Flight Experiments

Schneider has, at some investment in effort, brought his one airship here from the tower. It was a huge effort to build it, and it's easier to move than rebuild, but maybe only just! They flew down to the Tower's first floor, that was easy enough apart from the stairs, but it had to be partly disassembled and portaged out the door. Once outside, the mast and airbags were reinstalled and inflated with air. Since player-based Fire is a bit wild, propane heaters, much more steady and controllable, were used to heat the air in the gasbags. But they were only heated partially, enough to lift the ship 5-10 feet so it wouldn't have to be dragged from the Tower to the sea. A team of grunties had been hired to pull it there from the Tower entrance, and the wagon driver that was hired was a lowbie adventurer from Scale so as not to complicate things more than necessary and ask odd questions.

Once at Carmina Gadelica Marina, the grunties cast the airship off, and Schneider and crew piloted the airship to the water, then slowly dumped the hot air, letting the gasbags deflate and packing them as they could. The airship was provisioned, then sailed like any other sailing vesseel, with the gasbags stowed as cargo. Scalies have some members with nautical experience in this world, so some crew was borrowed from the captured pirate ship, and captained by Llyn, to sail this craft to Breg Epona, which took nearly a week.

Schneider then remounted the gasbags and reinflated them with air, and once again used a small amount of propane to heat the air just a bit, enough to lift the ship about ten feet. Twenty was his intended ceiling, and one assistant was detailed to watch a short trailing rope and shout if it left the ground. In that way, the airship was flown, slowly, to this ship's cradle on a small rise southeast of Breg Epona, which some players may regognize held our second test airship a year and a half ago. The ship has been re-provisioned, but only for a 2-day journey, as the trip will be short either way. Schneider is dressed for the desert, wearing a pale dustcloak over his normal clothes and a loose cloth covering his head and the back of his neck, though his long white hair flows out from under it.

Uta shows up dressed for the desert as well.

Unfortunately, the only set of clothes fitting the desert's climate she owns is Gwen's 'Desert Dancer' outfit.

"I've been told there would be flight," Uta says, as she just... appears on the spot. One moment she wasn't there, the next, bam. There she is. "If it is true that there is flight, I want one flight please." She stands there, at the side of the airship, facing the same way the contraption does, holding her staff. Then she turns sideways, and seems to notice the item for the first time. "Oh, cool. What is this?"

She turns to Schneider again, gesturing at the airship. "Did you make it?", she asks with a smile.

So they needed a captain right? Well she can help with that, it's been too long since she'd hbeen on a boat so how could she say no to this? Also she was a healer which made her a bonus to have along. Even more so she was an Undine too. so she was here with bells on for this whole mess.

"So you been at this for a while, It's good to be out and about like this Mr. Schneider."

She pauses and looks to Uta for a moment with a grin on her face. "Hello good to meet you! A trip with a pair of hotties."

Oh god...

Schneider blinks as Uta sort of shows up from nowhere, and the outfit draws a wolf-whistle. Then he clears his head and ohs, "You've flown on this, Uta, in the Tower. We sailed it here because building another for just this experiment would be a pain, and I'm pretty sure we can keep this from getting wrecked like last time we flew from here." Which Uta may also remember. He smiles to Llyn also, smirking as she mentions being a healer. "Thanks for sailing us here," he acknowledges. "So we can /all/ heal, then, that makes things easier." As for a trip with a paid of hotties, that's just the lot of a bishounen protagonist.

He gathers all the prospective fliers around, consisteing of Uta and Llyn, and says, "Okay, this is my plan: We sail southeast from here, cross-country, at about a hundred and twenty to a hundred fifty feet of altitude. Our very first flight experiment," which Uta was unavailable for, "discovered that one hundred feet seems to be the altitude that triggers the gargoyles. We will keep one person on lookout at all times, and one person on monitoring height at all times. We will proceed southeast over the desert for about four hours, then land, and take up a defensive position. I don't know what all is in the desert, but we ought to remain alert. About eight hours from launch, we anticipate that if the gargoyles will have launched from the Tower, and not returned when we landed, they will arrive. If they have not arrived in twelve hours, we will re-inflate the gasbags and sail another four hours toward the coast. If they do arrive, we'll have to fight them off or they'll destroy the airship."

"The first wave will be defeatable if we concentrate our ranged attacks on them, and since we're landing before we fight them, there should only be one wave. If they turn up and we fight them, then we'll re-inflate and re-launch, but back to Breg Epona, and staying at twenty to fifty feet altitude, so we won't trigger them again. Are there any questions?" Schneider looks around to the team members, making sure to add everyone to a dungeon party now, so if there is a fight, we can use party/raid chims.

When the comment about a pair of hotties is dropped, Uta blinks at Llyn, confused. She looks at Schneider. She looks at Llyn.

"I mean, sure. Both you and Schneider -do- look attractive... oh. OH." She bursts into laughter. "No, no, don't worry, thanks for pointing out that I have good options here, but I'm not interested in dating."

"I did?", Uta double-takes when Schneider points out she knows the airship. She takes a long, intense stare at the flying contraption. "...did you do something with it? OH! It's a new hairdo, isn't it?" She turns to Llyn. Frowns again. "What was I saying again- oh, right!" She turns to Llyn again, and says, "I like your hairstyle! You just changed it, right?" She look to her side, towards the ship, tapping her lips, "That's why I didn't recognize the airship at first..."

Uta keeps silent, listening to Schneider explaining the plan. But somewhere in the middle of his speech, something seems to suddenly trigger her attention, her perplexed gaze fixed on the Human. When Schneider finally asks if anyone has questions, Uta raises her hand.

"...Did you change your hairstyle?"

Llyn is grinning still. 5R
"Chain healing can be a very usefulk thing and oh? That s something I can help with but do note I'm only experianced on sailing ships. Though I grasp the idea of what we are doing!" She grins even more.

"Yes and thank you Uta!" She's beaming now.

Schneider ignores Uta's refusal to to date, he wasn't offering, and it'd be weird in-game to do that. Anyhow, having a kid in game and then leaving it here to go back to RL sounds like a sad plan, though he did see some players who had gone native do just that. He gives Uta a puzzled look when asked about his hair. "That," he says after some consideration, "is a complicated answer." Because while his hair did, technically change, it didn't change much in -appearance-, it's only a /smidgen/ lighter than it was. But this is Uta, she picks up on things. Schneider says to Llyn, "You're fine, I've flown this before. I'd just never -sailed- it, so that's exactly the experience you were needed for."

The ship is made ready for flight, mostly by junior Scalies working at Schneider's direction. Food for a couple days is onloaded, in case they're stuck in the desert, and parachutes are provided for Schneider and Llyn. He will explain to her how to use it. "It's intended for short falls, so pull the cord as quickly as you can if you have to bail out." And then Schneider adds to the propane-fueled fire that heats the air by turning the valve a bit more, and the ship slowly rises after a few minutes.

The ship sails, at about a hundred twenty feet, over the desert, making time pushed very slightly, only a bit above a walking pace, by Schneider's control over the winds. A rope, carefully measured to a hundred feet, hangs from the ship, and his job is to watch it and make sure it doesn't touch the ground, but doesn't get too far away, either. Uta and Llyn are charged with lookout, though the monsters are not expected for eight hours. That's how long it took them last time.

"You're welcome," beams Uta.

"I wouldn't know, Llyn, I don't have the first idea about water ships. Or airships. Or fireships. Or earthships- wait, no, the latters are called 'wagons', and I own one." She beams. "I know that one!"

Schneider mentions he has experience flying the ship, and that Llyn might be a great fit for sailing it."If you ever need help getting it pulled around by grunties," Uta chimes in, feeling like she had to say something at this point, "Uh, I've done that." Awkward silence. "I mean, steer grunties that were pulling something." She looks down and mumbles. "It wasn't exactly a ship." Her face raises, and she looks into the distance. "Although... hmm. I think the barrel that composes the main body of my traveller's wagon would float... would it?"

After tapping her lips a few times, she shakes her head, and moves on.

She watches the parachute with interest, and adds, "And in case of emergency, I can, at well-diminished ability, slow the fall of one unarmored person alongside myself. It will not be a -pleasant- fall, but we'll survive. So, let's stick close together, in case one of you needs help being rescued."

While time passes, Uta dutifully alternates between keeping watch and resting. She, of course, uses this time to keeps her fellow Adventurers company. "So, Llyn, how are you liking Yamato?"

Llyn looks over to Uta for a moment.

"I'm starting to be able to sleep at night somewhat again."

Landers haven't tried to do anything here then again the local alliances have been far more diplomatic than the certain people from the Palace Lands.

"As for sailing I did it since I was a child back in Korea."

She notes with a bit of a grin on her face.

She'll be getting to work now on her part of this task, she also will keep an eye out for monsters as well.

"Good to know I still have not found a way to unbind myself from the city in Palace Lands I started with..."

Schneider doesn't know much about water ships, but he didn't know anything about flying before starting this project, so we can all learn things. Schneider pilots the ship for about four hours, and then slowly dumps hot air to descend, until the keel is resting on the sand, and he will furl the sails, hauling lines to bind them snugly to the spars, so they're smaller targets in case they're attacked. "Okay," he calls to the others, "Help me dump the air out and get this gas bag folded up."

The gasbag gets deflated, and the sails have been furled, that is bound tightly to the spars so they present little target to the monsters we anticipate attacking the ship. Unfortunately, this means the ship slowly tips on its side as the lifting air is dumped out. The last of the air is expelled with the ship laying on its side, and the gasbags are folded and stowed.

Alas, the ship provides no shade in the midday desert sun where we're all waiting. The minutes turn into an hour, and an hour baking in the sun is not good. Schneider, at least, has anticipated this, and had warned everyone to dress appropriately as he has. Hopefully Uta is noy succeptible to sunburn. Water has been brought along in anticipation of this, and some of it is distributed regularly to keep people from getting dehydrated. Sadly, this much water attracts the desert creatures who can sense such things, and the party occasionally needs to bat away scorpions and lizards. Then, maybe a hundred yards away, from between two dunes, a lizard appears that cannot be batted away because it is as big as a bus. Sensing the boat's water, it scuttles forward, and Schneider shouts, "Protect the ship or we're walking home." He doesn't add, 'Or getting a free trip to the chapel if the lizard eats you.' It seems self-evident. But Llyn'd be in an even worse bind, so he says, "Llyn, you don't know? You just have to get citizenship in one of the Yamato nations to re-bind over here." He thought that was common knowledge.

"Oh, so... you were sailing outside of ETO as well? As a hobby? A job?", Uta asks Llyn when she mentions her previous sailing experience. Better no to address more glum subjects.

Uta gets out of the ship, and helps Schneider with the folding up and stowing of the gas bags.

Uta has brought some potions and lotions to help with the sun, but there's only so much one can do.

And then. IT CAME FROM THE DESERT. And went to... still... the desert, technically? IT STAYED IN THE DESERT. Hm. No, that doesn't quite pack the right punch.

In any case, the giant lizard of undetermined radioactivity approaches the group, and Uta, promptly, spins her staff. This is where one drops a clever and witty one-liner. See, it's an art: the monster approaches, and you have a window of only three seconds to think of, set up, and deliver your witty one-liner. But Uta's an Adventurer, and Adventurers are notoriously good at this.

Here it comes. 3... 2... 1...

She can't think of a witty one-liner.

So, one has no choice but just leap and start whacking the reptile with a staff, annoyed. "...Lizard... lizard... uh... pun with lizard..." *WHACK! WHACK! WHACK!*. "...hmmm... Rhymes with 'wizard'..." *WHACK* "Should I aks Gwen to make a little conical hat I always carry around, just in case we encounter situations like these?" *WHACK* "I plop it onto the lizard, and go, 'Look! A Lizard's hat!'" *WHACK WHACK* "No, no, it's dumb..."

The lizard, however, is strong. All Uta manages to do is hold it -- someone else will have to deliver more effective blows.

Llyn seems very happy to be doing this, it's been far too long she's been on some form of ship. Sure this is an attempt at an airship but hey she's sialing in a way then the monsters come. Llyn is not going to hold back she'll start chanting on the deck her hair going flying as she l4ets lose a chian of powerful holy explosions at the mosnters.

"YOU ARE NOT WELCOME HERE!"

Schneider chants, "Brain, Brain dead. Obey your blood oath, come forth from the land of Avalon. Fire of Gehenna, become a fiery blast and burn everything around us!" He gestures damatically, shouting, "EXODUS!" an explosion slams into the lizard, burning its HP bar badly, his explosions mixing with Llyn's holy explosions, but it still approaches, and Shneider has no one-liners. As it is nearly on top of the party, Uta steps forward and beats it about the head with her staff. It looks like it's about to take a bite out of her, then the damage over time from the ranged attacks catches up with it, and it bursts into pixels all over Uta.

Schneider looks relieved as the lizard is defeated. "That was not anticipated," he says, and then we set in again to wait. Luckily, as the afternoon wears on, the shadows lengthen, the ship, itself can be used for shade. About three and a half hours /more/ pass from when we landed, give or take a few minutes, and Schneider calls out, "Everyone alert for gargoyles. This is our window." Then nothing for maybe twnety minutes, but then, on the horizon, is that a mirage? The shimmering air resolves into flying shapes, black and human-sized. They are coming fast, headed straight for the party. "Okay," says Schneider, "this is what we all came for."

<Party attacks vs DC9, cards used must have Ranged>

Uta intones a Chant, alternating the sublime and ominous; it has strong vibes of a Dies Irae. Two beams blast from her staff, a green one hitting herself, and a red one latching onto the Gargoyles. As the technique is known for, it begins to sap HP from the monsters, and feed it to Uta, which was in bad need of it after all the time under the devastating beams of the desert sun.

"Lizard. Reptile. Tile. Tile bathroom. Reptile bathroom?", she mutters to herself. "-Still- terrible material for one-liners!"

Llyn does seem down with Schneider's chanting for his spells, not to mention he seems to have developed a number of custom ones. She would have to up her spell game at some point due to this.

"From the depths of the ocean I call forth the power of the tides to smite mine enemies!"

Then comes the burst of high pressure water bolts she seems pretty pleased now.

Schneider casts hurriedly, not one of his custom spells though its much more obscure than Exodus or Helloween, "Seek and destroy, oh spirit of the sinful inferno! Blood fire! Death into the Void! Impellittari's Fire Ball!" The fireball bursts among the attacking wave, and a few of them shatter into pixels. Llyn's water jets nail several flyers, pixelling them, and some others are simply unable to fly afterwards, fouled by the splash damage, as it were. Uta's strange magic links her to the few remaining gargoyles, and their HP slowly leeches away as they rush closer and she grows stronger and stronger, though her one-liner skill doesn't get any better. As they lose strength, they fall from the sky and smash into the ground, which finishes off any not slain by the leeching damage.

With the one anticipated wave of gargoyles driven off before they can damage the airship, Schneider says, "Okay. /That's/ a data point. So, our original plan was, if they did attack, we'd sail at =low altitude= back to Breg Epona. I'm happy not to wait and see what other sorts of wildlife come out at night, so ... " and we will have to go about getting the gas bags re-inflated first, which will require the party's assistance to expidite. That turns out not to be very difficult with Llyn, Uta, and Schneider using Air magic to fill the gasbag pretty quickly.

Boarding is a simple process with the ship on its side; Schneider tells everyone to stand on the railing with their back on the deck. Heating the air (once again) to make it lighter, using the propane burner, will bring the ship back upright in maybe twenty minutes as the balloon lifts us just a smidgen, and then everyone can stand up from now laying on the deck, and we can unfurl the sails and fly back home. At low, but not super-low, altitude. It's a bit more complicated, the low-altitude flying, but with an eye to giant lizards, Schneider's put on another twenty feet of altitude. But night falls, and it's much cooler now as we descend towards our original launch point. That base crew is hailed by chim and ropes are thrown down, and the ship is guided into the cradle as Schneider slowly lets gas escape from the airbag. Then, with a thump, we have landed in the cradle and some wag on the ground blows a whistle and shouts, "Moored. Shift colors," to Schneider's confusion.

"Well," says Schneider. "That was the experiment. They'll come for us even if we fly in short hops. Next experiment: can we fly up to Fort Ouph?" He just thought of that one. But it's night time now, so he'll take off for whatever lodgings he can find in the city, and bid farewell to the party. "Thank you all for flying Scale Airways."

"I'd love to try out that experiment! Fort Ouph!", Uta exclaims, pumped up by the energy she just drained. Gargoyles! Part of a complete breakfast! "My own Root City! So full of ancient Gnome Lore, waiting to be discovered! A Gnome which I am not, but still, they're cool-" She turns to Llyn. "Speaking of Undines," says Uta, despite this being the first time Undines come into the discussion, "We of the Loosely Organized Open Network of Students (we need a name with a better acronym...), are going for some underwater research about the Undines, and we could use some people like you. Remind Schneider an me, later on when we go to celebrate at a tavern, to tell you about the LOONS later, and assess whether you're a viable candidate..."

Turning to Schneider, she exclaims, "Speaking of Schneider! Thanks to our hottie pilot, apparently! And our hottie captain!", Uta beams, this time addressing Llyn. She still doesn't seem to have understood the original compliment was addressed to her. "Schneider, I'll be glad to assist you in your flight experiments any time you DETAIL!"

Uta punches her fist as she exclaims the last word, louder than the others. "I should have said, 'You made a big mistake. Let me explain why in DETAIL!' And then chop its tail off! Because THAT'S what you do to a lizard! De-tail it!" Uta, at this point, is walking around in circles, and gesticulating wildly. "Oh, DANG, Schneider, we have to go back now! I have thought of the perfect one-liner!"

Llyn liked where this work was going it was exciting and maybe she could make some actual new friends givin enough time to do so. She'll be making notes and doing a lot of sketches when all is said and done. She will be making use of air magic, not her best scool but enough to get the job done to get them up and going towards Fort Ouph.

"Sail on good sir."

Schneider gives Uta a worried look at the suggestion we go back, and the reason. "You know lizards /survive/ losing their tails, and regrow them, right? Cutting off a lizard's tail is unlikely to hurt it much." As to thanks and Ouph, he nods, and says, "When I have it planned, I'll let you know." Ouph will be interesting because it's a root town, so maybe flying there comes under special rules? He nods to Llyn, and wishes her, "Fair winds and following seas," as he understands is traditional among mariners.

Llyn pauses for a moment at Uta's offer and there is a big damn grin on her face as Uta explains what the LOON is and she seem to like the terms of it too.

"You have my attention on this Miss Uta. I'll be happy to see if I'm fit for LOON!" She will looks to Schenider for a moment. 5R
"I wonder does that apply to Salamanders not that I'd try something like that on people..." She admit it's just one of those huh sort of things.