Duty Session 268: Totally Typical Tomb

    It's one of those days. June has gone to the Hunter's Guild picked up a quest and started on her way to go clear out a graveyard. Normall you'd get a party together then pick a quest. But this is June. As she's walking through town and then as she walks towards the graveyard she just sends invites to random Adventurers who don't look like they're doing anything. The middle aged librarian looking woman dressed as a barbarian princess, just handing out party invites is a thing at least SOME people have gotten use to.

All quests are good quests to Lin. Every invite could lead to greatness and every tomb could be a gold mine. Sure, he hasn't stumbled on either yet, but the potential is out there. The Pooka bounces cheerfully up to the gathering point, excitement in total contrast to the graveyard's gloom. "Hiiiii!"

Yeowang is one who accepted June's party invite. In fact, she had been browsing quests, too, so it's good. She is wearing utilitarian clothes, but as we proceed to the quest starting point, she gathers up her long hair and ties it in a loose bun atop her head with a cloth band to secure it. That'll keep her very long hair out of her way. She looks over the assemblage calmly and nods a greeting, smiling at Lin's enthusiasm. "Good day." She wonders, "So, do these tombs all exist and are discovered one by one, or is the space empty, and then the game developers place a dungeon here when they want to?" She hasn't figured out the RP thing at all.

With a wary glance at the pop-up invitation, Kyo looks around for a moment, then reads the details. Always happy to lend a helping hand, even if his face doesn't always show it, the Salamander arrives at the rendezvous promptly. He crosses his green-scaled claws across his chest and finds something to broodily lean against, because... that's what they do, right? A slight wince passes over his features at Yeowang's mention of game developers. "Does it matter? We go in, bad things die, we get rewards, right?"

    If there is anything Amalthea is growing weary of, it's paperwork. Paperwork and herding cats. Unfortunately as the second in command of the Odysseia Knights, this means that when she isn't actively main tanking for raid bosses, much of her work IS handling the Scale Emblem's paperwork and herding the cats of the crazy solo players guild in Gardenia's name.
    So what does the old Paladin do?
    She sneaks out.
    Heading for the local Hunters Guild to see if there was anything more interesting to do.
    'Interesting' comes in the form of a sudden part invite to go raid an undead infested tomb.
    Deal.
    "Ah, hello, hello, dears." The older woman says as she approaches the group, one hand resting on the pommel of the sword at her hip, an easy and warm smile finding its way to her features. "I can handle tanking for the group. Just don't tell anyone I'm here. I had to sneak out of one of Castle Reach's windows just to get out from under all the paperwork." She says, chuckling as she makes a playful shushing motion with one finger.

    June smiles at everyone and gives a bow that one might at a corporate meeting. "Hello for anyone who doesn't know me I'm June.. Junko..Arima Junko." she licks her lips "I'm happy to have you all join me." she looks to Yeowang "Ooh no see graveyards, or more properly memorial places are here all the time, they're used by Landers to mourn their dead since they do not leave bodies behind. They are mostly cerimonial shrine locations however sometimes items or things related to the departed are locked away. I don't really know specifically what causes it but sometimes undeath floods into them and undead monsters spawn. So don't worry you're killing someones great grandad or anything it's just a spawned enemy due to a necromantic force." she takes a deep breath and knuckles the side of her head. She switches to speaking in Sindarin (elvish) which is also translated though the words are definately in a different language than Japanese. "Junie, they don't really want details do they? Are you going to lecture on game design next or try to check any relics they have for more of the Alverian script hmmm? Get your head in the game Junie you have this... your quest, your party, gota do the team lead thing get your ass in gear."

    The woman is obviously speaking to herself from tone and volume. She shakes her head and looks at the gloomy graveyard. "Anyway, we'll head inside, find the necromantic core, destroy it, gather up our loot and then I'll let the hunter's guild know this space is safe for people to come mourn at."

Yeowang nods to Michio, "Yes, that's the case if we win. I was merely curious. This is my first ... game. My younger brother plays, but I never paid much attention to the details." She arches a brow at the mention of paperwork, and considers. Then she says, "Paperwork is the heart of any good organization. It is what allows it to function efficiently, rather than going off in all directions aimlessly." It's unclear whether this is intended as a pep talk for paperwork, or just a general cheer-up thing? "But of course you must work for yourself as well as your guild," she allows, understanding Amalthea's need to not be buried under paper. She doesn't look like the type to do paperwork, though she may be the type to cause it for others. She nods to June as she explains what the memorial garden is. "I wasn't worried about killing anyone's relative. It was curiosity as to the level of 'pre-planned' vs 'ad hoc' event structure."

"I've got a suspicion that a lot of stuff has been here for a long time." Lin offers an answer to Yeowang's question while wandering (disrespectfully) through the graveyard. He stares at gravestones, trying to make out names. Michio's take on the matter makes Lin wrinkle his nose. "Only if you think the only possible advancement is what we're handed! If something's spawned then we can figure out the mechanics and control where they show up. It's worth thinking about!" The Pooka smiles brightly and tugs on his coat, anxiously adjusting how it hangs. "Anyway. Let's get inside! There's no reason we can't have both loot drops and system mastery."

Violet eyes gaze off into the distance for most of what June says, though as her tone and style of speech change Michio turns to look at the woman, arching a delicate green eyebrow up curiously. He still doesn't speak until she finishes explaining the plan. The salamander grunts softly in response to Yeowang's words, before he gestures offhandedly towards Amalthea, "This one said she can tank. I can deal damage, and help in various ways. I am not a powerful healer, but I do have some Artes in that area as well."

    "Mae l'ovannen, hiril vuin. Uin edhel, pedin edhellen." Amalthea says, beaming rather brightly at June. For the unintiated in Sindarin, that simply means: 'Well met, my lady. I'm no elf, but I speak elvish', as she gives the woman a nod of acknowledgement.
    "I wouldn't worry too much about it." She adds before unsheathing her sword and taking to the standard tanking position of standing at the fore of the group. Checking that her shield is strapped securely to her arm, "This isn't my first crypt run, but not every tomb is the same. I'll try and be careful regardless. Shall we?"

    June nods "Come on let's get started, early started early done." She says heading into the gravestones, heading to the central crypt where the necromantic forces always seem to setup shop. Once the adventurers pass a line the rattling sound of bones fills the air. A carpet of boney rodents running towards the party. Long teeth clattering as they swarm over the tombs and each other in an effort to devour all the living.

Yeowang nods at what Lin says, filing the information away mentally. She nods to what Michio says about roles. "My main task is damage, also," she agrees, and nods to Amalthea about getting on with things. Though there's not much else to do but chat as we make our way /to/ the site. When we get there, she'll fan out just a bit, and when the skeletal rats swarm out, she low-kicks them, one after the other, pirouetting like a dancer as she kicks them clear, a bit lower in HP after every kick, until finally there are no more to kick.

"RATS?! If I wanted to fight rats I'd have gone to a tavern cellar!" With a most un-dragonly squeak, the Salamander begins throwing tongues of flame at the skeletal vermin. He seems quite non-plussed by the little beasties, however, and succeeds only at searing the tops of Amalthea's boots, doing little more than tarnishing their gold trim.

    Right then onwards into the graveyard.
    Only to come across a carpet of undead, skeletal, rats. Amalthea whistles to herself at the sight as she rubs at her chin thoughtfully.
    How to handle that?
    Well first, the old paladin starts by wading right into the mass of rats, just as Michio scuffs her boots.
    "--Ah that's hot." She mutters, beginning to stamp. ... Then her every step starts to shake the ground with rattling force, causing the mass of bony rodents to start breaking apart as she spams her taunts to hold the aggro onto herself instead of the others.

There's no hesitation from Lin when the party starts moving. He gets in place on the back line and pulls his spellbook from his belt. He flips it open to a seemingly random page and smiles confidently. When the swarm of skeletal rats shows up, he chants a long series of syllables and puts his magic to work. The fog glows as lightning spears down from the sky. Tiny rodent bones go flying as thunder fills the air.

    June looks at the skeletal horde and charges in as she so often does, only without starting up a chant of light... wearing scale mail bikini into rat horde... is a bad plan and she spends most of the fight flailing around and knocking rat skeletons off her legs. Glowing lines and bites appearing on her skin.

    Lin starts thunderwaving the tide of little crunchy bones even as Yeowang danekicks her way through her part of the tide. Amalthea with Michio's 'aid' shakes rattles and rolls the little beasties into bits.

    Once the party has cleared the path they head towards the central Mausoleum only to have June get distracted by a bit of tunnel going under the wall. "Hey guys...? Anyone else have the feeling that this is an alternate route? Who builds a tunnel UNDER a crypt and then seals it off...? Looks a bit unstable though so uhm... anyone got a good way to shore it up? I'm sure we've got enough muscle to beat through the wall."

"Actually, I think I have an idea..." The Ki Master takes a step back and begins chanting and waving his arms around in arcane patterns. As he does so, vines and roots sprout through the soil and begin wrapping around bricks in key locations. "There. Remove the bricks that aren't secured and the tunnel should remain stable."

Yeowang kicks the last of the rats away and proceeds with the others to this ... mysterious place. Looks like it might be an alternate way down? "I can help with digging," she says to June, and will start in on that, clearing away the earth from the crumbling entrance. "I haven't seen any way like this before," she admits. "But I'm willing to investigate. Could be interesting." Help with digging is what she does, then, clearing away earth as Michio stabilizes the remaining structure.

Lin's high on power. With the last of the rats, he lowers his spellbook. Bright blue electricity spiders its way lazily over his silver hair before evaporating. The Pooka looks far, far too pleased with himself. "That's a really weird entrance. I wonder why they'd even block it off?" With unrestrained enthusiasm, he raises his spellbook and tries to help the clearing action. But, true to form, he goes a little too hard. What should have been a simple earth moving spell becomes a violent shove that sends bricks flying. Now unstable, more of them topple back over the entrance. "Oh no! I'm so sorry!"

    That sure DOES scream alternate path.
    So when the party stops to see about trying to find a way through it, Amalthea sheathes her blade.
    "Huh." She muses, lips pursing. But then Michio handily secures some key bricks in the wall and everyone gets to digging.
    What does Amalthea do?
    Lifting her boot up she gives the wall a good, firm, solid, powerful, straight-on horsekick.
    The force is enough to shatter the stones not held up.

    June smiles as the party starts working together easily and quickly. PUGs around here have been quite good lately but then... everyone is sort of doing this kind of thing 24/7 and it's been almost a year already. She rolls her neck, once, twice, and then iron scales are running up her body, horns sprouting from her head as her muzzle grows. Greenish fog puffs from her muzzle and after Amalthea's kick, she charges. 5' nothing, but when you're covered in iron scales, made of solid muscle and bone and sporting iron horns... you go through what you charge at. The small explosion of dirt and brick leaves her half sprawled in a tunnel... that is lit against all logic. "Looks like we found a way." she chuckles as she stands up brushing dirt off her iron scaled shoulder.

    The party starts down the path until they come to a hallway with holes along each wall. "That's... that's traps for sure." she says with a chuckle. "Someone on the dev team watched their Indiana Jones."

    Moving on right along. With the wall out of the way Amalthea follows through the opened path until they reach... The dreaded floor tile puzzle.
    "Walk in the name of God... Only in the footsteps of God will he proceed... Proceed in the footsteps of the word..." she murmurs, stepping forward onto the letter 'J'.
    She is IMMEDIATELY pelted by poison darts, causing her to stagger back.
    "Agh agh agh! Damn it-- I forgot it begins with an 'I' in the Latin alphabet that makes twice now!"

Yeowang follows June and the others dow into the hall, and when the holes are pointed out, she nods gravely. There's a pattern to them, but she's no scholar. She eyes Amalthea, and realizes that being a scholar isn't as simple as all that. But she's not one for puzzles, she's more physical, more in the moment. Or, in this case, a step ahead of the moment, sprinting now, one step ahead of the traps as they spring just behind where she is at each moment.

The rush of victory has instantly turned to the weight of embarrassment. Lin looks a bit ashamed as the rest of the stones are cleared away and June charges through what's left. He soldiers on with significantly less enthusiasm than before. "Yeah, that's totally trapped." He hangs back for a moment before trying his own approach. "In the ancient Alv language it definitely starts with two-crazy-circles-with-a-tail."

"Interesting." Michio says as he nods in agreement with June's assessment. He takes a single stride forward and steps intently onto one of the tiles.

As a dart shoots out from one of the holes, a quick flash of clawed hand grabs the projectile, then studies the tip of the dart intently. First he inspects the tip, then dabs it ever so lightly on his tongue. Michio spits to the side and grunts, then takes some herbs from a pouch on his waist and begins chewing them as he strides down the hall.

Some of the projectiles are avoided, some are not, but the man simple flicks the darts away and looks around at the others. "Okay then?" He looks to Amalthea and offers her some leaves. "Chew these. Don't swallow. Spit out both the juice and the pulp."

    June looks to Lin "I haven't found a word for God in Alverian... although... I only have one word fully traslated for intent and meaning." she licks her snout, wide bovine tongue stroking over iron clad muzzle. She follows after the others, darts skipping off of her iron scales, until the last one that manages to wedge under a scale. That's when the swearing starts... it's in Khuzdul (dwarvish) and it involves improbable family pairings and impossible phsyical acts... it goes on for a while even as she takes some of the herbs and chews them walking along to the next area.

    Which is how she almost ends up tumbling into an unknowable abyss...only fast reflexes keeps the loose stone from dumping her down the shaft to doom. "Ooh... well... I guess this is a thing... who knows how to read music?" she asks with a sigh.

Yeowang ends her sprint in this odd ... is it a music room? With a pipe organ. And a decidedly unsettling music rack. The organ's bellows are clearly inoperative, but that's an easy fix, patching them up with a few bandages and some sticky, and then pumping it up. It doesn't hold a ton of air, but enough to make noise, and as long as she keeps pumping it, she can keep the air flowing.

"Is it wishing for something?" Lin counts his paces and hops from stone to stone, casually querying June's vocabulary. Arriving in the organ chamber, he spreads his hands wide and lights up with a huge grin. "Hey! Now we're talking. I can read a bit of music." That dreadful overconfidence is back, and this time it's potentially deadly. Lin does seem very comfortable at a keyboard, however. He steps up to the keyboard and reads over the page. "This shouldn't be a problem."

June's reflexes might have saved her, but they nearly doomed Michio. As the boviopoid dodges back she collides with the Salamander and knocks him sprawling. He even almost catches himself, except not. He is, in fact, dangling over the ravine, claws gripping the ledge. "Uh... Little help please?"

    Leaves acquired, Amalthea commences chewing. "Ah, thank you dear." She asides to Michio as the group moves on and she plucks poison darts from her armor.
    And so the group finds the spookiest pipe organ Amalthea has ever seen.
    "Oh dear."
    At least Lin has the musical aspect handled, but as the floor starts to fall away, she takes to a knee to reach for Michio's hand.
    Only for the space beneath her to drop next, putting her in a similar position, hanging by a hand.
    "Ah... Not our finest moment, eh?"

    June is bouncing about quickly from stone to stone, and when Amelthea goes down helping Michio she grabs the tank by her armor plate and with heave of strength a 5ft nothing shouldn't posess, and tosses the pair through the opening door that Lin manages to play open. "There we go... uhm yah that's the one I've managed so far, but I'm hopefully getting more examples soon." she says. Then she's making her own metalic way through the door. The party heading down a winding stone passage and into a great cavern. "Okay... which level designer even did this..." she sighs "It still baffles me... they don't even have a lore friendly way for a ship this big to get under ground this far... unless they go with some teleport excuse." she scratches at her iron scaled cheek with one clawed finger. "It's definately the Inferno though... no mistaking that ship." she says.

Yeowang peers at June as she explains about the ship. "This is a world ruled by magic," she counters. "Why does there need to be logic. Pirates obviously teleported it here for some nefarious purpose." As she takes in the scene, and the big pirate captain skeleton thing, she sighs. "Uh. That part there," she points, "is definitely the captain's share. We ought to leave it be..." She has no heartburn fighting the mooks for the rest of the loot, punching and kicking like a whirlwind. She -was- an MMA fighter, and her high level shows here as she doesn't even break a sweat.

With a shrug, Michio walks directly up to the corpse of "Not-One-Eyed-Willy-Because-Trademarks", picks up the hat, and puts it on. "If I'm not mistaken, the pirate's code says the one wearing the captain's hat is the captain, and thus, if that's the captain's share, it's now mine, and I choose to share it with all of you. Also, since I'm the captain, you.. uh.. scallawags, can just ship off." This last directed towards the skeletal pirates.

"Yeah, that's as far as I've gotten too. We should compare notes sometime!" Lin says to June. His fingers are light and fast on the keyboard, and after the tune he looks a little disappointed by something. This passes when he sees the ship. "I love it! It's perfect! We're going to get so much gold."

The ensuing fight goes far worse than could be expected. The Pooka ends up with hands full of gold, a chalice in one hand, a candelabra in the other, and he's got no will to drop either and pull out his spellbook. He takes a swipe at a skeleton with the candelabra, then falls back on the deck.

    Once freed from her precarious situation and moving on, that sure is a ship under the ground.
    "That's--" Amalthea begins to speak. Yeowang beats her to it. This is okay, it's all well and good because it means people won't touch the captain's share as-
    Michio declares himself captain.
    It earns a chuckle from the old Paladin as she turns to face the the incoming skeletons and storms toward them, smashing bones with her shield and cleaving spines with her blade while holding aggro.

    June snorts "Yes well I'm happy to, I've been gathering all of the Alverian script I can, as well another researcher is getting old songs in Alvish recorded." she says. Then she looks at the giant skeleton "I... don't you have to beat the captain to Be captain?" she asks? Sending a spinning kick into the skeleton... who roars to life leaving the bovine woman in a wrestling match with the captain. She rolls around pounding on the giant, eventually winning, but far lower on health than is good, and then the cannon sounds the cave starting to crumble around them. "Cheese it!" the woman announces in English with a laugh as she bounces outof the ship heading for the only exit. Sure she fails to grab any of the money but she has plenty of gold, she really was just here for the XP and to explore in the end. She stands in the clearing gloom in the graveyard dusting off her iron scales. "At least the place is cleansed." she says having switched back to Japanese.

The Captain's hat is tossed over one shoulder, but a sack of gold is slung over the other, and Michio follows June out of the cave. "Yes, it is good that the Landers can properly mourn their dead." As he says this, however, a dark shadow seems to pass over his features. He offers a soft sigh and looks to the path to one side. "Thanks for the party all. Chim me for duties any time."

Yeowang grabs quite a lot of the cash. She -was- here for the rewards, it seems, and she's not eager to leave without it. That said, she's not too keen on being left here to her fate, so she'll scramble of with the rest of the party, her inventory weighted down with enoooooooormous bags of gold.

    "It's a regular mutiny." Amalthea asides as June goe toe to toe with the risen captain while she fends off the skeletons.
    When the cannon fires and the cave starts to come down- Amalthea isn't going to wait for it to come down around her.
    She books it.
     "Phew..." She heaves a sigh as they make it out and... "Ah..."
    Realization strikes.
    She forgot to grab treasure on the way out.
    Worse realization strikes.
    Someone probably dumped more paperwork on her desk.
    Sigh.
    Ah well at least the Landers can mourn in peace again. That's a reward unto itself.

Victory is gained, even though Lin spends far too much of the climactic fight attempting to swashbuckle with a candelabra instead of... anything that he's actually capable of. Heavy gold objects in each hand, he runs as fast as he can from the crumbling ship. "No no no noooo!" Doesn't he realise he can put them in his inventory? No? When the party's back at the quest entry point, he doubles over, panting for breath. "Oh man. I am... never fighting without magic... again."

    June smiles at Lin, those pointy teeth don't belong in a bovine mouth but it's fine. "I'll see you around the libraries, that's where we've been gathering to work on the Alverian issue."