Duty Session 388: Sher Kar Challenge

Goldenblade is getting people together near the Westelande capital, for the trip into the desert. She explains, "The Westelanders have a coming of age ritual, where they go to this sort of burrow, and the kids fight the Sher Kar. But giant ants have taken over the burrow and they're a bit too high-level for the Landers. That's where we come in. We go in there, stomp on some ants, and whatever the ants have going on there, get it out of there. The Sher Kar are beasts, they'll attack, too, if we see them, but don't kill them, we want them to repopulate." The explanation done, she checks the supplies for the trek through the desert to where the Sher Kar challenge, if anyone had gone to the Westelande ritual back in the day, happens.

"Giant ants, really? That's a little worrying, considering it wasn't that long since /other/ giant bugs caused trouble around here," the Doctor of Tolbana observes, scratching at his chin. He wears a veil attached to his hat today, a thin cloth that covers his face so that only his eyes peek through a narrow gap. It keeps the sun from blinding him, the heat from cooking him, and the sand from getting absolutely everywhere (only mostly everywhere). "Well, best to nip this in the bud as best we can, then. We can't exactly afford something like this drawing attention while a war is brewing."

"Man I'm not worried." Then again when is Syx ever worried, at least openly, "I mean they're just ants or Sher Kar or whatever we're fighting. I'm sure I'll just be able to haul them through the air and slam them into the ground and they'll die like everything else." That's his plan at least. Which really that's his plan for every encounter so par for the course

"Giant ants -again-?" is Vertina's input on the matter. "First infesting lakes and now this. Grrr." She really does emit a growl, showing 'angry anime girl' sharp teeth and all. "And interrupting sacred Westeland traditions besides! How rude!" Rude enough to at least partially stir her from her peculiar mood. "Time for us to go play exterminators."

    New Job? New request? NEW CONTENT? Nariko was on the way before anyone even had the chance to suggest she get her feet moving. Ants? Whatever. People have killed rats, gnolls, slimes, pirates, what's a colony of giant ants? "Easy, that's what it is!" Nariko announces, replying to Vertina more than anyone else. "So lets get to it then, punching, kicking, shooting, slashing, however, lets just put'em in the ground," Beat. "Further in the ground." ... "Whatever lets just make them stop moving!"

    A familiar looking Monkey Cait Sith walks into town, he's not been seen in a very long time but here he is. A yawn escapes him as he comes to the group that is gathering. "Hello everyone." he says. His tail sways behind him, as he arrives. Wynfei sees the leader and smiles, "Hello Goldenblade." he bows to her, "It's been a while." he chhuckles. He looks around aat the others, and he smiles as he sees Vertina, "Hello Vertina." he says as he walks over to her.

Goldenblade shares Vertina's anger. She can't even recall who all was with her and the other Westelanders a year ago or so. But they'll remember those ants. To Syx, she emphasizes, "Fight the ants, do /not/ fight the Sher Kar. Anyhow, you probably won't get XP." Not like she knows for sure. To Proph, she nods, "Yeah, ants like the sandy environments. Who knew, right?" Her tone there is pretty dry. She smirks at Nariko's enthusiasm, saying, "that's what I like to see!" As Wynfei shows up, she smiles to greet him. "Come join us, we're clearing out a monster lair," she explains.

So she'll lead the party out of the city and across the arid terrain, no need to go into much detail about the trip. It's boring. Sorry. She leads the way to a place like a quarry, though. An open pit with several ramps down, and she points out the giant ants at the bottom. "Those are what we're here to kill. All right, light them up."

"No but specifically there is a problem with ants around here," Prophylaxis insists, making his way alongside the rest of the party into the depths of the desert. "Like, an entire ant-agonistic kingdom of hiveminded ant-people lives a little ways out in the sands. They've got a town."

Are these ants related to those ants? Who knows? Maybe they'll find out? Prophylaxis peeks down at the giant ants at the bottom of the quarry...

And fires a handful of magical bolts directly into loosely-resting boulders sitting precariously above the lot of them. A few quick pops of arcane energy later, and those bolders are knocked into the pit, aimed precisely to come smashing down on top of one or more giant ants.

"Wynfei!" Vertina takes a moment to give her friend a bearhug. "How appropriately wandering monk, showing up just when we happen to need the help!" She set him back down and then turns her attention to the pit as the monsters at the bottom are pointed out. "Alright. Like she said, let's get to it!" The Salamander Martial Artist hops down onto a ramp to get a bit closer to the targets.

Once she's within range she pulls several kunai out, and starts throwing them at the giant ants as she's making her way down the rest of the path.

    The werefang gives a wave to the assembled party, along with the approaching wandering monk, before they're all off. TO THE QUARRY. No giant robots to fight the giant ants though? Lame. Eh well. Ants are ants, no matter the size. "Lets get to stomping then!" Leap! Land. Bucking ant. Seriously the planned on stomp didn't go quite as planned, resulting in Nariko riding the thing like a bull. "NOT WHAT I INTENDED!"

    Smiling to Goldenblade Wynfei chuckles and nods, "Thank you for alloowing me too join you all." he says as he looks to her. Though when he is bearhugged, he hugs Vertina back, "I've missed you my friend." he says as he looks at her. When she lets him go, he is able to gather air. Watching the others he bows to them and follows. As they make throuogh the desert, Wynfei moves easily, same as when Golden Blade and Vertina last saw him. "So fighting ants." he says.

"I make no promises if someone fights me I fight them." Syx replies to Goldenblade. Though once the group does arrive and finds the ants that have been gathered near the entrance, Syx lets out a battlecry and leaps into the pit. Zero hesitation as he dives down into it and starts swinging.

His punches are savage and directed. There's a ton of power behind them sure, but each strike does have a purpose. He's not just swinging wildy. Weak points in the chitin armor of the ants are found and exploited, powerful throws delivered when needed. All to serve the purpose of destroying every ant that gets within arm's reach.

Goldenblade can only shrug to Proph. "I dunno if these ants are related to those ants. There's an uncle joke in there, but I can't find it." She grumbles at Syx and says, "I guess all the kids /aren't/ ecology nerds." But he's kicking ant right away, so she hurries down the ramp to face the ants as well, meeting them as they scuttle upwards in a clash of blade on mandible. Her swords flicker with an inner fire as she fights hard, laying out hard strokes which bite into their HP bars. Vertina's kunai take out the ants as they swarm and try to get closer, dropping one, then another. Wynfei's fighting skills are certainly not rusty as he fights off the ants, finally clobbering the one Nariko's riding and allowing her to jump free.

Ants defeated, Goldenblade looks at the various entrances into the underground lair. "Any guesses?" she asks. They look alike to her. "We want to find their Queen, but I'm not sure how, to be honest."

Vertina crouchs down to expect the ground. "There's tracks." A pause. "-Lots- of tracks." After another moment or two of shifting about she sighs and stands up. "Stupid multiple legs, I can't tell what direction they're coming or going, there's too many marks and not distinct enough because tiny bug feet."

    The rodeo comes to a fairly abrupt stop when Wynfei puts the ant Nariko is ontop of right to sleep. Permanently. At least the sudden stop gives her the chance to leap clear and land on her feet, after a flip, because cat. That will always be the answer. "Well. That was something." All the ants are dead! Bah. Onward, then.

    The entrances are given a looking over, but one in particular draws Nariko's gaze. "Look at the walls, the scuff marks, the wear and tear cause, you know, ants. Gotta feel with their feely-dodads to move along, so... Follow the marks."

Prophylaxis taps thoughtfully at his chin. "Indeed. If we could follow their chemical trails, this would be trivial. But we can't. So instead, we'll use their natural behavior against them. Ants are very clean insects, you know? Very tidy. They keep any plants or fungi that don't belong in their nests very well contained. Which means if we accelerate the growth of any such flora in the area, we can be reasonably certain that the paths with the least amount of overgrowth is where we need to look."

As for how they'll manage that... Prophylaxis has the party covered. The doctor taps the earth with the base of his staff, sending creeping veins of rich, verdant energy into the ground. Soon, several of the passages are practically covered in moss and lichen, leaving only a handful without any such obstructions. "There, that should help narrow things down a little, I think."

Syx is no good at this tracking stuff. And is having too much fun beating up ants anyway so when there's none left, he goes wandering down one of the tunnels to look for some more. Maybe it'll be the right one!

    Finishing off one of the ants, Wynfei moves to regroup with the others. He smiles to Nariko, "You seemed to have had things in hand." he says to her. He too begins looking around, a lot of his skills weren't for this type of duty but he waanted to help.

Goldenblade tries listening to the earth, which sounds a bit sissy to her, but it's really a thing, so who knew? It's still a bit sissy, even if it works. She doesn't eat quiche, either. Vertina, sadly, is overwhelmed by the sheer number of ant tracks here. They've been scuttling all around, with no easy way to tell which way they came from or went. Nariko, it seems, has found the best path, one of the choices Proph has revealed with his undergrowth growth magic, and Goldenblade agrees quickly, "Yes let's go that way," calling for Syx to follow them all down the way we've decided.

Goldenblade leads the way down, and the tunnels are entirely wide enough for even the broadest and tallest players, and the reason becomes apparent when we encounter the Sher Kar. "Just get past them," she urges, particularly attempting to herd Syx, who'd previously expressed his desire to fight everything, past these critters. "Sneak or block," she calls. "Or for those if you with the lore, mind control." The finger waggling is over her head.

You put big difficult monsters in the path and expect Vertina to just sneak by or something like that? If you do, you don't know adrenaline junkies very well. "It's about time we got to the good parts of the mission!" Sure, they were asked to not kill the Sher Kar, but something something about what you can live through.

Not that she goes into it completely recklessly. "Hey big fella, there's something in your teeth..." A heavy straight punch puts a ki-infused fist directly into the monster's face. "MY FIST!"

The charged blow is enough to slam a Sher Kar into another and both of them into a wall, dazing them so others can get past. Hard to control minds if their minds are already concussed.

    Sneak? Block? Mind Control? "Buh? That isn't gonna work.." And when Vert punches, Nariko joins her. One KO'ed monster. "See? Path open! They'll be so distracted worrying about their brother... sister? ... This one here that we can move on with no issue! Perfect!" Shoulder clap, "Good job, Vertina, was it? I like your style."

"Yes, mind control," Prophylaxis wrinkles his nose and wiggles the fingers of his strange gauntlet. While this would normally result in very little at all, in THIS case, Prophylaxis somehow conjures a globe of some strange... greenish... chemical /stuff/ into his palm. He hucks it at the Sher Kar, where it bursts into a haze of bliss-inducing pheromones and sleepy gas. "Absolutely, mind control. Yes."

Syx can't really sneak or control monsters so instead he tries to fight these things. But Goldenblade told him not to kill them, so he's pulling his punches, doing his best to keep them at bay without really going all out. The flame gauntlets seem to help a bit at that. He really would rather just go to town on them though. They respawn! Right?

    Having gotten the dust out of his head and the fur between his ears, he stretches and quickly moves to catch up with the others. Though now seeing the only way through is to throw hands, he moves up beside Vertina, a grin showing, pointy canines flashing. He rolls his shoulders, "Guess it's time to play." he bounces and begins meleeing.

It looks like Proph has mastered the chemicals that the Sher Kar use to know when to be aggressive and when to be passive, and Wynfei, Syx, and Nariko fighting alongside Vertina's aggressive blocking is entierly effective in causing the Sher Kar to back into their side passage. It's technically a bit of side-burrow that they can fill in behind them that the ants haven't found, but it's home. "Don't hurt them /too/ badly," she insists, "This is Westelande cultural crap we're trying to save." Well, she's bought into trying to help them, she's at least got to sing the party line. This is Goldenblade's chance to kiss up to that important Lander general and get the influence she'll need to get that badge. She ghosts past the Sher Kar while this happens, they don't even notice her in the confusion. Syx successfully restrains himself from clobbering the Sher Kar too badly, though he's kind of stuck in a toe to toe slugfest, neither one doing much other than countering the other until the party pulls him out of the melee. The Sher Kar do not pursue as the party contnues down the tunnel thanks to Doc's efforts.

The tunnels lead on, and it's several minutes twisty walk until they find themselves in a slightly wider bulge in a tunnel hopefully leading to the ants' main chambers. Unfortunately, it turns out to be blocked by a small group of guard-ants, and they begin to close with the party immediately. It's a small chamber, and very little space to move in.

    "Eh! We're getting buy, and the big one is just out cold. It's fiiiiiiiiine," Nariko insists before stepping over the monster and moving on, only to find ants. Bigger, meaner, fighty ants. "Oh, hmm. Hey guys, can we just, you know, get by- Ouf. I'll take that as a no." One of them snapped its mandables at her. Head roll. "Well, I tried!" Fire washes over the tiger grinning a most feral grin. "I don't have a magnifying glass so this will have to do~ " It's kind of pretty, watching the trails of fire as Nariko does the martial arts thing. Even better if one had a slow motion camera but, well, those don't exist here.

Vertina grins toothily at Nariko. "Don't you know it! Sometimes the best way to deal with a problem is just go right into it." She didn't say anothing about not having a plan of action. Just her closest to planning is planning how she's going to smash someone's teeth in.

Ants don't really have teeth, but that's not going to stop her. "Look, they sent more people to have a bad time." Nor is the limited fighting space. A proper monk excels in close quarters. Especially when one can get creative. Vertina jumps up to grab onto the ceiling, usin the claws of her battle gloves to dig in. And uses the grip for leverage to swing the rest of her body up and pedal kick an ant-guard in the head and chest repeatly until he collapses and dematerializes.

Oh no, not close quarters fighting! What ever will Syx do?!

"Alright ants, you know what? I'm not trapped in here with you. You're trapped in here with me!"

It seems Syx has every intention of proving that phrase correct, as he grabs the closest ant and immediately launches it through the air at the next group of them, before following after it with reckless abandon.

This is really where he's most at home, it seems.

    Wynfei doesn't talk much, this was fun. He didn't join in on the banter. Watching the ants come in, Wynfei throws a viscious back kick to one. He then elbow smashes another. Oh this wasn't anything new for him. A laugh escapes him, it's loud and he bounces on the balls of his feet, tail dancing behind him. "Alright, have to admit, I'm loving this." he laughs.

Oh no, not close quarters fighting! What ever will Prophylaxis do?!

...No but seriously. Prophylaxis is SOME KIND OF SQUISHY MAGE. The doctor grimaces at the sight of this crushingly tight corridor he's expected to fight in without accidentally blasting one of his party members. "Probably shouldn't fireball here... Can't use a cannon... Ah!" He snaps his fingers, apparently deciding on an appropriate course of action!

Which appears to be... cheering. "Nn, you guys got this! Fight those ants dead!"

...Yeah. It's not much help.

Nariko bathes the ants in fire, which does not help them or make them happy. They are less fighty when she is done with them. Vertina, far from being hampered by the close quarters, uses it to her advantage to kick the guard ants in the face. Or what passes in ants for a face. Syx hits an ant with another ant, and it only escalates from there. And not in a way that ends well for ants. Wynfei has found this to his liking also, it looks like chance has granted Goldenblade a very close quarters team! And Proph. But he's helped a ton with some of the other challenges, she won't bug him, so to speak, about this.

So it turns out that those guards weren't guarding the queen, but the egg chamber, and as the party looks around in the dim light, they can see thousands of fist-sized eggs and a similar number of grubs being tended by workers. There is no reaction at first, but then the grub tenders turn to defend their nest, and the grubs they turn in case there's food.

Kung-Fu fighting is wonderful and all, but would you look at this, a target rich environment.

"Hey, Nariko," Vertina grins at the were tigress she's decided she rather likes the chops of. "You want to see something really hot?" The Salamander scrapes a clawed foot across the ground to start gathering rock and dust, while using her elemental bending to start forming it into a spherical shape. That grows until it's roughly soccer ball sized as she bops it back and forth a few times. The catchs her toes under the formation, and flicks it into the air in front of her. Plants her opposite heel and uses it to pivot, sweeping the first leg up high and around as her foot ignites in flames.

"METEOOOOR STRIKAAAH!" Flaming foot slams into the ball, setting the dusty rock aflame even as it's sent hurtling into the chamber, hurtling through a few grubs and tenders before crashing into one of the stacks of eggs and sending the entire cluster up in a glorious conflageration!

    "Stupid ants," duh, but Nariko did try to talk to them! The insects. That are incapable of vocal speech. Whatever. The tiger martial artist's flames die down, but as she has a look around the egg chamber, a twist of each wrist keeps the flames on her bracers. "Oh ho. Look at this absolute mess." Arms come up in regards to the nurses and grubs. Ready to go, until Vert gets her attention. "Eh?" Rock. Fire. Smash. ... It must be christmas.

    "Yeah, okay, you are teaching me that like, tomorrow," Nariko insists as the pyroball smashes into the eggs and sets everything on fire. That's the tiger's cue to smash in ant and grub heads cause, lets be honest, smashing all those oozy gooey eggs is not something she wants any part of.

    Wynfei was seeing all of the fire being used and honestly the tight quarters weren't a problem for him either. He was able to bounce around and jump as needed, using his tail to wrap around ceiling structures just to allow him to lead else where. Though as he gathered his ki, he could feel the flames envelop his hands but as he leapt towards an ant, well the fire goot out of control and singed him aa little, "OUUUUUCH!" he shakes his hands and blows on them, "That didn't do what it was supposed too do." he frowns.

Eggs! If they can deal with those, they might be able to put a dent in how quickly the ants can keep replenishing their numbers! But first, they'll need to deal with... this.

Ant guards, that is. And as expected, there are a /lot/ of them. Prophylaxis' expression flattens as he digs through his inventory, "I'm sure I have something useful in here somewhere... Hmmn..."

But by the time he finds anything worthwhile, SUFFICIENT FIREPOWER seems to have taken care of the problem for him.

...Victory??

Burning down eggs? That's something Syx can do. With his usual reckless abandon of course! Engulfing his whole body in flames, Syx goes to work, running around slapping eggs with a flaming hand, throwing eggs at the wall like a baseball, and generally making a nusance of himself. All while on fire and laughing like a madman the whole time.

If people didn't know him it'd probably be terrifying.

Vertina's Meteor Smash smashes like a meteor into the eggs, destroying hundreds of the closely packed things in a swath of destruction. Nariko smashes the workers and grubs messily, but they're not really fighty ants and barely resist. Syx is unstoppable as he dashes through the chamber, setting fire to everything he doesn't smash. And to some of the things he goes on to smash also, because thorough. Goldenblade is not sure how well she knows him, because she's at least mildly concerned as she goes through much more calmly setting fire to the grubs and eggs and workers. Oh my. Wynfei gets a bit /too/ free with his fire, which is why they tell you not to /play/ with fire. Apparently the others are trained professionals. And Proph. Famous for his fire, he seems more interested in a more finessey way to end the grubs. But with so very much fire so close at hand, the eggs and grubs and workers are incinerated before he can come up with it.

"Well," says Goldenblade as she surveys the burning remains of the egg chamber. "The ants won't be respawning here, at least. But the smoke is filling this place in, let's get out of here."

Vertina huhs. "Haven't tried to teach the technique to anyone else yet... but we can certainly give it a shot!" Hehehe, shot. "And I'll bring plenty of drinks for us to stay hydrated too." Now that all the action is over she's started to slip back into the Strange Mood mindset. But not before picking up one of the busted mandibles left from the dead guards. "Mmm.. not much can be done with this for liquors. Maybe find another use for it later." Into the inventory loot pile it goes.

    Having cleared the egg chamber, he wasn't hurt too badly and he didn't back down either. He was already moving to leave, he been away too long and friendships is something he has to work on and repair. Hearing Vertina looking to teach someone, yeah he's rusty and honestly out of shape. Shaking his head, Wynfei begins to leave.

    "Oh, I will -make- it work!" Nariko barks, despite cat. As for loot? Inspect inspect inspect. Mandible? ".... I .. guess?" Yoink. Much like Vertina, the 'loot' goes into her stash for later. "Well, that went far better than the last place. Training pays off! WOO! How do you like that?!" She punts an egg-tender's husk cause, well, why not?