Re: Intense Struggle Season 2! (Round 3: Castle Suterrea)
08-16-2011, 09:27 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by Drakenforge.
Karen threw another fireball at the back of the plant as it made its getaway. Reudic was uncharacteristically fast for what had been a fairly slowly hovering plant prior to its rampage. As such it managed to tell where her fireballs were coming from due to the heat and light they gave off and easily dodged them. She was also having difficulty with her spells. It was tricky to build the necessary fire without burning herself normally, but while moving it became increasingly hard, and so did aiming, and since Reudic would never tumble if it dodged while moving it was free to do so as much as it wanted.. As Karen prepared to launch a homing spell she saw a green tendril snake out and slap a familiar looking slab of stone as it hovered passed. A jet of fire narrowly missed Reudic as it triggered another flame trap, but her spell flew through regardless. She knew it was a weak spell, not even enough to harm Reudic, but she had hoped enough to slow it down, or scare it into thinking she had the upper hand. She waited for the streams to stop and ignored the remaining embers as she leapt over the trap. After another minute of running she rounded a corner only to find herself with two possible exits. An open window let in a cool breeze while a dark stairway branched out to the right, leading down. Karen couldn’t tell which path Reudic had taken, and choosing incorrectly could waste enough time for the round to end.
If she had to choose she would rather spend her time looking for Lillian. While Reudic had taken Lloyd by surprise, it had lost that element entirely and was now a clear enemy. Once he was back to normal, all three of the more hardened entrants would be able to take Reudic easily. While Sarika was even more helpless than usual with her missing implant, she had a power to keep herself safe.
The case of the amulet theft meant that Lillian had nothing to protect her. She was vulnerable and missing. Karen was willing to spend the rest of the round finding the little girl. As a plus, if she could get everyone looking in one group, minus Reudic, the chances of any one of them dying would decrease.
Accepting that it was the best decision she began heading back the way she had came, leaving a small hidden fire trap in her wake in case Reudic tried to backtrack. As she passed the still smouldering stones she wondered if she could help Lloyd and Sarika recover from the toxins given to them. It dawned on her that her alchemist class could be useful, with the right ingredients. She closed her eyes and envisioned a wheel with icons spread out on the circumference. Each icon stood for a class. Currently the image of a witch hat and another of a sword were glowing. She concentrated, causing the image of a vial to shine.
A new weight dropped on her shoulder, and when she opened her eyes she was a satchel hanging by her waist. She unbuttoned the flap and began seeking out certain ingredients and instruments, laying them carefully on the floor one by one. After that she slowly began manually preparing each ingredient, sometimes grinding leaves down with a mortar and pestle, and watering down the pulp, or using her magic to boil a liquid and coughing as the dark smoke wafted through the air. She had to be very careful since she could easily make a mistake, while in game she wouldn’t have needed to be so diligent. After a while Marcus eventually caught up with her, and asked her what happened to Reudic. His eyes darted to the scorch marks a few feet from her kneeling form, and then to the rows of alchemic items spread out in front of her.
“He got away. Two paths, stairs and a window. I figured curing these two,” She glanced over to Lloyd and Sarika’s semi-conscious forms, “And then finding Lillian took priority. She’s the only one that can come to serious harm once those two get back to normal. How’s the leg?” She asked, while carefully funnelling a black liquid into two separate vials, stopping both with small corks.
“It’s fine” He lied, though Karen had expected as such. The smell of blood was still pungent, yet that may have been Sarika. Karen motioned for Marcus to rest them by the walls while she tried to cool her newly mixed anti-toxins. She inspected Sarika first, since she was the first to be subjected to the toxins. Karen carefully removed the seer’s goggles and inspected her eyes. Karen had never studied aviary eyes, and was very surmised at the sharp, yet golden stare that Sarika gave a funny looking portrait on the fall. While like Lloyd the toxins were diluting her pupils, the false future visions were wreaking havoc with her. Karen removed the stopper from the first cure and tried to pry open Sarika’s mouth, a task easier said than done.
After a brief struggle Sarika gave in to the witch’s efforts and drank the black liquid.
“Will that even work?”
“Dunno.”
“What’dya mean you don’t know?”
“I paid good money for the ingredients. This thing usually cures boss level debuffs and poisons. But the effects it has now are unknown. Could be poison for all I know.”
Karen watched Sarika intently while Marcus fretted about her fake ignorance. Karen probably shouldn’t have been playing with the mercenary, but watching his reactions lifted her spirits in this grim battle. Everyone needed to blow off steam once in a while, this was just her way.
“Huwzhu- DAMN THAT HURTS.”
Sarika, having regained both her sanity and her sense of pain was writhing around clutching at the crimson mess of down that had once held her staff arm. Karen quickly muttered a healing spell to sew up the scabbed wound. She apologised quickly as she prophet asked what had happened.
“We found you being led around by Reudic. Apparently you lost your arm to a mimic beast, but we killed them all.”
“Probably all of them.” Karen added.
“Whatever. Anyway, soon after Lillian disappeared.”
“Again?”
“Again.”
“And all we found was her penchant.”
“Which Reudic stole.”
“And left Lloyd in a mess on his way out.” He pointed a thumb at the Elven mage, who was currently trying to hogtie a man named Holmes to stop him finding a hollow bible. Karen pushed back his head and tried to get the glass tube into his mouth, yet Lloyd resisted far more harshly than Sarika, while remaining far less loud.
“You might want to grit your teeth before you do that.” Sarika added, aware of what was going to happen.
Karen was forced to jam her thumb between Lloyd’s molars to keep his mouth open. She silently thanked the seer for the heads up, and poured the black liquid down the Elf’s unwilling gullet.
As he regained his psyche they recapped what they had just told Sarika.
“But now we need to figure out a plan.”
Karen was quite sick of Marcus’s plans, and stood boldly and announced her own.
“We go down.”
“Why down?”
“The towers are empty. This is a castle. Where else would a young maiden be magically transported?”
“You plan to look for her with cliché? That’s just reckless.”
“You got any better ideas lay them down, because right now we have nothing to go on. Either we stick together for the first time and get something done instead of aimlessly getting ourselves attacked or one of us runs out of luck and gets themselves killed. The Monitor can’t stop us teaming up, so lose the lone wolf attitude.”
Karen glared at Marcus, not caring about the height difference between them. After a while Marcus admitted defeat and let the witch’s plan unfold.
“What do you think we’ll find down there?”
Karen once again felt the sensation that something very horrible was happening.
“... We need to move. Now.”
She checked that everyone could keep up with her as she ran through the corridors, back to the hole leading several floors down. She shouldered Sarika and leapt, while Marcus and Lloyd climbed down.
“It’s that bad feeling again, “ She whispered into Sarika’s ear, realizing that this was probably why the seer let herself be carried in the first place, “It’s down there. And isn’t alone.”
As the ragtag team of adventurers made sure that the magical field around the door had been taken down by Lloyd they set off down the cold and hard stone steps, not fully comprehending just what lay ahead.
Karen threw another fireball at the back of the plant as it made its getaway. Reudic was uncharacteristically fast for what had been a fairly slowly hovering plant prior to its rampage. As such it managed to tell where her fireballs were coming from due to the heat and light they gave off and easily dodged them. She was also having difficulty with her spells. It was tricky to build the necessary fire without burning herself normally, but while moving it became increasingly hard, and so did aiming, and since Reudic would never tumble if it dodged while moving it was free to do so as much as it wanted.. As Karen prepared to launch a homing spell she saw a green tendril snake out and slap a familiar looking slab of stone as it hovered passed. A jet of fire narrowly missed Reudic as it triggered another flame trap, but her spell flew through regardless. She knew it was a weak spell, not even enough to harm Reudic, but she had hoped enough to slow it down, or scare it into thinking she had the upper hand. She waited for the streams to stop and ignored the remaining embers as she leapt over the trap. After another minute of running she rounded a corner only to find herself with two possible exits. An open window let in a cool breeze while a dark stairway branched out to the right, leading down. Karen couldn’t tell which path Reudic had taken, and choosing incorrectly could waste enough time for the round to end.
If she had to choose she would rather spend her time looking for Lillian. While Reudic had taken Lloyd by surprise, it had lost that element entirely and was now a clear enemy. Once he was back to normal, all three of the more hardened entrants would be able to take Reudic easily. While Sarika was even more helpless than usual with her missing implant, she had a power to keep herself safe.
The case of the amulet theft meant that Lillian had nothing to protect her. She was vulnerable and missing. Karen was willing to spend the rest of the round finding the little girl. As a plus, if she could get everyone looking in one group, minus Reudic, the chances of any one of them dying would decrease.
Accepting that it was the best decision she began heading back the way she had came, leaving a small hidden fire trap in her wake in case Reudic tried to backtrack. As she passed the still smouldering stones she wondered if she could help Lloyd and Sarika recover from the toxins given to them. It dawned on her that her alchemist class could be useful, with the right ingredients. She closed her eyes and envisioned a wheel with icons spread out on the circumference. Each icon stood for a class. Currently the image of a witch hat and another of a sword were glowing. She concentrated, causing the image of a vial to shine.
A new weight dropped on her shoulder, and when she opened her eyes she was a satchel hanging by her waist. She unbuttoned the flap and began seeking out certain ingredients and instruments, laying them carefully on the floor one by one. After that she slowly began manually preparing each ingredient, sometimes grinding leaves down with a mortar and pestle, and watering down the pulp, or using her magic to boil a liquid and coughing as the dark smoke wafted through the air. She had to be very careful since she could easily make a mistake, while in game she wouldn’t have needed to be so diligent. After a while Marcus eventually caught up with her, and asked her what happened to Reudic. His eyes darted to the scorch marks a few feet from her kneeling form, and then to the rows of alchemic items spread out in front of her.
“He got away. Two paths, stairs and a window. I figured curing these two,” She glanced over to Lloyd and Sarika’s semi-conscious forms, “And then finding Lillian took priority. She’s the only one that can come to serious harm once those two get back to normal. How’s the leg?” She asked, while carefully funnelling a black liquid into two separate vials, stopping both with small corks.
“It’s fine” He lied, though Karen had expected as such. The smell of blood was still pungent, yet that may have been Sarika. Karen motioned for Marcus to rest them by the walls while she tried to cool her newly mixed anti-toxins. She inspected Sarika first, since she was the first to be subjected to the toxins. Karen carefully removed the seer’s goggles and inspected her eyes. Karen had never studied aviary eyes, and was very surmised at the sharp, yet golden stare that Sarika gave a funny looking portrait on the fall. While like Lloyd the toxins were diluting her pupils, the false future visions were wreaking havoc with her. Karen removed the stopper from the first cure and tried to pry open Sarika’s mouth, a task easier said than done.
After a brief struggle Sarika gave in to the witch’s efforts and drank the black liquid.
“Will that even work?”
“Dunno.”
“What’dya mean you don’t know?”
“I paid good money for the ingredients. This thing usually cures boss level debuffs and poisons. But the effects it has now are unknown. Could be poison for all I know.”
Karen watched Sarika intently while Marcus fretted about her fake ignorance. Karen probably shouldn’t have been playing with the mercenary, but watching his reactions lifted her spirits in this grim battle. Everyone needed to blow off steam once in a while, this was just her way.
“Huwzhu- DAMN THAT HURTS.”
Sarika, having regained both her sanity and her sense of pain was writhing around clutching at the crimson mess of down that had once held her staff arm. Karen quickly muttered a healing spell to sew up the scabbed wound. She apologised quickly as she prophet asked what had happened.
“We found you being led around by Reudic. Apparently you lost your arm to a mimic beast, but we killed them all.”
“Probably all of them.” Karen added.
“Whatever. Anyway, soon after Lillian disappeared.”
“Again?”
“Again.”
“And all we found was her penchant.”
“Which Reudic stole.”
“And left Lloyd in a mess on his way out.” He pointed a thumb at the Elven mage, who was currently trying to hogtie a man named Holmes to stop him finding a hollow bible. Karen pushed back his head and tried to get the glass tube into his mouth, yet Lloyd resisted far more harshly than Sarika, while remaining far less loud.
“You might want to grit your teeth before you do that.” Sarika added, aware of what was going to happen.
Karen was forced to jam her thumb between Lloyd’s molars to keep his mouth open. She silently thanked the seer for the heads up, and poured the black liquid down the Elf’s unwilling gullet.
As he regained his psyche they recapped what they had just told Sarika.
“But now we need to figure out a plan.”
Karen was quite sick of Marcus’s plans, and stood boldly and announced her own.
“We go down.”
“Why down?”
“The towers are empty. This is a castle. Where else would a young maiden be magically transported?”
“You plan to look for her with cliché? That’s just reckless.”
“You got any better ideas lay them down, because right now we have nothing to go on. Either we stick together for the first time and get something done instead of aimlessly getting ourselves attacked or one of us runs out of luck and gets themselves killed. The Monitor can’t stop us teaming up, so lose the lone wolf attitude.”
Karen glared at Marcus, not caring about the height difference between them. After a while Marcus admitted defeat and let the witch’s plan unfold.
“What do you think we’ll find down there?”
Karen once again felt the sensation that something very horrible was happening.
“... We need to move. Now.”
She checked that everyone could keep up with her as she ran through the corridors, back to the hole leading several floors down. She shouldered Sarika and leapt, while Marcus and Lloyd climbed down.
“It’s that bad feeling again, “ She whispered into Sarika’s ear, realizing that this was probably why the seer let herself be carried in the first place, “It’s down there. And isn’t alone.”
As the ragtag team of adventurers made sure that the magical field around the door had been taken down by Lloyd they set off down the cold and hard stone steps, not fully comprehending just what lay ahead.