Duty Session 514: Investigating Payon Cave

The Guild in Ninetails have helped to guide the party to a location where, they say, there is a noticeable undead presence. It's mostly thick forest, but there are mountains in the middle distance. The party must make their way through the forest, which is infested with lower-level undead, to get to the Payon Cave, a dungeon that was once a mine, but is now overrun with undead. Clearing out at least the highest level of the mine will reduce undead activity in the area.

Haru, fully rested from his Weird Mood of glassworking, has taken the request for a simple investigation within Ninetails. All work is important, less the undead become the new Gnolls, which in turn were the new Undead, and its due for being retro fashionable. He waits by the entrance to the Paydon Cave, taking note of the geological location for minerals that might be there. He may not be able to Mine, but his Earth summon, Terra, is well built for it.

Yeowang had done a lot of the organizing to get the Guild to get adventurers to clear out the cave, and the surroundings. There was some goal that will be achieved, certainly, beyond just eliminating undead, but eliminating undead is always good. She has used such woodland lore as she possesses, which is not a lot, to aid the journey. In truth, she's a deadly hunter, but not really great at a lot of the ancillary tasks. It's a weakness, but only so much can be done at once.

Uta walks in leisurely. Her white staff, in the shape of a white snake coiling around a ruby red gem in the anatomically correct shape of a heart, arrives on the designated spot for the quest.

She looks around. "I was just wondering," she blurts out without any context, "are ghosts technically boneless skeletons?" She's looking up and away, distracted, finger touching her lips.

As the party treks through the woods, they can see that it's not a normal place. There are few birds and fewer animals, and what there are tend to burrow and hide. There are tracks and trails, though what uses them is initially not clear. As the party follows such a trail, which seems to lead in the right direction, they become aware of a small squad of skeletons marching toward them. The party will have to fight these skeletons to get to their destination.

Haru keeps his summon, Eve, out with him. These days Eve is looking larger than usual. A year ago she was the size of a housecat. Now she is the size of a small dog or a larger breed. Two tails have grown to three. The eyes are still red. She walks in the shadow created by the Artificer. "It makes sense we would come across some undead," he says as he spots the skeletons with the same excitement as he might encounter a racooon. The four small stones circle around him, pulsing raw arcane bolts towards the critters without breaking a stride forward. "Thats a good question for Kau, Uta. Possibly Setsuna. I always had assumed that Binders and Spirits were raw mental anima whereas skeletons and zombies are raw physical ki. In that regards, skeletons have more in common with a programmed robot and ghosts have more in common with AI." Another bolt fires off. "But since my focus is elementals and object anchors in Artifice, its hard to say. I impose my will on an anchor and the elemental forms around it. In that way, its like a necromancer imposing their will on an object of bone and making a skeleton out of it."

Yeowang nods to Uta as she arrives, and shivers at the question. "I hope not," she says, "They're all made up, of course," she says, though it's the talking-yourself-into-it tone. "But this is a game, so they can make up what they like. But then, it's just a game monster, not a /real/ ghost." -That- seems to calm her down quite a bit more. Was she looking nervous for a moment?

But when the paty of skeletons come marching along, the solution becomes obvious. Or, rather, the plan becomes obvious, the solution is a bit tricky to implement. Stepping out into their path, she gives one a hard strike with her fist. It's no worse than hitting a board, and with the pain dampener, it's like wearing boxing gloves. Spin-kick takes out another, but then she needs to scoot back before she's surrounded. She dances around them, striking and stepping back, until the party manages to defeat them. She looks a bit relieved. They were still a bit spooky.

Uta nods along to Haru. "Or like when time comes to summon slimes. Or handle monsters in general." Yeowang gets a similar acknowledgement. "There is some unifying logic in how to deal with these monsters, indeed. Possibly... recycling the same bit of code for everything? Seems like the basics rely on an imposition of Will. Mind over Matter-"

The last vowel is cut short, as skeletons appear.

Uta clasps her hands around her staff, closes her eyes, and causes the gem atop it to glow as she begins to recite, "Oh powerful Holy Light of Divinity and Healing, here I implore you, cast your Blessing upon this Land and purify it from the Unholy Creatures which- OW OW OW let go of my LEG!", Uta yells, as she begins to bash the skull that's gnawing on her calf using her staff, creating wakes of high-intensity light like in an high-exposure photo; Each Whack, a flash, each blow, a shattered skeleton. She eventually launches into a martial dance of pirouettes, swipes, jabs and plain old smackings that makes luminous polychrome confetti out of her portion of the undead squad.

"...sorry for the interruption," Uta apologizes, panting, once she's done, as she adjusts her nurse's cap that got a bit lopsided as part of the exercise. "What was I saying again?" An intense frown perches on her features for a few seconds, before dissipating. "...I guess it wasn't that important. Nevermind over Doesn't Matter."

The party has navigated through the forest and entered Payon Cave. The entrance is wide enough for about three players to enter side by side, though it narrows to two farther in. It's dark, and stinky, and the reason becomes clear as the passage opens up into what was once the initial staging and organizing area for the mine. A large group of zombies are standing around, motionless until they spot the party. Then they lurch forward to attack.

The party can fairly easily evade these slow zombies, and of course fire works on them. They are also not very perceptive, and can easily be avoided by a party creeping around the outside of the room.

"Werefangs and Caits are made up too," Haru offers a somewhat unpopular opinion, "as are fae races. Anything that isn't human. But. They still follow metalaws to exist. Things like genetics and influences." He takes a deep breath. A game. Elder Tales is a game. War is a game. Anything can be 'a game'. People are certainly playing God(desses) with their lives. "There is reason to believe that monsters follow a degree of law as well. You can't code an object that doesn't have things like a class or variables. There is an elegance to it, else we'd be seeing a lot more chimeria-like shenanigans where arms equals 3 and skin equals water vapor." No. Dont be a thing. Please no. Burn the idea with fire of people free-form hacking the object database for monsters. Much like how Haru burns this here zombie. With fire. Lots of fire. Like it was a zombie spider. Oh no, dont make those either.

Yeowang nods as Uta discusses other monsters and situations and things. She tries to take all the game knowledge in, but there's so much, and it all seems so arbitrary sometimes. But the fight is over in any case, and the cave is discovered. It was not hard to find, the trail led straight there.

She nods to Haru about the other races being made up, which may be why she selected Human as her race. She is not on a firm understanding with 'made up', which Haru seems to be following a mental track that ... "Careful," she calls quietly, because of actual monsters.

She looks around, judges number and position, and sprints. Running flat out, she manages to stay just ahead of the mob until she gets enough of a lead and they eventually lose interest.

"Gotta be honest with you there, Haru, that sounds about right and I can give my first hand account that it feels kind of weird to be something that doesn't exist," Uta comments, an involuntary shiver running down her spine and causing her dark wings to flutter, while her hands rub the upper part of her crossed arms. "But, as you point out, here I am, somehow."

Zombies. Time to become one with the Darkness and sneak, sneak, sn-

"That reminds me!", she exclaims, with a snap of her fingers that causes all the zombies to turn towards her. "When I delivered the manticore Li Gan had asked me to capture, he mentioned he was surprised to see hybrid, chimeric monsters in Yamato. He didn't expect them to be here. And- STOP BITING MY LEG!"

Holy bashing resumes.

The party has navigated through the forest and entered Payon Cave. The entrance is wide enough for about three players to enter side by side, though it narrows to two farther in. It's dark, and stinky, and the reason becomes clear as the passage opens up into what was once the initial staging and organizing area for the mine. A large group of zombies are standing around, motionless until they spot the party. Then they lurch forward to attack.

The party can fairly easily evade these slow zombies, and of course fire works on them. They are also not very perceptive, and can easily be avoided by a party creeping around the outside of the room.

"Everything you say matters to me, Uta," Haru notes on the earlier topic of being distracted. He is an aloof guy. Has a matter-of-fact way of addressing topics over matter-of-feeling subjectivity. So when he says something matters it comes off as genuine, if not steril. Even if Uta gets distracted, it is part of who she is and all things are equally cherished as the whole. His fire magic showed his state of distraction. It was lackluster to say the least. The Adventure-y skills he doesn't get as worked up about anymore. Haru isn't much of an Adventurer. He is a crafter and an Enchanter. "Thanks for looking out," he tells Yeowang on the earlier actual monster warning, "and I'll need a hand on this part. I developed a strong Arte for breaking puzzles but navigating and searching is a weak point. Adventuring leverages all kind of talents, at least."

On the topic of Uta's existance, the wandering gives some time to chat more, "You are you. Every iteration, every version. I played Angelic Layer in the past, a fair amount, and I often wondered about what free will would do for one. Kind of like the Persacoms." Ah Angelic Layer and Chobits integration, you majestic beasts. "Huh," something Uta said made him think. Not the leg biting. He runs a finger along the side of his monocle, which is as close to pushing up glasses as you get with a half-pair of glasses. "Maybe alterations are a new thing. We've all seen what these meta superpowers can do. It shouldn't surprise me that people are tampering with the code. Or the DNA. Its all data in the end, even in the world we came from."

Yeowang nods gravely to Haru about looking out, and as far as giving a hand, will look around with a puzzled look. "Where are..." she begins, but then something looks familiar. "I think I came this way before," she says, and will try to lead the way on, smiling to Uta as she comes along, only slightly chewed.

"Come on, come on," she says, leading the way through the maze of twisty passages all alike. It's not apparent at first, but she actually has lucked into the way. Who knew?

"I come! I come!", Uta replies to Yeowang, scrambling to follow her lead! The smirk is politely left unmentioned.

"...Iteration...", Uta repeats, as if rolling the word in her mouth to assess its taste. "...You have a point there, Haru. I guess I -am- still me, despite not being me anymore. Because once I become something that I am not, well, by definition, what I am not becomes what I am. So, there's no way for me to be something I'm not." After this tangled reasoning, accompanied by some gesticulation of fingers pointing in various directions and tangling arms, her smile widens in satisfaction. "Not bad for someone who doesn't exit!"

With a shake of her head, she resumes the discussion from earlier. "I think Li Gan meant that it's strange for them to be in -Yamato- specifically. I should try to remember his exact words exactly, but I got the impression he thought it would be normal for them to be -elsewhere-, just not on this server." Looking up and away, she taps her chin. "And considering how the Palace Lands don't seem to have hybrid monsters apart from Dire Hybrid Beasts, I think Li Gan might have been thinking of a server we haven't visited yet..." A blink. "What are you still doing here?", she mumbles, and skewers the zombie head gnawing on her leg using her staff. Shatter!

"And now, time to find the way!", exclaims Uta, and-

Well, the Goddesses know where she went off to.

The party has made its way through the maze of twisty passages all alike, and have arrived at what seems like some once-important area. It may once have been a staging area for miners heading out in various directions, or it may simply have been an ore-rich area that was completely mined out until only the cavern remained. Something has made its home here, though. A small bed lies in the middle of the cave some hundred feet distant, and a dresser with a mirror. A lone candle flickers fitfully on the dresser. It's almost like a home for some sad, pitiful recluse.

Further investigation is prevented, however, as a frozen male corpse - much too fast to be a zombie, jumps out from a side passage and leaps to attack the party, mindlessly proclaiming how he will protect the one he loves with all his might. For some reason, he moves only by jumping. There is no reasoning with this one, he must be destroyed, but he is fast and agile and it will not be simple.

Yeah, Haru was not lying about not knowing how to navigate. This is nothing new. "Exactly so, Uta," he says, making the most out of their time being lost. "I think, therefor I am. We are not who we were before, so thinking about what we were before is historical reference. Its also worthwhile for pragmatists, as planning for happiness in the future when you will be a different person from when the plan started? Limited results." He smiles, if a bit muted these days, "Huh. In Yamato specifically? Then when we go back to the Palace Lands we should compare. I plan to find Feng Huang because I have been searching for the Phoenix since the Apoc event and Feng Huang is the closest thing." Is that why he want to Seeker's Landing almost a year ago?

Ore. This is one of the reasons why Haru likes to expl-ore. It is difficult getting precious metals and minerals on the market. The depleted mine is a good reminder of this. It is the candle that gets Haru's attention. There is something poetic about it. A dark, empty cave. The only light is this single candle. A candle in the dark. "As it is with those disconnected from society and reality. To descend into darkness and into madness by the world of light beyond. We create our own monsters and craft weapons to destroy them, so that we can feel good and safe within our own reality," Haru is a bit more 'Haru' right now. Like that kid at the coffee shop that tries to sell you on how coffee is just bean juice, man. It might be expected for Haru to start bolting out spells, but he does not. The four stones collect in a line in front of him, erupting into an arcane blade into his hands that he grabs. Thin as a rapier. Pure magic. The enemy is too fast to get good Wave Artes off and he owes it to the beast to address the denial of its existance head on.

Yeowang is listening to Haru as he waxes philosophical about life and who we are and what we are doing here. She had the same conversation with Shiruba and Jazuhanzu just the other day, but from the other side of the perspective. Somehow maybe. But all that is interrupted by the jumping man's attack. This guy is hard to hit, and the jumping is wildly unnatural, which makes it hard for her. Most monsters at least move kind of normally.

But Yeowang is resouceful, at least. If her small attacks have trouble, she can bring out the serious attacks. The ones she uses on the really dangerous monsters, which this guy kind of doesn't look like to her. She will wait until a jump takes him straight away, and hoping that he can't change direction mid-jump, she executes her own flying roundhouse kick, and BAM, nails him, though it wasn't as clean a hit as she would have liked. Still, it'd score a point in a tournament. Solid impact.

Some say you can't spell 'explore' without 'ore', others will say that you cannot spell it without 'lore'. Others yet will be quick to add that you cannot spell it without 'xp', either. Uta, at the moment, is not spelling it without 'EEEEEEEEEEEE!'

Suddenly reappeared after having wandered off to roam the cave (and the surrounding area. probably), she's now back with the party, and resuming the discussion with Haru, the last bit of which she managed to catch before getting temporarily lost.

"I suppose it's the best way to go about it. To chain the masterful reasoning of the two greatest philosophical minds of all times, I think I can confidently say that 'I think, therefore I yam what I yam, and that's all what I yam.'" Beam. "Thanks, Har-"

Leap again! "Seriously, dude! We're engaging in introspection here! How can you expect us to explore the nature of Self if you keep bounding around the place?"

Spin the staff, and create the most massive current of air to be seen this side of Payon Cave in... well, at least since that candle was lit, likely. Unless the flame is kept burning through unnatural means.

As the undead Bongun cries out in death, there is a stirring in the small circle of light in the center of the cave, A young girl, it seems, and beautiful, but with a tragic look in her eye, crawls out of the bed and timidly approaches the party in a series of what seem to be hopping steps. When she sees the party clearly, she hops forward, and when she gets close to the party, she smiles, revealing razor-sharp fangs. "I hunger," she says pitifully, "I hunger so much." And she tries to slake that hunger by attacking the party. She is deadly in melee and must be confronted at range, or else with Earth magic that can mire her. Those with Holy powers may find them of use.

There is a slow blink as Haru sees the tragic looking girl appears. "The world is filled with these details. Its a fine balance between letting yourself sail through it like an astronaught through a starless sky and being distracted by the present danger," he says as he looks at the pitiful creature. "Does anyone else find this scenario a bit," Haru looks for the words, "heart breaking?" He does, at least. Even without all the context clues, there is enough here to put in that the fate of these two was not pleasant. The world isn't built around justice. These things happen. "I'll make it quick and painless."

The four floating stones around Haru begin to slow down as a powerful Wave Arte starts into its chant. Unlike other Artes Haru uses, there is a metallic sing-song sound that comes from the resonation of the stones. It sounds like when medicine balls are circling each other. They hymn out a "Rrha yant ga guaysu fowrlle yorr." The ground becomes swept in snow. A blizzard begins to form in the enclosed area, changing the landscape entirely. Only it is not snow. It is thick volcanic ash. "Ashes to Ashes. Dust to Dust." The concentrating young Artificer says as he stares at the hungering Munak, causing the burning and blinding flecks to concentrate around her. "Ashfall Snowblind."

Yeowang arches a brow as the scenario unfolds, and she suddenly wonders if this maybe is /her/ fate also? If she never finds Jae Gu? Will she die and come hunting for flesh? Will he find her later, and defend her corpse to his death? It's too tragic!

But she needs to be stopped, so she steps up, and gets beaten savagely for her trouble. This may /be/ a future her, but she has zero chance of facing her in melee. She dances back, and as Haru harries her, she will pull out her bow, and use the Hunter skills she uses so very rarely, actually scoring hits for once. Almost certainly because the target's movement is hampered.

"To heal, that belongs to me," Uta comments to Haru. She would put a hand on the Artificieer's shoulder, if it is clear enough that the gesture is not going to disturb his casting. "I will take care of the 'painless' part."

Uta, once again, clasps her hands around her staff, and as she intones a haunting, mesmerizing tune, tendrils of light in various shades of blue and green flow across the main body of the rod, traveling up and down, spinning, flowing into the gem and focusing there.

The gem resonates, and the haunting tune is somehow spread across the room. People who have been in the Maidensong Isle quest will recognize the tune, and the feeling: it's just like a Siren's Song!

It might not directly deal damage, but that is not its goal; its goal is to keep the hungry creature entranced. Still. With her feeling numbed.

And if the creature is capable of pleasant feelings at all... possibly elicit those.

She would also comment to Yeowang, given their recent discussion, about her worries, but Uta is no mind reader. But, hopefully, the song will be able to bring her a little calm and peace too?

There is a small smile back to Uta on her identity. A healer. Haru affirms that as he trusts the work of the three of them to do what they can. Thats all they can do. It is a resounding victory. As humane as can be considering the situation.

The monsters have been cleared from the Payon Cave. The restless undead have been put to rest. Relief enters the region once more and coin enters the Adventurer's pockets!

Haru gives Yeowang a pat on the shoulder but does not say anything. He recalls how Yeowang got here. How she was looking for Jae Gu. How the Apoc put a wrench into all of this. No words, though. Not the language for the situation. He lets the snowlike ash settle on the field, going to where the one candle was burning. He takes out another, lightning it next to the first and setting it there. More than fifty percent more candles now. "To hope," he says, giving a look to Uta, then to Yeowang, "that power belongs to me."

Yeowang does derive a bit of peace from Uta's song. It's strange, but there you go. Not being good at magic doesn't mean it has no effect on you, and whether or not she believes it works in RL, it certainly does work here, in entirely concrete ways. That she doesn't understand and can't reliably replicate.

As for hope ... "The weak can hope. I will do." She cements her will together, and now sounds entirely composed and back to her usual self, with the look in her eye that bad people do not like.