Duty Session 148: Goblins in the Rotting Forest

The Third and Fourth Waves were something of a chaotic mess. Some people mentioned something about a horrible soul-eating ghost ship and a flock of deadly magical gargoyles. That issue was resolved in the classic Adventurer method of massive DPS and grandiose heroposing.

But that's not this issue. This issue is something else: The Forest is now alive with Goblins coming from... somewhere. No one seems to know from where, and their presence seems to have a deleterious effect on the forest nearby. Hence, the Hunter's Guild is again contracted to provide Adventurer solutions to Adventurer problems.

And Plant Duck and Friends are there to answer. Proteus looks into the forest, wrinkling her nose at the sight of a burned area deeper in the woods. "All right, everyone. Are we ready to roll on this? Should be pretty straightforward. Just another Goblin infestation, right?" She shrugs under her hooded cloak and turns to glare again into the underbrush. You never know when a tangle of thorns might actually be a Goblin nose.

Dragon Butler, Yobi Kin, stands to the right of Proteus looking out into the forest itself to try and get a glimpse of what is happening out into this rotting place.  Nobody knows when he got there.  However, he does produce a small spray bottle.  

"I had someone in town give a small relief from the insects out here.  It is not much, but it will at least make things tolerable...until we're covered in filthy water and the mire of this place.  I can take care of THAT when we are home," he says, handing the small bottle off to anyone who wants it.

The Salamander makes a thinking motion with his hands.  "I am ready, and while it might be straight forward it is never a bad idea to be ready for anything, Miss Proteus."

Kauchemar just nods a bit to the rest of the group, hands folded behind her head casually. "I did poke around the forest a bit previously. This corruption is nothing like what I've seen in-game before. Unfortunately I was interrupted by an ... old aquaintance and didn't get to dig really deep into anything." And the way she says 'old aquaintance' seems to suggest something more like 'on and off rival' or such. Which a certain kitsune ronin definitely qualifies as. Especially when they end up interrupting each other's work.

The waves had made a mess of things. She's heard about the ship but was not there it was very chilling in the end. Then is the matter of goblins. Gwen had no love for them and was more than happy to lend Proteus a hand in the effort.

"I'm all geared up and ready to go Proteus."

She looks to YObi Kin for a moment and she smiles a bit.

"I appreciate that senior and it's good to meet you. Gwen Pendragon."

She notes before looking over to Kauchemar.

"Keep frosty who knows what's going to be crawling about in here."

     Shin Heno has his hands behind his back and a big grin on his face. "Straightforward, huh? Sounds nice and relaxing."

     He waves at Kauchemar. He stops and gives Yobi a look, then holds out a hand. "Shin Heno. I'm a Hero oF Justice. Nice to meet you!"

     Shin cracks his knuckles and tilts his neck to the side. "Let's go hit some Goblins, then!"

Proteus does accept the small bottle and spritzes herself a couple times before passing it on. This is going to be a rough, messy, and sweaty situation and the butler seems to have things well in hand with solving at least one of the many irritations of being out here. "Thanks, Yobi. No one enjoys bug bites."

Proteus frowns at the mention of corruption. "I wonder if this is the same kind of corruption that befell Ezzo. I'll have to get a closer look..." She hums. She waves to Gwen. "Nice to see you here." She says to Gwen. Having more backup is nice, and Gwen is on the shortlist of people Plant Duck considers a valuable ally.

Cooking for Att when he's in a Fey Mood gets you a lot of rep.

Shin gets a nod and wave. The Hero of Justice is always nice to have on hand. At least, until he becomes the Hero of Manga. That's going to be a thing.

Of course, all of this is really neither here nor there as a rustle of underbrush that isn't the Adventurers comes up. Proteus hisses quietly and ducks behind a tree. Hopefully others do the same, because soon a Goblin pops its head out, glaring around, before it pulls back and begins stalking off. "Okay, looks like we found the first problem." She gestures. "Maybe we can scare it a bit and chase it back to the others?" She asks.

"Ah yes, Yobi Kin.  I am glad to finally place this face to a name," Yobi says with a polite bow to Glen.  It is a fine gentlemanly bow, one that you would expect out of someone like Yobi.  He likewise gives the same bow to Kauchemar.  

Shin decides to do things western style, to which Yobi takes the grip in a firm shake.  "Yobi Kin, Lightning speed Butler," he says with no shame in his title at all.  Shin might be a hero of justice, but Yobi is the fastest butler he knows about.  

To Proteus he nods, "You are welcome of course.  Perhaps you should take some samples from this place when we are leaving?" he offers a suggestion, before moving on with the rest.  When the first goblin is encountered, he notes people going to scare it off, which leads to him moving to try and stay hidden, so he can follow it stealthfully.

Not a single sound is heard as he walks around.  Taking a slightly longer, but silent path after the goblin should it flee.

Kauchemar is a bit tallk to duck under things, so she just stands behind one of the thicker withering trunks to keep from being immeadiately noticable. At least she's got dark colorations to help. Her ears perk up at the mention of scaring. Followed by a low nickering chuckle. "You're talking to the right nightmare~.. Just be ready to follow him."

With that Kauchemar steps out with a deliberately slow and imposing stride. She doesn't directly approach the goblin, but her prescense in its own right, partially due just to being a nasty and fearful monster species, is creepy. It's not directly sneaking, but she's moving to keep directly out of his sight, to give that extra paranoid feeling of being watched and followed. She purposely takes out her whip, and uses it to snap a withered branch off a dead tree and flick it off to the opposite side.

Something is out here, little goblin. Dread and run for safety. It's your only hope.

     Normally, Shin might be on his game. Normally, he might transform into 'Algol', shift into his weird bug armor, and scare the hell out of the goblins with a dramatic theme song and his usual declaration - 'the demon star will light the way to hell' is pretty terrifying if it's coming from a big black bug thing in the middle of the night.

     Alas, not this time. Shin trips on something and goes face-down in the dirt, his scarf settling over his head like a funeral shroud. He manages not to make too much noise, but it's noise he didn't mean to make, and it's noise that'll probably let them know where he is.

     Off to a great start!

"What's so weird about monters spawning in a forest? Goblins have to come from somewhere, spontaneously stepping out from behind trees is probably best for everyone involved." Whis wonders, scratching her cheek from under her hood with a hand and slouching along. The whole operation seems suspect.

It's a spooky forest, right?

Looking up, at the ways game twists and reaches inward towards the hidden disturbance, Whis clicks her tongue.

"Well. I take it back. This looks awful. You really only take us to the best quests, Proteus. Please make sure to take care of me!" Whis request, insistent in the 'please' and 'me'.

A cursed forest surrounded by ash and destruction. And goblins. Goblin?

"What? There's just one. Just power through, and don't worry about the aggro until they leash." She deadpans, gathering glowing power in her hand. "Can't believe I'm doing this right at the start, but I'm not calling a scout!"

She unleashes the power down into the forest, blasting a path through with a beam of light. "Or a healer."

"You have a point there Whiskey Sour for the Goblins this is the sort of place that would be monster-infested..."

Gwen Muses as she pushes on with the res to the group she's not the most stealthy thing in the world but she can normally bring a good bit of physical power to the table, she's going to try to hunt the Goblin Down before it can escape but she's just not quick enough to do so, thankfully Whiskey is very much on point and can handle it before the Goblin can escape and give a warning it's fellow.s

"Damn it, I was too slow there."

Yobi ducks into the forest and vanishes. The hallmark of a good butler is not knowing he's even doing his job, and his skill shows, the practiced ease of the speedy Salamander putting him into the perfect position as Kauchemar shows off her Nightmare nature as well. The combination is perfect, really. The increasing terror and spookiness becomes more and more oppressive upon the Goblin until Whiskey unleashes her wrath, bright and terrible. The sudden contrast causes the Goblin to snap immediatley, screeching and howling into the forest.

The plan was good. As far as it went, really. Unfortunately, everyone else has little mistakes here and there.

Proteus attempted to get in on the sneaking, but with her efforts she simply ended up getting caught on a large number of branches and thorns, her cloak taking damage while she curses and mutters... Which kind of defeats the point of trying to be stealthy. Shin Heno trips, putting him behind and ruining his cool entrance pose to send the Goblin running off. Gwen is a great tank, but unfortunately most tanks are a little on the slow side, which means the timing just isn't there to hit, the Goblin is already running off by then.

Still, it all worked out despite a few hiccups. What's a couple mistakes in a raid group? At least they weren't dodging templates.

"What's weird is what they're doing to the forest. But all I have is vague reports about it. For now... Let's just keep going and put a stop to it." Proteus sighs, rushing along... Only to see the Goblin closing in on one of the ancient Living Trees. "Wait, is it ducking into... Gah! Stop it!" Proteus points, moments before the door gets slammed shut and locked.

"Quick, we need to get this door open. There's a massive network of tunnels beneath this place and if we lose the Goblin we're never going to be able to catch up." Proteus immediately sets to work pulling out a lockpick from her Inventory and gets to work on the complex lock.

Fortunately they do have a couple of lockpickers here. But that doesn't mean she can't help. Kauchemar channels some of her earth attunement and slams one hooved foot hard into the ground near the tree's base. A low rumble rolls through the surface, making everything feel slightly askew. The idea is simple though, she's trying to disrupt the foundation of earth the tree is rooted in, so the door won't be so tight in its frame and easy to shove open when they get the lock open.

The trail ends at the tree, causing the butler to consider it for a moment.  This Lore bit would be interesting to the young mistress.  He takes a moment to record it down, before pocketing the notebook and stepping out of stealth to pluck a specialized tool into one of the other locks that Proteus moves to work on.

He synchronizes his movements with the imps, aiming to make quick work with the door.  Attempts to manipulate the frame to help them are appreciated.  "Yes, Miss Whis, it is the actual change of the environment that is odd, not the Goblins themselves.  Perhaps it is part of the event code," He says helping explain.  

"Tunnels you say?  Tracking will be helpful down there..." he muses, considering the situation.  

Gwen was mistaken in the Goblin being finished off but the chase is on. She'll take off after it along with the rest of the party, and it doesn't take too long for them to find their way to where the goblin fled to she'll take a moment to look at the door. "Which is almost certainly full of goblins and traps."

Gwen would note as she starts to change an earth spell to try and help force the door open, maybe someone is better with lock picking than her effort to brute force it.

"Maybe we'll get some idea of what caused the change, when we get to the end of this..."

     Shin isn't really the subtle type. Where everybody else is doing lockpicking and using their basic senses and all that other stuff, Shin just raises his foot and stomps it on the ground. A vibration sweeps out through the earth - a pulse of echolocation, a little bit of earth magic he picked up.

     He just waits for it to come back, hands in his pockets, whistling a jaunty little tune.

"Of course it's full of goblins and traps. That's why we're going in there." Whis rolls her eyes, watching the lockpicks get busted out on top of the actual factual pillars of earth. This seems very handled - so Whis elects to be situationally useless.

"If it makes you feel better and safer, ready a spell or ability and throw it down the hallway. But if this was someone's 'home', then it's only natural people are going to live in it. Tenancy is how the government gets you."

Whis cheers on the lockpickers. This is her lockpicking ninja way.

Kauchemar believes in bump techniques in getting doors open, and her earthen vibrations set the magical tumblers chattering, helping to set them into place for Whiskey, Yobi and Proteus to get to work on picking the lock, the three working in efficient tandem to pop the thing open (while Whis provides immoral support).

But nothing is ever easy. The door sticks when Proteus yanks on it to try to get it open. Gwen is already ready to help though, providing a nice heavy impact to pop the door open nice and easy while Shin checks on the tunnels below, getting an idea of what he's dealing with before they rush in and down. Shin gets a sense of a tangled warren below, perfect for Pooka, at least. Unfortunately, not so perfect for the Adventurers in question. Still, he can quickly give some tips to the others.

Just as predicted, however, the group breaches the room, mostly wrecked with only remnants of the people that used to live there. The warren entrance, however, is apparent, and they can immediately decend into the rootborne tunnels. Or rather, what are now tunnels, the withered remnants of many of the roots that would have closed them off a testament to the life-consuming power of the Soul Eater that attacked during the Wave of Calamity. Proteus scowls at the sight of them. "That accursed Sickle..." She mutters. "What was he even thinking?" A pause. "Well, I know what he's thinking."

At this point, however, Proteus withdraws an odd device that looks like a lensed object on a swivel mount, and she sweeps it from side to side, a thin beam washing back and forth trying to pick out signs of the passing of the Goblin.

Something is going on with this goblin but the question is where did the little devil go? It's not here that much is clear. She'll take a moment and start to look around also putting those ears of her's to good use as well. She might just be able to pick up where the Goblin has gone. Maybe some sign of its passing or the sound of its movement? If she does find something she will relay it to the party right away.

     Second verse, same as the first. Shin shrugs and puts his foot down again for another wave of vibration. Once he's got his bearings and he's got some kind of trail - of footsteps echoing through the ground - he flicks his fingers down the tunnel and starts heading off that way.

A hallway, everything is obviously /trapped/.  Ok, good, that is...noooormal?  At least the goblins aren't really acting out of the ordinary, unlike those bugs.  So they just need to be careful, and not following the wrong path or anything.  

He thinks he sees a path and steps forward.

It's actually a trap.  Roots strikeout and suck him up into the dirt above.  Apparently, it wasn't a very lethal trap.  With a muffled sound, Yobi can be heard speaking, "If it's not too much trouble, could you pull me out of this very embarrassing predicament?"

Kauchemar trots down inside with the rest of the party. This is a bit cramped for tall people like her and Gwen, but she'll manage. "Tch. This forest looks and -feels- even more foul underneath. The corruption is really getting down inside the root network."

Of course there's tunnels down here, and tunnels mean traps. It doesn't matter if it's from the Goblins now infesting the place or the Pooka and Gnomes that might of once lived here. Traps are traps. And Kauchemar knows the best way to deal with traps.

Make someone else set them off.

This is where things like necromancy do come in handy, as she just summons undead and sends them shambling ahead of the party to set off the traps instead and clear a path.

The underground area is a mystery, but it's nothing that Whiskey Sour can't solve!

"Proteus, are you using consumables for this? That's low. Consumables for a route select." She chides, smirking. "Still... If it works, right?"

Following along after Gwen, Whis falls in line to track the trails. "There's got to be footprints, right?"

She points as Gwen uncovers some wall-markings. "See? these aren't fissures. They're scrapes."

They're fissures. Whis has no idea what she's talking about.

The group was prepared for this. Gwen uses her ears, Shin continues to echolocate, and they both get back some faint vibrations ahead that might be the Goblin rummaging around. Yobi, unfortunately, searches around and promptly is yanked up through the ceiling into what seems like what used to be a bear hibernation area. Thankfully, it is currently lacking in bear, else the Salamander would have been served to a hungry bear on a silver platter.

Kauchemar, meanwhile, sees this happen and just sends the undead to deal with most of it. Dozens of the crawling dead get snapped up, crushed, pulled into alternate paths, and impaled. Thankfully, it looks like even if they reset, they know where the triggers are now.

Proteus glances back even as Whis prods at her. "It's Golau Chwilo." She replies. "A minor relic I managed to keep through the Dark Wave. Relax, it's not a consumable." She sighs, and points. "Come on, everyone, let's get this going."

A short time ahead, they locate the escaping Goblin... And Proteus just lets the ninja Butler do the job of cleaning up the mess, because the butler is very good at cleaning up messes.

The Goblin never gets to the next room, which is apparently where it was going. Proteus peers around the corner, and looks back, signals 'two' with her hand, gesturing once left and once right. At that, Proteus leaps around the corner and gestures, a window opening up for her to activate an Ability: N + , #

"Unravelling of sapience, shattered thoughts to fragment and stick as a splinter in your mind... Begone!" A little overwrought considering the input is enough, but the Mind Shock rips into the pair, stunning them for critical moments to allow the others to engage unimpeded.

Oh look, sentries! Unfortunately none of the undead Kauchemar used to trip traps to make a path survived long enough to be useful in a fight.

That's okay, she's perfectly fine with getting involved herself when it comes to it.

She also still has her whip in hand from earlier. A flick of the wrist unfurls it, and with a powerful jerk of her arm it's snapped out at exceptional speed to snag one sentry around the neck. Kauchemar uses her equine physique to pull hard, which he instinctively tries to resist again and pull away from her, which only makes the whip bind tighter around his neck and likely choke him out if the other attacks don't mangle him first. "You're hanging yourself I'm just providing the rope!"

     The minute the sentries are there, they're going to regret it.

     Shin walks forward. He holds up the stone belt buckle and waves it in front of him. Then it slaps onto his belt.

     One hand rises above him. One hand goes out in front of him. His hands sweep around in a wide arc, until they've gone the opposite direction, completing a full rotation.

     "Transform."

                        0 01 0
                      1 /----\ 0
                     0 /      \ 0
   ARMOR BEETLE    ====|  /\  |====  CODE: ALGOL
DEFENSE OF DESTINY ====|  \/  |====    COMPILE
                     0 \      / 1
                      1 \----/ 1
                        0 10 0

     The red light consumes the area. It walks forward, fading into the stars of a constellation. The ominous red glow of the belt is the last light that fades from the black-armored monster, with the bloody scarf and the bloody eyes.

     "Masked Ranger Algol."

     "The Demon Star will light your way to hell."

     And then he's upon the sentries, his foot glowing blue. He slams down onto the guards, spikes of ice emerging from the ground explosively. Unfortunate for them.

Yanked out of the hole he got roped into, he takes a moment to wipe the dirt out of his hair and shoulders.  "Much appreciated," he says, before letting out a sigh and walking with the group.  However, once he sees the goblin they were going after...

He runs right in front of it and lifts his leg up to slam his heel right into the top of the Goblin's noggin.  Turning around only to wipe his foot off on the ground, which he determines is cleaner than the goblin's shirt.  

In the next room, they find Hobgoblin guards.  Investing Hobgoblins was definitely meaningful.  That means a higher-powered Goblin was nearby, if not behind the door.  Which means they need to be precise with their strikes.

With a dash, he runs right for the Hob on the right, aiming to send his fist straight into the stomach of the larger creature, followed by punches so quick it looks like he just punched a second time, instead of the four or five he just did.  He steps back, letting the creature fall.  His eye looks towards Shin.

There is a long time where he seems to just BURROW into him with his eyes.  "I find your aesthetic pleasing.  We should talk later."

"It's what? Go-ra-u Cha-wi-ro? In Japanese, please." Whis complains. She joined Plant 'Hwa-ya-den' not out of any love -- or understanding -- of the name structure. She thought it was some weird joke. There's lots of weird jokes, and she doesn't have access to Alteranative Future Apocalypse Bing to drop into a translator. She has to deal with language nerdery in real time like a normal person:

Through ignorance.

"Ne, ne, just call it something normal. It's a search bar." She ribs, carrying on.

With the bevy of spells and debuffs launched towards the sentries and the Nightmare and Lightning Butler's advances let Whis just sort of come along behind everyone else!

And mostly join Kauchemar and Yobi in kicking the hell out of the goblin guards like a cartoon.

The Hobgoblins are stopped for critical seconds and that leaves one wide open for Kauchemar to begin throttling them with her whip. Proteus just stands there tapping a foot as she watches the Doomquine choke the thing out, the skin slowly tinting towards a ghastly yellow. "Just horsing around?" Proteus asks, arching a brow.

Shin busts out his henshin, which means it is now Business Time. He wastes absolutely zero time rushing in and slamming into the hobgoblins with a blast of icy destruction, impaling them even as Yobi Kin introduces them to a new and innovative 12-step program. Too bad that this program involves crushing force applied repeatedly.

"I didn't name it." Proteus replies to Whiskey. "And I am not calling it a Search Bar. That's silly." Whiskey, meanwhile, gets to sate her anger at ridiculous and unspellable names with violence like a normal person, joining in the gangbeating.

The group enters the next room, and it is... a large, unpleasant area. Totemic signs are placed all about the location to form the framework of a powerful ritual of pestilence. Which makes one wonder why the Goblin Shaman performing said ritual is comaparatively lower level than one might expect from this. Oddly low, really. Still, it is clad in some strange-looking robes. The insignia doesn't appear to be anything seen normally in Goblin shamans... But that doesn't keep it from screeching an alert. Suddenly, it's on, what with Goblins coming out of the woodwork (literally), launching waves of attacks along with a barrage of Arcane Bolts and nasty curses from the spellcaster who is bravely leading from the rear.

You know, standard Goblin tactics.

"Damn Goblins." Proteus says as she sketches another Ability: ( * #

An Arcane Eye pops into existence behind her, the burning sight helping to allow the others present to see through the shadow effects being layered throughout the battle.

Gwen knows what her job is, she's got to get this goblin's attention and she will take note to rapidly inspect it that strange symbol on its clothing caught her attention. She charges at it intending to get into its face long enough as she pops several tanking abilities to keep it busy to allow her companions. Whom as far as she's aware, she's damn well impressed by what the people from the Plant are doing today yeah they been levelling pretty hard from the looks of it to her.

"It's a caster watch it I don't know what spells this one has!"

     'Algol' wastes absolutely no time.

     He runs straight into the cave, straight towards the ritual. His hand slams on the top of the belt. The red star briefly turns green. Light spreads down his leg like circuitry, pulsing, foretelling the viridian violence visited in the near future.

     The belt sings out:

    CODE: THORN

     and 'Algol' jumps over the Shaman. There's a front flip. There's an explosion of thorns from behind the Goblin to drag it straight into the kick.

     'Algol' keeps going.

     'Algol' skids to a stop on the other side of the Shaman, two hands on the ground to keep himself stable, his scarf flowing behind him.

Hands behind his back as they enter the room his eyes open to the odd arrangement of the room, and the Goblin Caster.  Odd, that its level is lower than expected...the robes it wares might be what has it's importance elevated?  Hard to say, but right now they can ignore that.  

The gloves come off, literally taking his gloves off of his hands.  The scaled and clawed hands burst into flame, as he takes a more serious stance.  He rushes forward to meet the summoned goblin forces.  His hands tear through them, as well as accelerated kicks into others.  

He fights like a hurricane, aiming to keep them from encircling him.  Fire enhanced punches tearing through goblin flesh as he goes.  "I will leave the caster to you casters, I will handle the small fry."

Kauchemar pulls her whip free once the hobgobling is pixelationg from the choke, and a few good extra kicks courtesy of Whiskey. "I like my options. Keeps opponents guessing, screws with their heads when you abruptly do something other than the magical classes they associate you with," she replies to Proteus, viper fangs showing through her smirk.

Once the guards are dealt with, they move on into the next room. Which is... wow. A brow raises. "These totems... are they trying to -control- the corruption? Spread it? This is all sorts of twisted, even by my standards..."

Oh, yes, there's still goblins to deal with. A spellcaster for one, and of course he's got flunkies to make things less pleasant. "Do your thing, tanks! And butler!" Holy crap when things get serious that gentleman's servent is throwing down without losing his composure. "Appreciate it!"

Kauchemar starts weaving her own magic from elemental energies.

o/~ Sought upon and doth discard... Bitter, broken, tundra hard.
Glittering and yet soon lost... eternal like permafrost. o/~

Kauchemar strikes her hands together, unleashing a torrent of blistering cold and ice at the shaman. Temperature plummets and defenses crumble with it, you can almost visualize the red dropping in a thermometer until it crashes out the bottom.

o/~ By wretched cold, you are slain! Struck down by death's chilblain! o/~

Gwen does what she does best, and tanks the assault for the rest of the adventurers. She gleams with resilience as her suite of defensive abilities pop off, and it shows as the goblins both turn to assault Gwen... And also have a hard time dealing damage to her. Even the Shaman's barrage of spells seems to have trouble.

Yobi Kin launches forwards, efficiently and mercilessly dispatching goblin after goblin as Gwen tanks and keeps most of the attention. The Lightning Butler strikes with incredible speed, shredding along through the enemies.

"I have no idea. We'll have to examine the area afterwards. If we get the chance. This might be a load-bearing boss." Proteus answers Kauchemar's question as the Nightmare Bard sings. The deadly song rolls out, rhyming death upon her enemies as blasts of ice wash outwards, striking into and overwhelming the defenses of the Shaman and freezing it for a critical moment.

A moment later, Shin flips above and delivers an incredible blow, the descending kick blasting outwards in shredding thorns that engulf the Shaman and tear it apart, the creature shattering into nothingness in the explosion.

The Shaman falls at that point, as does the remaining Goblins. The room goes quiet, and Proteus glances up at the ceiling expectantly... But the tree fails to collapse in on itself. "Well, that's a nice change." Proteus says before walking up to scrounge in the remains of the Shaman. From it, she stands, holding up a gleaming orb that gleams with odd green flickers of light within. "Well hello, what have we here?" Proteus asks... And she squints. "Wait, I've seen one of these before. Merek had one. Careful with this..." Almost as an afterthought, she glances around at the totems. "Oh, yeah, I guess we should do some purification work around here before we head out. This ritual area isn't going to do anyone any favors. Let's clean it up."

Yobi ends a combo on the other side of some goblins.  All of which collapse into a pile of parts a few moments later, and blood splatters to either side, but not directly in front or behind.  His hands release their flames, as he tucks them back into each glove and pats his collar and upper shirt off.  

"Ah the job is done then?" he says, looking over the orb.  "That's a curious thing?  Also, who is Merek?" On the offhanded comment of purification, he looks at the cave a bit.  With a nod and a fist in his hand, he causes a watering can with a pink flower on it to appear.  A bit of water magic fills it up!

Then a bit of light magic purifies it.  He goes around watering the cave with purified water to help.

Kauchemar likewise was staring upward for a moment, and is likewise both mildly surprised and relieved when it doesn't decide to crash down and force them into a hasty retreat.

"Oh yes, the part where you rudely trash the place before leaving. Just like a frat party." Kauchemar prys one of the totems out of the roots, then gives it an extra kick with her hoof to knock it over and break it. "Huh." She squats next to the rubble that remains and shifts some aside to reveal as similar green glow. Thrusts her hand into the mess and pulls out another of those orbs. "Ooo, it's like a Kinder Egg!... actually, that makes sense. If they were trying to do rituals with their tribal relics, why not shove an item of power into said relics.... I wonder if they had these, or they're a leftover of the Waves."

Either way, she deposits it into her inventory.

The fight doesn't last too long with the sort of firepower that's backing up Gwen? That's not really a sshock to her. she'll take a moment as she makes sure the Shaman is dead and she's; not too beat up and she'll pause for a moemnt at what she fines as well. 5R
"Wait this is an Enigma Piece..." Gwen stares at it for a moment.

"A Guy from Grandure. He used one and we were able to see into the past. These things can do things against the laws of Alba...but they are consumed in the process..."

The entire fight, there's something missing. It's not, you know, Whiskey's healing or general buffing support. No, no...

It's that she's not there. Physically.

She just hard skips the whole last boss encounter, having given Kauchemar a smile-and-a-wave and pantomimed following along with hanging back for a bit.

So, split up from the party, she pants a bit, checking her status gauge as her gaze swims lightly.

"Gh..."

She hadn't been feeling good since the lunatics had tied her up and left her for a few hours. Worse than her normal itch was the feeling of being too hot, of sweating constantly. Boiling out of her skin.

Sounds of battle, from down the way. "Better help out a little." Whis grumbles, joining the battle late - largely only to mop up health bars and fleeing enemies.

With a big smile and a brightness she dearly doesn't feel, Whis collects her loot. "Ooh, something valuable then? Very nice... Just like you guys!" She pumps her loot-collecting fist. "Nice fighting."