Duty Session 90: Obligatory Rat Cellar

In each of the starting cities, there are at least a couple of poor merchant landers who have developed mysterious rat problems. This is clearly bad for business! A worried looking Lander stands outside their shop, rubbing their hands together, looking anxious, flagging down any passing Adventurer they can find to help.

Difficulty:    Easy
Rec. Party:    3+
Rewards:       3
World Rewards: None

Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     Aimless wandering is a passtime for some people. For Fukasa, it was mostly out of boredom at the moment. Not much was happening that she was aware of, and so she was in Alne browsing the shop. One of the landers waves her down, along with anyone else that will listen. "Adventurer! I need your help!" Calls out the merchant man. Fukasa glances towards him and starts to just walk past.

     The merchant briefly looks annoyed, but continues, "Wait, adventurer, I'll--" "Skip. Tell me what you need, I was just messing with you for a moment." Fukasa says, turning towards the lander with a shark-toothed grin. "L... let me gather a couple more people!" The lander says, "There's a lot down there, and I think it might be too much for one person." Fukasa crosses her arms in response to this, tapping her foot. "Fine, I suppose I can wait. I'm not doing anything else anyway."
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

Sure there's wandering, then there's the laz- the efficient route of waiting for a lander to run out with the proverbial exclamation point above their head. Book resting against her knee, Hisame's doing something with a bit of charcoal, though that ends rather quickly with a snap and pocketing the coal. "You've got no business sense if you don't talk to the people offering money for work." Standing up, brushing herself off and checking her armor briefly, the imp grins. "Please continue. I'm curious enough. Or skip to the end, either or."

A glace to the impatient undine gets a cheerful enough grin, "I'm good to go when you are. I figure two's good enough to get started at least. I think. We'll find out anyway." Hisame sounds completely relaxed with the idea either way.
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

What's this, another Lander with an infestation problem? Dareshetani was just on his way to the public bath house after a long dusty day, but the hyena werefang hunter hesitates when he overhears voices. "What's the trouble, friend?" he calls over. "Rats? Slimes? I can help. I promise I'm not one of the monsters," he smiles, ducking his head and showing as little of his teeth as possible to put the merchant more at ease.
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     The lander looks relieved at the appearance of two more Adventurers. Which seem to have much more pleasant responses than the Undine. Ahem! "Adventurers, my cellar has been infested with rats... again! I would like for you to go in and attempt to root them out for me." ... "...If you could find the source of them too, that would be nice. I will offer a reward, as I said. And of course you can keep whatever you find on the rats!" Not that there is likely to be much, right?

     Fukasa actually nods towards the Lander. "Sounds like a pretty standard quest, all in all." She muses on that. "I accept." She turns towards Hisame. "Probably two would be enough, yeah. Honestly for rats, one might be enough. Maybe. Maybe they have ROUSes, though." She muses on that. "Anyway, you can call me Fuka, for the purposes of any callouts or whatnot."

     Dareshetani gets a slight nod. "I'd be fine with you being a monster anyway." She flashes a grin. "Then maybe I could Handle you, make you do my bidding~." She says in a joking tone towards Dareshetani. There's... a slight edge that she might be a little serious, but considering her title is Beastmaster, she's probably just roleplaying, right?
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     "Alright anyway, let's head on down." Fukasa says, beginning to walk down into the cellar, hands resting behind her head as she walks rather relaxed and calmly. She starts to hesitate almost immediately, sniffing at the air. "Ugh... do you guys smell something?" She asks, wrinkling her nose and glancing around.

     The room is ... dank. Mold, moss, water damage, it seems like the place had been flooded recently. Probably not the lander's fault, after all, why would he have left his basement in this state? Possibly they could do something about the moss or ivy with knowledge of it, or mix a potion? And of course, there's that skittering in the wall from the rat problem. Perhaps there's a hole or something that it's coming from that would let the party break through?
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

"Ooh, not without buying me a drink first," Dare quips, giving the shopkeeper a friendly nod as he proceeds with the others down into the cellar. His nose immediately wrinkles at the smell. And then he has to outright cover it with one hand, coughing in response to the unpleasant air. "Ugh, smells like... something rotten," he remarks in a more nasal tone than before, trying to breath through his mouth only, not that that helps very much.

He makes a retching sound and slaps his other hand over his muzzle as well. The only option he really has here is to get through the miasma as quickly as possible. He darts forward, tears leaking out the corners of his eyes as he squints through the darkness looking for the tunnel opening. Because there's always a tunnel opening.

It's too much though. With a sound like a giant cat hurking up a giant hairball, he doubles over and vomits on the floor. He wobbles there for a minute, hands on his knees, legs shaking, and then, as his ears twitch in response to another skittering sound, he's able to lurch and stumble through the rot and into the slightly less fetid air of the rat domain beyond.
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

There's a moment where she checks the other two out, offering her hand up as she rests finds something convenient to be lazy against. "Hisame. It's kind of quick no matter how you look at it, isn't it." She shrugs, "Good meeting you Fuka. And canine-person." She then drops her hand, following in.

Then the smell hits her. "Huh, what a wonderful new smell we've discovered." She fishes around in her collection of vials, using her thumb to pop the lid of one and holds it up to her nose to try and mask the smell. Before looking down and finding the bottom of the vial broken. There's a dejected look "I liked that lavender." before carefully putting the vial down by the door. She'll grab it on the way out. Maybe.
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Dare leans against the tunnel wall for a minute, panting, wiping his eyes and then taking his waterskin from his inventory for a cleansing gulp. The first mouthful of water he spits back out on the floor with a disgusted grunt, then he takes a proper drink. "Ugh... I'm sorry, that was awful. On the plus side the shopkeeper probably won't notice MY mess among all the other grossness."
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     Fuka moves over towards one of the more brittle walls, listening for the skittering sound. "Hmmm... let's see here..." She equips her weapon, a rusted trident that seemed to be encrusted over with attached barnacles which ... probably hamper its usefulness. Good old Black Wave ruining equipment, right? Either way, she pushes it into the wall and begins to heave and work at breaking through it.

     "A drink first? Hah, you're a cheap contract to make for summons, then!" Fuka replies to Dareshetani, a bit of strain from her voice as she works on leveraging out a section of wall, followed by... the sound of a cat horking up a giant hairball? Fuka squints her eyes as the begin to water as another less than pleasant smell is added to the already gross smell of the room. "...Ohgod you're gonna make me throw up too." She grunts out, and then... ... he fell through the wall where it was rotten? Well okay then. "...Huh." She pulls her trident out of the wall. Which had likely been the wrong one, anyway.

     "Wonderful new smell, huh? Well, that's one way of putting it, Hisame." Says Fuka with mild bemusement. Aaand broken bottle. Well, that's unfortunate. But they managed to get forward into the next area!

     Hmm. A corridor, and possibly a maze? It wasn't exactly a very interesting corridor, beyond that it was in the side of this cellar, and there seemed to be many splitting off passageways. It was almost like one of those old games without a map! "....Let's stick close together, guys." Fuka comments. "I've got the Tracking skill so hopefully we can follow where the little bugger went."
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Dare realizes that Hisame referred to him as canine-person and remembers his manners suddenly. "The name's Dare, by the way. I'm sure you're absolutely charmed to meet me after that display." He shakes his head with a little rueful sigh, and puts his waterskin away. Back to business.

Hunting and tracking is, at least, right up his alleyway skill-wise. Or tunnel-way, as the case may be. He looks down at the swirls in the dust on the floor; definite rat-sign, problem is the tracks go pretty much everywhere. And he's frankly a little gunshy about using his nose to scent for the things, after what they just went through. So instead, he closes his eyes and focuses on rotating his ears, listening for the sound of skittering present instead of looking for tracks past. Finally, he points down one of the passages and opens his eyes. "That way, is what my ears are telling me. Sounds like more than one of the 'little buggers' though."
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

There's a glance to Fuka from the Imp girl, "I mean it's clearly a joke. I'm pretty sure it's one of the worst things I've ever smelled and I've hung out at comikets." She shakes her head and sticks closely to the other two. Sure a city's it's own kind of maze, but those have signs. Also police booths, maps, phones and aimless wandering.

And then there's vomiting. And a grimace. "H-hey watch the boots. I hate cleaning these" though she jokes to hide the building nauesea herself. Which fails. She adds to the mess nearby after a short run.
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     "I agree, looks like there's some more recent rat crap down that way too, and these scuff marks are less dusty so probably more recent." Fuka comments in response to Dare, walking down the hallway. And carefully avoiding the crap she pointed out. "I mean, I don't know about you knowing me, but I don't really know you so... I mean. There's weirdos out there. I know, I've encountered enough of them to... uh... yeah anyway!" She coughs a bit it, just a bit awkwardly. Though she plays it off as having breathed in some of the dust.

     A success! The party seems to be moving along at a reasonable pace between Dareshetani's hunting skill and Fuka's tracking. Following tracks, sounds, and fresh crap, eventually they... they find it. If they really wanted to have found it, that's a different question entirely. Because it is RANK. Even worse than the earlier cellar. Trash lines the place, a ton of it is probably rotten, and the rats mixed up inside the mess of rotting trash and moldy food. It's probably another 'interesting smell' for Hisame, though!

     "Oh no. Not this shit again. Uh-uh. I'm not going to deal with this." Fukasa spins her trident, several runes appearing in the air in front of her that she reads out loud, followed by her slamming base of her trident into the ground. In front of her, a giant pufferfish appears, which blows out a torrent of water towards the filthy rat nest!
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Of COURSE the right tunnel had to lead to another pit of stench. Determined to make a better showing for himself this time, Dare reaches down to the small hand drum he's taken to wearing on his belt, tap-tapping a simple beat and trying to focus his modest bard skill to channel the spirits of air. He hums a bar, then sings in light baritone.

"Summer breeze, makes me feel fine, blowing through the jasmine in my mind~"

A light, cleansing breeze rushes down from the tunnel behind, ruffling his fur and carrying some of the rank stench of the rat mess away with it, if not the garbage itself. It does, in fact, smell very faintly of jasmine.
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

She's finished getting that taste of bile out of her mouth, so when there's a second, much worse smell Hisame just grimaces and starts to say, "Rain Fl--" no. No jokes about the blue bomber. With a hand out, palm up, she forms a sphere of water, then simply drops it to the floor, helping with that gust of wind by literally flushing the garbage away from them.

"Good work." She offers the hyena, "I didn't miss your name right? I mean Dog-boy's good enough I guess, kinda rude though."
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     Unfortunately, it seems like Fukasa's fish isn't doing well in the smell either, and ... well. If you've never seen a pufferfish cough, it's doing it now! And it's a horrifying noise, very wet and ... squelchy. And the water it spits out ends up more like a spout of water than a torrent. It gives Fukasa a dirty look, spraying her in the face before unsummoning itself. Was it... muttering curses under its breath as it disappeared? No, it must have been a figment of your imaginations.

     At least the other two seemed to be having more success, as Dareshetani summons a refreshing breeze from behind them that /somehow/ doesn't smell of rot and mold and is actually... quite pleasant. Fukasa gives a soft exhale and inhale on that breeze appearing. "Thank goddess, that smell was about to make /me/ retch too, saltwater and rot don't mix well." She says, wrinkling her nose as she rubs away the salt water. And then there's a more successful rush of water from Hisame!

     "......I could kiss you for that. In fact, uh." Pause. She looks at Hisame, and then her lips. "...Nevermind, uh. Nope." She looks back towards the now-cleared-out rat's nest. "Aaaaanyway, onward, peasants!" She says in a joking tone as she moves forward. The rats had been blown, washed, or intimidated away, opting to flee rather than be given a /bath/ of all things. Gross! ...Which is probably for the best, as waterlogged rats don't... smell great.

     Moving onwards, they find a room that... smaller rats seem to be avoiding? "Interesting, I wonder what's up in here." Fuka muses as she peeks inside.

     Inside... it's actually rather beautiful. Strips of cloth of many different colors are visible covering the floor, it looks almost like the other rats had been paying tribute and decorating the area for ... the... giant horrific rat that's sitting on top of its hoard of cloth scraps like it were some small rat-dragon, spikes run down its back and it looks particularly angry.

     The giant rat starts to foam at the mouth, a black miasma beginning to drift off of it as it starts to approach the party, clearly enraged at them encroaching upon its domain!
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

"It's Dare," Dare repeats, pretending he didn't just give his name a few minutes ago. She probably just couldn't hear him due to the vomitting, and it costs him nothing to be nice about it. "Actually, interestingly enough, hyenas are genetically closer to cats than dogs, although they're their own distinct family under Carnivora," he remarks casually.

And then, rat-dragon. "Oh, of course it's breathing pure death," the hunter remarks. "Because we haven't had enough of THAT down here." He swiftly unslings his bow from his shoulder, and nocks an arrow, eyes narrowing at the target as he tries to channel a different reservoir of magical energy this time. It worked for him at the festival, so he knows he can do this. A low, "hrrrrnnnnn..." growls out of his throat as he concentrates, and a glowing orb of purplish energy begins to spark and roil around the hand holding the arrow. "MIND SHOCK!" he calls out the invokation as he releases the bowstring. The magically charged arrow streaks forth and the boss-rat has a fraction of a second to look surprised before the arrow impacts with an explosion of dark energy!
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

There's a crazy rat thing, clearly twisted and corrupted by magic. She tilts her head at that and slowly settles against her weapon, resting on it as she draws a sigil through the air, clawed gloves leading a pulsing rune for a moment. She puts the finishing flourish on the spell, then closes her fist around it, the spell scattering to the wind. The effects weren't immediately obvious, but the rat's corruption would suddenly shift into overdrive. Those horrid spines spreading throughout it, that miasma starting to pour from it, but not in anything resembling a controlled manner.

Only after that probably-not-so-nice display does she look to the Hyena and asks, "No kidding? Never had to draw one, never looked it up to be honest." She then offers a thumbs up, hefts her weapon and shoulders it as she slips past the writhing rat monster.
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square



     Fukasa just seems to be having performance issues with her water spells today, as she lifts her trident towards the giant rat. "Finally, a chance to just have a good fight!" She says with a bright grin. Once more several runes appear before her as she mutters under her breath, a swirling bubble of water beginning to surround the rat, only for it to end up missing the corrupted rat as it moves surprisingly quickly towards the party. It's very angry, and no blast of water is going to stop the corrupted rat's rage! "Motherfucker you're supposed to /die/ when I shoot you!" Fuka shouts at the rat, her eyes seeming to flash with her rage, as her hair fans out in aggravation. How dare this mere rat resist her powers!

     It doesn't resist EXPLOSION DARK ARROW though, as Dareshetani releases his arrow of doom towards the rat, it tries to dodge, but it catches it right in the shoulder, consuming it in the black energy of his Mind Shock! As the dark explosions fades, the rat seems to be... giving off even more miasma? "...Oh no did you make it stronger." Comes a somewhat sarcastic comment from Fukasa from behind Dare. She doesn't /actually/ seem to be mocking it, more the mechanics of the fight. Probably. "Also that's interesting about the hyenas, I guess we'll call you catdog from now on then." Fuka adds.

     And then... Hisame pumps it /even more/ full of corruption. The rat... begins to give off more and more of the dark miasma. Until its body begins to... grow so many spikes that it's starting to pierce itself in several different places, the rat is left unable to move and probably bleeding to death.

     "...Well, that's... a brutal way to kill it." Fukasa says, admiring the handiwork for a moment. "Anyway, let's move on." Several passageways later and they're... approaching a ... bedroom? With a bard sitting in the middle of it, enchanting several rats. "Really? REALLY??? A /bard/ is doing all this? Couldn't you at least make the damn things keep themselves clean?!" She shouts towards the Spriggan. She doesn't even give them a chance to respond before her trident is spinning in front of her, a large sphere of water beginning to form as she incants her spell. At the end of her spell she strikes it, "GRAVE CALL." And the water sphere bursts open, revealing four drowned-looking pirates, their flesh missing in several places, barnacles stuck to their skin, and their hair seeming to float unnaturally as if they were still underwater, even though they were above land. "...Minions. Have fun." She points towards the bard, sending the Drowned Pirates towards the bard to begin doing their thing. That being, well, repeated swipes with their cutlasses. They're a bit awkward and lurching, being zombies, but there's enough of them that it doesn't matter that much.
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

The neither-a-cat-nor-a-dog-man laughs. "Catdog is fine if that's easier to remember." Surely that was the boss fight there; there must be just some little epilogue bit to the quest that they need to trigger in order to get their rewards. When they reach the bedroom doorway in question though, he lets out a disbelieving huff. "Oh no. No no no," Dare protests. "Only room for one bard in this dungeon."

And the swaying, dancing rat immediately bring to mind an appropriate song for this Battle of the Bards. He used to rock this one on Guitar Hero. Granted, all he's got is a drum here, but nevertheless he begins thumping a fierce beat on it. He tucks his chin down slightly to lower his range and add more growling grit to his voice, and straight up bellows METAL into the room.

"Just like the Pied Piper
Led rats through the streets
We dance like the marionettes
Swaying to the Symphony
OF DESTRUCTION!"

Angry dark magic seems to swirl through the air with his words, and as the miasmic tendrils sweep past the dancing rats, it draws their attention away from the Spriggan and toward him instead. Stunned, the previous song completely drowned out in their ears, the rodents begin to stumble zombie-like themselves in his direction. And conveniently into the path of the actual zombies.

One of their heads explodes.
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

Hisame actually manages to look surprised, "Brutal?" Looking back at the creature, she pauses, shrugs and says, "Yeah I guess. Maybe I'm desensitized to it by now." She twirls her finger in a dismissive manner and continues the other conversation instead, "So how are they more like cats? Is it in the skull? Or is this just a, "Close enough for government work" situation?"

Then there's a bard. "Why is it always bards?" She asks after some contemplation. "No offense" she adds after and starts to walk forward, weapon at the ready, but the other two are already doing their thing. Spotting a potential escape route, she decides to err on the side of caution and slams her foot down, creating a fissure that speeds towards the tunnel and suddenly sprouts into a massive earthen spike. "Stick around, let the man finish his song." Pause. "That was terrible. I should use it when we're back home!" And then a dash forward, weapon raised and at the ready.
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     The bard begins to play music, attempting to send rats towards the zombies as they come towards her-- only for her own rats to be commandeered by Dareshetani! Moving zombie-like towards the zombies and ... one of their heads randomly seeming to explode into the standard red and white pixels of things dying in this game world. Which is probably for the best, even if it /would/ be satisfying. Seeing that her rats are being taken over, the Bard starts to make her way quickly away from the fight!

     Zombies, a giant hyena-man, an angry fish lady and... whatever Hisame is... just too much for the child to try to stay and fight! Aaand as she's running, she runs RIGHT INTO an earthen spike, landing right on her butt and her instrument bouncing off to the side. And... the child... just starts /crying/. "...Y...you guys are mean!!! I was just making friends!!! Y...you'll be my friend still, won't you mister rat?" She asks, reaching for one of the rats... only to get bitten. As zombies start to approach her.

     "Whoa, okay, I'm fine with a lot of things but like." Fukasa snaps her fingers, magical circles appearing underneath the zombies, which sink into waterholes that appear below them. The child, meanwhile, just sits there bawling. Fukasa sighs and walks towards her, reaching to grab the child by the back of her clothing and just... carry her up the ladder. "Come on, let's go find you a real pet. Something clean. Like a fish or a jaguar or something."
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Dare seems to come out of something of a daze when he stops singing, and the drumbeats fade off to an uncertain tapping. "Uh..." he says.

"Uh... what? Kid, what the hell are you doing down here? Did you even see the--" he cuts himself off when Fukasa takes charge and picks up the child. "You coulda gotten hurt," he mutters sullenly, though the way his ears are drooping it seems he's more disgruntled with himself than her. He waits, idly kicking at some junk on the ground, to make sure they reach the top of the ladder safely first. He catches sight of the kid's instrument laying to the side, and stoops to pick it up before following upward. He already blew up her rat, no need to rob her of her guitar, too.
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

looks at the rat scurrying off and actually makes an effort to catch the thing, safely even. She's wearing armor, it should be fine. As for the child, the rough treatment from the others gets a surprised look and she calls out, "Hey take it easy, she's crying." Followed by walking forward and actually trying to calm the kid down. Whether she grabbed the rat or not, she says, "I have a pet rat somewhere far from here that I miss, I know that. Come on, stop crying and we can be our friend." She glances to the other two, "At least mine. We'll find a nicer one. Or.. something." Then she offers her hand out. Which considering the horrible thing she did to another creature here, is probably some kind of whiplash.
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     Rough treatment? Actually that was mostly from Fuka, really. Dare seemed to be more of a gentle giant. Fuka lets go of the child when Hisame approaches though. No need to try to do something that someone else is clearly better at. "Here, you can take care of her then. I'm too young to really have much experience with kids." Fukasa says. "...I still suggest we get out of here though, I need a bath. You need a bath. The child needs a bath. The rats need a bath. This entire place needs a bath. Also we should report to that lander, probably."
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Once they're back on street level, Dare offers the Spriggan child her instrument back, with a muttered apology but also an admonishment: "You need to stay out of those tunnels. There's worse than just rats down there." Like giant, dragon-rats. And vomit. "You could get hurt," he concludes, awkwardly.

To the suggestion of baths though, he wholeheartedly agrees. "I needed a bath BEFORE we started this. I'm gonna need to clean my armor, too; I can STILL smell that mold. Ugh."
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Dare eventually clears his throat. "Uh, anyway, since you asked... the difference is mostly in the shape of the skull. Feliforma - that's cats, hyenas, mongooses... mongeese? --whatever, their ears set up differently from the Caniforms. They also tend to have shorter snouts, and some other minor stuff. I... used to spend a lot of time on Alexandria."
Fukasa Yuri
Alne - Main Square


     Dare returns the child's instrument, which actually gets a slightly annoyed look from Fuka briefly, but it fades about as fast as it came. "...If you're going to befriend rats, at least go get one that hasn't been bathing in who knows what down here in this filthy place. Also." Fuka turns towards Dare more fully, lifting her hand up towards him and quickly incanting a spell. Iiiit's the water jet spell, so if he doesn't try to dodge it or anything he'll take minor damage! ... But also it'll blast off a lot of the mold and grossness from his body. "There, that should help you feel a tiny bit less gross." Also sore. "The other thing that would make you less gross, is, of course." She glances up the ladder. "Getting the heck out of this place?" She wrinkles her nose. The child is... probably about ready to get out of there. At this point mostly because of stranger danger, due to Hisame's kindness with capturing the rat.
Dareshetani
Alne - Main Square

Dare does not dodge. Dare takes the water jet directly in the face and then just kind of stands stunned as it blasts over the rest of his body. "Gahk--" cough, splutter, snort, sneeze. And then he just kind of... lifts his arms and flicks water off the ends of his fingers, his fur all lying flat, his short mane plastered down over his eyes, leather armor darkened and trousers soaked through. But he does feel less gross. "...thanks," he decides, eventually.
Hisame
Alne - Main Square

Notes the annoyed look, but doesn't worry too much abut it. "You know, I had a feeling it was the skull, but I also figure that's a weird thing to classify things towards one species or another. You do enough anatomy and you see some fun similarities- neeeevermind. Let's not confuse the kid-" Pause. "Do you have a name kid or did I miss another one?"

She shakes her head quickly and checks her satchels, fishing for anything to help cover up the sensation best described as 'stank'. Or awful. Awful works too. The rat in question does get a bath in something flower smelling. She's holding it, it's going to smell better than the back end of an abattoir mid-summer.