2022-03-31: Of Fire and Ice
- Log: Of Fire and Ice
- Cast: Ida Everstead-Rey, Dean Stark, Rebecca Streisand, Avril Vent Fleur
- Where: Goddodin Village
- Date: March 31, 2022
- Summary: Ida and Dean, as Seers, have perhaps particular interest in testing themselves within the shrines -- but the trials being what they are, they ask Rebecca and Avril for their assistance. However, even so, the path through the shrine will prove a difficult one, even for the Seers and their allies.
DG: A party led by Ida Everstead-Rey is now entering Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial. DG: Party formation is now over. An Entry Challenge will now be drawn and displayed to the party.
===================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>=================== ====================<* CHALLENGE - Seraphic Afterimage *>===================== |Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 2 | --------------------------< Challenge Information: >-------------------------- As the sealed gate opens, Igraine stretches out before the eye. Gray stone walkways give way to a central chamber writ large, including a lake of magma surrounding a brown rock platform. There are gates going in multiple directions from here, stairways and pathways, and as you walk down them, you encounter a moderately-sized chamber with a ritual circle in the center, and a door at the far end. When you step into the room, however, the circle ignites in a Seraphic arte, and a silhouette wreathed in fire burns into being in the center, holding a trident. This afterimage of the Keeper of the Fire Trial will not let you pass unless you can defeat it. Good luck with that. =Dungeon Conditions: Wound====================================================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida's had a lot on her mind lately. Igraine gives her something to focus on that isn't a mystery weapon or an ancient conspiracy or a friend she's helpless to save. After taking the necessary preparations--ensuring everyone had adequate supplies of water, among other things--she and her fellow Seer and their friends set out to the heart of the shrine.
It's still oppressively hot. The grey stone walls have been baking in this heat for centuries, if not longer; Ida looks up at the ornamentation on the ceiling, and then at the lake of lava in what appears to be the central chamber. "I think we now know how it feels to be biscuits," she remarks, mopping at her brow with a handkerchief. Sweat drips down her body. She takes a swig from her canteen, and glances about the room. "I think... there?" That tunnel is open, and it looks like it's centrally-placed.
A bright glow illuminates the chamber at the other end; Ida's seen enough Seraphic artes to recognize their glyphs when she encounters them. "What--" she says, and that's all she gets out before fire swirls within the glyph, forming a familiar silhouette. Ida's surprise gives way to a fierce, defiant grin. "So it's going to be like this, hm?" The Seraphic image raises its trident, and leaps for her. "Fine by me!" There's the faintest note of fear in her voice, but... only just. "Flare out!" Ida whips to the side. The image's diving thrust misses her by less than a foot. She spins on her heel, and throws an unlit flare grenade into the simulacrum's body. The fire will ignite it without her help.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has used her Tool Flare Grenade toward her party's challenge, Seraphic Afterimage.
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.
Yvain had flamed off somewhere--presumably the center of the Shrine, since that's where he said he was going--leaving everyone else behind. Dean had joined up with Ida, and the two of them had sent a message to Avril and Rebecca to join them (because it's always better with friends, and even if Boudicca is the Oracle for Moor Gault, she's also a Wind Seraph, and wind is weak to fire here, so it would be mean to her to bring her along), and now--here they are, taking on Igraine! Fire might not be the *greatest* element to use in the Fire Shrine, despite all those says about fighting fire with fire, but as a Seer of Moor Gault, Dean feels like this is something he and Ida have *got* to do.
But it *is* super hot.
"Tell me about it," he says to Ida, loosening his scarf so it more hangs around the shoulders of his jacket. Maybe he should've taken off some layers, but what if his scarf got lost?? He loves this thing. There's no way he could lose it, any more than he could lose any of his other treasures.
Ida points at a tunnel. "Sure, looks as good a path as any," he says. But once they actually reach the spot--a glyph flares, and suddenly there's a burst of fire, and-- "Yvain?! I thought you were staying at the center of the Shrine!" he utters. He pauses. Then he peers at the fake Yvain. "Wait a second... You're not Yvain, you're just some kinda illusion!!" He snaps his hands out and calls up Twin Fenrir in them. "Let's take it out, guys!" he calls before charging in to batter the simulacrum with his combat rods, finishing with a blow to the head with Ace of Spades for good measure.
DG: Dean Stark has used his Tool Ace of Spades toward his party's challenge, Seraphic Afterimage.
<Pose Tracker> Rebecca Streisand has posed.
The oppressive heat is something Rebecca isn't unused to, though she's affected enough for Igraine she's got her vest off, leaving just her top, her denim shorts, and her boots. With the heat it's already becoming sweat-stained but more tolerable.
"With gravy." Rebecca quips to Ida's statement as she looks around, keeping her hand near her ARM. However as they enter the chamber and the glyphs start to glow...
"Dean! It can't really be him." Rebecca says immediately, though maybe not quickly enough that Dean hasn't already realized it's not actually him. Quick drawing her gun she fires off a few shots at the image of Yvain. "That'd be too simple."
With a seeming sixth sense for the few ley lines in the room that aren't the intricate web of fire ley, she runs over to a spot and... pulls out her Medium.
"I'll set 'em up."
A column of water erupts, already starting to sizzle into steam, before a great orb of fluid seems to drip off the ceiling down the center of the column atop the effigy of Yvain.
"You see how hot his fire really burns Avril!"
DG: Rebecca Streisand has used her Tool Sky Medium toward her party's challenge, Seraphic Afterimage.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
If the others had decided to head into the depths of the Fire Shrine--
Well, of course, Avril was going to head in as well. How could she not? Even beside the feeling she had about the place, it seemed only proper.
...Perhaps it comes as no surprise, though, that out of the four of them, Avril alone proceeds through the place as if there were very little amiss -- as if they were not in fact coming face to face with the reality of life for a loaf of bread, or a biscuit, as Ida puts it.
"I feel as if that is also the correct path to travel," she answers Ida, sparing a glance Rebecca's way (she really is not so much as breaking a sweat, is she) before they approach that platform not far ahead.
She pauses, even moments before the others sight the figure standing there, let alone address it. "Be careful, I--"
It is but an image, a haze born from the flame and heat within this place, but no less the powerful for it.
"Rebecca is correct. This is not Yvain." Her eyes widen. "--He means to test us through this!"
Indeed.
Absolute Zero comes to hand and she falls in immediately. "Then I shall hold him at bay!" she calls out, darting in to close the gap.
DG: Avril Vent Fleur has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Seraphic Afterimage.
===================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>=================== ====================<* CHALLENGE - Seraphic Afterimage *>===================== |Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 2 | --------------------------< Challenge Information: >-------------------------- As the sealed gate opens, Igraine stretches out before the eye. Gray stone walkways give way to a central chamber writ large, including a lake of magma surrounding a brown rock platform. There are gates going in multiple directions from here, stairways and pathways, and as you walk down them, you encounter a moderately-sized chamber with a ritual circle in the center, and a door at the far end. When you step into the room, however, the circle ignites in a Seraphic arte, and a silhouette wreathed in fire burns into being in the center, holding a trident. This afterimage of the Keeper of the Fire Trial will not let you pass unless you can defeat it. Good luck with that. =Dungeon Conditions: Wound====================================================
==============<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial - Round 1 *>============== ======================< Results - Seraphic Afterimage >======================= Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ida Everstead-Rey 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Flare Grenade 2 Combat Effects: Embolden ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dean Stark 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Ace of Spades 3 Combat Effects: Rally ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Avril Vent Fleur 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rebecca Streisand 0 --(5)--> 5 Pass Sky Medium 2 Combat Effects: Embolden ----------------------------------< Party >----------------------------------- Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 0 --(20)--> 20 Pass Conditions: Wound(2) Effects: 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. DG: Rebecca Streisand has drawn a new Challenge.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== =======================<* CHALLENGE - Blazen Wolf Pack *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- This rough brown chamber is of unworked rock, leading further into the complex through a gray stone door but also farther into the caverns by way of a dark hole in a wall. Living in the hole is a group of wolves! Fire wolves. They swarm out of their den and attack! =Dungeon Conditions: Wound====================================================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
'You're not Yvain, you're just some kinda illusion!'
"He warned us about this!" Ida shouts, her voice rising above the roaring flames. The Yvain-apparition flickers as the flare grenade goes off, momentarily losing cohesion--in that moment, Dean lays into it with every weapon he's got. Bullets rip through the flames, and the figure flickers back into its Yvain-shape as it starts parrying with its trident. But Dean has it on the defensive. The Ace of Spades plunges into the flame-spectre's torso, and while there isn't the satisfying sensation of breaking earth, Dean nevertheless feels a hit.
The spectre backs away from him, and takes another swing at Ida, blurring into her rear arc and thrusting the spear forward--a strike that could catch her center-mass. Ida feels the heat of the specter's passage, and is in motion. She starts to twist, her spine flowing, rather than bending; her torso ends up at an angle that would indicate a horrific internal injury if her body weren't part-Hyadean. Rebecca's water falls from the ceiling, pouring onto the image. It starts to boil on contact, rushing outwards with a burbling hiss of hot steam. Ida backs off, extruding armor to guard her unshielded arms. And then--
The Ice Queen makes her play, and what a play it is. In a single, masterful strike, Avril lunges and buries Absolute Zero in the figure's chest. It loses cohesion again, this time flowing downwards, into the Seraphic circle that created it. The door opens.
Ida lets out a huff of breath, and rakes a hand through her sodden hair. "That was... just the initial test," she says, clearly impressed, but also coming down from that momentary adrenaline rush.
<Pose Tracker> Rebecca Streisand has posed.
"He did?" Rebecca asks, who wasn't there for the explanation, "Sure sounds like Dean to have forgotten already." This time it's more of a tease than a lecture. Fortunately the fight is over fast.
Rebecca looks over to Idea, breathing hard, "Seems that way. This place feels designed to wear us down fast if we don't keep pushing forward."
Rebecca in contrast to Avril, is already getting quite sweaty, the battle didn't help with those matters any. Rebecca flashes her a smile, seemingly admiring the fact that she seems immune to heat, which lends her an air of being the most put together of them in here.
"Avril, we'll be relying on you more the deeper in we go."
Quickly guiding onward to the next chamber of seemingly quite natural brown rock - there's a sudden dark hole in the wall. "Suspicious. Don't you think?"
Rebecca tries to creep up to it, but before she gets close, there are two burning flames that look like candle flames appear. Then two more. Then exponentially they all seem to multiply into a dozen pairs.
With a sudden growl - wolves that seem mostly flame begin to pour out of the wall and start to swarm them all using deadly pack tactics.
Rebecca beats a hasty retreat, drawing her ARM and just unloading a full clip into the fray as she tries to leap away. "SECOND TEST! SECOND TEST!"
DG: Rebecca Streisand has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Blazen Wolf Pack.
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.
"Mannnn, don't talk about gravy AND biscuits, you're gonna make me hungry," Dean complains to Rebecca. At least with Avril also saying Ida's choice feels right, they know this is the way to go. He takes a quick drink from his own canteen, putting it away just in time for the Yvainacrum to appear. Rebecca realizes its true nature sooner than he does, Avril points out that this too is part of the test, and Ida reminds him that Yvain had warned them about this, and he shoots back, "Yeah, I get that *now*!" His cheeks turn pink when Rebecca muses that it's just like him to have forgotten already, and he grouses, "Yeah, yeah, I'm dense, I know."
Still, his spirits rise again quickly. Between Rebecca's magic, Dean's shovel, Avril's sword, and Ida's grenade, it's gonezo *real* quick, at least. Dean beams at the group. "That was way easier than I thought it'd be! We've all gotten a lot stronger since we started traveling, huh?" Maybe part of the Trial is realizing that.
It helps that Avril remains as unflappable as ever with her Ice Queen cool. She really is amazing. When Rebecca says they'll be relying on her, Dean smiles brightly and gives her a firm nod. "Yeah!"
Onwards they go. They stop near a dark hole in the wall. Dean is absolutely about to walk right past it when Rebecca declares it suspicious. "Huh. You think so?" he wonders, looking at it. "It's just a hole, isn't it?"
The cosmos immediately proves Rebecca right and Dean wrong when it spits out *fire wolves*. As Rebecca scrambles away while firing bullets, Dean closes in to whack them on the snouts with his combat rods. Can't surround them if they can't maintain their formation! "Don't worry, we've got this!!"
DG: Dean Stark has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Blazen Wolf Pack.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
The fight is over with quickly. Yvain had meant to test by its nature, of course, which has left Avril wondering what it was meant to test at this stage -- surely, there was something he wished to learn about them and their intent by putting such an obstacle in their path so quickly. Vanquished handily or not, this will not be the end of it, either.
Absolute Zero returns from whence it came and she advances with the rest of them.
"...I do not doubt it," she answers Rebecca simply. "This space should by rights be my antithesis. It is often said that fire should win against ice. But a single fire cannot survive a raging snowstorm, nor can it hope to melt a glacier. ...I wonder who might win out, should we come to blows?" She smiles, even so.
"But I shall deliver you to the trial in one piece. Of that, I do so solemnly swear."
There's a hole ahead. Rebecca finds it suspicious.
"I think so too. There is something strange about that hole," Avril agrees, looking to Dean. "Dean, we should check to find out if it might have a trap. Perhaps this is another test?" She has clasped her hands together before her, even as Rebecca slowly creeps towards the hole.
There is a growl, and Avril whips her head in the direction of that ominous hole--
Immediately, Absolute Zero is in hand once again, but she does not advance upon the snapping snarling pack of fire wolves. Instead, she throws out a hand in the pack's direction and thereby comes a torrent of glacial spears -- slowing, perhaps injuring the wolves.
What is this meant to test? Caution, perhaps?
DG: Avril Vent Fleur has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Blazen Wolf Pack.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida has come a long way since her journey to Ignas. In many ways, she's a different person than the frightened young woman who dared to approach a bandit raid, but was too scared of taking life--and losing hers--to do more than that, at first. The heiress takes a long pull from her canteen as they walk on. "Willfully throwing oneself into danger, time and time again, tends to have that effect," Ida says, once she's swallowed the mouthful of water. "You either learn from your failures, or don't, and get dragged under. What we've been through would temper the hardiest souls."
They come to the hole. Ida's eyes narrow, and she keeps her distance as the others approach. One hand moves to snatch up another grenade as the first pair of lights ignites. As the third wolf appears, Ida's teeth jump on edge. "Flare out!" she shouts, and she hurls the thing over Dean's shoulder, at the wolves. If any make it to melee range, she lunges, striking at them with open-palm blows.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has used her Tool Flare Grenade toward her party's challenge, Blazen Wolf Pack.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== =======================<* CHALLENGE - Blazen Wolf Pack *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- This rough brown chamber is of unworked rock, leading further into the complex through a gray stone door but also farther into the caverns by way of a dark hole in a wall. Living in the hole is a group of wolves! Fire wolves. They swarm out of their den and attack! =Dungeon Conditions: Wound====================================================
===============<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial - Round 2 *>=============== =========================< Results - Blazen Wolf Pack >========================= Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 5 --(5)--> 10 Pass Flare Grenade 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dean Stark 5 --(13)--> 18 Fail Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Avril Vent Fleur 5 --(5)--> 10 Pass Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rebecca Streisand 5 --(13)--> 18 Fail Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 20 --(20)--> 40 Pass Conditions: Wound(2) Effects: 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> Rebecca Streisand has posed.
Rebecca gives Dean a look that's half exasperated and half amused as he says she's going to make him hungry. Before she nods Ida's way, "That may be... but tempered or not, I still still feel we've got a ways to go." She's not going to be a downer but, she sure remembers how what Kartikeya was like.
Before Avril's answer comes, and Rebecca actually gets this small grin. She doesn't take her poetry journal out here but she's definitely writing that one down for inspiration later. "If I were a betting woman - I know what my money would be on."
The Wolves though at least temporarily curb thoughts of hunger as Dean starts booping wolves on the snoot with COMBAT RODS. Yet while their formation seems disrupted - they're only smarting, not defeated. Rebecca's bullets seem to be having a similarily rough time.
Fortunately, Avril seems to do better with the glacial spears as the combat text goes RED to indicate that they're indeed weak to that. Ida's Grenade then detonates and mops up the remainder, with one final one being struck down by an open palm strike.
After it's all over, Rebecca takes a moment to take a breath, taking stock of a few small fang marks that look like burns... then promptly hands over a small hand sized bundle to Dean. "Now that that's taken care of... let me just get ahead of this. Hard tack Rations." Then a small wrapped tin, "Leftover porridge." She steps moves on, just sounding amused, "Eat your 'biscuits and gravy' as we walk Dean."
DG: Avril Vent Fleur has drawn a new Challenge.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== ======================<* CHALLENGE - Blue Torch Puzzle *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- This room is very cold. Two torches are lit with a strange blue flame that radiates a chill that cools the room around them, but six torches exist in the room. The room has six pedestals, one for each torch, and is hexagonal in shape. The door on the opposite side will not open without the puzzle's solution. Further complicating matters, normal fire won't work to light the torches! =Dungeon Conditions: Reckless, Tire===========================================
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
To that, Avril does not remark or comment. She just smiles, ever so slightly.
Still, such thoughts such as the encounter to come with Seraph Yvain may need to take a brief back seat -- of rather more import is the matter of the (quite literal) wolves at the door. There is one fleeting moment when, spotting how the wolves are reacting (they're not dissuaded, merely held at bay momentarily by Rebecca and Dean alike), Avril is given space to wonder whether this may be another sort of test from Yvain. But the wolves are in fact weak to ice, and the thrown grenade serves to fully sort the matter.
"Are both of you alright?" she asks, when everything is truly over and done with. Rebecca and Dean are not without injury, sure, but it is not serious injury. And so, what with Rebecca offering up Dean what a growing (?) boy needs, they head on once again.
The heat seems to dimish by degrees the closer they get to the chamber that lies ahead. By the time they step over the threshold, it's become positively freezing. Hopefully everyone brought with them the remainder of their various ensembles.
Avril, still seemingly unaffected, regards the flames that are lit -- and the empty stone torches that suggest they may yet hold an ember.
"Anti... fire, perhaps?" she wonders aloud, tilting her head to one side as she watches a particular blue dancing flame. After a moment's thought she pulls out her mirror and -- gently -- slides it into the fire.
Perhaps one might capture a blaze that does not exist with a mirror that...
Avril blinks slow. There was something... about the mirror, just then?
How strange.
DG: Avril Vent Fleur has used her Tool Mirror of De Soto toward her party's challenge, Blue Torch Puzzle.
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.
Ida functionally agrees with Dean, and he grins at her. "Yeah! We've been traveling... what, five years now? And we haven't backed down from any challenges!" Though they've no doubt still got a ways to go. Dean nods to Rebecca at that. "Yeah... There's still a lot of problems left in the world. We can't just rest on our laurels. I guess that's why we keep having to go through these kinds of trials, huh?"
Once the wolves are defeated, he takes another drink of water--and then Rebecca, blessed Rebecca, hands over some FOOD. Dean, who actually was getting hungry after back-to-back battles, brightens. "Yeah!! You're a lifesaver, Rebecca!"
And then he does indeed eat his biscuits (hardtack) and gravy (porridge). It's a little messy, but it's fine.
"You know, I never got that about fire beating ice," he commends, mouth half-full, as they walk. "So what if fire melts ice? Ice turns into water, and then it douses fire! How's that a victory for fire, huh?" He swallows and smiles. "I'm fine, by the way! It was a little rough there at the end, but I'll be great once I finish this up." OM NOM NOMPH.
He brushes his fingers off on his scarf as the group enters the chilly room with the blue flames. "Anti... fire??" he echoes, puzzled. He looks around at the room's tableau for a moment. It absolutely doesn't help. "...maybe there's some hidden hints?" he suggests, calling up Twin Fenrir and loading his Detector bullets. He fires one--it covers the area in a strange green light that calls up a matching screen overlay--and, hopefully, will show if there's any hints, treasures, or coins in the room that might help them figure this one out.
DG: Dean Stark has used his Tool Detector toward his party's challenge, Blue Torch Puzzle.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida doesn't have Master Maekir's knack for cryptic-sounding patter, but she's learned quite a few martial lessons in her day. Lots of them have little to do with the punching, and everything to do with the why behind punching, and the things that happen after punching. "There's always someone more powerful than you," she says. "But power is not strength." Ida's voice is soft, sisterly--that's a lesson she had to learn the hard way.
The wolves are defeated. It was certainly less unpleasant than Ida's last fight with elementally-infused canines; she stops to take another drink as Rebecca passes Dean his snacks. As the corridor starts to cool, Ida pulls out her Seer's mantle, and fastens it into place. "What's this about, then?" she says, glancing about for Seraphic glyphs or any other signs of sorcery. There are none--not until they get to the torch room.
Ida's seen this motif before. She follows her first instinct, walking up to one of the unlit torches and getting to work on it with her spark-striker--but the thing refuses to light, no matter how hard she tries. Ida glances back at Avril, and smiles. "Good idea," she says. She takes a spare rag out of her kit, and lowers it into the flame. If it catches, good. If it doesn't catch, there's always the option of physically disassembling the torch-holder, if it has removable parts. It's fine.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has used her Tool ARMS Meister's Field Kit toward her party's challenge, Blue Torch Puzzle.
<Pose Tracker> Rebecca Streisand has posed.
"Few small burns." Rebecca indicates to Avril the extent of the damage, "Don't worry, if that's the worst I get out of this place I'll consider myself fortunate." Before she gives Dean a scrutinizing look, "Well I wasn't here to hear Yvain's declamation. Is that why we have to keep going through these kind of trials?" Again there's a light tease, like she's testing if he was listening.
Though she gets a moment's joy out of Dean's reaction all the same. It's the little things. "Each and every day." She says of being a lifesaver.
Dean though adds that he thinks ice will eventually win against fire... and she adds. "And then the steam returns to the clouds above - which becomes rain - which refreezes and comes down as snow?" Rebecca adds to Dean's little progression.
She then pauses to contemplate what Ida has to say, before eventually seeming to agree, "Maybe so. Problem I suppose is, the ones with the power won't respect us having that advantage in strength of character."
And then the heat, just abruptly gets colder. "Huh that's a change... not that I don't mind some relief but..."
It starts to get freezing REAL fast. And even as hardy as they all are, Rebecca recognizes the danger, "Guess we're now on a different kind of time limit to solve this."
Rebecca gives Avril a puzzled look, "Anti... fire?" Her brain seems to be trying to work through the concept. Though she doesn't get it until Avril pulls out her mirror, "Like a fire's reflection? Hey, good thinking!"
Dean fires his Detector Bullets, and Rebecca instead starts moving through the room slowly with a badge, which in theory works like Dean's Detector, but in practice it's more much narrow in scope. It's not until she goes by one of the stone torches that she stops upon hearing some chime only she can hear, and scrutinizes it, "Maybe try lighting this one first Avril?"
DG: Rebecca Streisand has used her Tool Treasure Tone toward her party's challenge, Blue Torch Puzzle.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== ======================<* CHALLENGE - Blue Torch Puzzle *>======================= |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- This room is very cold. Two torches are lit with a strange blue flame that radiates a chill that cools the room around them, but six torches exist in the room. The room has six pedestals, one for each torch, and is hexagonal in shape. The door on the opposite side will not open without the puzzle's solution. Further complicating matters, normal fire won't work to light the torches! =Dungeon Conditions: Reckless, Tire===========================================
===============<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial - Round 3 *>=============== ========================< Results - Blue Torch Puzzle >========================= Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 10 --(0)--> 10 Pass ARMS Meister's Field Kit 2 Wits Effects: Enlighten -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dean Stark 18 --(0)--> 18 Pass Detector 2 Wits Effects: Stalwart -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Avril Vent Fleur 10 --(0)--> 10 Pass Mirror of De Soto 1 Wits Effects: Cleanse -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rebecca Streisand 18 --(0)--> 18 Pass Treasure Tone 2 Wits Effects: Enlighten -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 40 --(20)--> 60 Pass Conditions: Reckless(2)|Tire(2)|Wound(1) Effects: Cleanse|Enlighten(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> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"Hmm... though, once it becomes water, it is ice no more," Avril remarks, as if to suggest that the difference between ice and water were more than mere semantics. Perhaps she would know it best of all -- not simply because of her own powers, but because of the Medium she bears. Lucidia's Medium, the Original Artificial Medium of the Sea. "While it is true that water defeats fire in most circumstances, what I have said remains true for water: against strong fire, only a little water cannot triumph."
Such musings are perhaps best left to the side, though, what with the challenge before them now -- as Rebecca notes, they're on a time limit before the cold overcomes them perhaps just as swiftly as the oven without might.
"Yes... it is not 'ice', but neither is it possesed of all the attributes of fire. If I were to place my hand within it, what would you think would happen?"
As a reflection of fire, it would burn, most assuredly.
As Ida will find out with her torch.
But rather than expending heat, it consumes it. In the way that a normal flame would make parts of her hand feel uncomfortably hot, perhaps, this one treatens to take the heat right out of her. Still--
Avril deposits some of her collected flame onto the one stone torch. Two others ping in succession in response to Dean's Detector. That means that Avril and Ida will need to both approach these two.
And in the end, when Avril's mirror has no more antiflame to give, Ida's torch will serve to light the last empty torch.
The door opens.
DG: Dean Stark has drawn a new Challenge.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== =========================<* CHALLENGE - Liquid Fire *>========================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 4 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- Dominating the center of the room is an intricate circle of Seraphic runes, flowing outward in waving lines reminiscent of flames in reds, oranges, and yellows. Golden lines trace through the fire mosaic, runes and lines evoking power and the Ley. When the group finishes filing in, the doors all close, and the circle begins to activate. A figure of pure flame erupts from the center of the room, humanoid but made completely of writhing fire. Attacking the group with a mixture of physical force and Fire spells, it changes its shape regularly: becoming a cyclone, a hand that can grab, and an untouchable field of flame. When it is in its untouchable form it counterattacks every attempt to destroy it with horrid force. This is a fearsome enemy. =Dungeon Conditions: Injure===================================================
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.
"Hmmm... Yeah, that's true," Dean concedes to Avril. "So basically, it doesn't matter if you're at a disadvantage as long as you're strong enough!" A powerful life lesson.
Even if maybe not all of it quite gets through to him. Dean stares blankly when Avril asks what would happen if she stuck her hand in an ice flame. "Huh?? Uh... It's not quite ice, but it's not quite fire, so..."
algebrameme.gif
Fortunately, with him having already fired the Detector bullet, it's okay if he's ???ed out of the rest of the puzzle. Avril, Ida, and Rebecca handle it, and the door opens to allow them onwards. Dean's pretty fine with that, all considered.
The group enters a new room--a large, spacious room, the kind that would conveniently be a really good place to fight a really strong enemy--at the center of which is another one of those huge Seraphic glyphs. It's similar enough to the one they saw earlier with the false Yvain that Dean's instantly on his guard, even before the doors slam shut and the circle activates.
"I knew it!" he says as he calls up Twin Fenrir, Ace of Space at the ready in his belt to boot. A humanoid figure sort of melts into existence at the center of the glyph, "melt" in the sense that molten lava melts together. The figure lets loose a horrible shriek and rains fire upon the group before morphing into a giant hand and attempting to slap the ground where Dean and the others are.
"Scatter!!" he shouts as he dodge-rolls to one side, quick enough to avoid getting flattened and/or melted but not quick enough to avoid getting flung hard to one side in the wake of heated air. As he gets up, it changes forms into a field of flame, and when Dean attempts to whack it with his combat rods, it smacks him EVEN HARDER with a whoosh of flame that knocks him back again.
But get knocked down twice, get up three times. With a low 'ugh!' he gets back to his feet, one eye shut. "Looks like this guy's a tough one... Be careful of that counterattack--it's a doozy!"
Fortunately, an instant later, the creature changes forms again into a cyclone of flame. Dean trades out his guns for his Devil's Arm, snatches up some of the rubble around the room, and hurls it into the center of the vortex to slow it down. "Here's hoping this works!!"
DG: Dean Stark has used his Tool Ace of Spades toward his party's challenge, Liquid Fire.
<Pose Tracker> Rebecca Streisand has posed.
"That was a nice break." Rebecca says with a sigh as the heat of the next room does away from the telltale signs she was about to start shivering from the last. Using the opportunity to stretch as they go to try and warm up her muscles more quickly.
The next room though is large, spacious, and Rebecca absolutely gets the same vibe Dean does. "Trying to cover for before?" Another light tease at Dean, before it forms into... "That's... not Yvain." Dean yells 'Scatter' and Rebecca leaps up, strikes the wall, and fires her portal guns to quickly duck over a huge burst of flame. Coming out from the other side, she pops onto the thin webbing of the Ley that's where her portal intended to bring her out of...
"Drenching it! Take a step back so you don't get scalded on accident!"
Invoking her medium, water seems to rain down upon it in a great torrent. Causing an aforementioned cloud of steam to arise. She hopes it's not gonna counter attack it from here, but...
... it's quite possible it will! "Avril! Ida! Hit it with all you've got!"
DG: Rebecca Streisand has used her Tool Sky Medium toward her party's challenge, Liquid Fire.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
'Problem I suppose is, the ones with the power won't respect us having that advantage in strength of character.'
"They won't," Ida says, as she sets one of the antiflames alight. "But in my opinion, that gives us and advantage... not that I don't hate being talked down to, mind." The door opens, and Ida smiles, slotting her torch neatly back into its holder and fastening everything back into place. She can't suppress a little shiver at the cold, even though she knows it's fleeting. Is it impossible to take one of these torches with them? Even if so, it would be against the spirit of the thing.
Ida stows her Seer's mantle and takes another swig of water as the group moves on, and the temperature swings wildly in the other direction. "I wonder how they set up the thermal gradient here," she says, to no one in particular. "Magic would smooth it out, however they went about it." Then, another door, and another room.
Like Dean, Ida's reaction to the glyph is instant and wary. Her hands dart down to her ARM belt, and whip both weapons free. Devil's Due gleams in the flame's light, and the still-unnamed Devil's Arm refracts a shimmer of Malevolent rainbows. Ida opens fire, sending four bullets downrange before the figure changes, and rushes them. The martial artist leaps out of the way, skidding to a stop in a three-point crouch. Red-hot debris strikes her, tracing painful trails down her arms. Thankfully, the exoskeleton blunts the worst of it.
Then Dean gets smacked down, and Ida reflexively opens fire--the hand whirls on her, landing an open-palm strike that sends her flying. "Ghhk--!" she chokes out, as she hits the ground, and skids again. She sucks in a smoke-laced breath, shakes her head, and waits for her opening. Once she sees it, she opens fire again. This time, only some of the bullets are aimed directly at the thing; the rest ricochet off the walls, trick-shots meant to catch the thing while it's off-guard.
Ida would reach for a flare, but she's not sure they'd work--the earlier creation seemed somewhat resistant, and this thing is definitely more powerful.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Liquid Fire.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"Well... perhaps so?" Avril hazards, tilting her head to one side a bit like an overquizzical dog. There are other factors that may come into play, the darker part of her whispers, feeding the impressions of such into her waking mind. Strength is itself important, but in the arena of war, it isn't the only thing. Take, for example--
"Well, do you not think I might become frostbitten? It is rather like a burn, in and of itself. ...Regardless of strength, it is important to recognize your opponent's own strengths, and prepare accordingly," she muses, as she takes her mirror away from the stone torch.
There are glyphs on the floor in here; it may be for that reason that she doesn't initially answer Ida's remark.
"These are Seraphic glyphs," Avril observes, turning this way and that. "And--"
She stops in her tracks. "Something else is here. Could it be another manifestation of Yvain's--"
In a matter of speaking, yes.
Flame detonates against the arena floor, where Avril had stood mere moments ago. In her hand again is Absolute Zero, but she has not moved to take the floor right before the liquid flame that is their opponent here. Rather, she focuses her attention on Dean as he closes on their opponent.
"Dean!" Fortunately, he doesn't seem to be badly hurt.
"--Know your enemy's strength, and answer in kind!" she says, repeating her earlier recommendation. Taking a step back when Rebecca drenches it, Avril, blade still born before her as if in anticipation of a counter, nods in agreement.
There's still steam in the air. She pulls on it, draws it inwards.
Focuses it upwards in a great prison of steam--no, water--
No. Ice.
DG: Avril Vent Fleur has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Liquid Fire.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== =========================<* CHALLENGE - Liquid Fire *>========================== |Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 4 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- Dominating the center of the room is an intricate circle of Seraphic runes, flowing outward in waving lines reminiscent of flames in reds, oranges, and yellows. Golden lines trace through the fire mosaic, runes and lines evoking power and the Ley. When the group finishes filing in, the doors all close, and the circle begins to activate. A figure of pure flame erupts from the center of the room, humanoid but made completely of writhing fire. Attacking the group with a mixture of physical force and Fire spells, it changes its shape regularly: becoming a cyclone, a hand that can grab, and an untouchable field of flame. When it is in its untouchable form it counterattacks every attempt to destroy it with horrid force. This is a fearsome enemy. =Dungeon Conditions: Injure===================================================
===============<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial - Round 4 *>=============== ===========================< Results - Liquid Fire >============================ Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 10 --(18)--> 28 Fail Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dean Stark 18 --(5)--> 23 Pass Ace of Spades 3 Combat Effects: Rally -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Avril Vent Fleur 10 --(5)--> 15 Pass Fight 0 Combat Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rebecca Streisand 18 --(18)--> 36 Fail Sky Medium 2 Combat Effects: Embolden -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 60 --(20)--> 80 Pass Conditions: Injure(2)|Reckless(1) Effects: 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> Dean Stark has posed.
"Hey, a hole's a hole! This is obviously a big room for fighting in!" Dean protests at Rebecca. But the raging fiery creature raises its head, and it's no longer time for friendly bickering.
Rebecca calls down a great waterspout in an attempt to douse some of the creature's flames. Unfortunately, her timing is a little bad--it hasn't quite transformed out of fire-field mode yet, and it sends a violet gout of fire her way. However, it does get weakened as a result of her attack, leaving it vulnerable to getting further doused by Dean's shovelwork--what a different a Devil's Arm makes--and Ida's *own* Devil's Arm, before Avril finishes the job with a great pillar of ice.
She was right. Greater force really does make up for any disadvantage. The creature lets out a ghastly wail, then is extinguished.
"Whew," Dean breathes, wiping his forehead on his sleeve. "That one was a *nasty* one. But with something *that* strong, we must be getting close to the end!" He looks around at his friends. "Is everyone okay? We'd better take a quick break and heal up before moving on. We're close to the end, I can feel it!"
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has drawn a new Challenge.
===================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>=================== =================<* CHALLENGE - Bridge Over Troubled Lava *>================== |Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 2 | --------------------------< Challenge Information: >-------------------------- Finally, a central chamber opens up. Magma rings the circular platform ahead on all sides, the ceiling stretching up high enough for a dragon -- or a Gear Smooth grey stone makes up the walls, and in the middle... A broken bridge. Once, it spanned the gap over the lava between your group and the final gate, but now it is so much wrecked and ruined stone. There must be another way across -- but you'll need luck and skill to find and use it. And the final gate awaits... =Dungeon Conditions: Hesitate, Bad Luck, Suffer===============================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
For a few, alarming seconds, Ida and the flame-entity are locked in close combat; the thing's in humanoid shape, and hammering her with a flurry of punches. It has the advantage in that its arms aren't strictly solid. Ida parries as best as she can, holding her ARMs to absorb most of the creature's fury.
And then, Avril ends it. Ida sinks back, breathing heavily. Smoke rises from a few scorch marks on her shirt, and silver wicks out of her flesh to cover fresh burns.
Still, she survived. And she was given a chance to practice something important: a balance between restraint and overwhelming force. "I'll be all right," Ida says, to Dean. Instead of finishing off her canteen, she pops the seal on a Potion and downs it like a shot. It's hydrating, and medicinal! "Does anyone else need healing? I have... another Potion, and two vials of berry cordial."
Dean's feeling is right on the money. Ahead lies a massive gate, but the way to it has crumbled into a pit of seething lava. There aren't even any support pillars left. Ida frowns. "Well," she says, "this is certainly a situation we're in." Then, a thought occurs to her. "...Rebecca, do you still have that portal gun? Can it reach all the way?" Even if it can only reach part of the way, Ida has means to help.
DG: Ida Everstead-Rey has used her Tool Zephyr Boots toward her party's challenge, Bridge Over Troubled Lava.
<Pose Tracker> Rebecca Streisand has posed.
Rebecca DOES, take that gout of violet flame, which despite the hastily erected Magic Guard she puts up, still burns REAL BAD. Coming out of it, she's definitely singed in various places. "You... weren't kidding about the counterattack." Popping a heal berry in her mouth after and chewing it, she grins sheepishly Avril's way, "I guess it answered me in kind too." Before noting to Ida, "Wouldn't turn it down."
When they move on to the next room - there's a bridge, and a pit of lava below. Rebecca does some calculations, and tries to fire off the portal gun all the way. It doesn't appear on the other side. "Can't quite make it. Maybe a little more than halfway - and that's a stretch at that angle. That's enough for me maybe with enough momentum..."
She looks to the others, "Maybe if Avril invokes her Medium on the other side, we can jump once we're out the other side..."
Rebecca fires a portal at the wall behind them to give them space for a running leap, then another a little more than halfway across the pit on an odd formation at the ceiling.
She tries her best to pretend she's not nervous, but she absolutely is about this one. "Let's take our time winding up for this one. Noone go until we're all ready."
DG: Rebecca Streisand has used her Tool Portal Guns toward her party's challenge, Bridge Over Troubled Lava.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
Ice triumphs at last over fire, just as she had said--
In a manner of speaking, that is.
Would her strength last against a Seraph, particularly one as old as Yvain? Or, if she tapped into her other self, would she instead...
It is not a matter that brooks dwelling on longer than this. Her gaze lingering but a moment more where the flame had dwelled, she turns at last to advance.
Except, there is one problem with pressing further: namely, the broken bridge in their path.
"..." Avril does not, at first, have anything to say about this situation, instead silently returning Absolute Zero -- or its hilt, at least -- to its proper place on her person.
"The portal gun... it may well succeed," she remarks, walking up towards what remains of the bridge on this side. "But it may have trouble--"
Somehow, she had realized it would be so. Some intuition, based on how it functions and Rebecca's constant use of it?
She already has taken out the Medium.
"Yes. I believe that may work," she says, glancing back over her shoulder at Rebecca. "Let us do our best, in that case! I am ready, Rebecca."
DG: Avril Vent Fleur has used her Tool Sea Medium toward her party's challenge, Bridge Over Troubled Lava.
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.
"Ooh, berry cordial for me, please," Dean tells Ida, perking at the sound of 'berry' and not realizing that a cordial is something alcoholic. It's fine, they're almost done, and he's technically an adult now anyway. Once he knocks back that shot, he nods vigorously at Rebecca. "Right?? It hit *hard*!" he declares.
But onwards they must go--past a broken bridge over a pit of lava. Not great! He grimaces, but fortunately, Ida comes up with the genuinely brilliant idea of Rebecca using her portal guns. He perks. "Hey, yeah! That'll make this easy-peasy!" he declares. "And on top of that--" He turns towards Avril, but she's a step ahead, having already gotten out her Sea Medium. He grins. "Then this oughtta cover our bases. All right, let's go!"
And with complete and perfect confidence in his friends, he walks right through the portal to--hopefully--the other side, safely.
DG: Dean Stark has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Bridge Over Troubled Lava.
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== ==================<* CHALLENGE - Bridge Over Troubled Lava *>=================== |Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 2 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- Finally, a central chamber opens up. Magma rings the circular platform ahead on all sides, the ceiling stretching up high enough for a dragon -- or a Gear Smooth grey stone makes up the walls, and in the middle... A broken bridge. Once, it spanned the gap over the lava between your group and the final gate, but now it is so much wrecked and ruined stone. There must be another way across -- but you'll need luck and skill to find and use it. And the final gate awaits... =Dungeon Conditions: Hesitate, Bad Luck, Suffer===============================
===============<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial - Round 5 *>=============== ====================< Results - Bridge Over Troubled Lava >===================== Player Exhaustion Pass/Fail -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ida Everstead-Rey 28 --(10)--> 38 Pass Zephyr Boots 2 Agility Effects: Quicken -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dean Stark 23 --(10)--> 33 Pass Rush 0 Agility Effects: BASIC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Avril Vent Fleur 15 --(10)--> 25 Pass Sea Medium 2 Agility Effects: Quicken -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rebecca Streisand 36 --(10)--> 46 Pass Portal Guns 2 Agility Effects: Stalwart -----------------------------------< Party >------------------------------------ Leader: Ida Everstead-Rey 80 --(35)--> 115 Pass Conditions: Bad Luck(2)|Hesitate(2)|Injure(1)|Suffer(1) Effects: Quicken(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 Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial!
====================<* Igraine - Shrine of the Fire Trial *>==================== ===========<* CHALLENGE - The Lantern's Haze and the Fire's Truth *>============ |Type: Discovery |Dungeon Ability: Conclusion|Challenge Rating: 1 | ---------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------- The Great Gate opens, and the central chamber of Igraine awaits, the site of the Fire Trial to come. It is a large chamber, stretching forth from the entry hall, and within awaits a humanoid silhouette. Along the way is a small room, on which sits a red lantern on a pedestal. While it has the look and function of an oil lantern, it never needs to be refilled. In addition, it has a few magical effects: it can render a haze unto the area it's in, obscuring images and even sounds through a magical fog that makes it easy to act, but hard to identify anyone within. Its smoke can also disrupt illusions, impart focus, and enhance one's ability to find truth. This could be a powerful Tool. Strangely, the initials 'M.M.d.D.N.D.' are inscribed on it, though... In addition, those with the Blessing of Althena in the element of Fire may unlock a powerful fire-related spell, such as Firaga. =Dungeon Conditions: Treasure=================================================
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Berry cordials are mildly alcoholic, but so are many common Filgaian medicines. This one is even from the trusted pharmacy of Jacqueline Barber. At most, Dean will feel a little flushed. It's fine.
Ida gives Rebecca some room as she experiments with the Portal Gun; as she suspected, the room's just too big for her to put both portals on safe ground. "Everyone together," she says, nodding in assent at Rebecca and Avril's statements. They're all going to have to trust each other for this to work. Once everyone's ready, Ida starts to count down. "Three..."
She braces herself for a running start.
"Two..." She breathes out, and with it goes the fear of a sudden, fiery death.
"One... go!"
The four friends charge for the portal. Avril is the first one out, and the surging power of the Sea Medium buoys her up, carrying her through the air. Ida is next, and the wind picks up beneath her in a green-tinged gale. Sparks of light dance in the air beneath her as the gust paints a path, following Avril's magic. Rebecca is next, and then Dean. Everyone lands in one piece on the far ledge, with more than enough room to spare.
Ida takes a moment to press her hand to her chest and collect herself. "We did it," she says, with a smile. And as if sensing them, the door opens. "Good job, everyone." She reaches out and claps Dean on the shoulder, and then flashes Rebecca and Avril a smile of pure relief. "Let's take a moment. After all, we're not done yet, are we?"
But the Shrine has one last surprise in store. A lantern, sitting on a pedestal in a small room, presented like a prize for the victor. Ida looks it over, curiously, and steps in close. "...Are those initials?" she says.