Duty Session 470: Obligatory Rat Maze

Flickering torchlight casts long shadows in the cellar beneath one of the city's shops. Crates are stacked against the walls in neat rows. Everything seems neat and organized. It is clean in a way that you normally wouldn't expect, without even a hint of dust or spider webs.

What there are signs of, is rodent activity. Some of the crates have been gnawed on, their contents spilling out onto the floor. There are droppings in small clusters here and there. No wonder the poor shopkeeper is upset!

However, the most unusual thing is the large crack that runs up along the wall of the cellar. It is just large enough for the tallest of Adventurers to uncomfortably squeeze through. The air from below feels cold and has a fetid smell to it. A distant sound of squeaking echoes up from an ancient, spiral staircase that descends into the shadows below.

"Rats!", exclaims an unusually excitable Uta with a suspicious glint in her eyes and a suspicious aroma about her (not that it's very noticeable in this cellar, to be fair). "I need more for my laboratory experiments!" She underlines the sentence by holding her hypodermic syringe vertical, and squirting a little liquid.

    Fuka will never not support her friends. She's just glad that, right now, Uta's basic needs are taken care of. Reasonably well-fed, mostly clean, probably not well rested but not feverishly exhausted. It could be worse, her current obsession. Going to acquire rats for study is fine. Going to acquire them for food... well, admittedly probably also fine. Just a bit ew. Besides, in her experience these under-cellar expeditions have a reasonable chance of falling into running water at some point. Sewer water isn't exactly clean, but as long as there's no disease it can fill a need too!

    "Careful, Uta. You're squirting." Fuka observes. "I know you're excited, but let's not get carried away here! We have a mission to remove the rat problem. Removing the rats seems like a fair way to go about it to me!" she grins.

Curtana had been told stories about a 'kung fu nurse' and how she had been experimenting on slimes for quite a while now. Curtana hasn't been sure if the stories about someone like that were simple exaggerations or not. As far as he knew, slimes are just annoying monsters that need a bit of population control and were not real major threats.

Having met Uta, even for just a short time, is making him start to feel sorry for the slimes.

Trying not to let the thought of feeding rats to slimes bother him too much, Curtana creates a small orb of light to hover above as a light source. "We're pretty much getting two bir-well, rats with one stone here. Clear out the rat problem and get Uta some...supplies for her research. Should be easy enough." Easy doesn't mean they should get careless, though. One could likely notice how Curtana still keeps his shield at the ready.

"FUKA!", Uta armflails at the tiny Sylph, with the obligatory blush. "YOU'RE MAKING THIS WEIRD!"

"Indeed, I will-" A pause. "Have I introduced myself? Uta Furore, Aerialist, Musical Kung-Fu Nurse, Monster Handler, and so many other things I've lost track. Currently researching anaesthetics to ease Lander pain," she introduces herself to Curtana, with a bow. "Rat quests used to be among the easiest in the past," she continues explaining to Curtana. "Yet, of late, they seem to have gotten more difficult. Something is afoot here..." Uta intones a short aria; helical tendrils of light and magic dance on her staff, coalesce into the gem at the top, and when the incantation is done -- the gem glows faintly, enough to function as a magical torch of sorts in the dark recesses of the cellar.

At the end of the spiral staircase, the light the Adventurers carry flickers over uneven ground. There are sharp spikes that stick up in places, making it look intentional, as if it were some sort of trap. However, as they step closer, something crunches underfoot.

Bones. The floor is littered with bones. Some appear to be small, as if they were from many rats having met their ends here. Others seem to be larger, as if the creatures were some monstrous variety. "It is quite unusual for animals or monsters to leave this many drops behind, something must have killed a great many things here," Uta explains, as she waves her staff left and right, to shed some light. She stands still, and perks her pointy ears. "Did you hear this? I think I heard some sounds."

    "I'm totally not the one making this weird!" Fuka protests insincerely as she makes things weird, grinning in playful amusement. "I, for one, am not holding a syringe and going all mad scientist!" she claims. In this, at least, she's correct. She's just the one carrying a sword named Frank. Perfectly not scientific, despite at least two thirds of the origin of the name. "Anyways we need to find the rats before we can make them lab rats. I'm sure there's something around here. Look around everyone, squeal if you see something!" Fuka says, using the tip of her sword - a long heavy-looking weapon stylized to look like a jagged lightning bolt - to poke around almost squeamishly.

Curtana does take a moment to return the bow towards Uta before they start to descend down the spiral staircase through the crack. "Curtana Willowbright, traveling Knight and no one of any major reputation. I just enjoy traveling around and helping people, be they Lander or Adventurer." The news that the rat quests are starting to get more difficult are a worrying sign that something is amiss, though. Perhaps it won't be so easy to find some rats to procure.

As for Fuka...well, he already met her just a short time ago. He's already learning not to be surprised if she did make things weird, but that doesn't help to hide the blush forming on his cheeks.

The bones are a grisly sight, but nothing seems to be lurking among the bones. The light coming from the hovering orb above his shoulder doesn't seem to be pointing towards anything obvious, and the room has no obvious exits. Continuing to walk around, a step of a heavy boot brings up a sound different from most of the stone around him, and Curtana steps back to get a clearer view. "Oh! I found a trap door, everyone. Certainly not rat made, though."

"Oh, wow, that's a nice sword," Uta comments to Fukaziroh, as she gets close enough to take a good look at it. "Is it new?"

Uta walks over to the trap door that Curtana found, "Hmm. I am no expert animal handler, but I would also be inclined to say that this does not look like an artifact of rodent culture."

She pulls the trap door open, revealing nothing but darkness below. "I guess we'll have to jump...". A few tests would reveal that it isn't a particularly long fall, and as the group drops down, they soon discover that the dungeon seems to have come to an abrupt end.

At least, it appears that way, at first. They find themselves in a cylindrical chamber with no obvious exits. However, there are a number of strange things about the room. There are unusual gaps in the stone here and there, with nearby indentations that look almost like keyholes. There is strange writing scrawled on the walls that look as if it may be some sort of language, likely explaining something about the room.

Most unusually, however, is a lute that looks pristine where it lies against the wall. It is almost as if it was left there. A rat peeks out from behind the instrument, squeaks at their sudden presence, and then runs into a hole in the wall, vanishing somewhere into the tunnels below.

    Fuka is as proud as a new mother as she shows off her weapon. "Meet Frank! I made him myself!" she claims. Well, more like she got some highly skilled weaponcrafters together, gave them the appropriate materials, then planned the etchings and engravings and cores to give it more function than just a slashy-stabby-smacky thing.

    She temporarily puts the blade away however to navigate the trap door and the short descent. Leaves it away when investigating the musician room. "I feel like I've been here before..." she muses, looking around. She still has zero clue what the scribblings on the wall are, though she suspects they're some sort of code to solve the magical musical puzzle room. "Oh hey look, a rat!" she points suddenly, only for the rat to disappear in a hole far too small for even her to follow.

    "Rats. Uh... Songbird, you want to try the lute?" she offers instead, then notices Uta seems otherwise distracted. She shrugs, and picks up the instrument. Perhaps surprisingly to some, when she strums it she seems to actually have some clue what she's doing. "What do you say? Shall I sing you two a love ballad? An exciting, pulse-pounding tale of adventure? The ballad of Frodo who they called Eleven Fingers despite him having only the normal number on his hands?"

Uta is taking the lead on jumping down the hole in the floor, and Curtana isn't wishing for the first time that wings properly worked in this world. Thankfully, it's not a long fall and shouldn't be too difficult to get back out of, so they just need to be careful getting back out.

Landing down in the depths, Curtana would take a glance around to see if he could make any sense of the senseless scribbles carved into the stone. No matter how long he seemed to stare at them, they don't magically shift around into something he can understand, and he feels a headache starting to form. Pinching the bridge of his nose, Curt takes a moment to calm his mind. "Shame things can never be simple in these dungeons. I miss those days."

Seeing Fukaziroh actually keep the notes coming from the lute in tune is a surprise, but a very pleasant one. "Not really a ballad, but i'm more a fan of Bilbo over Frodo myself. Honestly felt more like a proper story than the drawn out story that trilogy was."

"Pleased to meet you, Frank!"

Uta feather falls to the ground, touching ground with the tip of one foot first and then the other. She gives her wings one flick, and looks around. As Fuka notices, she is quickly lost in trying to interpret the scribbling. When Fuka calls to her, at first she goes 'hm?', and then, as if realizing something, whips out a (really nice looking) fountain pen, and scribbles down something hastily. "Here, play this!", she says, extending the music sheet to Fukaziroh. "Loremastered on the spot. Should give us access to the next chamber."

"I will have to agree with Curtana there. There is a certain immediacy, a certain je-ne-sais quoi that makes me prefer that particular work to the longer ones."

She frowns. "Although now I'm wondering why people misdiagnosed Frodo with polydactyly. Is it a song about medical malpractice?"

The tunnels continue to weave beneath the surface of the city. Sometimes, the group finds themselves coming to places where the path ends in rubble or empty corridors, forcing them to backtrack through the maze-like tunnels.

Eventually, they find themselves skirting the edge of a large chamber where a massive looking creature slumbers. Someone makes the wrong sort of sound, but one ear twitches in their direction and red eyes snap open, a massive rat head turning to face them.

As the monster stands, it licks at a muzzle filled with pointy teeth. Foam has formed at the edge of the creature's mouth. Its danger rating is unusually high for a creature found in this level of dungeon, as if it has somehow been affected by some sort of buff. With a mad scramble of paws, the massive rat starts to charge towards them.

    The mystery of the 11th finger of Frodo will have to remain unsolved, perhaps. "Well perhaps the love ballad of the Pooka Legolas and the Gnome Gimli then..." Fuka offers before trailing off to examine Uta's loremastered song. "Huh." she muses, apparently at a loss for words. Now, Fuka's not an amazing musician but she's competent, and it takes her little time to pick up and pick out the song in question, allowing them to continue along.

    Seeing what comes next, Fuka halts. "Uta, no!" she says with all the caution one might use when Paige is looking thoughtfully at a cactus. "We'll find another. This one's got rabies and I prefer my friends to only foam at the mouth sometimes!" She doesn't even wait for acknowledgment, instead turning her sword upside down to gesture with the hilt. Chanting runewords of earth and projection, she channels a rockfall trying to either bury the feral ratling or block it off.

Seeing how Uta managed to seemingly make a song on the spot and combined with Fuka's musical prowness allows them to continue through these rocky caverns is a sight to behold. Well, that, and Curtana would have been scratching his head for days trying to figure out how he could have continued on his own. "I honestly see myself as more of a Boromir type. He had an amazing choice in a horn."

The sight of the massive rat is a shock, only because the knight was honestly expecting the beast to be at the end of this adventure. "I absolutely agree. If the rats are supposed to be for your slimes, we don't want them foaming at the mouth either!" Chanting under his breath, Curtana calls upon his connection to the earth in order to send spikes upwards to pin the rodent of unusual size down in place. It seems to be less effective than the falling rocks from above, but every bit helps.

Uta's eyes glint with excitement as she takes a Paige from Merek. "I am going to Data Drain- I mean, sedate it. +_+"

Uta runs towards the rat from one side, while the rat charges on her. At least, she's drawing aggro for the team?

(Due to her build, she shouldn't be drawing aggro)

At first it is Curtana's spikes that just out of the Earth, but with a series of powerful zig-zag leaps, the rat dodges all of them. Then it's Fukaziroh's runes, that rain rocks on the creature, and dock off a sizeable chunk of HP. Finally, when the Spriggan and the Rat are close enough, Uta leaps in the air with a yell, does multiple flips, and finally raises a bottle of potion while chanting a low, growling tune with sudden high-pitched notes.

Tendrils of magic dance on her staff, coalesce on her gem, and a beam is shot towards the ceiling -- and a massive stalagtite shoots down to shatter the potion, drench the rock in it, and skewer the rat.

The rat stands there, transfixed, both metaphorically and literally, until it slides off and, immoble, THUDs to the ground, despite still having some amount of HP left. Uta tentatively walks over and takes its pulse, by resting her hand against its jugular vein. "...It's alive!" Clenching her fists, she looks at the rest of the team, excited. "Successfully anesthesized!"

It is not much further down a larger set of tunnels that the group begins to hear a strange sound, like metal scraping on stone. A dimly lit chamber lies ahead of them, and as soon as they enter, a series of armored ratlings turn in unison, making a sound like an army moving in step.

Each of these creatures is small, standing on back legs, with rodent-like features. They wield a variety of weapons of questionable quality, but seem to move with an almost militant sort of unison. One of those at the front gives a squeaking sound, as if they were commanding their forces.

Uta just stands and stares. "...What is this, the battle of Elm's Squeak?"

Then, with a high-pitched yell, the little army of ratlings charges forward, poking and prodding at the Adventurers with their tiny weapons. It would be adorable... if it didn't hurt so much.

    Fuka's not sure how she feels about Uta managing to anaesthetize the rabid rat. She considers just finishing it off but eventually decides that perhaps they'll find more suitable subjects later and she can persuade Uta to carry them off rather than going back for a rabid rat that's currently half-crushed by rock. And if not, well, no big deal right? As long as her friend is satisfied, that's all that counts.

    Entering the next chamber, Fuka grins as she sees the tiny rat horde. Armored rats! With little weapons! Normally she might be squeeing in delight at the cuteness, but today she's got other things on her nasty little mind!

    "I see a bunch of fresh victims!" Fuka calls out, gripping Frank in a manner vaguely kendo-like and squaring up. The sword powers up, lightning flickering heavily across its blade. No, it's not a spell. She didn't chant, though she did pour power into the blade. "Frankenstein's lab needs fresh bodies!" she cries out. "TASER MODE ACTIVATE!"

    What comes next probably is best described only in abstract. It's probably fair to note that lightning is not equivalent to a taser burst. And also fair to note that a lightning blade is rather effective against opponents armed and armoured in metal.

Curtana makes a 'tch' of annoyence as the giant rat refuses to be held in place with those earthen spikes he created. "Darn. My hocus pocus has been all out of focus lately." Thankfully, where he may be dropping the ball, Uta and Fuka are there to pick it up. Uta, despite the warnings from both him and Fukaziroh, went all out on the giant rat, and even manages to deliver some kind of potion that paralyzes it completely. Curt takes the time to just clap his hands together with an impressed look on his face that the kung fu nurse managed to capture such a huge creature. "Well...that's certainly something I couldn't do. Remind me not to get on your bad side, Uta."

He's not sure how impressed he's going to be when they help Uta drag it out of here, though.

Such a large hoard of rodents could be intimidating to some, but this sort of situation is exactly what Curtana does best. "Then come, let us march to Elm's Squeak. To War!" Charging forward in the front, the knight seems to be doing a suicide charge straight into the middle of the rat hoard. Then he lets out a vicious roar, waves of blue light flowing from his body to capture the attention of any rodents that wish to give battle. Those that were foolish enough to ignore him and strike out at Uta and Fuka were the targets of a longsword to their back. "There will be no dawn for rats!"

The unrestrained power of lightning slashes through the miniature rats the way a certain Artificer might slash bloqs, if bloqs were available for slashing in this world. Which they might or might not. Pixels fly around everywhere, plenty of rat bones are dropped -- and sometimes even '1 x Fried Rat Meat'.

Curtana's plan, this time, goes without a hitch. His flawless tanking attracts hordes over hordes of tiny rats, poking at him with their tiny lances, slashing at him with their tiny swords, and even the ones farther away, who cannot yet hit directly, squeak squeaks not meant for innocent ears.

Good thing Fukaziroh's the only one around to hear them.

"My bad side? Why's that?", Uta asks, without realizing what is going on. She mostly spins her staff and blows rats around using air currents.

Through another set of tunnels, the way underground opens into what would now be a familiar, circular room that seems to always designate a boss encounter.

This particular room is filled with a variety of small trinkets gathered from all over the city above, creating a personal stockpile of the monster who calls this place their home. For some, the sight of the little kobold sitting atop his pile of treasure would be familiar. He was one of the boss encounters in the first version of this dungeon.

However, upon spotting them, the Kobold darts to his feet and dives onto an absolutely massive rat that he seems to be using as a mount. Brandishing a spear, Squeak - The Rodent Rider charges forward, ready to defend his hoard of treasures from the Adventurers, yet again.

    "Songbird doesn't have a bad side!" Fuka observes defensively. "So you don't have to worry about getting on it. Her front side's nice. And her back side... well I certainly don't need to tell you, Curt!" Fuka grins in malicious cheer. Fortunately for all, the rats at this point are pretty much dealt with, and Fuka's sword has run all out of taze. Oh, and Fuka's mostly teasing. Mostly. "Besides she's a nice person! Unlike me!"

    And yet, when the group advances to confront the final boss, Fuka is quick to step up. This time she uses another (relatively) new trick, channeling energy within with the aid of some fresh runewords. Protection, shadow, self, shell... her skin floods with dark mana, turning the little sylph into something more appropriate to an unseelie fairy of the winter court rather than her typically bubbly cheerfulness. She doesn't physically change except for the shading of her skin, but the resulting change does seem appropriate somehow to the coming of winter. Not nice indeed.

    With that added armour, she wades into melee combat, trusting her defensive shielding and Curtana's solid presence as protection that'll allow her to focus on the attack, deflecting incoming strikes into something relatively ineffective in exchange for her being in position to retaliate with the weighty hacking strikes of a heavy blade.

    When the fight finally ends and Squeak lies pixellated, Fuka breathes a happy sigh and turns to her friend. "Well, that hurt!" she says happily. "I bet you know JUST THE THING to help, right?" she offers Uta

Tanking the vast attention of the hoard upon himself does help to keep the worst of the damage away from his fellow Adventurers, and his gleaming platemail manages to give great protection against the shoddy weapons turned his way. It's the simple advantage of numbers against him that lowers his HP significantly, but he's giving a pleased smile at their handiwork after the battle is done. Curtana starts to sip a bottle of red liquid down to get his health back up and gives a quick thumbs up towards Fuka. "Glad to see Frank in action. The name is a great choice for it."

Curtana doesn't seem to make any vocal reaction to Fuka's teasing, but the bright red blush on his cheeks that are visible despite the poor lighting shows he heard it loud and clear.

He turns his head towards Uta and makes an exaggerated head motion in the direction where the giant rodent from earlier was, trying to change the subject. "Swords and spells are something i'm completely fine and capable of handling. Potions that can knock something that size out in just a few seconds? That can be terrifying."

The kobold by himself would be a simple enough opponent by himself. The rodent Curtana was internally calling the Rat King would be more challenging, but only due to it's size. The two of them working in tandem, however? They're proving to be worthy of the title of final boss of a dungeon.

He may not have any fancy magical tricks up his sleeve like Fukaziroh does, but the kite shield Curtana is using is quite effective at keeping the kobold's spear at bay. Calling up a coat of flames on his longsword to help aid his cuts, Curtana joins the melee. He works defensively, waiting for openings from spear and claw before striking out with several slashes, and he falls into a rythum.

Letting out a sigh of relief as Squeak breaks apart, Curtana flicks his longsword a few times before sheathing the blade. "Great job, everyone. That was a lot of fun, all things considered!" And the saddle he retrieved from the chest is pretty neat as well, though he's not sure how useful it would be for him.

"Fukaaaaaaaaaaa!!!", Uta flails, all red in the face, at the comments about her sides.

"Well, it was a concomitance of circumstances," Uta admits to Curtana. "Had to get its HP very low anyway first, otherwise it wouldn't have worked. It would probably be too unreliable to use in combat -again-, but it did prove an important point for my research!"

And then -- boss fight! In the thick of battle, Uta's contribution consists mainly in shooting a beam of magical energy from her staff, and keeping the boss in place -- or directing it, in a manner reminiscent of the proton packs of a certain franchise.

Don't cross the streams, it's bad.

When Fukaziroh mentions JUST THE THING to help, Uta's eyes return to glint, and -whoop-. There comes the syringe, ready to strike. "Just tell me where."

In her excitement to test her new experimental drugs, she completely forgets to pick up any loot.