Duty Session 325: 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

Kotono
Alne - Main Square

There's trouble in this merchant's shop. Rats. And they're mean and filthy too!

When there's rats, who ya gonna call? Ratbusters?

Nope, but there's always Kotono who's willing to help out those in need. It seems like a simple enough job, but there's no telling what kind of rats might be down in that basement. Which is why Kotono's asked for help.

When SpritesHero (OK, it's Bob, but this is just for reference sake!) arrives, Kotono smiles a little. "Thanks for joining me, I don't look forward to taking on these things alone!" She twirls her daggers then looks towards the entrance to the cellar. "Let's get ready!"
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

Rats again, it would seem. His expression is...perhaps a tad less enthusiastic than Kotono's manner. Nonetheless, his smile as he approaches is polite enough. He greets Kotono with a bow.

"The pleasure is mine," he observes. Not that the glance he offers the cellar conveys any sort of pleasure. A grudging sense of duty, perhaps, but no real pleasure. His hand drops to his sword hilt as he straightens. "Ready when you are. Yell if you want me to do something specific."
Kotono
Alne - Main Square

"I will, don't worry," Kotono replies as they head into the cellar. Almost immediately the green-haired girl wrinkles her nose. "Eww, it stinks like nothing else!" She waves her hand in front of her face. "If rats do live down here, then they must have a weak sense of smell!"

For a moment there seems to be nothing out of the ordinary, until there's the sound of chittering nearby, and Kotono goes on alert. "I don't think we're alone here." She holds her blades on either side. "Better safe than sorry!" She then proceeds to spin around the general area of the chittering with her blades going. "Take that!" The ivy is cleared up rather quickly thanks to the spinning blades of Kotono.
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

For his part, Robert takes a less direct approach, due to the fact that the vines in his section seem to be quite old, quite dead, and exceedingly stiff. Carefully pulling a glove onto his right hand, he withdraws a pinch of powder from a pouch that, in turn, pops into existence from nowhere. Probably his inventory. A sweep of his hand disperses that pinch of powder into a shimmering sheet of air in front of him, gradually superimposing on the vine wall in front of him. The vegetation withers away, crumbles, and falls to the floor.

"Agreed," he states. There is a hiss of steel against leather as he draws his sword. "I think we're about to have company. You are front-lines, yes?" he hazards. Though he doesn't actually -say- anything about the room's smell, he does risk a sharp inhallation. He regrets it, instantly, features going a sickly shade of green. His throat tightens, as though he's about to gag, but he manages to hold it back. Are those tears in the corners of his eyes? "After you, ma'am."
Kotono
Alne - Main Square

"Thank you," Kotono says with a slight smile as she proceeds into the passageway, her smile fading as she looks around with awe. "I never would have imagined something like this could have existed in a place like this." She looks around a little, stopping as she approaches the strange door. "Looks like we aren't getting past that easily." She looks at the runes with a discerning eye, and after touching one, seems to realize something. "I think I know the pattern, but help me out just in case." She says as she starts to work on touching the runes correctly.
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

"It -is- rather odd, isn't it," Robert concurs, lifting his right hand. Until he frowns, realizing it's not at all clear how he's supposed to help her. Luckily, there's what appears to be a lamp of some sort powered by raw magical power. He slaps his hand on its operation rune and powers it through brute force, illuminating Kotono's work area. It's not much, but at least it'll be easier to see.

"A rat infestation past a rune-locked passage," he comments, with a faint tightening of his lips. "Tell me I'm not just being paranoid. I don't think rats have learned to operate runes." Beat. Well. There have certainly been strange things before. "Probably," he amends, hastily.
Kotono
Alne - Main Square

"I don't think the rats built this... unless they're not your typical rats or something like that." Kotono bites her lower lip, trying to think about what could have caused this. "Is there something else at work here? Maybe there's something else here... something we shouldn't know about?" She gulps a little but keeps going anyway. After all, it couldn't have been the rats. Maybe they were built a while back or something?

Kotono dismisses that train of thought long enough to realize that they're now surrounded by rats. "Oh oh," Kotono says nervously. "I think we just stepped into a rat convention... and we're their intended lunch!"

A pause as Kotono holds out her blades again. "Although I don't plan on being rat lunch today!" With that, Kotono proceeds to go into a slashing spree, slicing and dicing the rats away!

"Whew, too close!" Kotono says. "Let's keep going!"
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

"Perhaps.....the rats are a trap," Robert intones in sepulchral tones, hands lifting, fingers rippling through the air spookily. "Oooooooo."

As musical (and ghastly) as that sound might be, Robert really shouldn't be screwing around in the middle of a duty. And regardless of whether Fate appreciates his antics or no, he evidently decides he needs his come-uppance. Which happens when he steps on something large and furry, which squeaks, then half-crunches, half-squishes underfoot. For a moment he freezes, but he rapidly forces himself to glance backward over his shoulder. Eyes. Eyes everywhere. Beady, black, squinty-little eyes.

Robert nearly hops backwards, hand instinctively slashing in an upward diagonal through the air, erecting a flaming barrier. It's not particularly good at killing the rats. But it does make sure the rats from his side have to funnel through a narrow opening towards Kotono. He holds the wall in place until she's done with her whirlwind of death. "Right," he intones, as though a bunch of rats -didn't- just almost make him scream. "Onwards."
Kotono
Alne - Main Square

Ignoring the faux pas that happened with Robert, Kotono leads on, starting to become more uneasy about this whole thing. "Something tells me this isn't your typical den of rats. We'd best be on guard." The girl moves a little slower, her steps deliberate and slow to avoid drawing any unwanted attention from anything that might be hiding in the darkness. "I've really got a bad feeling now..."

Kotono's bad feeling would get worse upon arriving in the lair of the armored rat, and her eyes widen for a moment. "OK, I think we've just confirmed that this is definitely not your typical rat's nest! We're gonna have to get physical!" She draws her blades. "En garde!" She yells as she goes in blades flashing.
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

SpritesHero similarly dives in quickly when he sees the armored rat. There's a shrill whistle, to catch its attention, and he too sprints forward with sword in hand. He executes a blur of strikes--mostly thrusts and mostly ineffective against its armored head, with the exception of a slash that nearly takes off the critter's ear.

What he -does- manage, however, is to pose a continual threat against its nose and eyes. And while the rat -is- able to keep those regions from getting nailed, it also means that it's presenting a number of openings to Kotono's flashing blades, which presumably make quick work of the beast.
Kotono
Alne - Main Square

As if things couldn't get any worse, right?

Kotono and Robert come upon a kobold which is spewing some nonsense. "I don't know what you're talking about," She says with a narrowed eye. "But I do know you're in our path and you're gonna have to get out of our way!"

Taking out her runes, Kotono attempts to invoke a spell to heat things up...

Only to wind up only smoking a bit.

"I'm... gonna have to smoke you out I guess?"
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

SpritesHero doesn't end up doing much better. He -does- manage to summon his fireball. What he doesn't manage to do is actually hit the Kobold. It's as though his jest from earlier itself tugs that flaming orb off-target. It abruptly yanks downwards a the last moment, plummeting into the horde of refuse. Which, in turn, immediately goes up in a raging inferno. "Uh," Robert observes weakly, backpedaling towards the entrance. "Maybe we'd best just let that burn out, yeah?" The kobold fled, right? So this is a job well done? Not done in the most traditional way, perhaps, but an evacuated kobold is an evacuated kobold.
Kotono
Alne - Main Square

After all is said and done...

"We made it. There's that." She smiles a little to Robert. "That was a bit of a challenge, but we made it through. Still, I'll never look at rats the same way again." She shakes her head. "At least we did what we had to."
SpritesHero
Alne - Main Square

There's a bit of a pause.

"Yes," Robert allows, though his expression still borders on the stiff side, and he keeps glancing over his shoulder at the chamber with undiluted suspicion. "Curiouser and curiouser, as they say." There's a faint shiver as he readjusts his thoughts. He grins at Kotono, bows once more. "Appreciate your leading on the job. It was well done."