Peregrinus and Exilis share a look, before the smaller hawk banks left into a slow circling climb and Exilis and Iugo bank right into the same. With the air cleared of the monk's vessel and the other outriders, they train their gazes on the distant island.
The island before you is little more than a floating chunk of rock, perhaps a piece broken off another island long ago.
It’s barren on top, but beneath it an equally sized amount of thick dry branches and twigs is stuck to it. At first you think it’s the wind, but you soon realise the bark and vines are moving slowly, like breathing.
...That’s the spirit. It’s curled upside down to rest. You can’t tell tail from head, or if it’s got anything approaching animal features like that.
It glistens with dark purple pods of some slimy substance.
You reckon the spirit to be about half a mile long, the same width ways too.
[OOC: Uncertain if I read the above correctly; is it the entire island that is the spirit, or is the spirit the plant-type objects that just happens to be hanging, possum-like, off the bottom of the island?]
Exilis charges forward on Iugo, attempting to pass between the monks' descending vessel and the island-spirit. He repeatedly waves his lance in the air, the point making the twin circles of the scout sign for danger and pointing to port, hoping that the monks will turn away in the proper direction. He avoids, as much as possible, making any noise.
[OOC: Apologies, but I guess it’s a pretty confusing sight even if my description were better.]
It is evident that the collection of bark, pine needles and dry vines is not part of the small barren island. Closer inspection reveals what might be talons holding on, as well as hooks (attached to other limbs?) further along.
The monks slow to a halt, but don’t alter course. They’ll stay there for now.
Goh shouts over with her hands shaped around her mouth, “What do you see, sir?”
You feel in this moment like she couldn’t have been louder.
The shape of dead wood, this giant spirit, begins to rhythmically undulate.
As if in reply, you hear... what must be the spirit. It’s no animal call, it’s like nothing you know.
The slick purple ooze that pocks it’s surface like measles rock back and forth between the bark and branches, clogging several areas to a standstill.
The sky waxes from light to dark green. You can no longer see the sun, or any celestial bodies, really.
You feel your stomached lurch! Your mounts scatter and it takes longer than you’d like to reassert your control!
When you do... you realise... the spirit is now on top of the island... or... now you’ve all been forced to adjust to flying upside down! The sky is wrong.
You have passed into its realm. Almost the world you know, but a layer beneath it*.
No time to comprehend all this, the monk’s craft is listing sideways! They can’t control it! The wheel is spinning, but they’re all sliding off. Poor Pang is holding on by a rope! Get in there and right their craft before they fall to an untimely demise!
How do you save each monk?
*I’m making the cosmology as we go, and you’re free to give me your ideas too.
Picture a radio. This is the world.
Now imagine the circular frequency tuning dial. It can be turned by certain factors of will, place and occasion.
You usually reside on frequency 001.0, but with each turn of the dial you find yourself in a slightly different version of the same world.
Right now you’re listening to 054.3, Spooky Forest Vibes FM.
Endless_Serpents on
+4
NipsHe/HimLuxuriating in existential crisis.Registered Userregular
Doruthan, seeing Lina's feet leaving the deck, relies on an old trick the skywurm-hands taught him as a child: he wraps both arms around his mount's gill-region, and squeezes it into a choke-hold!
"Shumbakh!" the Falling Crag yells into Squall's ear-holes. In response, the skywurm goes arrow-straight, and deflates. The skin of the skywurm pulls taught around its skeleton and anatomy, and whatever force was holding the beast and its rider in the sky loses its grip.
Falling at a breakneck pace, Doruthan and Squall careen past the ship and the falling Lina. At a suitable distance below her, the Inferno relaxes his choke-hold on his ride, and shouts a new command at it.
"Bos!" With the word, Squall regains its bloated eel-like composure, hanging weightless in the torpid sky. Veins of fiery red pulse along its length, and the air around it shimmers from a newfound heat.
And, with a bit of luck, Lina will fall right into Doruthan's arms.
Iugo is a sky-borne hunter, and it is simplicity itself to aim him at Pang and have Iugo grab the boy in his claws.
The trick is in getting Iugo to do it at speed and yet gently enough to not harm the young monk - a several-inch-long talon passing through the wrong portion of the boy's anatomy might be as lethal as the fall.
Off-balance, Hawthorne grabs for both Jenna (hovering alongside the rail, now reaching out herself in uncertainty at the change in gravity) and Zahab. He's not sure what the plan is, and Zahab might be able to fly, or something? but better to offer a hand, anyway....
Each of you save your respective monks seconds apart, but Doruthan’s skywurm Squall has the most trouble dealing with the sudden velocity driven passenger.
Doruthan
Not so aerodynamic compared to the other mounts, Squall swings around with the momentum of Lina, who dislocates her shoulder as you grip her by her wrist. Any higher or lower in the air and she’d be dead, and not quickly, for none know if the sky has a bottom.
Together you spiral into the spirit. It wakes, rearing a head of bark and hanging vines. It reveals a vast circular maw lined with hanging purple pustules, but no features you recognise. It arches its back, and looks as if it’s about to take off!
Doruthan, Squall takes 1 stress, and will take a minute to be flight worthy, but they’re otherwise fine. Lina is rolling side to side puffing and panting as she clutches her arm.
Do you pop her arm back in its socket?
Doruthan, you are on the neck of the spirit. It’s as if you’re clambering through a ruined forest floor of fallen, dried trees.
Exilis & Hawthorne
You are closest to the craft, which is almost vertical in its descent. You need to get her back on course! To do that, you may need to jump from your mounts as they hold on to the monks.
First, describe how you get back on the craft.
Then, either of you, roll+STR to man the lines.
On a 10+, you pull out the sails and get her the right way up.
On a 7-9, you right the craft, but she’s heading for the spirit!
On a 6-, you’ll need to do more to solve the problem.
Next, either of you, roll+INT to mend a blown engine.
The engine keeps the craft defying gravity, and it’s currently shaking apart! Get below deck and sort it out.
On a 10+, choose 3.
On a 7-8, choose 2.
On a 6-, choose 1, and there’s a complication.
- It’s fixed, for now.
- It won’t be so slow your trip back takes days.
- You don’t take damage fixing it.
As the spirit shakes itself and begins to clamber around, it takes shape before your eyes.
It lifts off!
Geth roll 1d3 for Saving Monks
Saving Monks:
1d31 [1d3=1]
Endless_Serpents on
+3
NipsHe/HimLuxuriating in existential crisis.Registered Userregular
"Be still, child of the sky." Doruthan puts a hand lightly on Lina's dislocated shoulder, and his hands grow in soothing warmth.
"For you to be stable on this spirit, you must first be whole and mended. I promise, this will hurt less in the long run." The Unflinching Flame cocks her arm before she realizes it, and pops the joint back into place. He then cradles Lina in a monstrous hug, warming her wholly until the pain subsides to a workable level.
Once stable, Doruthan releases her and stands, grasping at this or that suitable branch to peer across the spirit's back.
"Now, we just need to commune with our friend spirit. Let us find its ears, and whisper it a soothing tale."
Lina says a few words unbecoming of a monk, but thanks you all the same. They look pale.
It’s not easy work, but you feel you can traverse the neck of the spirit without falling. The monk, less so.
“I think... I think I should meditate on that idea, sort of, in the vicinity of right here.”, the monk meekly states.
The spirit raises in the air, and Lina grabs a branch for dear life.
She’ll listen to you. Do you want her here or with you, likewise your mount can remain or come with.
You make your way to the head of the spirit, and you feel the vibrations of its humming voice beneath your feet. You brace yourself against its bark, and your hand becomes sticky with a purple gunk. It smells like rotten eggs.
As you look your palm over the spirit grows louder, and dives! It sends you landing on your knees, bursting a pod of the purple stuff, then it lifts again.
NipsHe/HimLuxuriating in existential crisis.Registered Userregular
edited July 2019
"Lina, stay with Squall. If this spirit becomes wild, an earthsky wurm is your best friend; they tend to be a touch cowardly when threatened, and they're very agile when they want to be. Which is when they're threatened. Grab his harness with both arms, and hang on. I will return when I reach an understanding with this spirit."
Minutes later...
Doruthan shouts over the wind and crashing of the spirit's wooden form, braced against a larger trunk that protrudes from its neck-line. "Brethren of the sky! The fire has called me to you and your majestic form! I would wish to commune with you, and understand your place here beyond the Tempest." As he shouts a violent shake causes The Mount Majestic to grab the trunk harder, and the purple gunk aids his grasp.
Wait...this morass...
Geth, roll 2d6+1 for Discern Realities (WIS)
What here is not what it appears to be?
What here is useful or valuable to me?
What is about to happen?
What here is not what it appears to be?
The outer form of the spirit should not consist of such dead material. That much is evident. Spirits reflect the world around them, and effect the world in return.
You can’t see any eyes or ears, so if it has them they must be covered by the gunk!
Further, the body is more like a vessel for the spirit, is exists within its wooden shell in a different, less physical form. It’s in no such danger, but if it’s outer form was destroyed it may well persist as a pure spirit, disconnected from the world.
What here is useful or valuable to me?
Right in the middle of the head is a whale-like blowhole. You can feel warm air being breathed out and sucked in. It’s about ten feet across.
You possess three small items of incredible value for this exact situation, but with the wind as it is the spirit will be incapable of sensing your incense! You’ll have to find away...
You’ve also got your adventuring gear. A rope might well be handy for whatever you’re about to attempt.
What is about to happen?
The spirit is about to slowly turn right and bank at a sharp angle. It’s head towards the descending craft, it’s cry strange and deep! It seems attracted to the monks and your allies for reasons unknown!
Whatever you plan, do it now, else you’ll have to hold on tight until it chooses to fly straight.
Endless_Serpents on
0
NipsHe/HimLuxuriating in existential crisis.Registered Userregular
Doruthan quickly ties off a rope from his pack, wraps it around the forearm of his off-hand, and begins to rappel down the blowhole...
Within the spirit’s wooden shell the environment is smoother, like polished mahogany, yet parts of it move like dark, green sinewy muscle.
Purple pods and splattered goo clog its workings, causing muscle to spasm and sealing opaque door-like flaps.
Something akin to a heartbeat pulses through the air, and through you.
As your eyes adjust you see you are not alone.
Two beasts are tearing into each other with abandon! It’s obviously a fight to the death. One is a slow but persistent translucent tentacled creature, the other gallops and bucks like a wild horse, squawking ceaselessly.
Pang appears to be unharmed, clutched in Iugo's great talons. It is fine for the moment, but over the long term a less-than-secure position - if the electrum eagle needs to fight, it would be hard-pressed to do so without harming or dropping the boy. So, the first order of business is to get Pang up into the saddle, which Exilis accomplishes by loosening his straps, standing, and half-walking / half-bracing up to Iugo's neck. The eagle then brings up Pang, almost as if to take a bite, and Exilis is just close enough to grab the monk's arm - then, together, they manage to get the monk back to the saddle and strapped in. The somewhat awkward maneuver has caused Iugo to lose altitude faster for a few moments, but since that puts them ahead of the diving ship, it actually works out. "We need the ship!" Pang yells over the wind of their flight.
[OOC: Is Goh still on the ship? If so, Pang probably mentions his friend. Maybe she can provide some assistance with one of the things? Hopefully the engine ...]
First, describe how you get back on the craft.
On Exilis's home islands, there are a group of electrum eagle riders known as the Itean; they are, quite simply, the best of the best. In addition to serving a somewhat ceremonial role as the bodyguards of the Aquilaean chief, they perform feats of amazing control and strength in flight demonstrations on holy days.* They clamber over their eagles in flight, passing over and around their bodies without harnesses, striking dramatic poses. They stand on their eagle's shoulders as they climb straight up into the air. They link arms as their eagles pass over and around each other, passing a rider from eagle to eagle before returning him to his seat. So Exilis knows that what he is about to attempt is absolutely doable; he's seen it done dozens of times. The one time he tried it himself didn't work out so well, but that was years ago, as a boy, and he's a far better rider than he was in those days. Probably. "What are you doing?" Pang asks as they begin their manuever. "Something stupid!" Exilis yells back, but he's uncertain if the young monk heard him.
Exilis urges Iugo up and over the descending craft, flipping him inverted just as they pass by the highest point in the rigging. Pang's harness pulls tight as what passes for local gravity pulls at the monk, and Exilis reaches, reaches, and grabs hold of the boat with one hand while unfastening his straps with the other, allowing him to fall towards the vessel, pulling himself around the rigging. After righting himself, he clambers down, looking for the lines that control the sail. Hoping he has the right one, he hauls in.
You land just as planned with the triumphant call of Iugo at your back as their shadow races over you. You manage to grab a line, then another. Despite pulling with all your might it does little to ease the craft’s plummet.
Goh is clinging to a line, sideways on to the deck, and slowly pushes with her feet up to you, Exilis.
“Shit a brick!”, she exclaims from beside your feet.
She pauses to think of a more monk-like phrase, but thinks better of it.
Barely audible over the wind, she shouts again, “Over there! The emergency buoyancy aid!”
It’s a casket drilled onto the middle of the deck with a single large locking pin holding whatever it is in the casket down. Looks rusty and even to you, meant for a different type of craft altogether.
Make your choice:
- Fire an arrow at the pin, breaking the casket open, and fall from the rickety old boat. Iugo will take 1 stress to catch you. No roll required.
- Work your way there on foot by catching various lines that are whipping around, but you’ll be right next to the casket when it opens. Likewise, no roll.
- Roll to Defy Danger if you want to slip the pin by hand, and move away, and stay onboard. There’s dire consequences for messing any part of that up!
[OOC:
Since I haven’t stated a stat you get to decide how you manage it.
Defy Danger
‘When you act despite an imminent threat or suffer a calamity, say how you deal with it and roll. If you do it…
…by powering through, +STR
…by getting out of the way or acting fast, +DEX
…by enduring, +CON
…with quick thinking, +INT
…through mental fortitude, +WIS
…using charm and social grace, +CHA
On a 10+, you do what you set out to, the threat doesn’t come to bear.
On a 7–9, you stumble, hesitate, or flinch: The GM will offer you a worse outcome, hard bargain, or ugly choice.’
Barely audible over the wind, she shouts again, “Over there! The emergency buoyancy aid!”
It’s a casket drilled onto the middle of the deck with a single large locking pin holding whatever it is in the casket down. Looks rusty and even to you, meant for a different type of craft altogether.
Exilis can see the what Goh is pointing at. It looks rusted together, like it'll need a significant amount of effort to spring it free. He looks down and ties the useless-damn-rope he'd been pulling on to the nearest cleat. Murmuring a short prayer for the ancestor eagles to watch over him, he starts clambering towards it - hand over hand on the lines scattered about the deck, hopping over and around various pieces of the ship ...
Roll to Defy Danger if you want to slip the pin by hand, and move away, and stay onboard. There’s dire consequences for messing any part of that up!
Geth, roll 2d6+2 for Defying Danger with Dex
ED: Forgot - my failure roll above to man the lines lets me mark XP, which brings me up to 8, enough to level at the next opportunity! Woo!
With a hand clasping the pin and the other strengthening your wrist you pull back with all your strength!—
And a huge balloon of thick cloth sends you reeling into the air diagonally. You frantically kick and grab at the air as naught but green sky fills your view. Fortunately, as you begin to fall the craft swings up with newfound buoyancy and you break your nose on the prow.
You take 4 damage which ignore armour.
You’ve got it flying again Exilis!
Now we just need to see if it can still be piloted at a decent clip. The engine is in poor shape.
Goh rushes over as soon as she gets her sky-legs, and calls all around her for Pang. Iugo lands on one talon, rocking the craft, and drops the young man roughly on the deck.
He’s already approaching when Goh asks if he can fix you up. Pulling out some herbs and powders, bandages and paste, he sets your broken nose on the spot. Your face hurts like Hells.
"Nob the firz tibe I'b brokeb by node. Id alwayz hurz like ell. We neeb to ged the engid running! Worby aboud that firsd!"
The spirit uncoils from the rock behind the ship - with their eyes forward, focused on Exilis, the two young monks haven't seen it yet, but the scout gets a near-perfect view.
“By the Seven Crow Brothers!”, exclaims Pang as they follow your gaze around.
Goh, acting on instinct, sprints below deck to attempt to jury rig the engine.
If no one can help her, just before the spirit is upon you she’ll fix it enough to manoeuvre, but it’ll be a slow flight back and she’ll hurt herself in the process.
So Hawthorne had a rough moment there, one arm clasped by Jenna's grasping tentacle, the other yanked down by dangling Zahab, but by now all three have collapsed in a pile on the deck. He's at the right angle to see Goh charging into the hold, so he blinks fuzzily a few times, then sits bolt upright. "Of course, the engine!" he cries, and stumbles after her.
The engine room is cramped, you can just about stand up straight, but most people struggle. It’s very hot in here, and you wouldn’t want to grab any of the metalwork.
There’s a host of spinning contraptions that somehow keeps this heap skyborne, but you’re no engineer. They’re going fast enough you could get something ripped off if you touched them. One of them, however, is noticeably not moving, and has a large metal bar jammed between it.
On your left Goh is straining to turn a knob on a series of pipes. She has a cloth over her hand to try and keep the heat at bay. Condensation is dripping down the pipes, so they might hold water?
Even over the noise of the engine you hear the spirit’s reverberating cries. Spooky.
Hawthorne's flighty, but mindful of the lessons of his godess: see, think fast, then jump. He pauses in the door and does his best to make sense of things, eyes darting around the chaotic machinery.
[OOC
Geth, roll 2d6+2 Discern Realities
(if I may)]
e: Hawthorne's trying to figure out: What here is useful or valuable to me?
[OOC: So long as a move can be triggered you can always do it.
For instance you can’t Hack and Slash from another room, of course, but if you’re squaring up to something and you want hit first, just do it.]
Hawthorne
What here is useful or valuable to me?
Quick thinking is valuable!
Goh looks pretty lean, so there’s no point being a white knight and trying to butt in, you’d be no better at it.
What you could try is finding a way to dislodge that metal bar from the should-be-spinning contraption.
Besides the immediate problem you see:
- A knocked over box of tools; wrenches and the like.
- A large torn length of cloth drenched in oil.
- A swinging holy symbol (not yours) on a thin chain. It’s to bring good fortune probably, or to protect travellers, the usual stuff.
- A dirty gooey purple clump attached to the ceiling, about a foot wide and half that deep.
Oof, I think I pick my way over to the pipe and give it a good tug with both hands. In the TV version of the story, the shot is identical to when Hawthorne was trying to pry his quarterstaff free of the mudfish.... and so this time he's tried to line himself up not to get shredded if or when he goes flying backward.
You pull the bar free and all the wheels spin faster! You get the bar caught between two pipes, and it hangs there temporarily before hitting the deck and falling sideways. It barely misses your feet. The craft suddenly speeds up! You’re lifted, dropped, then jostled back against a hard wood shelf.
You hear a hissing, and the engine room fills with steam as sprinkles of water burst from unseen devices above. The water is acrid, but cool.
Goh is knocked out with her head angled against some knee-high pipework. Steam swirls around her, leaving her a light grey shadow across the cramped space.
The consequences of your actions are not always on you.
What do you do?
—
For everyone else, the craft is stable, but slower than you’d like.
The spirit is flying towards the craft for reasons unknown. It continues to wail in pit deep tones.
Hawthorne recovers quickly, but oh! this hand was not well-played. He bites his lip, takes a deep breath, and dives into the steam. First things first: drag Goh bodily out of the scalding clouds.
Is it your clergyman’s calling, or just your upbringing amongst the factories of your homeland that gives you this bravery? Perhaps you’re just a swell fellow.
Despite the sudden heat you manage to pull the young monk out onto the deck, finding strength that is beyond your stature. Steam billows out behind you, though the sprinklers have now subsided.
You take 2 damage.
Goh murmers something, her hand shakily reaching for her bubbling red cheek. She’s out of it, barely conscious and confused.
The spirit continues to sing. It’s gaping mouth is close, too close, and can see deep into it’s smoothed wooden interior. It’s wings like a parting horizon lift and fall like the passage of eons. The craft is small, smaller than you remember. You feel small. You are small. A speck.
Yeah, absolutely, not the first friend Hawthorne’s pulled away from a burst steam pipe. Usually not him who broke it, though.
He kneels over the feverish monk, taking off the pewter alley krake figurine he wears around his neck and pressing it into one of her hands. He claps both of his hands around that one and mutters a prayer, brow furrowed. It’s a common formula asking Sister Moon to show the body a path out of sickness.
Posts
What here is not what it appears to be?
Geth, roll 2d6+3 for Exilis's discerning gaze
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
What here is not what it appears to be?
The island before you is little more than a floating chunk of rock, perhaps a piece broken off another island long ago.
It’s barren on top, but beneath it an equally sized amount of thick dry branches and twigs is stuck to it. At first you think it’s the wind, but you soon realise the bark and vines are moving slowly, like breathing.
...That’s the spirit. It’s curled upside down to rest. You can’t tell tail from head, or if it’s got anything approaching animal features like that.
It glistens with dark purple pods of some slimy substance.
You reckon the spirit to be about half a mile long, the same width ways too.
What do you do?
Exilis charges forward on Iugo, attempting to pass between the monks' descending vessel and the island-spirit. He repeatedly waves his lance in the air, the point making the twin circles of the scout sign for danger and pointing to port, hoping that the monks will turn away in the proper direction. He avoids, as much as possible, making any noise.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
It is evident that the collection of bark, pine needles and dry vines is not part of the small barren island. Closer inspection reveals what might be talons holding on, as well as hooks (attached to other limbs?) further along.
The monks slow to a halt, but don’t alter course. They’ll stay there for now.
Goh shouts over with her hands shaped around her mouth, “What do you see, sir?”
You feel in this moment like she couldn’t have been louder.
The shape of dead wood, this giant spirit, begins to rhythmically undulate.
As if in reply, you hear... what must be the spirit. It’s no animal call, it’s like nothing you know.
The slick purple ooze that pocks it’s surface like measles rock back and forth between the bark and branches, clogging several areas to a standstill.
The sky waxes from light to dark green. You can no longer see the sun, or any celestial bodies, really.
You feel your stomached lurch! Your mounts scatter and it takes longer than you’d like to reassert your control!
When you do... you realise... the spirit is now on top of the island... or... now you’ve all been forced to adjust to flying upside down! The sky is wrong.
You have passed into its realm. Almost the world you know, but a layer beneath it*.
No time to comprehend all this, the monk’s craft is listing sideways! They can’t control it! The wheel is spinning, but they’re all sliding off. Poor Pang is holding on by a rope! Get in there and right their craft before they fall to an untimely demise!
How do you save each monk?
*I’m making the cosmology as we go, and you’re free to give me your ideas too.
Picture a radio. This is the world.
Now imagine the circular frequency tuning dial. It can be turned by certain factors of will, place and occasion.
You usually reside on frequency 001.0, but with each turn of the dial you find yourself in a slightly different version of the same world.
Right now you’re listening to 054.3, Spooky Forest Vibes FM.
"Shumbakh!" the Falling Crag yells into Squall's ear-holes. In response, the skywurm goes arrow-straight, and deflates. The skin of the skywurm pulls taught around its skeleton and anatomy, and whatever force was holding the beast and its rider in the sky loses its grip.
Falling at a breakneck pace, Doruthan and Squall careen past the ship and the falling Lina. At a suitable distance below her, the Inferno relaxes his choke-hold on his ride, and shouts a new command at it.
"Bos!" With the word, Squall regains its bloated eel-like composure, hanging weightless in the torpid sky. Veins of fiery red pulse along its length, and the air around it shimmers from a newfound heat.
And, with a bit of luck, Lina will fall right into Doruthan's arms.
The trick is in getting Iugo to do it at speed and yet gently enough to not harm the young monk - a several-inch-long talon passing through the wrong portion of the boy's anatomy might be as lethal as the fall.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Doruthan
Not so aerodynamic compared to the other mounts, Squall swings around with the momentum of Lina, who dislocates her shoulder as you grip her by her wrist. Any higher or lower in the air and she’d be dead, and not quickly, for none know if the sky has a bottom.
Together you spiral into the spirit. It wakes, rearing a head of bark and hanging vines. It reveals a vast circular maw lined with hanging purple pustules, but no features you recognise. It arches its back, and looks as if it’s about to take off!
Doruthan, Squall takes 1 stress, and will take a minute to be flight worthy, but they’re otherwise fine. Lina is rolling side to side puffing and panting as she clutches her arm.
Do you pop her arm back in its socket?
Doruthan, you are on the neck of the spirit. It’s as if you’re clambering through a ruined forest floor of fallen, dried trees.
Exilis & Hawthorne
You are closest to the craft, which is almost vertical in its descent. You need to get her back on course! To do that, you may need to jump from your mounts as they hold on to the monks.
First, describe how you get back on the craft.
Then, either of you, roll+STR to man the lines.
On a 10+, you pull out the sails and get her the right way up.
On a 7-9, you right the craft, but she’s heading for the spirit!
On a 6-, you’ll need to do more to solve the problem.
Next, either of you, roll+INT to mend a blown engine.
The engine keeps the craft defying gravity, and it’s currently shaking apart! Get below deck and sort it out.
On a 10+, choose 3.
On a 7-8, choose 2.
On a 6-, choose 1, and there’s a complication.
- It’s fixed, for now.
- It won’t be so slow your trip back takes days.
- You don’t take damage fixing it.
As the spirit shakes itself and begins to clamber around, it takes shape before your eyes.
It lifts off!
Geth roll 1d3 for Saving Monks
"For you to be stable on this spirit, you must first be whole and mended. I promise, this will hurt less in the long run." The Unflinching Flame cocks her arm before she realizes it, and pops the joint back into place. He then cradles Lina in a monstrous hug, warming her wholly until the pain subsides to a workable level.
Once stable, Doruthan releases her and stands, grasping at this or that suitable branch to peer across the spirit's back.
"Now, we just need to commune with our friend spirit. Let us find its ears, and whisper it a soothing tale."
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
It’s not easy work, but you feel you can traverse the neck of the spirit without falling. The monk, less so.
“I think... I think I should meditate on that idea, sort of, in the vicinity of right here.”, the monk meekly states.
The spirit raises in the air, and Lina grabs a branch for dear life.
She’ll listen to you. Do you want her here or with you, likewise your mount can remain or come with.
You make your way to the head of the spirit, and you feel the vibrations of its humming voice beneath your feet. You brace yourself against its bark, and your hand becomes sticky with a purple gunk. It smells like rotten eggs.
As you look your palm over the spirit grows louder, and dives! It sends you landing on your knees, bursting a pod of the purple stuff, then it lifts again.
Minutes later...
Doruthan shouts over the wind and crashing of the spirit's wooden form, braced against a larger trunk that protrudes from its neck-line. "Brethren of the sky! The fire has called me to you and your majestic form! I would wish to commune with you, and understand your place here beyond the Tempest." As he shouts a violent shake causes The Mount Majestic to grab the trunk harder, and the purple gunk aids his grasp.
Wait...this morass...
Geth, roll 2d6+1 for Discern Realities (WIS)
What here is useful or valuable to me?
What is about to happen?
What here is not what it appears to be?
The outer form of the spirit should not consist of such dead material. That much is evident. Spirits reflect the world around them, and effect the world in return.
You can’t see any eyes or ears, so if it has them they must be covered by the gunk!
Further, the body is more like a vessel for the spirit, is exists within its wooden shell in a different, less physical form. It’s in no such danger, but if it’s outer form was destroyed it may well persist as a pure spirit, disconnected from the world.
What here is useful or valuable to me?
Right in the middle of the head is a whale-like blowhole. You can feel warm air being breathed out and sucked in. It’s about ten feet across.
You possess three small items of incredible value for this exact situation, but with the wind as it is the spirit will be incapable of sensing your incense! You’ll have to find away...
You’ve also got your adventuring gear. A rope might well be handy for whatever you’re about to attempt.
What is about to happen?
The spirit is about to slowly turn right and bank at a sharp angle. It’s head towards the descending craft, it’s cry strange and deep! It seems attracted to the monks and your allies for reasons unknown!
Whatever you plan, do it now, else you’ll have to hold on tight until it chooses to fly straight.
Within the spirit’s wooden shell the environment is smoother, like polished mahogany, yet parts of it move like dark, green sinewy muscle.
Purple pods and splattered goo clog its workings, causing muscle to spasm and sealing opaque door-like flaps.
Something akin to a heartbeat pulses through the air, and through you.
As your eyes adjust you see you are not alone.
Two beasts are tearing into each other with abandon! It’s obviously a fight to the death. One is a slow but persistent translucent tentacled creature, the other gallops and bucks like a wild horse, squawking ceaselessly.
What do you do?
[OOC: I’ll start on a map when I’m home.]
So far you know not much. The map will be updated regularly, this is gonna be a real dungeon crawl.
[OOC: Is Goh still on the ship? If so, Pang probably mentions his friend. Maybe she can provide some assistance with one of the things? Hopefully the engine ...]
On Exilis's home islands, there are a group of electrum eagle riders known as the Itean; they are, quite simply, the best of the best. In addition to serving a somewhat ceremonial role as the bodyguards of the Aquilaean chief, they perform feats of amazing control and strength in flight demonstrations on holy days.* They clamber over their eagles in flight, passing over and around their bodies without harnesses, striking dramatic poses. They stand on their eagle's shoulders as they climb straight up into the air. They link arms as their eagles pass over and around each other, passing a rider from eagle to eagle before returning him to his seat. So Exilis knows that what he is about to attempt is absolutely doable; he's seen it done dozens of times. The one time he tried it himself didn't work out so well, but that was years ago, as a boy, and he's a far better rider than he was in those days. Probably. "What are you doing?" Pang asks as they begin their manuever. "Something stupid!" Exilis yells back, but he's uncertain if the young monk heard him.
Exilis urges Iugo up and over the descending craft, flipping him inverted just as they pass by the highest point in the rigging. Pang's harness pulls tight as what passes for local gravity pulls at the monk, and Exilis reaches, reaches, and grabs hold of the boat with one hand while unfastening his straps with the other, allowing him to fall towards the vessel, pulling himself around the rigging. After righting himself, he clambers down, looking for the lines that control the sail. Hoping he has the right one, he hauls in.
Geth, roll 2d6+1 for Manning the lines
*
... plus this ...
... plus this ...
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
You land just as planned with the triumphant call of Iugo at your back as their shadow races over you. You manage to grab a line, then another. Despite pulling with all your might it does little to ease the craft’s plummet.
Goh is clinging to a line, sideways on to the deck, and slowly pushes with her feet up to you, Exilis.
“Shit a brick!”, she exclaims from beside your feet.
She pauses to think of a more monk-like phrase, but thinks better of it.
Barely audible over the wind, she shouts again, “Over there! The emergency buoyancy aid!”
It’s a casket drilled onto the middle of the deck with a single large locking pin holding whatever it is in the casket down. Looks rusty and even to you, meant for a different type of craft altogether.
Make your choice:
- Fire an arrow at the pin, breaking the casket open, and fall from the rickety old boat. Iugo will take 1 stress to catch you. No roll required.
- Work your way there on foot by catching various lines that are whipping around, but you’ll be right next to the casket when it opens. Likewise, no roll.
- Roll to Defy Danger if you want to slip the pin by hand, and move away, and stay onboard. There’s dire consequences for messing any part of that up!
[OOC: What would be the defy danger roll?]
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Since I haven’t stated a stat you get to decide how you manage it.
Defy Danger
‘When you act despite an imminent threat or suffer a calamity, say how you deal with it and roll. If you do it…
…by powering through, +STR
…by getting out of the way or acting fast, +DEX
…by enduring, +CON
…with quick thinking, +INT
…through mental fortitude, +WIS
…using charm and social grace, +CHA
On a 10+, you do what you set out to, the threat doesn’t come to bear.
On a 7–9, you stumble, hesitate, or flinch: The GM will offer you a worse outcome, hard bargain, or ugly choice.’
DEX would make sense here.]
Exilis can see the what Goh is pointing at. It looks rusted together, like it'll need a significant amount of effort to spring it free. He looks down and ties the useless-damn-rope he'd been pulling on to the nearest cleat. Murmuring a short prayer for the ancestor eagles to watch over him, he starts clambering towards it - hand over hand on the lines scattered about the deck, hopping over and around various pieces of the ship ...
Geth, roll 2d6+2 for Defying Danger with Dex
ED: Forgot - my failure roll above to man the lines lets me mark XP, which brings me up to 8, enough to level at the next opportunity! Woo!
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
And a huge balloon of thick cloth sends you reeling into the air diagonally. You frantically kick and grab at the air as naught but green sky fills your view. Fortunately, as you begin to fall the craft swings up with newfound buoyancy and you break your nose on the prow.
You take 4 damage which ignore armour.
You’ve got it flying again Exilis!
Now we just need to see if it can still be piloted at a decent clip. The engine is in poor shape.
Goh rushes over as soon as she gets her sky-legs, and calls all around her for Pang. Iugo lands on one talon, rocking the craft, and drops the young man roughly on the deck.
He’s already approaching when Goh asks if he can fix you up. Pulling out some herbs and powders, bandages and paste, he sets your broken nose on the spot. Your face hurts like Hells.
Geth roll 1d4 for Fall Damage
The spirit uncoils from the rock behind the ship - with their eyes forward, focused on Exilis, the two young monks haven't seen it yet, but the scout gets a near-perfect view.
"Oh shid."
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Goh, acting on instinct, sprints below deck to attempt to jury rig the engine.
If no one can help her, just before the spirit is upon you she’ll fix it enough to manoeuvre, but it’ll be a slow flight back and she’ll hurt herself in the process.
[OOC: All you, mate!]
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
What's he see in there?
There’s a host of spinning contraptions that somehow keeps this heap skyborne, but you’re no engineer. They’re going fast enough you could get something ripped off if you touched them. One of them, however, is noticeably not moving, and has a large metal bar jammed between it.
On your left Goh is straining to turn a knob on a series of pipes. She has a cloth over her hand to try and keep the heat at bay. Condensation is dripping down the pipes, so they might hold water?
Even over the noise of the engine you hear the spirit’s reverberating cries. Spooky.
[OOC
Geth, roll 2d6+2 Discern Realities
(if I may)]
e: Hawthorne's trying to figure out: What here is useful or valuable to me?
For instance you can’t Hack and Slash from another room, of course, but if you’re squaring up to something and you want hit first, just do it.]
Hawthorne
What here is useful or valuable to me?
Quick thinking is valuable!
Goh looks pretty lean, so there’s no point being a white knight and trying to butt in, you’d be no better at it.
What you could try is finding a way to dislodge that metal bar from the should-be-spinning contraption.
Besides the immediate problem you see:
- A knocked over box of tools; wrenches and the like.
- A large torn length of cloth drenched in oil.
- A swinging holy symbol (not yours) on a thin chain. It’s to bring good fortune probably, or to protect travellers, the usual stuff.
- A dirty gooey purple clump attached to the ceiling, about a foot wide and half that deep.
What do you do?
You hear a hissing, and the engine room fills with steam as sprinkles of water burst from unseen devices above. The water is acrid, but cool.
Goh is knocked out with her head angled against some knee-high pipework. Steam swirls around her, leaving her a light grey shadow across the cramped space.
The consequences of your actions are not always on you.
What do you do?
—
For everyone else, the craft is stable, but slower than you’d like.
The spirit is flying towards the craft for reasons unknown. It continues to wail in pit deep tones.
Despite the sudden heat you manage to pull the young monk out onto the deck, finding strength that is beyond your stature. Steam billows out behind you, though the sprinklers have now subsided.
You take 2 damage.
Goh murmers something, her hand shakily reaching for her bubbling red cheek. She’s out of it, barely conscious and confused.
You’re gonna need to heal her!
Hawthorne, mark 1 experience.
Geth roll 2d4 damage for Steamed Man.
The spirit continues to sing. It’s gaping mouth is close, too close, and can see deep into it’s smoothed wooden interior. It’s wings like a parting horizon lift and fall like the passage of eons. The craft is small, smaller than you remember. You feel small. You are small. A speck.
You need to get the spirit away from the craft!
He kneels over the feverish monk, taking off the pewter alley krake figurine he wears around his neck and pressing it into one of her hands. He claps both of his hands around that one and mutters a prayer, brow furrowed. It’s a common formula asking Sister Moon to show the body a path out of sickness.
Geth, roll 2d6+2 Cast a Spell (Cure Light Wounds)
The spell is revoked — no more healing until I commune.
“I don’t know what happened to the Ancestral Vase of Komolung!”, she yelps.
Half her face appears mildly sunburnt, but she’s otherwise fit as a fiddle. A faint scent of old perfume and rain on concrete swirls around you.
Her voice begins slow, then picks up its usual force, “Trippy. Thank you so much! Guess I should get on the wheel!”
“Also: Look at that!!”
She begins to turn the craft away from the spirit, but it follows!