Duty Session 158: Convoy Escort Quest I

The Ninetails Dominion is in a bit of a pickle as of late. The undead threat continues to put pressure on both its civil and economic infrastructure. When the Dominion's merchants cannot travel the roads safely, commerce grinds to a crippling halt and both Landers and Adventurers suffer. Unfortunately, said merchant convoys are also juicy targets for the undead hordes ravaging the countryside.

But that also means those convoys are effectively magnets for the damn things. And it's a lot easier to deal with a problem when you know it's coming. Prophylaxis has put forward a notice to the united Alliances that he's going to be escorting one such supply convoy through the Dominion and requests assistance from other Adventurers in ensuring it reaches its destination safely-- and that any undead foolish enough to bother it are rendered into inert piles of red pixel-dust.

The doctor himself is waiting at the rear hitch of one of those covered wagons, sitting on the lip of the carriage bed next to a tightly-packed menagerie of supplies and sundry trade goods destined for the other end of the Dominion. The convoy is due to depart soon, so if anyone is going to show up, they aught to do so before it's too late...!

    Merek would be coming along with the party which is defending that convoy. He does take a moment to put that beltcape about the waist, then he takes a drink of the potion that he brought with him. The man nods to Prophylaxis, "Alright, well it looks like there are always things to do."

Goldenblade has gathered to escort the convoy. She's ready for a long trip over rough terrain, though she's not an outdoorsman by inclination or training. Camping ought to at least involve a winnebago. There's a reason that we, as a species, moved out of caves. No camper, she's quite knowledgeable in making shelters, so that expertise might be used. Arriving at the starting point, she calls out a greeting to those already arrived. "Hello." Not a huge greeting, she looks a bit weary.

As a Messenger Kauchemar tends to be one of the first people to catch wind of such requests, and the Nightmare Were Fang is often one of the first to arrive on a scene because of it. Though all she does is lean against the side of the wagon, seeing as they are just finishing prepping up to start moving. Folds her hands behind her head. "This is more my style, being on the move instead of standing in one place like a giant target." She pauses, then snickers a bit as she glances towards the back of the wagon. "At least someone remember to pick Doctor as their profession so we won't have to worry about disenteria!"

    Setsuna shows up...not to late, as he approaches the convoy from the front. The note about this being a long trip was what appealed to him. It would give him time to clear his head, and think about his situation. He smiles at hearing the oregon trail joke as he looks at the group that gathered . " Ok but word of warning, don't try to ford the river. It never ends well." He looks at one of the wagon, " So which wagon do we chill in ?"

"I figured that it would make for a decent change of pace," the Doctor of Tolbana says to Kauchemar with a slight smile. "We're going to be riding along in this one here. These boxes--" Prophylaxis knocks on the wooden crate nearest to him, which hinges open to reveal that the whole thing is in fact a facade hiding a relatively spacious internal compartment. "Are actually meant to conceal our presence until we're needed. The seats may not be too comfy, but it's something, at least."

Prophylaxis doesn't say anything about dysentery, but he does shudder just a little bit.

"First thing's first though, before we leave..." Prophylaxis unrolls a map of the local area from his pack. There's a dotted line that roughly corresponds to the path that the convoy is meant to take. "We should decide on a route. This here is the usual one, but if we want to avoid the undead, we might want to make some adjustments. Unfortunately, I'm kind of shit with maps, so..."

Hopefully the others are... less shit.

Goldenblade huhs as it becomes clear we're expected to plan a route and navigate this convoy as well. "That wasn't in the original deal," she points out. Also, she'd gotten used to GPS and Mapquest. This cross-country orienteering thing is something she hasn't done since scouting in the 1950's. But with a map open, she can at least point out a route that will work. The presence or absence of dangers on that route is another thing entirely. She looks over Proph's proposed route and points out, "That's a kind of a tough grade, it'd be slow going." Maps she's meh at, but grades and inclines she understands. "But if you went this way..." she points.

    Looking over the map, Setsuna begins to trace the routes. "Lets see..." trailing off as he looks over it some more, "Yes I think..." He keeps looking over it carefully inspecting every inch before looking up at the others, " Ok so I think this is the map of the area we are in, now does anyone know where we are on it?" Maps apparently aren't his thing either.

    Merek looks to the path forward, while he nods a bit along to Goldenblade, "Well, if we follow that you're right, then we can all travel from that point," he notes, then he begins to assist with the party when it comes to dealing with cartography as well.

After a few moments of everyone being ready and nobody moving Kauchemar lets out a soft neighing sigh. "Oh it's going to be one of -those- escort quests is it..." she murmurs as she gets up from her lean. "Fine, fine, it's all fine... But I kick the first person that tries to actually hitch me to pull anything." Fortunately equines aren't really used for that around here.

Instead of bothering with the map she climbs up onto the front of one of the wagons and stands there. A scroll is drawn in one hand, while the other waves in front of her face and the specteral spectacles of supernatural flame appear around her glowing eyes.

It's quiet as she stares seemingly into space and views things unseen to the mortal coils, various paths and potentials... Then abruptly thrusts out her arm to point a direction with the end of the scroll, which is now glowing just faintly in her grasp. "Onward! Divinity determines your destination and decrees a destiny of deliverance and distribution awaiting!"

Prophylaxis stares at Kauchemar like she'd inexplicably sprouted a second head. But then he realizes that the line she was projecting is inexplicably intersecting and lining up with different portions of both Merek's and Goldenblade's suggested routes. He looks from the mysterious glowing scroll to his own map and then back-- and shrugs. "Sure, let's go that way. Works for me."

And for a while, it does in fact work pretty well! Occasionally they go off-road and the entire convoy rattles down what looks to be an old, half-cleared animal run before shuffling back onto one of the Dominion's internal highways... When it becomes obvious exactly why it is that they took that detour, even though it wasn't even slightly apparent before.

Just down the road, in the direction that they /would/ have come from... is what looks to be an undead barricade, a makeshift wall of bone manned by skeletal archers and shambling ghouls. As the party emerges, the undead apparently take notice of the fact that some impertinent adventurers straight-up bypassed their blockade...!

This is something of a problem for them, and significantly less of a problem for the adventurers. "Looks like they're onto us," Prophylaxis says, peeking out from his hidey-hole. "At least we don't have to deal with their walls. Get out there and burn them all down...!"

The undead are riding forth on equally undead mounts, chariots with bone-shod wheels pulled by skeletal horses. Some are launching projectiles of barbed bone from osseous bows, while others are attempting to ride in with lance and sword...

But they're also in a rush to catch up, so the party will be able to bombard them at their leisure before the monsters can close in. Best to use the opportunity while they have it!

Goldenblade acks at the ambush so soon after leaving our point of origin. To Kauchemar, she was saying, "Yes, onward, to - oh shit!" Well, we're a bit far off, so she unlimbers the bow from her back and nocks an arrow. She doesn't use it often, and it shows: her arrows mostly fail to hit the target, landing either short or long. "This archery stuff is easier said than done," she complains.

    Merek would look a bit up to the enemies that are taking them on, then he tries to sweep his magic Mind Shock into them, though there are likely too many for him to assist with, "I think we should retreat," he notes, while he nods a little bit to the party.

    They had a path and so Setsuna took his spot in one of secret compartments, which was a little roomier then some of the airlines he had flown on in the past. As he gets comfy and closes his eyes for a moment, his tempting of fates causes fate to remind him of it's existence as the convoy is attacked. Springing from the box , Setsuna sends out bolts of magic one after another trying to at least scare away the monster. " We should pick up the pace I think."

Once the caravan starts on its way Kauchemar sits down atop the wagon and leans back... but she's unusually quiet for her as the journey moves on. That is maybe an omen of some sort. Nightmares are classically good at being ominous like that.

Whatever it is, a gang of chariot riding undead charge onto the scene... and she doesn't look all that surprised. "I never said Destiny came without Danger," she notes before anyone can give her any crap for her previous proclimations.

Even as she stands, turns, and gives a dramatic wave of her hand. "Winds of change, change their way!" A few more such gestures and a blast of wind is send whirling out behind the caravan. Looks like she's trying to make the pursuit slow down rather than try to blast them directly.

Well, there's the problem with the undead. You never know quite how stubborn they are to put down until they're charging through a volley of magical and physical projectiles alike without a care. One of the skeletal horses gets an arrow embedded in its eye socket for its trouble, but it isn't deterred in the least...!

At least Kauchemar's gale seems to slow their advance, but even so the caravan is peppered with arrows! One of the carriages catches fire as a flaming arrow lands on the canvas roof! For once, something is on fire and it isn't the Doctor's fault! Prophylaxis himself doesn't fare too much better than his fellows, but manages to hurl enough magic missiles with enough accuracy that one of the chariots comes unwheeled and careens into its neighbor, putting a halt to the undead advance... for now.

The convoy comes to a stop once it travels a safe distance from the undead encampment. "Well, that was a little close for comfort," Prophylaxis says with a grunt of mild consternation as he hops from his perch, "And the wagon we lost was packed with most of our food, so... I think we aught to see if we can't forage around for supplies while the Landers do some repairs."

By some stroke of luck the caravan manages to make it to the first camp location of the journey. Only to find a large portion of their foodstock was gone with the wagon that caught aflame. "Okay, -that- I did not forsee." This is why divining the future is less reliable than divining the past. You only see possibilities and potential, nothing is set.

"Well, can't be helped." She wanders over to a nearby stream... but all she has to try and fish with is her whip, and that doesn't work very well in the end. "The only thing I'm succeeding at is nothing."

    Merek takes time to look around, before he finds a few herbs to pick up. He begins packaging them, while he brings that to the party, "Well, we can eat, it... Well, we can eat." Not notably eat well, though they can eat.

When we get to the site where we're going to camp, Goldenblade is more than ready for a hearty meal. Sadly, the cart with our food is the one that was lost. "Gah, why was the food not mixed a bit in all the carts," she mutters sullenly. Well, if something must be done, something must be done. "Look," she says, "In the old days, when the food was scarce, they just cooked up what they had. My mom used to cook everything to well-burnt. Everyone did, back in the day, and you couldn't tell meat from leather." So, she will have a go at cooking the hell out of something like food. But it's a very fine line between well done and burnt charcoal, and Goldenblade's enthusiastic application of FIRE to the issue turns out to be a bit /too/ enthusiastic, and she's unable to salvage any of the spoiled rations.

    They escaped the undead monsters and Setsuna sighs some relief as they escape, "Surely that is the only thing that is going to be problematic and smooth sailing from here. " He says outloud as he looks back at the undead once more and then forward. When they come to a complete stop and such though, thats when the problems catch up. Setsuna hadn't realized they left the food behind. So off to get food they go, Setsuna retrieves a knife shaped rock from his inventory as he goes hunting. He thinks he is in luck to, their was a squirrel...kinda sorta. It was meat, and as Setsuna approaches it very quietly he cracks a twig and it scampers off. He returns to the wagon empty handed, " So who enjoys the taste of air, as that seems to be all I could manage to bring back."

"I mean, there /might/ be other food, but that was most of it and now it's all on fire and being eaten by undead," Prophylaxis answers. "Unfortunately, I've come up empty too. Either we all suck at gathering, or this just happens to be a downright barren stretch of land." Well, at least Merek is able to get them /something/ to eat. Sure, it's a few leaves... each... but that's more than nothing! Some of them are even a little bit sweet! There are even a few nuts and berries there. It's something!

Not much though. At least they still have some stale bread to munch on from the emergency rations.

But just when it seems as though the party is going to have to travel to the other end of the Ninetails Dominion on nothing but the contents of the world's most heinously understocked Panera Bread, something appears in the middle of the road. It's a tall, majestic creature, a simply massive, glorious example of its species. It is a peko, but not just any peko! It's a peko... whose plumage is blood red.

"It's... beautiful," the doctor says, a Hunger debuff hanging heavy 'round his neck, "And... so tasty-looking...!" The Red Peko cares little for the desires of these adventurers. The creature rakes its talons across the earth. It shakes its head, spreading its plumage aggressively, as if to say 'come at me if you dare!'

It's sure as heck coming for them. Even before anyone launches a single arrow, the Peko is on the move! Beware its MIGHTY KICKS!

(And possibly also large falling rocks)

    Merek looks to the creature while he nods a bit, "I will distract it with herbs," the man notes, while he takes a moment to find a little nice pack of herbs which he uses as bait.

Goldenblade grumbles at the starvation diet. "When we get back, I'm gonna eat two Jumbo Crescentburgers," she announces. And then we're confronted with the Gojira of supper on the hoof. Both swords out, she charges recklessly, muttering a battle cry about drumsticks for supper. She's a whirlwind of in-your-face fighting, here and there and blades going everywhere, and the giant peko is losing HP very fast.

    Setsuna looks at the Peko and smiles, "It's beautiful. It's going to be mine. " Whether or food or for the simple want to ride something that big, it doesn't matter. He doesn't wait as he was out to the bird and summons a spector of a dire Peko on top of him and begins to mimic the bird trying to coax it into a calm state. " There we go big guy... just settle down. " He has the bird settled down and between the attaks from some and treats from others he hopes maybe such a giant peko could be used to help pull the wagons faster then the grunties.

Kauchemar snorts. At least she's still equine enough of a monster that she can at least tide over on some foliage, even if she'd rather have a nice bloody steak. "You know what the worst part is?" She chomps on some of the meager finds. "Not once has this dumb quest given me a proper music cue!"

... That annoys her more than the undead attacks and lack of food? Bards, go figure.

But then fate decides to either shine on or mock them, as a massive red bird descends upon the convoy in the latest testament to why escort quests -suck-. "That is one hell of a turkey." Fortunately she still has her whip at hand, which she unfurls... and seeing Setsuna go to try and calm the bird, just cracks it into the air a few times, trying to strike a pitch that would be similar to the bird's squawk.

This Peko might have been king of the road, but it clearly underestimated how terrifying a starving band of adventurers could be. In fact, the ensuing ''battle'' (if it can indeed be called such) is so gruesome that we are instead going to cut away to this idyllic scene of a beautiful springtime field.

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"Phew," Prophylaxis says with a satisfied smile as he slumps back down into his seat. "That was a good bird. A little gamey, but definitely worth the fight. And we've even got some leftovers!" There's an ENTIRE LEG hanging inside one of the wagons, apparently being dried for preservation. The doctor of Tolbana pats his no-longer-empty belly and sighs happily.

There is a slight problem though. The King of the Road appearing was enough on its own to spook the various pack animals into a state of absolute terror, and that's even before these adventurers did utterly unspeakable things in the name of filling their stomachs! Now they're nearly in a frenzy. The party's destination is just a few hours away, but they're going to need to figure out a way to get this wagon train moving again before the undead take notice of a stranded convoy in the middle of the road...!

    Merek looks to the animals all in a frenzy, and seems to think about it. He tries to make them take off with his sword, although the only thing waving that manages to do is make them run along even further.

Goldenblade grumbles as the animals are hard to settle down. It makes it hard for her to sleep, and she's already pretty cranky. So, she stamps her foot down and there's a small earthquake. It does not settle the animals down. "Screw it," she mutters and goes over to go to sleep. "We'll eat them if they won't pull a load," she vows.

    Setsuna, now with a full stomach, is feeling good until he notices the pack animals are scattered about and frowns, " I am not getting stuckout here. I am not hiking back. All because some birds decide to get scared because we ate their cousin. " He taps on the ground and skeleton warriors rise from the ground. " Bring it back. Alive." The skeletons run after a peko and have managed to lift it up and bring it back to the wagon. Yes the Peko is still freaked and one skeleton is missing some ribs, another is missing a head. Still though the peko is brought back and tied to the wagon. Setsuna walks over to the Peko and looks it dead in the eye. " I can make corpses move just as easy as living things. " Yes he threatens the bird, and the bird on some level understands it appears as it settles back down.

Well that took care of food at least.

But now all the animals are in an uproar, either from the 'King of the Road' or seeing what the Adventurers did to it so they can continue to function.

She just stares for a long moment. Followed by a slow, exasperated sigh. Something about 'dumb birds' under her breath as she gets up from the ground. Brushes a hand back through her mane, then points accusingly at the rest of the Party. "I was serious what I said earlier about kicking anyone that tried... But I can't kick myself." With which she walks over, rolling a bare shoulder, and grabs the rigging at the front of a wagon. Fortunately despite being more magically inclined, the choice in monster species still gives her some considerable Were Fang strength and endurance, and just to spite the whole 'pulling the wagons themselves' is -exactly what she does-.

"o/~ Lines on my face ... lines on my hands ...
Lead to a future I don't understand
Some things don't go as they are planned...
Where are we going from here? o/~"

But at least she got her music cue, ironically enough.

Birds are dumb, it's true! There's a reason the phrase 'birdbrains' is a thing!! But they also seem to be utterly unphased by all but the most absolutely direct threats of physical violence. The superchickens cluck obstinately at Goldenblade's and Merek's attempts to quiet them down, and it takes a literal undead army to actually drag many of the creatures back into line. Prophylaxis just laughs, the irony is not lost on him.

Though... What if they /did/ create an undead peko...? Or grunty, for that matter? His patron might tear his head off, but a tireless beast of burden would be absolutely invaluable--

Well, he can think about casual necromancy later. Prophylaxis nods as the last of the pekos is drawn home and moves his hands in an arcane gesture. Translucent vines suddenly lash each of the beasts securely into place-- a temporary measure, but it'll do until they get to their destination, but...

One of them... has gone missing. This is a problem. There's a cart that doesn't have a peko...!

But it does have a transformed Kauchemar, who has taken 'sing until your voice has gone ho(a)rse' to a whole new level. The surprised (and still mildly terrified) Landers get the convoy back into gear, and slowly but surely they manage to roll into town...

Only to find that the /buyer's/ convoy never actually made it there! Apparently said merchant had his entire caravan ransacked and now has neither the means to transport nor to purchase the goods he promised to buy, but...

Well, there's a marketplace in this here city, and he promises that they can probably find substitute buyers there.

But he's already broken one such promise before, can he really be trusted? Is there truly someone who will fork over enough cash to make this whole trip worthwhile...!?

Goldenblade breathes a sigh of relief as we make it to our destination after so many travails and so much misfortune. "This whole mission is like a testament to bad planning," she grumbles. And now it's on us to get this crap sold? "We ought to just keep this," she complains. "The people selling this have taken zero agency in getting this to work, it's been all us. If we keep it, we can use it to supply your base up in the tower," she says to Proph. She has no luck in drumming up any business locally.

    Merek looks about while he tries finding any Merchant that might assist. Well, they don't find a lot, "Well, we can sell it all."

When the supposed buyers aren't there to meet them Kauchemar just lets out a groan as she slumps at the front of the wagon she spent the last couple of hours pulling. "Oh of course... of bucking course..."

The Were Fang drops the rigging, trudges over, and gets poised to do the whole town cryer thing to get some attention...

Only to fall flat on her face as EXHAUSTION status effect kicks in from all that pulling, and the only sound she's going to be making for a bit is snoring. Her stamina is exceptional but not unending!

    Setsuna sighs heavily as they are told that the buyer didn't even show and they are stuck with all this stuff. " So we just need to try to find a buyer for all this. " WIth that Setsuna drops a speed buff on himself and runs off to talk to every fancy rich lander he sees. However apparently he hit a 1 in a million bug where the speed buff, buffs the speech rate to and he sounds like a chipmunk on speed and returns empty handed and just sits by the passed out Kauchemar. " Does the owner of these wagons have insurance? Can we burn the wagons and collect the insurance money? If you need undead to do it I can help with that."

"We can't just... /take/ all of it," Prophylaxis waves his arm incredulously at the huge caravan of goods, then clarifies, "I mean. You saw how shitty getting this stuff /here/ was. Can you imagine trying to haul all of this crap back to Alne and then up to Tolbana? It'd kill us! No, give me a minute, I have an idea."

Prophylaxis turns to disappear mysteriously into the teeming marketplace, but then pauses, frowns, and walks over to Kauchemar's lifeless body to push a syringe of some kind of ~helpful stamina potion~ into her arm. /Then/ he disappears mysteriously into the teeming marketplace.

...A few hours pass, and the Doctor of Tolbana reappears unceremoniously... with his arms FULL of gold sacks. "I got us a buyer. Sort of. Managed to negotiate with the local Adventurer's Guild Branch and demanded compensation for our trouble in exchange for all these goods. They couldn't buy it all, of course, so I had to use some other tricks, but we're all getting paid," he side-eyes one of the Lander caravaneers, who suddenly looks very nervous. "...Even our clients, here."

Goldenblade is just about fed up and frustrated with this mission, so much has gone against us. She sits down next to Kauchemar and sits. Nothing more. She just sits. But after all's said and done, mostly by Proph, the payout is surprisingly decent. "I hope you sold off the wagons and pekos, too. Screw the merchants that sent us on this fool's errand." Even the Landers that are here with us. "Whatever," she says. "I'm taking a few days off."

    Merek lifts up a hand to wave along to Prophylaxis, "I'm with Goldenblade, we went through all of that and promises weren't even kept. I'll pay for the food," he notes to the people also.

Kauchemar is a big girl (over six feet tall I mean) so it takes a moment for the injection to get far enough into her system. But when it does she bolts off the ground and flumps on her rump instead. "I'M AWAKE I'M AWAKE I'M... shit, are we still here? For once I almost wish it was a bad dream..." she mutters, absently rubbing her arm where she got the booster shot (ha ha) and not entirely sure why.

Fortunately the Doctor manages to finnagle something for the troubles. "Well, that's great... But remind me to never do this stupid quest again."

"Don't worry, I found buyers for everything." Prophylaxis glares at the nearest Peko as he emphasizes "E V E R Y T H I N G."

(Really those Pekos are just going to a ranch operated by Prophylaxis' patron, and the wagons are getting stripped for parts, but Prophylaxis is j u s t f i n e with that.)

"Come on," he says, making his way toward the nearest boozehall, "I think we can all do with a drink."