Duty Session 536: Escort Quest: Artificial Stupidity

The adventure begins just outside of town. The Lander seems both excited and anxious, having never strayed this far away from home before. They are dressed for travel, wearing basic armor and wielding a simple sword. "It shouldn't be too far." They explain. "I need to deliver an offering to the shrine." Then, with a nervous expression, hands wringing, they add, "It's just... that there are rumors of monsters along the way. So, that's where you come in, right?" There is an uncertain laugh from the lander as the group begins their journey into the wilderness.

An offering? That sounds nice. Soujiro hasn't done a dreaded escort quest in some time so he signs right on up. Happy smile that will be unmarred with the ire of pathing issues and broken quest logic. His secret? Tea.

People with eatery establishments are popular for quest runs. Usually because they bring some of their wares along for the longer ventures. Needless to say Vertina is no different, having made sure to bring several bundles of yakitori skewers and flasks of juice with. "No point in adventuring on an empty stomach. Or dry throat." It's not rumors. There -are- monsters. But let's not spoil the moment or their ward might decide not to go in the first place and that would be some manner of weird fail condition.

Schneider is here at the quest start point, and he smiles to Seta and Vertina, looks at the Lander with a wince, and shrugs. "One of these, eh?" he asks his fellow adventurers. To the Lander, he says, "We'll get you there, safe, no worries." He looks around, then strikes what he hopes is a dramatic pose, his ornate coat half-unbuttoned on this June evening. A breeze blows back his hair, though those with an eye for it can spot that the breeze was his doing as well.

Shenmi approaches the group, hands on lapel, his usual smile plastered on his face. "My, my, so this is the quest from the Hunter's guild, isn't it? Funny how convenient these things go. I happen to need a quest," rather -- the reward for that, due to a certain tab at a certain tavern, but he does not mention that, "and lo, a quest happens to need me. A perfect match."

As it is usual for him, he bows and doffs his hat to all the presents. Soujiro, Vertina, Schneider, and the Lander who commissioned the quest. A couple turtle-doves from the Palace Lands (half turtle half dove, of course) fly out in the process.

The group travels for a time, following the main, well-traveled roads. However, just because they are well traveled, does not mean there is not danger. After a time, those who are keen-eyed would spot what looks like a flock of birds gathered along the roadway. "Oh, they're just birds. Go, get out of here!" The Lander tries to shoo them away, only to have all of the little bird heads turn in their direction. They take wing, beginning to circle around the Lander, diving and pecking at them. Raising their hands up to shield their face, the Lander shouts, "Ow, ow-- ow-- ow! Bad birds, bad birds!"

Bad birds indeed! Soujiro makes use of his magnetic personality to stand near the escorting Lander. He extends a hand Disney princess style, letting a few land on his hand, shoulder, and head. He doesn't need to say anything. Souji has one of those warm personalities that is a total chick magnet. Or a scarecrow by the amount of little birds around him and comical hearts blipping around their heads.

Schneider's solution for birds is to take control of the forces of air, the same ones he commands to blow his hair back dramatically, to blow the birds back dramatically away from the Lander. "That'll clear them out," he says, though the birds seem preetty mellow at this point anyhow.

That's a neat trick, but the Samurai better be careful or the chicks and the waterfowl he left at home might get jealous.

But of course no matter how awesome and charming and sparkly someone is, there's always a few in the crowd that have to be pricks and no go for it. Those are the birds that remain flocking in the air cawing and shrieking.

Those are the birds that Vertina knocks out of the sky with some Airbender bursts, sending them crashing off in the distance in the bushes. "Look, now the bird in his hand really is worth more than those in the bushes!" That's not how the saying actually goes but she doesn't care.

"Behold!"

Shenmi locks an intense gaze onto the birds: he stares straight into their eyes, as if attempting to hypnotize them.

Which... is exactly what he is trying to do, and succeeding at, as it seems. The birds stare just back, but they seem less and less active as time proceeds. And less... and less... and-

Thump. Thump. Thump. The birds eventually end up completely frozen. Birb.exe has stopped working. They just describe a parabola as gravity and inertia plunge them towards planting themselves beak-first into the ground.

And for those who don't... hey! Look! The turtle-doves are swooping in to attack!

"There we go," Shenmi grins to the group. "Should be done pretty quickly. I think it's safe to proceed and leave them to do their thing."

After a time, the party finds themselves on the edge of what looks to be an old wood forest. Mist lingers in the trees and the canopy only lets flickering glimpses of light reach the forest floor. The path seems overgrown with underbrush and fallen branches. What is worse, is that the forest shows signs of nearby monsters. Claw marks are visible against the tree trunks in places. The Lander, however, seems oblivious to this danger. They just keep walking as if nothing were wrong. "What a pleasant set of woods!" They then trip over a rock in the path and go face first into the dirt, making quite a bit of noise. "Ow. Hahah, oops." Those monstrous themselves might be able to traverse safely, but others may need to find a way to keep the hapless Lander from giving away their position to the lurking monsters.

Soujiro looks around the wooded area with bright, curious eyes. "It is like the Lost Woods," he makes a reference back to a classic game. Lost is a good reference to the Lander's antics there. The samurai offers his MVP a hand back up again. And again. And again. What might frustrate someone after a dozen falls does not seem to bother Souji much. Its okay to fail around him, he will help you back up.

... Yeah, we'll let Soujiro stay with the Lander, he's clearly the one with the patience for it. Vertina only has to be patient with paying patrons, and this isn't the tavern.

Still breaking out in a fight with a bunch of monsters with their charge so blissfully ignorant wouldn't be optimal right now, as much as Scales itch for a fight. So she tries to sneak past the obvious marked trees.. and gets foiled by the ominous cliche of brittle branches being stepped on. Which is enough for Vertina to skip trying to be sneaky and just book it for the next segment of the quest.

Schneider smirks at the Lander, and gives Seta a confused look. He doesn't get the reference, clearly. But he can help out, sort of, drawing in the darkness of the woods and bringing it around us like a cloak, to shroud our presence from the monsters' awareness. He steps carefully, which is uncharacteristic for him, but it's a measure of how he's trying to do the right thing and not just solve everything with a fireball. That's a different adventure.

"Careful..." Shenmi begins, as he silently kicks a stick away from under the Lander just before he cracks it with a loud noise. "You shouldn't be- whoops-" He casts a miniature fireball to woosh a thorny vine out of existence just before the Lander gets snagged by it. "I think it'd be better if- oh for goodness's sake!", he exclaims, finally sounding furstrated, as he yanks the Lander away before he walks straight into the aggro area of a gigantic anthill... crawling with ants. Glowing dire ants the size of fists at that.

"May I suggest... -looking- where you're going?", Shenmi extrudes through gnashed teeth.

The journey continues, drawing the Adventurers and their Lander companion to the edge of a rocky outcropping. There is a steep slope on one side, and a drop off on the other, making it dangerous going. Eventually, there is an area where the ground seems to have given way, leaving a long trench preventing them from going forward. "Well, this is trouble. I wonder if there is some way around..." The Lander comments, and begins to search around the area, with little luck. When prompted, he seems to keep repeating this thought over and over again. For the Adventurers, however, there are a few options available. A large rock seems like it might be able to be knocked down to give them a way across, but it would require the right combination of skills to break the piece loose. "I wonder if there is some way around..." The Lander repeats.

A hand is put on the Lander's shoulder. "No sense wondering," which is a Soujiro way of living. He is very rarely stuck in his own head. He lives for the now and the moment. Such as finding new ways to do feats of athleticism! The samurai picks up a large rock nearby and chucks it like a baseball player towards the even larger one to create a bridge. Ka-Krack! Souji Swol Arms to the rescue.

Schneider will see what he can do to help the situation, but there's not really anything that can be helped by setting on fire. "Not much I can do here," he says apologetically, but it looks like the rest of the party has it covered.

Vertina seems to be thinking the same thing as Soujiro. Though instead of picking up a rock and throwing it, she runs back a few paces to find a larger one. And gives it one of her patented shaolin soccer kicks! Sending the rock hurtling at the boulder.

And it turns out she actually kicked it -too- good, because her impromptu ball ricochets off the boulder from the speed and angle, only chipping off a few bits of stone as it arcs off over the crevice and lands on the other side. ".. Ah... uh.." She just shrugs. "Sometimes you can be -too good- at something?" the salamander murmurs meekly.

Shenmi prefers to work smaller. Instead of the smaller rock, he levitates many smaller rocks, which he quickly directs in a continuous stream to construct some sort of railing, aka 'pedestrian barrier.' "Don't want our protege to fall down a chasm, do we?" He might very well be the only way to keep him to walk straight off the bridge-rock.

The party exits out onto the plains, where it seems almost as if it should be a smooth journey from here. There is no sign of monsters or dangers, only a straight path through the grasses. "Gosh, I'm hungry." Wait what? The Lander walks to the side of the road and sits down. "We should stop for a break. How about some food?" They look to the group of Adventurers, expectantly, then their stomach rumbles. "Aren't you hungry, too? How about some food?" Clearly, they won't be able to continue on without feeding the Lander...

"How about some tea?" asks Soujiro. No. Food. Error, wrong item inserted into NPC. "I've been meaning to learn Hunting for better drops. This will be a great opportunity to train," says the upbeat samurai. However the world doesn't /reward/ optimism. It does in the longrun with good positive habits. But today? The loot drops out there just don't have the RNG to come back with a big haul to cook up on his hunt.

"I... uh..." Shenmi scratches his head. "Hunting is not my forte, but I will see what I can do."

He disappears in the distance, only to return some time later, empty-handed. "Sorry, no edible drops."

Remember the beginning of this quest when Vertina had the bundle of yakitoris and commented on not questing on an empty stomach?

Foreshadowing or not, that's what is relevant right now as Vertina takes the skewers and juice out to pass out to the group.

Schneider is not one to avoid taking a break, so when we sit down to rest, he will dig through his inventory to get out his starter fishing pole. He never did much with the fishing minigame, and his clumsiness shows clearly. On the other hand, the stream nearby is like wall-to-wall fish, and even an idiot could get something out of it. And Schneider is that idiot. He returns to the campsite with his catch, looking pretty pleased with himself.

Once on the road again, it seems as if it is only a short journey to the shrine. The location seems to be old, but enough travelers must come this way that it is not completely overgrown. There is an image of a knight, crouched, a sword held before her. A piece of cloth covers the stone statue's eyes. "We're here!" The Lander exclaims, then tries to rush forward, only to be stopped when series of bird-like monsters descend from the nearby surroundings, landing on or near the statue. Except... these are not birds. They have twisted figures, humanoid faces, wings, and taloned feet. Harpies. They seem to have claimed this place as their nest. Around the shrine, there are a series of broken instruments, suggesting that perhaps other travelers had tried to use some kind of music against them. "Ahh! Harpies!" The lander shrieks.

Harpies are just a different kind of chick. Double chicks. Souji does the same thing with the last birds and /befriends/ them. Who is more enchanting? Souji is. Radiant Sword Saint, ho!

Schneider blinks as the harpies show up, trying to block our path and eat our Lander. "There'll be no Lander for you," taunts Schneider, amnd hurls, "Damned!" at them, but the quick-cast spell doesn't pack much punch, and the harpies flying aroud are hard to target, so he winds up not being particularly effective. Still, it's just harpies, right?

Let's all be glad Vertina doesn't try to sing.

But being a Salamander she doesn't need to sing to get some hot licks in. Just a bottle of her custom made booze to amplify her fire breath, and start roasting the bird women stunned by the performance.

"Now, -THIS- is what I call 'A Job for Shenmi Jinreng, Master of Illusion, Crafter of Magnificence, Weaver of Wonders!" He moves as if dramatically sweeping his cape, except he has no cape. "...I seriously need to go visit Gwen one of these days. Once I have paid off all tavern tabs."

Enough talking! Shenmi darts into action, zigging and zagging between the discarded instrument; a lute here, a koto there, he taps on the bodies of the (mostly stringless by now) items with his knuckle, ear resting against them; sometimes he grimaces, but on occasion, he beams, satisfied.

He slowly piles them up in a... strangely familiar configuration?

"There we go!", he exclaims, as he runs back with a (non-giant) taiko, which he places right in the middle of the configuration, resting on the ground, which makes the whole picture finally click: he used the broken instrument's soundboxes to create a drum set. He sweeps up a couple of bones from the ground, pushes the brim of his top-hat up enough for Bao the bun-bun to peek out, and goes, "Assistant? It's time to show these monsters-" He leans forward with a grin, as if he was about to start a motorcycle race. "...some -sick beats-!".

And as he launches into an fast, elaborate, powerful, and extra-loud drum solo, solo whose intricacy can only be explained by Bao jumping out from under the hat and leaping about the drums in perfect harmony with Shenmi, making it more like a duet, technically, than a solo, one can see the soundwaves confuse and perplex the Harpies.

Or maybe they're just enraptured by the show?

Screeching from the sound of musical notes and flailing back from the magical onslaught set against them, a few of the harpies burst into pixels, defeated, while others take wing, fleeing from the shrine and leaving it once again, empty. "Oh, phew." The Lander gives a sigh of relief as they walk forward. Out of one of their pockets, they pull out a carved war horn, laying it before the statue and bowing their head. "Please, goddess. These brave souls deserve a token of your blessing. Gift them with your courage." At first, nothing happens at all, at least nothing noticeable. Though, perhaps in the minutes or hours that follow, each Adventurer would find a small token in their inventory, bearing a symbol of the goddess. How did that get there?

A relatively uneventful escort. "Loot," Souji says as he gets the notification, making notice of the token and taking it to inspect it a moment. "Looks like the Goddesses have noticed us," he says as he gives that winsome samurai look to the sky. Wind breezily making his hair and kimono move around. Mission accomplished.

Vertina dusts her hands off after all the harpies are dealt with. "And people complain about Escort Missions being a pain. I'd say we handled that pretty handily, the four of us." The escort got here alive despite their self-sabotage attempts after all. Then gives Shenmi a slap on the back, prehaps a little harder than necessary because she doesn't really think about her strength much of the time. "Didn't know you had that skill in your hat of tricks."

"I am a man of many skills," Shenmi replies to Vertina, mysteriously. Until the pat on his back sends him fly face-first into the taiko.

No damage done! He quickly extricates himself. "But, more seriously," he admits with a shrug and a grin, as he gets up and holds his hat upside-down for Bao to jump in while he adjusts his hair with a comb he just flicked into existence (not from his menu -- it's just, hand flourish, bam! Comb.). "As a Conjurer, as I've mentioned in the past, I am a combination of Acolyte and Summoner. And I get musical skills from the Acolyte class..." He places his rabbit-containing hat back onto his head, and bows to the rest of the party. "Thank you for all your help, Schneider... and thank you very much for leading us so competently today, Soujiro."

Schneider smiles to Shenmi and says, "I'm glad I could help out. It's really a weird quest type, but not too hard," he says, clearly unaware of the genre that this quest is parodying. "Let me know next time and we can run whatever you like."