Timely Intervention, part 1
Log Info
- Title: Timely Intervention, part 1
- Emitter: Whirlpool
- Characters: Braelnoir, Cryosanthia, Baz da Ork, Magnus
- Place: Wilderness outside of Alexandria
- Time: Monday, October 12, 2020, 9:32 PM
- Summary: Motiv, a former Animusite, knows exactly where an old site is and wants assistance exploring it. Cryo is along, heavily disguised, with Braelnoir, who isn't, and Baz da Ork, who can't. Following stealthily along is Magnus, who appears suddenly later. They find the hidden temple, enter in and discover a summoning circle. Venturing deeper they encounter a devil, doing Taxes! Batt... no, conversation ensues. Demon Lord Terrivus the Great asks the party to ask his summoner to send him back, and without striking an infernal bargain the party agrees that they don't believe fighting him is entirely necessary so they'll head deeper and see what happens. The eventually find the summoner in the stacks, asleep and reeking. Baz awakens him as only he can. There are screams and a pregnant pause!
-=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=-- Playing --=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--= Baz da Ork 7' 320 pounds of metal, muscle and stupid. WAAAGH! Braelnoir A tall, pale Acanian woman, branded in silver. Cryosanthia A dashingly tall, elegant white-scaled lizard woman. Magnus A Ranger! Whirlpool I am stinky! -=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--=--
"... why couldn't it be a Shard?" asks the tiny halting-voiced gnome. "It most assuredly could. The Shards could invest regular objects with divine energies. ANYTHING could then be blessed with it, no?" He's walking with you down the road, and after a rather lengthy series of allusions, metaphors and parables, has finally gotten to his point.
"... and that's why you never ask an angel to lie."
"Now, where was I? Ah, right! Why I'm dragging you all out here. Yes," he begins, "I've a theory that I need to procure some essential supplies to test. One of these tests involves the holy sites of Animus and consecrated grounds. His worship was never enormous enough in Alexandrosn for more than the occasional shrine in the city, but there IS an old temple construct, hidden in plain sight, of you know where to look. Wizards, right?" He chortles.
Braelnoir looks about with her Scythe propped over her shoulder, following the Gnome with a understated alertness to her gait. Once the sermon abates, she wonders, "So we got anythin' more on these Shards, luvvie, or's everyone still spinnin' moonbeams?" She rolls her shoulders a bit, question asked, but continues to look around hopes of staving off an ambush or something of the sort.
"Rrrr, yes. I'm a wizard." Says a suspiciously tall figure with a slight hiss. It sounds male, except to those familiar with sith'makar who easily recognize a female making her voice deeper and flatter. It is completely covered in grey and white vestments, robes, and a hood. Very volumnous robes, that could generously hide a tail. It nods, "Don't lie to angels, good advice."
Another hiss, "Will we be going inside or underground soon? I'd like to minimize my scrying vulnerability, and we should all have come in disguise."
The Big Ork simply scratches his chin and blinks a few times. "Wot?" He intones after listening to the Gnome speak. Then he glances to Braelnoir when she speaks. "Wot?" He asks again. Those black eyes moving from one person to another. Finally he decides to hot knife through butter. "I was told tae help out wit dis stuff. Are we kill'in anything?" Then Baz turns and stares at the tall Sith'makar. Himself at seven feet tall, covered in slabs of muscle, a small building's worth of steel. Spikes protruding from every point on his body, with the exception of a pair of brand new boots on his feet. The Big Ork grins then showing his long curved and yellowed tusks.
"Disgusied? As Wot? Mebe I wear pink and cut off a blonde horse's tail. Make meself up right pretty eh?"
"No, you're fine as you are. One easily recognized person in a group is perfect." The robed figure replies, "I meant my friend, whom my other friend seems to be rubbing off on. I want nothing from this Shard business tracing back to my family. I've had enough of being demon prey to last a lifetime."
A long exhale, the hood remains in place, even the long sleeves hide the hands. It could even be three kobolds in a trenchcoat in an even larger stormcloak. "I've heard very few details about these shards. The definition is so loose I can think of at least three other candidates. One being the very literally named 'Shard-Tower', which travels through time and regenerates itself."
The coweled head turns, "But we're seeing what this academic has found, perhaps there's something to kill yet."
Braelnoir sighs, "He's got me too damned flummoxed ta think o'that." she shrugs before, "Already stuck m'damned neck out too many times." to Cry- er, the Shrouded Wizard. There's a grin to Baz at his retort, then, "W'might get some killin' in. Friend already got hisself jumped over this Shard business."
"I mean, it's always possible you'll have to kill something. But you'll be inside, so use your indoor murder-voices, you murderous murderers you," says Motiv, halting along the way as he moves.
"Anyway, we're almost there!"
He points towards a ... rock set on the side of the road.
It is a big rock.
Really. Just an old boulder that rolled down and was moved off to the side of the road and into a ditch, it looks like.
<OOC> Cryosanthia says, "I'd like to cast detect magic and snark" GAME: Cryosanthia casts Detect Magic. Caster Level: 8 DC: 14
The shrouded wizard waves its hands in the sleeves, from deep within the hood there is a glow, like two eyes peering out. It stares at the rock. It also rests a sleeve on Braelnoir's shoulder, there is a squeeze through the fabric.
"So, is it the rock or under the rock? Should we be rolling it up the hill?" Over, and over, the unexpected vision of doing so pops into her head.
"Also I'm not a murderer." It's something the shrouded wizard feels the need to point out.
"I like demons." Baz intones. "Dey fight alot, and dere skulls clean up real nice. Well the ones that don't rot into sludge." He turns and nods towards Braelnoir. "Ya, keep it simple. Fightn is what I was bred for. It wot Kor wants me ta do." Then they reach the big boulder and without further ado Baz rumbles on over towards it and pokes at it with his massive sausage fingered hands. "Rock." He tries to get a good grip on the rock and see if he can move it without making use of magic.
"Never said Murderin', luvvie, I said killin'." Brae snaps back at the appelation. The touch to her shoulder gets her looking to the Shrouded Wizard, a little nod, then back to Baz on his words. There's a little shrug and she looks to their 'client' as the Orc moves to get his muscle on.
"There is magic up the hill," The shrouded wizard says, moving around the rock, "This may just be the marker."
The hood looks at Motiv, waiting for confirmation or acknowledgement, "What made you consider this location? I'm quite curious about your research methods. What do you look up? Outsiders? Unusual magic and witchcraft, mysterious disappearances? Myths, monsters? Strange phenomenon. What are we in search of specifically when looking for shards?"
Motiv peers at the boulder, then turns to look at Cryo.
"...I was here ages ago before it fell. The temples of Animus, I mean." He points up the hill. "You see it too, don't you? It's a secret to everybody." He smiles, then moves ahead towards the hill, walking up the side, slowly, towards a particular spot.
There are grunts and strain from the Ork as he begins to apply raw muscle against stone cold nature. Rocking back and forth attempting to wrestle the nature world to his bidding. Then as everyone begins to walk by he pauses and looks over. "Wot?" Then he looks at the boulder he's got his arms wrapped around and grunts. "I'll be back, rock." He says glaring at with his black eyes. Then slowly trundles along after. "Secret temple for a dead God? Dis is gonna 'ave weird monsters isn't it? Why does it always have ta be weird. I needs ta ave the guild stop sending me to weird. I just got back from some pervy gnome wanting to smell my boots in his lake so we could take a mirror ta a bunch of ugly women who lived in a chicken house. Where did all da wars go?"
Braelnoir shakes her head and starts to follow the Gnome up the hill without further remark, though there's still a little heat of indignation in her eye, though it doesn't stop her from keeping a look out for would be assassins. She blinks hard at Baz's words with a, "What's this, now? Was there a big fuckin' bird, there?"
The shrouded wizard follows the gnome, carefully checking to make sure nothing has slipped out of the robes that might betray identity. It seems secure, so many clothes, sleeves that hang a good handspan past the hands.
Then a chuckle, "Rocs were our last mission. I've never been in a war, just strike missions and skirmishes."
The hood turns, clearly a glance at the gnome, then back at Baz, "That sounds pretty terrible." The shrouded wizard keeps pace, ready to grab the gnome if he falls in a hole, or step in front if something pops out.
"I guess being there would help. Any way to recognize these things, a specially tuned Detect Magic? A locate object that locates shards? A good scrying spell?" It's unlikely knowing what they smell like matters.
"No, I mean, what would be the point of hiding it if you gave giant arrows to it, hm?" says Motiv. He gives a nod towards a spot on the hillside and then utters words of magic, gesturing at the hillside.
A shimmer falls away, revealing, instead of hillside, an entrway. A door flanked on either side by statues of robed men holding balancing scalqes in the palms of their joined hands.
"Here! The doorway at last. Hm. Why is it open?"
The door, is in fact, open.
"The house had chicken legs, and a tongue for steps. I was gonna eat it, but it was still a house. I had almost drown in the swamp, I had no boots, and the lake tried ta eat me and the lizardman." Baz snorts, exasperated at the memory. "It was all just weird." He trundles after the group, bringing up the rear. "Ya I bet we don't need ta find magic. It'll probably just be more weird. Like a talking goat that wants me underwear. Well it ain't gettin it. It takes me an hour to get this armor on and off and I ain't ..." Baz pauses as the hill melts away and the doorway shimmers into view. "Ah, door is open. Someone beat us here? Get your dead God piece?" He thumbs the hilt of his scimitar.
"Least it's not a bunch o'glowin' fish." Brae quips, "Those gummed up the works somethin' awful in Merkabah." There's a glance to the Gnome and, "Site of an old Animus temple, right?" She shrugs the scythe free an reindexes it to her normal business grip, "Imagine we ain't the first ones here, of late."
There are certain moments in an adventurer's life. The shrouded wizard thinks back carefully. There are a quite a few years to count, and living in one likely doesn't. No, no, no, maaaybe. It depends how one classifies ruined cities. Yet, as Baz shares the frankly horrible details of his experience a strange noise starts coming from underneath the robes. They grow, as Braelnoir describes some glowing fish.
Into a very un-masculine, high pitched squeal, followed by, "I think... this is my very first dungeon! And the door is open! The hard part is done. What's next? Check for traps?"
The hood looks around, "If we're lucky they just got here and haven't had time to set up an ambush. Or get the shard. It's a race!" Something very gutteral and sensual in how that last word was said, long r, deep accenting of the a.
RACE.
<OOC> Cryosanthia says, "My wisdom is 10, I want to rush in. Anyone got lower?" <OOC> Baz da Ork has intelligence 10, open door just means c'mon in! <OOC> Braelnoir says, "also has 10 wisdom" GAME: Braelnoir rolls knowledge/military theory: (1)+8: 9 (EPIC FAIL) GAME: Cryosanthia rolls knowledge/military theory: (1)+2: 3 (EPIC FAIL) <OOC> Whirlpool says, "BRAEL EVERYTHING IS FINE THERE IS NO DANGER" <OOC> Cryosanthia says, "Go in. The dice command it" GAME: Baz da Ork rolls perception: (2)+11: 13
Without further ado the big Ork ambles up and into the doorway. He checks for traps with his big feet and face. Simply shouldering through the opening and into the hall or room beyond. The long slow slide of his scimitar from it's scabard adds a sinister edge to his heavy footed steps. "Wot am I looking for in here?" He asks over his shoulder towards their employer. His black eyes scanning back and forth.
Brae, for her part, gets a certain reflexive light in her eyes as Baz takes point on the open door, with her sister amping up as well. The mercenary fishes out her everburning torch and lights it, tucking it into her belt before moving in after the others, so she can see what may need, or is interested in, killin'.
The shrouded wizard is next to go, the hooded figure looking around, eyes still a-glow. Nothing unusual leaps out. It looks at the Motiv, "You're coming with us right? Follow along. If not we're going to need a map and a bit more of an idea where to go."
The robed one is eager to get inside. Not that it will help much, but once out of direct observation the incredible amount of clothes shrink back, turning into a light, white fighting set of armour of leather and mithril.
Cryosanthia pulls her buckler and icicle dagger out of her haversack, attaching the buckler to her arm and putting the dagger in her belt. She flips her wrists around, limbering them for casting, and follows after the ork. A deep inhale, trying to smell something other than him in this abandonned temple.
So, the interior lights up and Motiv gestures abroad.
"Behold! A shrine to Ani..."
Well, it was a shrine at one point. Now it's an ungodly mess. The great hall of the shrine appears to have had its furniture pushed all to the sides, a great summoning circle placed in the middle of the room. Definitely looking diabolical.
The statue of Animus that stands at the other end of the wallq, of a wizened figure stoooped over with a quartertaff balanced up on the tips of his fingers (perfect balanced as all things should be, right?) is still in tact, of course.
You hear a sound coming from the doorway behond into the back area of the shrine.
It sounds like muttering.
GAME: Baz da Ork rolls knowledge/religion: (11)+4: 15 GAME: Cryosanthia rolls knowledge/the planes: (17)+6: 23 GAME: Cryosanthia casts Icicle Dagger. Caster Level: 8 DC: 15
It's infernalism for sure!
The furniture was shoved against the wall to create the circle. Deliberatly. Not forced there because something large came through the circle.
As they journey into the room and the diabolical circle becomes clear there's a hearty chuckle from Baz. "Alright, dis I can get ta like." He slides his arm into his shield and then strokes the sharp edge of his sclimitar along the metal shield's edge. "Oh, lets wait till dey come through. I wants ta get me a big one. Or two. Ya." A line of drool hangs from his right tusk. Then he hears the noise coming from the other doorway. His eyes narrow at the muttering.
"I fought an infernal scorpion, it was vulnerable to good and cold iron. I don't know if anything we face will have similar traits," Cryo says, keeping her voice low. Her right hand moves through a series of graceful gestures, there's a twinkling of pale lights down her arm and then an icicle forms in her hand. So cold it is condensing droplets and tripping them.
The icy sith moves carefuly, watching the furniture shoved against the wall, as she moves up to the other doorway, doing her best to sneak as well as overhear what is being chanted.
Braelnoir nods, proverbial ears perking at the muttering from the beyond. She tightens her grip on the scythe, looking to her sister again and winks. She's got it. There's a glance to Baz as he makes his thoughts known and she considers it a moment. She wonders if she'll have to tap into the Dragon again, or if her usual means will suffice. "I'll try'n support both o'ya." She also surrepitously edges in front of the client. She doesn't know if he can fight, best he not get perished.
Magnus is there, quiet. His bow is strung, and an arrow nocked. He's watchful, silent, unobtrusive -- surety in the past.
"Well, then. There's only one way to go," says Motiv, glancing aqt the doorway into the back section of the shirne.
"I'll .. .wait here. Yes. That's an excellent idea." r
The gnome snaps his fingers and turns invisible.
GAME: Cryosanthia rolls stealth: (13)+4: 17 GAME: Magnus rolls stealth: (19)+12: 31
Well, nothing to do but go in. The light is helping a little, mostly letting her see things in colour and not with her darkvision. So almost blind, the white sith enters the passage way, feeling her way along with her icicle dagger ready. She creeps up on the mumbling.
Magnus glances over at Cryosanthia starts forwards, and goes padding forwards as well, sticking to the other wall, bow out and held low.
Baz quietly watches the duo sneak off into the room. He doesn't move to follow, as well he's hoping something will crawl out of the diabolical circle in the center of the floor. He's first in line and doesn't want to get off the pain buffet before he's filled his tray with hissing soul eating brutality.
The party pushes down the tunnel a little bit, passing into an open room which appears to be...
... a... library?
And then there's a figure seated at a table, surrounded by massive piles of books, working on a parchment with his qull and ink.
It is a demon.
Sitting there. At a table. Writing. The devil looks up towards your arrival, smooths back his hair. He's quite humanoid.
"...no, no... you carry that number, deduct the cost of the expense and oh, did he SERIOUSLY try to slip this one past the --"
He looks up at your arrival. Your heavily armed arrival and sags in his chair.
"/Finally/!"
The silver haired merc decides to hang back just a touch as her sister and the other creep in, allowing enough distance to open that her own, noisier footfalls won't give ther advance away. On the sudden 'Finally!" from beyond, she picks up the pace and expects the worst....
Cryo points her dagger at the massive pile of parchment, "You might not be aware, but I'm a great scribe and a decent accountant. Do you want to finish that and then we get down to fighting, or did you want the break right now?"
She's dropped into a stance, tail swishing from side to side, squaring off against the demon, "I know what the group answer is, but putting that offer out there."
She's grinning so much! An enemy that talks back!
Magnus steps off the wall, and settles into a shooting stance behind and to the right of Cryosanthia. "Is the accounting truly so vexing?" He's careful of the thing, but there's talking now, so he listens.
"Wot?" Comes Baz's voice fromd own the hall. He sniffs the air and seems to pick up the tang in the air of excitement. Soon he's making his way down the hall after Brae.
"Ordinarily, one such as myself would only thank the gods in a moment of abundant perversity, but no, right now, I am earnestly grateful for your appearance. Let me ask you a question: if you were to summon a minor lord of the hells, would you do it for something as simple as... as /doing your taxes/?!" He throws his hands up in dismay, sending some papers scattering. "But no! I, Lord Terrivus the Great, am made to scratch away like some common scribe on the most ridiculous, amateurish plot of tax avoidance I have ever seen in my life, and let me tell you, I have seen a considerably poor schemes in my day but this ... this is on a *whole other level*. And how do you simply fail to account for these things?! The absurdity, it's... it's... IT VEXES ME. Would you please tell my summoner to *resolve this matter himself* so that I may be dismissed?"
There is a pause.
"I would greatly appreciate it. It is not as if I am offering anything here. I just want to go home because this is dreadful."
"I don't pay taxes." Brae remarks offhandedly. She looks between the others and wonders, "So.... Ya know who brought ya here, Spooky?" of the demon, itself. She has a rotten feeling this was set up like caltrops under autumn leaves, "How long ya been here?"
"Um. Oh." Cryosanthia straightens in her stance, her blade dropping. She hasn't gone off the offensive, it's more that was a lot of talking back, and she wasn't expecting it. She does make a mental note that taxes are a great way of torturing demons. "I'm... thinking."
It still might be a trap, she glances to either side checking the positions of her sister, the orc and the very sneaky ranger, "We... were looking for something here. Might it be in the posession of your summoner? We'd certainly go after him to get the thing, and well, you know how it goes. We can tell him to dismiss you while we're getting our stuff."
As Baz arrive sin the room and sees a demon/devil he pushes his way towards him. "I'll sends ya home I will." He grins, his long tusks flashing. "I'm gonna cut ya in half, tear yer arms off and eat ya. What ever of you manages to squeeze out me other end can go back ta.." Then the big Ork pauses as Crysanthia seems to actually be asking questions of it nicely. This makes Baz pause and hold his scimitar still.
Magnus listens at the end of his arrow, considering. "Mmm. That's an interesting offer." I mean, minor duke of hell. He'd better aim well.
"Oh dear. You're going to eventually pay for that one way or the other, I'm afraid," says Terrbivus the Great, to Braelnoir. "Slicing me in half would definitely send me back, but then I'd be compelled to defend myself, and honestly, I don't really see the point of shedding blood to do what you can just get my summoner to do, whom you're going to need to talk to ANYWAY. I think he's further back in the stacks, taking a nap." He points behind him deeper into the Animusite library. "Now, if you don't mind, I really need to return to this ... deeply insultingly base plot of tax avoidance so I can go home, assuming you can't get him to send me there."
He sighs. Heavily.
Then he starqes at the report and parchment and ink as if they're some kind of dreadful monsters themselves.
"... did he really just try to spin his collection of pornography as a BUSINESS EXPENSE?!"
Magnus deadpans. "The better to torment you with, I'm sure." He lowers his arrow, relaxes the draw on the bow. Then, he gets ready to slip further into the stacks.
Braelnoir arches an eyebrow and shrugs, "Everyone pays fer somethin'." There's a look to Cryo, the tall drink of water, then Baz, "So... We gonna go kick the summoner's ass, then?" The note about porn gets a snerk, 'Ha! That's called keepin' up morale!" a chuckle follows.
"It's getting weird again isn't it?" Baz says with an almost sniffle. "We comes across a big demon and he's playing wit books instead of fighting! Here we are in a temple to a dead god wit a big demony circle on the floor and we got taxes? Wot?" The big Ork looks from person to person, to demonic entity. "WOT?" He waves his shield and scimitar then stomps back into the stacks. "Gonna find dis git and put my foot so far up his ass me new boots are gonna come out his mouth covered in everything inside him!"
GAME: Cryosanthia rolls profession/scribe: (19)+15: 34
Cryo is stretching her neck, she has a lot of neck to stretch. Cryo is leaning, she has a lot of tail to counterbalance, she leans like she's in a hurricane. She peers, careful to stay out of frustrated swiping range. Scribe skills activate. "This one thinks... there is an error in the third column on that page."
She points with her icicle dagger, then carefully circles around the demon and the desk, backing towards the stacks until she feels safe enough to turn around. Just before she does and heads into them, she says, "If this is a trick, this one must say, ten out of ten. Amazing."
The white sith heads after Baz, slowly enough Braelnoir can partner up with her.
Braelnoir blinks, "I kinda wanna see this." she smirks, "Be like punchin' a shark in the gills with an acid gauntlet. Spectacle fer th'masses!" That said, she tightens the grip on her scythe and moves in with them.
The devil stares down at the paper like it is an even bigger monster. "...so there *is*," he sighs, slumping into his chair with the air of the agony of defeat.
You push futther into the old Animusite library and hear what sounds like a powered artifice device whirring away.
...wait, no. It's just someone snoring. Indeed, there sprawled on a matress tucked into the croner of the library, surrounded by piles of dirty dishes, is a skinny, young man who looks like he hasn't bathed in a MONTH. Smells worse.
He's definitely the source of the snoring sounds. He's *super* asleep.
"Wait, before you touch him," Cryo says, holding out a hand. The man REEKS. The scent of him cloying and clogging up her nose. She's on the verge of heaving, knowing things she does not care to know. She stuffs her icicle dagger in her belt beside its twin, and then curls her fingers and waves her hands.
Washing. Wash bodies. You've washed body parts for decades. It all fades into the background with all the other unpleasant memories, and the prestidigtation cleans up the stinking sleeper. Leaving him just sleeping. "Ok, now he's safe to touch."
Magnus considers. "This is not a recommendation on..." He takes out an arrow, anyhow. "Do be careful -- after all, he summoned a devil to do his taxes. I don't trust his sense of proportionality."
Baz starts towards the sleeping form when he's stopped by Cryosanthia. While she does magic to the reeking body, the big Ork sheaths his scimitar and shoulders sheild. Then he looks at Magnus. "OOh, he might summon another one?" Baz asks earnestly. Then once Cryosanthia gives the go ahead the big Ork leans in and grabs the sleeping man by his legs and hauls him up upside down suddenly. Raising his arms, and thus the man's body until the first thing he sees is the bedazled rhinestone-like symbol of Kor on Baz's chest, then Baz's screaming Ork face with spittle flecking out at him. "WAKE UP YOU LITTLE GIT! WHY YOU MAKING MY LIFE WEIRD? DEMON DOING YOUR BOOKS! WHERE IS THE DEAD GOD PART? YOU TALK THE GNOME!!" Then Baz shakes the man and spins him around as he looks around for the Gnome. "GNOME!?" Baz exlaims, lowering the formerly smelly sleeping man dangerously close to the floor at what Baz likely feels is 'Gnome' height since they're all shoe thieving perverts. "GNOME."
Snoooore...
...snooooooooooooore.
Then Baz is yelling at him after and then he's seeing Baz's face and he strarts screaming because who wouldn't scream if they had Baz shouting in their face?
"AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"
...he's the loudest thing in the temple right now.
<OOC> Whirlpool cracks up.
<OOC> Braelnoir says, "cryo charges eclavdran with simplifying alexandria's tax codes for optimal effenciency and minimal burden on the people"
<OOC> Cryosanthia says, "YUS"
<OOC> Magnus cackles.
<OOC> Braelnoir says, "'Payback's a bitch, now get me reelected!'"
<OOC> Cryosanthia says, "Heees"