Duty Session 433: Totally Typical Tomb

    'I see dead people' is the last thing you want to hear when you're wandering around a graveyard. Unfortunately that's kind of what's been happening to the local Landers who've been visiting the memorials to their passed loved ones. Which is never a good thing. So they've called for... yes, you guessed it, Bob: Adventurers!

    Miyako, honestly, didn't -need- to be called. She was already on her way there. Or at least, to the general area. Why? Because reasons. "Far as I can tell from the histories," she explains, "Some of the Sylphs who took part in Operation: Anchor were from villages in this area," she explains to the adventurers who -were- called in for the undead-hunting party.

    "I was hoping I might be able to find their families, anyone who might have heard their story first-hand." She smiles a casual sort of smile, but there's a gleam in her eyes. "Take my mind off the war, get something more uplifting done."

Ayame had unslung her shield, wearing the runed circle on her arm and hefting it absently. Her wand was in her other hand, gloved fingers twirling it and a faint lilac light emanating from the tip, dancing around her as she moves.

"I admit, after everything I'm hearing, something a bit simpler and more direct is good" The sylph admits with a smile, her wings fluttering and setting her hair askew a little from the low ponytail it sat in "But aside from anything else, I figure I still have a lot of groundwork to put in" She gives both of the more experienced hunters a faintly abashed smile, trotting neatly along as she glances about in thought "And I can see how the professionals do it"

Goldenblade had been studying in the Library at Eas, in preparation for the Palace Landers' assault, but what she learned in the library at Eas forced her to make this little side trip. But on the side trip, the popup that there was a graveyard that needed clearing piqued her interest. She's cleared a few, and there's one or two tricks she's come to show the kids who might not be familiar with them, or spent fifty years and retired as a bricklayer.

"Ah, hope it's OK if I come along?" she says. She doesn't know any of the story of /this/ tomb, she nods at what Miyako says, taking it in. She agrees with Ayame, "This game is much more complicated than I thought it would be when I signed up. But yeah, simple and direct is good." She's pretty straightforward, herself, most of the time. Complication takes planning.

"Oh, professionals do it a lot better than this," Miyako comments. "They'd usually have three, four times as many people, or more. Lots of weapons. Lots of pre-cast buff spells. Heavy armor tanks. All that stuff." She's talking about Scale Emblem, mostly. And Floor Boss fights. "A nice little casual is more my style, though. Never was much into looking for fights."

    A fight, however, seems to be looking for her, as she suddenly trips and falls to the ground!

    She catches herself easily enough, and tries to twist around to get back up, but her foot is firmly caught by a ... skeletal hand. Oh dear.

    It's not alone, either. There's more of them. Lots more. Bones clattering as they approach, or emerge from the ground... time to break out the Blunt Instruments.

Ayame smiles to Goldenblade, studying her with perhaps a little envy. Then she nods, adjusting her grip on the shield as she answers the human "Fine with me as well" She agrees "I'm just here to look dumb and jump into the way of trouble. I'm not much in the way of a gamer - I just joined in to celebrate the new year with my sister" She laughs weakly.

Miyako speaks, and she nods "Hey, I'm a tank. And like I've said - armor the spots around the shield, and let the shield do the work." She insists, tucking it across her front, turning to look at Miyako -

- who's not there! She's on the floor! Ayame yelps, stepping forward, and covering her Fallen Comrade as she fires off wild blasts of magic from the wand.

Goldenblade smirks at pros doing this better, and she says, "I think we'll be f..." and cuts off as Miyako is tripped up by a sleletal hand. "Well, swords out," she says with amusement, and indeed her swords are quickly in hand. She'll slash at the wrist of the skeleton holding Miyako, and then when more crawl out of the ground, she'll engage them, slashing and spinning, a whirling, spinning doom made out of swords that whirl around and smash skeletons for big damage.

She calls to Ayame, "Oh, I'm no gamer, myself. My grandkids and their dad got me into this to save on long distance charges. But they missed the opening because they had to attend my grandson's high school ... some event or other, I forget. So, they said Gramps, get started and we'll meet you." She snorts. "Slackers. Now here I am smaking skeletons and where are /they/?"

But she nods at what Ayame says, "You'll do fine. So far, so good, right?" Spin, smash.

    "Happy to hear," the fallen Spriggan comments, "That you're both having fun with all this." A quick kick of her foot serves to dissuade her assailant long enough for her to skitter away from it and get to her feet. And get into the fight.

    Fortunately, Ayame's shield is enough to mostly protect them both from the attacking skeletons. Their weapons are rather crude to begin with, mostly old and rusty metal. Certainly not much use against solid armor. And while the Sylph's aim with her wand may be rather wild, there are more than enough targets for her to explode with it.

    Somewhat more precise is the all-dancing, all-smashing Goldenblade, whose golden blade cuts through bone and rusty iron almost as easily as it cuts through air.

    The undead do press in, however, their numbers seemingly unlimited, until Miyako finally gets her spell off. A pulse of shadow rolls out from her, passing her living comrades by, but wherever it encounters one of the skeletons, it wraps around their bones to glow black... and then the skeletons fall to the ground, 'life'less, the glow flowing back into the Spriggan girl who smiles a wide and ever so slightly creepy smile as whatever she's draining fills her up...

    "There," she says, her voice taking on an odd reverberation as she points to a small hill. "Clear away the brush." She produces to follow her own suggestion, producing a simple blade to hack at the plantlife with until the party's efforts reveal a bricked-up tunnel entrance.

    "Inside," she continues. "Ought to be," her voice quickly returning to normal, "something interesting..."

"Been managing" Ayame admits, her hair twirling as she moves smoothly, alternating hard, heavy blocks and bashes with the shield with wild blasts of raw magic. Her steps are small, quick, as she shifts from position to position, never letting herself get locked down "I assume they're worrying about you" her voice is small "It's all pretty weird. Kuroyuri played a bunch, but I - well, didn't have time"

She continues to fight, until Miyako's spell goes off. Then she pants, recovering from that little confusion and just staring at the devastation. And a little shake of her head "That" She tells the smaller figure "Is just showing off"

But it's a fond tone, as she blinks quickly and looks around, nodding to herself and moving to study the plantlife "Let me see ... I might have a better way" She murmurs, bending to a knee and placing her wand at the base of some of the brush. The violet light spreads; as the thorns begin to light up, and the brush and plants unravel, parting and clearing a path for the trio

Goldenblade finishes the fight as she started it, whirling around, slashing skeletons at each pass, the last ones poofing in a burst of motes and XP as Miyako's spell ends them. Once we've got ourselves sorted back out and moving on, she follows the group and siles as we find that small hill. She'll clear away the brush until Ayame's spell does it magically, and the brick entrance is revealed, and she smiles.

Well, this is pretty much right up her alley, and she's dismantled any amount of brickwork in the past, it's a task that happens pretty often, when you've got to take down the old stuff to lay new. So, she makes pretty short work of it, all told, and there's a hidden way forward.

The combination of Goldenblade's skill and Ayame's magical manipulation of the Earth are exactly what the doorway needs. All that's left is... well, the muscle, the brawn to go with the brains. And for once Miyako is content to play Big Dumb Muscle. Clearing bricks, packing dirt, whatever is needed.

    And finally the doorway is widen enough to admit the adventuresome trio. The tunnel beyond is clearly man-made, the walls lined with brick and shaped stone, and the floor clear and level, the spikes clean except for the occasional spot of brown stains where something failed to dodge.

    Wait, spikes? Spike traps? Uh-oh. Better get ready to dodge!

"Let me try something" Ayame murmurs. Quite pleased, it seems, to have a little distraction after baring her soul for a moment. She twists the shield, so it lays flat, her arm trembling a little as she holds up the wood and metal until she rests it against the wall as well. A movement of the wand, and soon, crystals begin to float from the runes etched into the metal of the shield; moving smoothly to form an arch; and then slide into the beams of light, letting it form an arch.

And then she breathes out, staring at it "That" She mutters "Worked better than I thought."

Goldenblade sighs with satisfaction at a job well done as the last of the obstruction is cleared, and she walks though the doorway with the others. And nearly into a spike trap. She steps nimbly aside, though, and there's another! She dodges the other one, and it seems like this place is lined with spike traps.

"Who builds these places?" she wonders aloud. "They're filled with all these traps, but," pause to work out a path, then /dash/, "but they're not quite good enough traps to get anyone. It's more obstacle course than death trap," she laments. On the other hand, anyone slower than the speedy Goldenblade would have been skewered. She barely made it through, herself.

    Miyako hmms softly, standing back to watch Ayame at work. "Impressive," she comments. The crystalline wall does do a remarkably good job of stopping the spike trap from slamming shut. "I've not seen that kind of work before. Something new?"

    Goldenblade makes it past the remaining traps, and Miyako makes her own attempt just behind her. Somehow, the Spriggan manages to trip once again, not over a skeleton this time but over her own feet, as she pauses to examine a carving on the wall. "Does this look like the rune for Anchor to you?" she asks, then stumbles right into the path of a spike trap. Fortunately she manages to dodge out of the way quickly enough, but her HP take a bit of a dip.

    And then there's a new chamber! With a ... pipe organ ossuary. "Creepy much?" Miyako muses, then spots the sheaf of sheet music laid out by the keyboard and makes a beeline for it. A quick attempt at a chord proves two things: Number one, the organ's bellows appear to have stopped working at some point. And two, it's connected to another deathtrap, as parts of the floor fall away to reveal the void beneath.

"It's almost like it's designed to let people get past with a sense of success, rather than keep people out" Ayame grins to Goldenblade, advancing under the archway of light and desummoning her crystals once they're all through, following along behind the smooth fighter.

"Sort of new" She tells Miyako "It's something I'd been working on. Focusing and controlling light; and crystals are a staple" She touches the gems set into the back of her elbow-length gloves, and smiles a little.

"Oh, no, that's not creepy much. That's creepy a lot" She says conversationally. A little grunt, and she twirls her wand, dragging together a small sprite of wind to try to force air through the mighty bone organ. Sadly, it mostly sounds like - well.

A bit rude.

She has the grace to look abashed.

Goldenblade will look back to Miyako as she asks about a carving on the wall, but she's got the artistic sense of a gnat, and about the same knowledge of runes, and can only shrug. "No clue," she admits. She smirks as Ayame echoes her opinion on the trap, though she suggests, "Or perhaps the trapmakers didn't realize people of our skill would be challenging these traps?"

And then creepy pipe organ music /and/ disappearing floor. But again, she's quick enough to see the tell-tales when a floor is about to go, and can make it to safety before the floor drops out.

    "Got to agree, Aya-chan," Miyako says as she looks through the sheet music. "Hmm, that's interesting... almost baroque... ooh, got to keep a copy of this to take home." And then she presses down on the opening chord, and there's a loud, impressive....

            Bllllaaaaaaatttt.

    The Spriggan looks up at Ayame, back to the organ, and shrugs, trying to play the next chord in sequence and begin the song. "Possibly," she agrees with Goldenblade, as bits of floor continue to drop away and the adventuress manages to keep ahead of them by sheer luck, skill, grace, and some various combinations thereof.

    Without air to power the bellows, and a more practiced keyboard-hand to play the song, however, all the dodging in the world doesn't help her when the entire floor just goes away. The trio are left to tumble down into a deep abyss... at the bottom of which their landing is, fortunately, cushioned by quite deep water. There's even a ship nearby... and light to see by! How useful! How unsurprising!

    Wiping water from her eyes and wringing it from her hair, Miyako strikes out for the ship. "I think the traps are more to dissuade casuals, yeah." She smiles as she starts climbing a line that hangs from one of the spars. "C'mon, let's see if there's any interesting salvage to be found here."

    'Salvage' indeed to be found, a quite nice pile of it spread across the Captain's table in his cabin at the rear of the ship. Where the trio get a good look at his eyepatched, fleshless skull-face. Well.

    And if that wasn't scary enough, as the adventurers begin to gather up the loot, more skeleton pirates return to reclaim their booty!

"Aww, you did a lot better" Ayame tells GB with a small chuckle "You're fast on your feet! I can hardly keep up" She smiles a touch to the redhead, and then sighs, continuing on as she cringes as the last echoes of the blaaaaat fades.

Then she tumbles!

Her wings flutter, though, and it's just enough to slow her landing into a splash rather than a thud. She picks herself out of the water, wading ashore - knee high boots proving an asset - and she stares at the ship "That's ..." She practically breathes "She's a beauty. I'd love to see her afloat" She mutters, heading up the gangplank - then throwing out her shield, keeping the others back a moment as it flashes white in warning "Careful. That stuff?" She gestures to a goblet, a small chest, a little crown "Leave that. That ... I'm pretty sure that's his" She gestures to the immobile captain, nervously "I'd let him have it, frankly"

Goldenblade flails as she falls, but when the water is visible below, she tucks, and hits the water like a cannonball. Rising back to the surface only a bit sore, she will follow Miyako toward the ship, which indeed seems to have interesting salvage. She will pick up such gold as is available, and any inteesting loot, but sighs as the skeleton pirates show up.

"Well now," she says, but a glance up to the roof of the cavern is a bit more interesting, and instead of fighting, she jumps up, and climbs her way up the rigging to the top of the mast, and begins hammering at a couple cracks in the ceiling with her pickaxe. This has the effect of caving the ceiling in, mostly past her rather than on top of her. Mainly on top of the skeletons climbing up after her.

    Some days, you get the loot, some days the loot gets you. Miyako stops with her hand reached out, about to grasp the goblet, when Ayame points it out. "Right. Leave One-Eyed Willy his share. Don't touch it." She starts sweeping up the rest, only to turn at the sound of skeletons bursting in. "Fun!" She sweeps up one more armload of treasure into her bag and backs out, twisting past the skeletons to run out onto the deck. There she leads them in a running chase, up and down the rigging, in and out of the shadows, her war-fans slicing at the boney figures and leaving small heaps of bones behind as a legacy of her path.

    "Hey! Watch where you're dropping that!" she yells, as a combined mass of rock and crushed bone falls from the ceiling to the deck before her, her arms windmilling as she comes to a stop right before it.

    With the number of skeletons rapidly dwindling, a small handful of them resort to something crazy. One of the ship's cannons is wrenched around to aim its massive barrel at the sparring spriggan, ready to fire its blast of shrapnel at her - the skeletons having loaded it with the bones of their defeated brethren! The Spriggan skids to a stop and starts racing away, the slow-match is brought to the touch-hole, a moment of sparks fizzing up from the hole, and....

                BOOM!!!

    And then the entire cavern starts to collapse. Uh-oh. "Make like a tree and get outta here, FLY, FOOLS!" Miyako sprints across the deck towards - aha! There! A small opening onto a wide river that crosses this part of the island. "Hurry!" She leaps from the deck, gliding briefly with her wings spread, making it perhaps halfway before she plunges into the water and has to swim for it.

Ayame is laughing. She really is. Her shield, the little blasts of raw lilac light that shimmers and dissolves skeletons into polygons, ensures she beats a solid path through the skeletons. It's partly exhilaration, even as dust falls and swirls in the air around her as rocks fall and skeletons die. Her little pack is stuffed full of gold, and she's even grabbed a few heavy gold chains, wrapping them around her waist over the corset. But explosions? Explosions make things no fun! So when that larger collapse starts, Ayame sprints after Miyako, tossing her shield down onto the water, and dropping onto it; dropping to a knee, her wand to the shield as the face-down runes light up once more. Swim? No.

The damn sylph surfs.

Goldenblade whoops, "Sorry!" as she almost drops debris on Miyako rather than her pursuers. But then the pirates get into the game, and she acks as the cavern starts to collapse more. She will join Miyako as she calls the retreat, rushing after her, though she boggles as Ayame boogieboards past on her shield. She had not thought of that! Well, also she has no shield, so she couldn't do it anyhow.

    The cavern fully collapses just as the trio of adventuresses reach the cavern's exit, fortunately for them. They leave behind the ship and much of the treasure - probably now crushed quite flat under millions of tons of rock - but the wave from the collapsing cavern tosses them up onto the riverbank, so they're at least out of the water!

    And they've gotten away with a fair amount of loot, most of it in gold and gems.

    A quick change of clothing via the menu leaves one dry, at least, and then Miyako reaches into her inventory to retrieve... a sheaf of yellowed papers, covered in sheet music! "Yes!" she calls, punching the air above her. "We got it! Look here," she says, waving the others over. There's a header on one page: The word 'Anchor'. "I knew there was something here!"

Ayame shifts to another set of clothes via the menu, reluctantly, ending up in a Gwen-creation of flowing skirts split to the lower thigh. At least it's still in her colors. She also shakes her head at the two of them, not quite hiding her grin

"What is it all about?" She asks Miyako, as she sorts through her well-gotten gains, satisfied as she makes the booty vanish to her inventory, nodding up to GB, before she chuckles

"One of the better things for a shield. Especially one tuned to magic" She explains

Goldenblade is spilled up on the beach, ass over teakettle, as the saying goes, and picks herself up with a wince, rubbing her neck. But she walks it off, and she looks over as Miyako seems excited about something. "What is it?" she asks, looking over at the papers she seems to have grabbed up in the looting frenzy.

She looks at the papers closer, enough to see the words, but still doesn't quite get it. She's slow on game concepts sometimes. "A clue?" she wonders.

    Miyako grins, nodding. "A clue," she agrees, handing over a share of the gold and jewels to the others in lieu of her musical treasure. "Shows I'm on the right track, there -were- Anchor survivors in this area. One of them must've joined ol' One-Eye Willy's pirate crew for a while."

"You'll need to tell us what you find. Or let us know if we can help" Ayame smiles a touch, helping GB up once she's settled herself, slinging her shield onto her back and sliding her wand into her glove, peering at it all with interest "I assume you're following something interesting?"

Goldenblade ahhs, nods. A clue. Clues are good. She could use a clue or two, herself. "On the right track, good," she agrees quickly, accepting Ayame's help with a smirk. "Yes, what are you trying to work out, when you find what you're looking for?"

    "Mmm. Have either of you heard of Operation: Anchor? It was ... a big quest, about two hundred years ago. During the Dark Times, when there were no adventurers, after the first ETO got cut off by Pluto's Kiss. That was when the first Leviathans showed up, and a group got together to go after one. All Landers. Thousands of them."

Ayame shakes her head "I've not, no" She blinks, listening and letting out a shocked breath "That's ... that's horrifying. It must have been a massacre, surely?" With a pained little wince, waiting for the worst

Goldenblade boggles at Miyako's story. "That ... wait a minute, the game generates quests for Landers when no players are around?" She's puzzled, and says, "I had no idea the game could do that. Computers are much more capable than I'd thought." Goldenblade's compter experience consisting of buying her child a Pong game in 1979.

    Miyako nods. "Hundreds died. Possibly thousands. And they didn't manage to kill it." No surprise, the Leviathans were - according to the modern ETO devs, at least - supposed to be part of the in-game system that made it impossible to cross from server to server. Except that now it's clearly not so impossible after all. "It was a brave and valiant attempt and a horrible tragedy in how it ended."

    She pauses, looking over at Goldenblade. "You know, that's a thought. I don't know if they were prompted by something, or if they just decided to do it on their own. Worth looking into, thanks!" She grins cheerily as she makes some notes of the idea. "Not sure if the servers were even up at the time, this was right after Pluto's Kiss, while the internet was down. But we'll see."

"If they go down, it might just default to generating history" Ayame guesses uncertainly "Like, fill in the gaps?" She suggests, looking around and sighing "But I don't know how you'd even test that idea"

Goldenblade can't even imagine a computer doing that. It'd take the servers not succumbing to the virus, and then remaining online despite no one playing the game. "Why would the gaming company even pay to keep the power on when no one's playing?" she finds herself asking. But she's old, she has no idea why kids do things with computers.

    "Exactly," the Spriggan says. "The servers probably -weren't- running. So where did the Lander history come from? More evidence, I think, that this isn't just the game with VR turned up to thirteen. There's more going on here."

    Miyako smiles and leans back in the grass on the riverbank, resting her head. "Honestly I like the idea that this is all real. I like being me."

Ayame gives an uncomfortable smile at that "I know people who'd agree with you" She nods, looking away with a sigh "I should head back to Eas. Still. It was good to work with you both. Talk soon, yes?" She asks hopefully

Goldenblade boggles at the idea this might be real. That would be more fantastic than she's prepared to credit. But she nods at what Ayame says. "I have to make a side trip to see a man, then I'll be back at Eas as fast as I can."

    Miyako nods. "You two have fun," she says, "Ayame, wanna have dinner later? I'm heading on to the village to talk to the locals about all this." She flashes the Sylph a grin.

Ayame shoots them both a look, then nods slowly "Sure. I'll find an inn and settle in. See you there" She tells Miyako, smiling a little. GB gets a smile as well, before the sylph turns and trots away