Duty Session 518: The Phantom Colosseum

    At the big raid to help take down the dungeon boss Hifumi learned that there are giant crabs that infest parts of the island. So he's gathering adventurers to head off and hunt through the area for giant crab hunting grounds. Giant crabs should mean giant crab meat, and giant crab meat would mean he could work on another signature dish for his resturant.

Schneider knows Hifumi pretty well by now, and even though they're not in the same Alliance, he is more than willing to help Hifumi expand his menu. It is guaranteed to be worth it, as far as he's concerned. So, the Exploder Wizard will join this expedition, giuving Hifumi a wry grin. "I haven't done this one in ages, and I got a Rose, so I'm not sure which way to go to get crab meat. But I'll run it with you until we find it, if you like?"

    The presence of a true ninja is never expected, which is why it might come as a surprise to the other adventurers when the dragon-masked kunoichi makes her appearance from the foliage behind Schneider and Hifumi, bursting forth in a flurry of leaves to land in a classic ninja crouch, one hand with two fingers extended raised next to her masked face with the other on the ground as her brown ponytail swishes from the movement.

    "Nin nin," Raiza greets the others solemnly, before slinking casually up to her feet in a relaxed slouch, the two fingers still held idly in nin position. "Did I hear something about a crab run?"

    Hifumi nods to Schneider "Well while we were raiding the boss I heard there are giant crabs and if I can get a reliable source of giant crab meat I'm sure I can make up some Crab Nigiri or crab Sashimi, or even crab tempura." he grins "See I'm working on expanding, and having more of my monster dishes will help with that, the stat boosts are good for business." he chuckles as the kunoichi asks about the run. He nods "Yup, we're trying to find where the giant crabs nest around here."

Schneider doesn't know the same classic ninja things as Raiza, it seems, and starts as she just appears out of nowhere in that odd pose. Wait, is that just a normal V-salute? "Uh, hello," he replies to her. He's not sure how to reply to her greeting. As far as crab runs go, he nods. "We're going to get Hifumi some primo ingredients, if we can," he explains.

He ahhhs as Hifumi explains, and says, "I like stat boosts. For a bonus, I can broil them in the shell. But those all sound so delicious, I'm getting hungry already."

    Schneider has done this often enough to learn what it means for Hifumi to run a party. Hifumi hands out Tasty Rat Bento with Pickled Triffid Salad replacing the usual Umeboshi. "Well can't adventure on an empty stomach." he says "Eat up while we sail over." he nods.

    The ship however runs into the Phantom Atoll and ghosts. "Lets get this done, find a way to get us past these ghosts, they're always a problem."

Schneider will spend the first part of the journey looking at all the life. No wait, that's a different journey. Schneider spends the first part of /this/ journey eating free food, actual good food, and he's not going to complain if his bento originally crawled around looking for cheese. It's tasty, it even says so on Inspect.

But then there's reefs and ghosts, oh my. Well, Schneider's got the solution for that! "Gunzenro!" he shouts, pointing at one of the ghosts, and a white hot flame engulfs it. "Gunzenro!" he casts again, and another is incinerated. It's got to be the bento, he's blasting the ectoplasm out of these ghosts left and right.

    "Nigiri? Sashimi? ...Tempura?!"

    The red draconic visage may mask Raiza's expression, but it can't mask the wonder that she shows at the suggestion of such delights. Her hands slip swiftly behind her, and in the blink of an eye, she's brandishing a pair of kama as if they were a knife and fork.

    "Truly a noble endeavour. I offer my services, free of charge!"

    Those familiar with Raiza would know she's not even a roleplayer - which would mean this kind of behaviour is just how she acts when there's an offer of Japanese cuisine on the line.

    Future culinary prospects are one thing, though. Present and palpable offerings are another. Raiza accepts bento and salad with the same depth of attention that most gamers would afford a food item - to be consumed hungrily and without question or Inspection. She spends the ship ride devouring the Triffid Salad before moving on to the Rat Bento. The mask, of course, is pulled away from her face for the partaking of the meal, revealing a pretty face with green eyes and a scar on one cheek.

    "Thanks for the food - I was pretty hungry. Busy grinding all day - I love the noodles in this! They're kinda chewy, but so tasty."

    As she makes the comment, she holds up a rat tail, about to bite the end off, when she notices the fog of the ship graveyard looming ahead. She bites down and chews the piece like a morsel of jerky as she gets up to her feet and moves up toward the ship's bow. And then...

    "Ghosts!"

    Raiza sweeps her mask back over her face and hops up onto the railing of the ship, balancing gracefully amidst the rocky ride.

    "Hey, you don't need to mess with us! Look, if you're hungry, you can have this!"

    She offers the remaining contents of her bento - half-eaten rat tail and all - to one of the ghosts as it looms toward her.

    Hifumi nods at the Ghosts and starts haggling for some citris fruits he keeps in his inventory all the time. Everyone knows you need citris even if you're a ghost pirate no one wants scurvy. Once past the pirates the captain lets the party out at a dock.

    Once the party is on solid land they start for the Colosseum, heading through a small town setup around the entrance to the arena when an ambush is sprung! Sahuagin spring from doors and windows, spears and magic flying in many ranged salvos. Breaking outof the ambush becomes a real priority, either to get backs to a wall or get into the colosseum.

Schneider laughs as Raiza quickly gets on board with Hifumi's program, and volunteers, even. That's a bit ahead of Schneider. But it takes several gouts of flame to subdue the ambush.

Schneider chuckles as we fight our way ashore, getting his boots on dry land and eyeing the onrushing horde and shouting something eldritch, holding his hands in a dramatic way, calling up a magic shield that the onrushing horde falls on top of, but then can do nothing to him. "Hah!" he shouts, flames dripping from his hands savagely struggling against Schneider's shield until a fire spell to the face ends his career in a spray of pixels.

    Her offering accepted as the phantoms flee, Raiza sits down on the rail and gathers herself, stretching out one leg across the top while the other dangles above the deck.

    "Gee gee," she bids the dissipating spectres, along with her fellow crab hunters, before washing her meal down with the contents of a flask previously concealed under her red sash while the ship makes landfall.

    When the crew arrives on the atoll, Raiza disembarks with a light leap, landing cat-like with her tabi (a tabi cat?) on the beach. She maintains a position on the flank of the party as they approach the town, kama held at a low ready position. Then, at the first sound of a Sahuagin horn, she drops into a ninja crouch and...

    "Nin nin."

    ...vanishes.

    Flees?

    *SHHKK SHKKK*

    Apparently not - as a series of criss-crossing red slashes blossom across the torso of one of the fishfolk, kama slicing brutally through the kunoichi's victim.

    "Twin blades cut swiftly
    A fish out of water gasps
    Sashimi on sand."

    The ninja whirls around, ducking the spear of another Sahuagin and cutting its legs out from under it with a low sweep of her kama before she rakes the other kama across its throat viciously.

    Hifumi looks at the ambush. "Run for it!" he shouts, dipping and dodging, the flowerdrake on his shoulder breathing flame to intercept spells and buffetting with it's wings to push javalins off target. He continues running glancing back at the party. Who are more inclined to fight their way free than just pretend to be a star striker on a football team.

    Once the party makes it into the Colosseum and start running around the maze like paths inside the team finds themselves at stairs leading into water with magic to let them breath. "Alright... it's the obligitory underwater bit... I remember this sucking a lot so ... keep on your toes."

Schneider will follow Hifumi once he's advancing, the sahaugin blown up or stabbed, and he looks around curiously to see what's what. "Obligatory what?" he asks Hifumi, but by then the paths have led us to stairs down into the drink. "I guess we're going underwater, then?" he says aloud, and with a hastily cast spell, he'll hop into the water.

Consigning himself to the flows and currents was not the very best idea, perhaps, as he's dragged from the main route into off-paths and eddies. But raw power seems able to get him back on the course of the flow, and he flows along.

    As a Sahuagin spearman suddenly lunges from the shadows of the corridor ahead of the party, a fan of kunai flies from the shadows of the corridor behind - the contribution of the kunoichi to the team's safety as they navigate the maze.

    When they arrive at the underwater section ahead, Raiza lets out a sigh behind her mask. "I need to train my swim skill at some point - I hate these sections."

    She dives into the water and, thanks to her sleek aerodynamic (or aquadynamic?) form, finds herself zipping along at relatively rapid speed through the water-filled tunnels - trying her best to keep on the same course as the other pair by desperately using her kama to hook herself into the right passageways.

    "BRRB BRRRBBBRB!" she burbles in frustration.

    The party manages to survive with just a bit of a beating and the stress of 'running out of air music' in the end. Then they reach a sunken ship it looks like air will be in short supply. They dive towards the pockets of air that can be found.

    Submerged under the water, Raiza pulls out a small device, pressing a button as she holds her breath. A series of red laser lights point in every direction before starting to converge on a single point - but flicker out. It seems as though the relic may not have been waterproof after all.

Schneider has many strange and edritch ways of finding things out. He is the Scale Librarian, and odd bits of information seem to come to his fingertips at odd times. So, it is perhaps not strange that he suddenly knows just where to find air amid all this water and froth and sunken ships.

    The team manages to find some air pockets and a tunnel to an underwater cave. And then.. It's a giant Kenyan Mangrove Crab! "We did it! Crab city, lets take this thing down, I'll make sure I have a map to get here... and then I can send people after crab meat." he grins and sends his little drake in to attack the crab. Of course even Snapdragon gets its share of the Triffid salad so he's got regen and that helps out.

Arriving at the underwater cave, Schneider takes a look around, and eyes the big crab, and tries to huck one of his fire spells, but it fizzles, hardl surprising given all the underweater. "Fine, fine," he grumbles, and he will haul out his sword, which the alert will notice is his starter gear sword, and stab the crab as hard as he can. While he is not hugely useful, he does manage to contribute to the overall effort, as much through perserverance as capability. But success is what counts, right? Right?

    Finally, the Megacrab rises before the party. It seems that they've found what they were looking for.

    Shaking her soaked ponytail, Raiza assumes a ninjutsu stance, one hand extended forward with two fingers extended together and the other arm held back.

    "Sashimi... nigiri..."

    Leaping forward with determination, she positions herself at the crab's flank.

    "...TEMPURA!"

    She slams a palm forward, waves of heat building as she drives it into the weak point of the crab's shell for -

    Not-so-massive damage.

    It seems that being completely soaked has made the Ragnarok's Wisdom technique somewhat less effective, as rather than a huge inferno, a puff of steam is released. This angers the crab, causing it to slam a claw into the kunoichi's midsection and send her flying backward against a wall.

    Hifumi with Snapdragon, Schneider and Raiza do in the end take the crab down, looting it. "Now that I know where it is I can send hunters so we get better meat drop quantities." he grins "Then crab will be on the menu." he chuckles "Good work and thanks. Your next night at the Isekai Ryokan is on the house both of you."