatively, and touches it.
A voice record. Ida listens to it like she's listening to a talk between ghosts.
"Don't tell Wayside," she says, at long last.
<Pose Tracker> Kahm Yugh has posed.
Whether the dragon had died or fled, the only relevant fact was that it no longer troubled them. Once Kahm was confident the threat was over, he proceeded to the edge.
Ida has begun to earn his eye. The woman didn't say much, but her actions spoke loudly, as did her style. When they reach the ancient ship, he does not look upon it with the same weight knowledge as she, nor does he hear the ancient audio with anything but a familiarity with one of the quarter knights mentioned.
"An interesting coincidence." Kahm remarks, frowning as he recognized the impracticality of trying to excavate this relic so far down, all while preventing drifters from reach. All this, and not a sign of Lieutenant Van Houten.
"I have no interest in Wayside." He answered Ida, which was as close to a promise as she was likely to get. "But from here, we should rest. Miss Elly is still out there, somewhere."