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The Pits of Avarice

Scene details

Setting:  None today seem to know of the "Crux of Creation" which Kernunnos, the sapient eidola once worshipped by the forgotten druids of Zerhem, claims will lead the way to the lost city of the Star-Crowned. The search for clues has been a difficult one. But rumors and legends have at last led the party to the Golden Hills south of Lake Gerisia, near the Oradian border, where Kernunnos has sensed the faint presence of one of the Crux's four arms.
  Hidden deep within those dusty hills lies an abandoned mine that is said to be haunted by the spirits of those slain years ago in a workers' mutiny against a gold-crazed merchant. But as to what an arm of the Crux would be doing in such a place, or where exactly in those suffocating tunnels it lies, the adventurers must discover for themselves -- if ghosts do not get them first.

Log

The party's journey here had been beautiful. From a bustling little lakeside town on the eastern shore of Lake Gerisia, they had traveled south through dry hills dyed golden by the sun, following a trickling stream. From the height of those hills they could still see Lake Gerisia sparkling to the north while feeling faintly the humidity of the Oradian rainforests to the south blown up the slopes by a refreshing breeze. Under other circumstances, perhaps they might simply have enjoyed a pleasant hike here.

But their environs now are far less pleasant. Following the pulse of Kernunnos, safely hidden within Reize's pendant, they make their way into the arid valleys between these hills, at last discovering a dusty and abandoned mine comprised of a series of ugly pits surrounded by rusting and abandoned equipment.

"Even the chronicles in Castle Zerhem's library had little to say about what happened here," Ivo is musing aloud as he shifts a broken tool, unrecognizable from languishing in the elements for so long, with his now dusty boots. "It was just a historical footnote... a merchant suitor of the Oradian Queen of that era desperate for gold, driving his miners to a bloody mutiny in the Golden Hills. But I found it striking that it happened around the same time that the druids came to Zerhem and built that aqueduct..."

He glances toward Reize, gaze flickering to the pendant, its current pale glow a telltale indication of Kernunnos' active power of Creation.

"...so if one of the four arms of the Crux of Creation really is here, maybe one of Kernunnos' chosen was somehow involved. But as to why..." He trails off beside one of the deep dark pits. "Based on the glow, we should probably start here. Any, uh... suggestions on how to get down?"

The pit seems to proceed into a tunnel and the mine proper, but there is a long drop and a sheer slope. Whatever means by which the miners descended into it seems to be long gone.

Reize Seatlan rolls 1d20.

Roll(s): 13. Total result is 13.

Reize Seatlan rolls 1d20.

Roll(s): 4. Total result is 4.

For one explorer, he is more than happy to have traveled out beyond the kingdom of Zerhem. There is the opportunity to learn more about the truth of the region and its history. Given from what Kernunnos had promised told them, Reize realizes that there is a lot that they have to learn about. Given the travels into the less pleasant environment, the young explorer covers his face with his scarf, arriving at the valleys between the hills.

Beyond this is now the appearance of the abandoned mine. "Oh... wow." He looks over towards Ivo as he muses about the mine. "Is that so...?" So it looks like a revolt happened against their previous 'boss'. Nevertheless, the boy thinks over on the situation.

He starts to wander along the walls, placing a hand over to get a feel of the structure of the mine. "Well..." He muses, approaching the deep dark pits. He looks down at the pit. "...I guess we could jump down." He frowns, "But... I don't think that is a good idea."

Wait... Reize didn't just jump down?

Reize takes a step away, starting to walk back with the group--- until a flyby rat approaches and Reize accidentally steps on it.

"!!!!!"

"AHHHH!!!"

..Oh hey, Reize falls down into the depths of the pit.

Ruidosa La Crima is eyeing the pit as she enters as she frowns. "Mom said this was a big accident back in the day and it's humans fault for being so greedy." he says. "But I think she works both ways for vampires too... maybe we sho....."

then Reize tumbles down and she looks to Ivo. "Is this normal!?" she asks as she suddenly, with a poof of smoke, turns into a blue-colored bat, and flaps down into the pit after Reize.

"H..hey wait up!" she yells. "WHY ARE YOU GOING SO FAST!?"

"Because I'm fallingaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!"

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

Anna is... Rapidly getting used to the life of being an adventurer.

For one, the runaway princess has a backpack now. And for two she has a much sturdier set of boots for long distance travelling. To her credit, the princess has rather enjoyed the journey through the lakeside town and hills but...

These mines just give her the creeps.

Coupled with Reize and company listening to an Eidola. Well, her mood is a little grouchy on that topic. BUT to her credit she has also kept her tongue still about it. So into the creepy mines where everyone supposedly died in the past.

Anna stops at the edge of the pit, pursing her lips as she looks down into the darkness.

"That could be a really long fall." She points out to Reize's suggestion to jump down.

Then the youth steps on something and goes tumbling down.

Anna reaches a hand out, but it's too slow and she's a little too shocked to do anything more than say "A-ah..." For a second. Ruidosa goes after him in bat form and she just watches for a beat, turning to look helplessly at Ivo.

Before the adventurer princess takes off her backpack for a moment.

"I guess we had better go after them." She says, pulling out a hammer and climbing piton, which she uses to tie a sturdy length of rope to the ground...

After which she drops the rope and begins carefully rapelling down after the other two.

"Visit your mother?" Ivo perks up noticably at Ruidosa's contributions. "Brilliant suggestion, Rui. Alright, everyone, let's pack it up and--"

He watches blithely as Reize slips and falls into the pit, the boy's screams echoing upward as long seconds pass.

"Is it normal? No," he finally says, even though Rui has already fluttered down into the pit in bat form. "Is it normal for *us*? Definitely."

He looks rather impressed at how well-prepared their princess friend is, watching as she prepares the rope before proceeding after her. "Don't look up, Anna," he quips playfully. There's nothing to see anyway. Meanwhile, Reize might be dead.

Actually, not yet. He's hurtling down what is quite a considerable depth, however, soon to impact into a pile of sandy soil littered with rusted mining tools, positioned at the center of an otherwise unremarkable chamber from which three almost indistinguishable tunnels twist and turn. The soil will break his fall a little, but not without doing some damage. If he or anyone else has any means of slowing his fall, it might be prudent to employ those now.

How is Reize's landing?

Utterly painful. The boy lands quite harshly on the ground, whihc is more of a pile of sandy soil that have been littered with mining tools here and there. Unfortunately, no one has managed to slow the boy's fall, leaving him in excruciating pain.

He can see it now...

One of those tools is a rusted hookshot. He is reaching out for that tool, "...I think I can refurbish it..."

The delusion fades away and reveals to be an annoyed rat that squeaks and quickly scampers off from the boy.

"...Oh."

Reize grimaces, rolling over towards his stomach and he starts to get onto his knees. "Ugh." He looks runs a hand over his head, and he tries to stand up to his feet. It is wobbly, but he does manage to recover.

"...Well, this is deja vu.... without the wild ride."

Ruidosa La Crima turns back into her more humanoid form as she reaches the bottom of the pit and then goes.

"UGH RATS!" she goes as Reize touches one. "Ewww, you touched it. You better clean your hands soon, rats carry all sorts of ''diseases'' ''humans'' get." she says as she shivers a little at the whole concept of rats.

She raises a hand and scans around for more rats to zap.

...None of them are of unusual size, right?...

Right? She looks up to the others and blinks a little. "Hey uh."

"You two gonna get down okay?" she asks.

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

"Why shouldn't I look up?" Anna asks cluelessly.

It's not like Ivo is wearing a skirt.

Nevertheless, once the princess reaches the bottom she dusts off her hands and steps aside so that he can land without her being in the way, and...

It is pitch black.

The party is likely to be eaten by a grue.

Except maybe Rui-- can vampires see in pitch blackness?

This is not a question that Anna voices, but rather decides to handle- at least for herself anyway as she takes off her backpack again.

Fumbling for a beat in the darkness, she finds what she's looking for a after a moment and with a few strikes of flint and a hunting knife, she lights a small lantern, which she holds up...

And grimaces at Reize's landing conditions. That... That was probably painful.

"Made it, yep." She replies to Rui while rummaging in her backpack some more and pulls out a small vial.

"Here, drink this." That's offered to Reize. It's just some pain killing medicine. It should get him back on his feet pretty fast.

Or *is* he? ...No, he isn't.

Ivo drops to the sand soon after Anna. He could wear a backpack too, but it would get in the way of his cloak flowing in cool ways. Also, Reize's pouch is surprisingly capacious when it comes to adventuring needs and knick-knacks. Nevertheless, the Cosmopolitan has his own way of contributing: withdrawing that magitech aether amplifying device and, once Anna lights her lantern, activating it, a similar flame appearing atop the strange little contraption he now holds.

"You alright, chief?"

He approaches and reaches out for the boy--'s pendant, lifting it to the light to check which way the pale pulse is indicating. So thoughtful.

"Looks like our goal is this way," he says, lifting his light toward the narrowest, most constricting and claustrophobia-inducing tunnel mouth. Just the party's luck. "Let's mark our path so that we can find our way back out once we obtain the crux arm." Hopefully there won't be another phenomenon like in that forest. "Everyone ready? Watch your feet." Rusted weapons and rat bites alike can inflict status effects. As he nudges a shattered pickaxe out of his path with his foot, its metal catches the light, revealing bloodstains mingling with the rust. Ivo hesitates only briefly before forging on.

"Hngh... I'll make sure... it's safe... oof..."

He has to contort himself just to fit through and begin proceeding down the tunnel, at one point reducing to coughing out a mouthful of dust. Though he's the tallest of the party at the moment, those bearing burdens or with especially bad luck (not naming names) might have an even more difficult time advancing.

Finally recovering onto his feet, the boy grimaces as he stretches his arms. Thoughtfully, Reize looks confused. "...If they have wings, do they become bats?" He scratches his head, looking at Ruidosa with a glance of askance.

However, it looks like Anna and Ivo are arriving to join them! When Anna offers a pain-killing medicine, the boy's eyes widen, "Oh! Thank you!" The young adventurer takes the medicine and he quaffs the vial down. He can taste the bitterness. However, he can feel the pain ebbing away. It's like he's rejuvinated by the feeling of the medicine, "Whoa! This is great! Thanks!" He flashes Anna a thumbs up.

As Ivo reaches out to grab his pendant, Reize furrows his eyebrow. "Ivo...." He twitches. He looks confused, "Ah?" He turn turns towards hwere Ivo directs the light.

As they find the light pointing to the most narrow path of the tunnel, the boy starts walking along the path. He does take the time to smack down a few rats their way. It appears that those little critters are also part of a request that was posted by a Zerham citizen.

"...Oh right, I was supposed to take out 10 rats while I am out here."

Ruidosa follows along, who can see in the dark. She eyes the pickaxes, and she can smell just faint traces of the bloody massacre that went on here but the blood is so... ''stale'' and useless she finds the smell akin to walking into an old refrigerator. She shivers. "Ugrk." she goes, holding hands to her lips, as she ughs.

"I can smell stale blood. It's awful." she says, awful in a way that she suggests she might get sick from it, not awful in terms of the tragedy , but perhaps maybe also both, who knows what she means.

She frowns a little as she eyes Reize. "Only ten?" she asks.

"Better go for more juuust in case..." she trails off as she follows.

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

No sooner than Ivo says 'mark our path', Anna has a piece of chalk in her hand. Which she uses to make the mouth of the cave path the pendant lights.

While grumbling something about said pendant and its light under her breath.

Ivo nudges an old pick out of the way. The light from the girl's lantern shines on it just right.

"Is that..."

No. No no no, nope. Don't ask that question, Anna, don't even voice it.

She cuts herself off and clears her throat instead, following after Ivo.

Thankfully she is small, so she can fit into the tunnel after him.

"Rats and bats are two different orders of animal entirely." The girl points out to the boy in the yellow scarf.

"Rats are Rodentia. Bats are Chiroptera."

Things you learn while sequestered in a castle and are made to read books, 101.

Anna's trivia knowledge aside though, remembering her days back at the castle makes her blood start to boil. So she takes a calming breath and ducks her head to squeeze through the passage.

"Why does that... oof... job keep getting posted at the Zerhem Vanguard Assocation over and over?" Ivo grunts back after Reize's comment. "It's a good quest for junior adventurers, but who has it in for rats so badly?" Hopefully, whoever they are, they don't run into Faruja on a dark night.

With a final cough, the Cosmopolitan finally pushes himself into a part of the tunnel that is slightly widened, making it much easier to maneuver. That said, the ground remains loose and sandy, making progress slow, and the tunnels twist and turn and branch. They would be exploring interminably were it not for Kernunnos' aid. It's hard to understand what sort of logic would have gone into structuring a mine like this. The very design, or lack thereof, evinces madness.

"How many workers were injured or perished trying to dig out a mine this sprawling...?" he murmurs, shaking out his very dusty cloak a little (but not too much, lest he shake it into his friends' faces). "Even before the mutiny, this place must have been hell..."

Despite these dour thoughts, he seems to perk up a little at Anna's trivia, looking back to the helpful princess as his allies join him in the wider portion of the tunnel.

"Ah, Linnoeus's Systema Naturae?" he comments, only showing off a little, mostly just sounding pleased. "That remains a core text of introductory classes at the Cosmopolitan Academy. A classic worthy of the name!" Even though he's sincerely enthusiastic about her knowledge, he's putting a little extra effort into being cheerful, remembering how Anna had reacted to the graveyard during their encounter with Fabroxo. "Are you interested in zoology, Anna? Maybe you could join me in Castle Zerhem's library sometime now that we have entrance permission--"

Unfortunately, Ivo may be making it worse. For as he chatters on, the dust begins to stir behind him.

"Hm?"

A skeleton with a half-shattered skull lurches up from where it lay buried, sandy soil pouring from its tattered garb, still clutching a bloody maul. As two more emerge behind it, another two burst from the ground behind them, practically colliding with each other in the narrow confines of the tunnel from which the party passed, trapping them in a pincer formation.

"Reize, take the other side!" Ivo shouts, drawing Hauteclare after only a brief stunned silence. "Assume a defensive formation with Rui in the middle -- and don't let them break through!"

The moment after he says that, however, a sixth and final revenant bursts from the very tunnel wall, bony jaw agape, lunging in the general direction of the girls with its skeletal hands sharp and stained with its own blood, a remnant of how the poor soul had once clawed at the earth in a failed attempt at escape.

And of course, Ivo does bring in the flipside of the quest posting, "...O--oh. I didn't think of it that way. A drunken Faruja would be a scary encounter for the guy.

The young explorer gets his education on the difference between 'bats' and 'rats', even if they sound the same. The explorer listens, giving the princess his undivided attention. "Ohhh.... I see."

The boy muses towards Ruidosa as she comments about 'going for more'. "I suppose." With any luck, the boy may make the bonus qualification for the item at hand. The young explorer would take the trip along the long path that was provided to them.

As they start to go further in the cave and the two exchange knowledge of sort, their attention is now pulled as skeletons lurch up from the soil with their weapons out. It looks like a maul and the group have them in a pincer formation.

Reize already pushes forth with a burst, swooping in behind the skeleton as he escapes the pincer position. "Saaaaa!" He is behind the revenant, moving in with a few sweeping kicks and swings of his boomerangs.

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

"Mmmmmmmm..." Anna murmurs. "It's mostly something my tutors at the castle forced me to read more than an actual interest. Anna replies. "I prefered my learning a lot more hands on, like what my tribe taught me." She admits.

For every twist in the tunnel she marks the wall, for every new path they take, she marks the wall. That chalk is coming in awfully handy right now.

Until the skeletons arise anyway.

The girl jolts at the very sight of the walking dead, the chalk dropped, lost, and forgotten to the sands as...

Anna is already moving.

Where there had been a calm, collected, intellectual princess before, there is now only a grim-faced killer, murder roiling in the girl's bloodshot eyes as she shoves past Ivo in the cramped conditions of the cavernous mines and flings herself into the center of the undead opposite the ones Reize goes for.

Snarling, face curling into a rictus of fury as she meets the bloody-handed revenant with a skull-smashing headbutt.

Her axe is unslung from where it had rested across her shoulders, and even in her haze-clouded rage, the girl's keen-minded sharpness is a testament to warriors everywhere as she turns the axe in her grasp to swing the heavy blunted side of the woodcutter's tool in order to crush bones, rather than even bother trying to cleave a fleshless foe.

Ivo would be disappointed at Anna's lack of enthusiasm for book learning, but he has slightly bigger problems right now. With his off-hand occupied by his light source, he can't easily protect himself with his shield. Instead, with a flick of his thumb, he heightens the aether output of the amplifying device currently resonating with fire magic. It emits a short close-range burst of flame at the two skeletons shambling toward him, lighting the remnants of their clothing ablaze and causing them to flail wildly. With the tunnel now quite well lit, he temporarily deactivates the device and withdraws his shield, sword outstretched protectively.

"Hang in there, Anna, we're here for you--"

Oh, right, *these* undead have physical bodies. As Ivo hears and glimpses the princess's, uh, face utterly pulverizing the dusty and brittle bones of the revenant that dared approach her before she turns the blunt side of her axe on the others, he comes to understand the importance of this distinction.

"Hmm."

Reize swiftly outmaneuvers their slower foes, smashing into them from behind. Soon it is their enemies that are in a pincer, with Anna tearing into them from one side and Reize from the other, the undead effectively stunlocked such that they can't even counterattack. The animated miners seem to be acting merely on impulse, having arisen only incidentally and not via some necromancer's machinations, and lack any proper battle tactics.

"Actually--"

In which case, the one least suited to deal with skeletons, given the current party composition, would probably be--

"Could *I* get some help here?"

Deftly parrying the lashing rusted weapons of his two skeletal foes, ablaze but seemingly undeterred, Ivo is compelled to retreat several paces, unable to utilize his sword's abilities in this constricted tunnel.

Oh no! It looks like Ivo does need some help in dealing with the skeletons. While it looks like Reize and Anna have things handled, it appears that Ivo is put in a disadvantage with the lack of space and the skeletons putting the pressure on him. That is why that Reize is running straight towards the skeleton that is lit ablaze.



The boy leaps off from the ground, spinning to a full spin. He launches out a lashing of the kick while calling out, "Sparrondo!" The footwork continues forward to juggle the skeleton until he cracks the other half of the skull with his boomerang as the finisher.

"We got you, Ivo!"

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

"Rip... And... TEAR...!"

Anna's snarl resounds through the cave almost as in response to Ivo's request for aid.

... Ghosts she's not so keen on, sure. But undead with physical bodies? Things she can pummel?

Anna is apparently pretty okay with those as she goes for the opposite skeleton from Reize, the one that is not on fire.

There's a clatter as her axe is dropped to the ground and she simply aims to bodily tackle the revenant to the ground one hand pinning it by the chest while the her other hand balls into a fist-- that she uses to start wailing on its brittle, boney, face.

"Nngh--"

Ivo flinches as he staggers back another pace, one of the revenants drawing fresh blood and ripping through his dusty cloak as the magitech fencer falters in his defenses. Gritting his teeth, he braces himself and bolsters his wavering courage with thoughts of loyalty, pushing aside the intrusive thoughts of how best to flee, trusting that his young friends will dispatch their opponents as long as he can hold these foes off just a little longer.

"Reize!"

His trust is soon rewarded. Ivo sighs with undisguised relief as Reize drives one skeleton upward into the very tunnel ceiling, receiving an environmental damage multiplier bonus that surely assists in the way the foe's bones practically explode with the final boomerang swing. Finally somewhat accustomed to Anna's berserker state (though never fully), he watches with mingled awe, terror, and growing interest as the princess proceeds to glory-kill their final adversary via an unskippable animation. Certainly unskippable for the skeleton, anyway.

"Thanks, friends."

Somehow, Ivo feels a little better, almost like the last revenant dropped some sort of invisible power-up. He's probably just relieved.

"Hey, is that--"

Forgetting his shallow wound, Ivo, finally no longer focused on fighting, notices an odd shadow illuminated by the flickering remnants of the felled skeletons' burnt clothing. Drawing and igniting his magitech amplifier again, he approaches what ends up being the tunnel's exit into a large pitch-black chamber littered with lumps of cloth and fragments of rusted metal. There, pointed at what appears to be a now caved-in unfinished tunnel, is, of all things--

"--a drill?"

It is a giant, rusted drill, clearly the implement with which the narrower of these winding tunnels were dug out. Ivo leans in, examining the artifact with evident interest.

"Since when was Granse producing magitech like this so long ago? It's completely improbable. How in the world would they *power* such a thing?"

Perhaps the party will not notice in their efforts to examine the drill or the room. But Reize's pendant is glowing brighter than ever before...

Reize Seatlan rolls 1d20.

Roll(s): 3. Total result is 3.

There is relief on Reize's face as Ivo appears to be safe and sound. He brightens considerably, looking at his friend as the older man can relax a bit. Watching Anna's berserker state is quite a site to behold.

Once the last revenant is dropped, Reize wipes a brow and he looks over towards Ivo, "Ooi! You okay?" He blinks, "Ah?" Sadly, Reize does not see the shadow illuminated. Instead, he does take to following Ivo to the unnel's exit as they arrive into a large, pitch-black chamber.

"Guh... can't see."

He grimaces, until he reaches into his satchel to procure a small rod. The rod emits a glimmering light. It's a tinder rod. It pulses with a bit of light, and then he looks over towards Ivo's inspection as a giant, rusted drill. He appproaches closer to the drill. "Kernunnos, is this familiar to you somehow..?" He could feel the pulse of the pendant.

There is a glance at the drill. He frowns, this is way larger than the artifact that Ivo helped him refurbish back within the crystal caves. "... I don't suppose that there are resources that we can gather to have you fix it up, right?"

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

With the last of the skeletons brought low, Anna picks herself up, dusts herself off, and takes a slow, calming, breath.

That's it. Put it away. Lock up the rage back in that secret place behind your heart, girl. Let it wait there until it's needed again.

A shivery breath and she picks her axe back up, eyes keeping a watchful stare to the dusty ground in case tht wasn't the last of them.

"Be careful, there could be more of them." She notes as Ivo begins to inspect the drill.

Little does Anna know... There ARE more skeletons. At least four more, to be exact. One inside her and one in each of her companions!!!

SO about that drill though.

Anna purses her lips, lightly rapping on it with her axe.

Yeah she has no idea what to do with a huge drill or how to fix it.

Ivo's brow is furrowed in puzzlement as his gloved hands brush the dust from the looming hunk of worn metal before him. "It hardly qualifies as magitech," he's muttering to himself. "It's just a modified boring device enlarged beyond usability without a power source... but given the aether crystal we found at the aqueduct, even the advanced technology of the time would never manifest the sort of output needed... which means..."

"It's here." Kernunnos' voice is faint but familiar. The sapient eidola is able to emit audible words from his resting place, but he seems to be focused on conserving his energies, only speaking when absolutely necessary and otherwise guiding them via light and pulses. "And... not only the Crux. I sense..."

The Horned Demigod trails off before speaking again, his voice startlingly choked, sounding vulnerable.

"...Aurora...?"

Ivo glances back toward Reize, quirking an eyebrow, before looking back toward the drill in earnest, taking a deep breath before straining up to grip the top of the curved metal object taller than himself.

"If it was powered by an arm of the Crux," he says as he begins to clamber up, boots scrabbling for purchase on the rust-roughened steel, "I have many questions... but foremost among them is *where* the... whoa!!!"

Ivo shouts suddenly as he finds himself face to face with a skeleton perched atop the drill, its bony hands still clinging to the surface, its form draped in what appear to be rather rich robes. The Cosmopolitan freezes before relaxing with another sigh, shaking his head.

"Don't scare me like that," he quips, tapping the skeleton.

Its eye sockets slowly take on an eerie blue glow.

"Or like that," Ivo squeaks.

All at once, unearthly specters begin to emerge from the lumps of cloth upon the dusty floor, their disembodied forms the silvery-blue of moonlight, their faces contorted in fear and agony. As Ivo tumbles backward to sprawl upon the ground with another yelp, six manifest, joined by a seventh: the skeleton atop the drill, now suffused in an intense aura of a similar hue.

"Ghh... hold on!" Ivo calls, pushing his cloak away from his face as he gets back to his feet. "Checking resonance frequencies..." Fumbling for his trusty amplifier, he aims it toward one of the specters. "Right... elementally, they're mostly wind, of course... but there's a bit of earth due to the surroundings, so if I intensify that..." He pushes a small lever as far as it will go, discharging all the power remaining to the device. As he does, the specters flash and spasm briefly. "A little more...!" He withdraws Hauteclare, disconnects its blade, and powers up that sparking energy upon its hilt with which he had stunned the marauder eidola in Verdios, linking it with the amplifier to intensify its charge.

With keening cries, the specters all flicker and begin to materialize, taking on a faint but significance substantial form, still able to hover in air and float about but at least tangible and vulnerable to physical attacks now.

"Now's your chance, friends!" Ivo calls. "As long as we can wipe those out, this skeletal fiend should be no problem." He flashes a grin, allowing himself some delight at the success of Cosmopolitan science against the terrors of the night. "As anticipated..."

A loud whirring begins to drown him out. As the six materialized specters close in on Reize, Anna, and Ruidosa, Ivo slowly turns back, eyes widening. The blue-eyed skeleton seems to be glaring down at him, holding what appears to be a diamond-encrusted rod in its bony hand, the relic emitting a power that flows into the drill itself. A drill that is beginning to spin and to turn its man-sized tip toward Ivo himself.

"...more... or... less."

Watching Ivo examine the worn metal, there is hope or at least some curiosity on if Ivo can make sense of it. However, it turns for the worse as even Ivo admits that he won't be of use in this situation. He does bring a hand over to his chin, trying to figure out a way to deal with it.

However, Kernunnos' voice resonates from the pendant. "Ah?" He looks over at the drill, and then he tilts his head over. "Aurora?"

And Ivo encounters another skeleton. "Wh---" The unearthly specters emerge. "...Ugh." This could be a problem. Given that Reize is unable to strike against the immaterial beings, his physical attacks are useless. However, Ivo is to the rscue as he uses that neat amplifier tool that he has.

As the specters materialize, the boy brightens, "Thanks, Ivo!" Reize immediataly brings his boomerangs to an upright position. He lunges in, swooping in to take on the whole group of them with the sweeping kicks. All six of them are caught up in the sweeping kicks before the boy lunges in with a burst of the air to launch a flip kick at one of them. A blade of energy emits from the impact. "Saaaah!"

  • Character: Anna
  • 1 year, 6 months ago

Ivo encounters another skeleton.

This is all well and alright until its eyes start glowing and it calls upon the souls of the dead and damned to fight for it, and starts turning the drill on the group.

Anna... Cannot do much about ghosts.

"... I uh. Can't fight ghosts." She says.

See?

UNTIL Ivo uses that sweet sweet technosorcery of his to make it so that Anna can punch the ghosts.

This is all well and good- and some ghosts do get punched as the princess lets her rage free...

And grabs Reize by the wrists.

Proceeding to spin the youth round and round and round, snarling all the while, to send more of those lashing energy blades from his kicking feet in every direction imaginable.

If Ivo couldn't do anything before, he *really* can't do anything now. His sword is supplying its aether to his amplifier in order to keep the specters materialized. Both his hands are occupied so he can't even hold his little shield to protect himself, not that it would do much against this massive whirring drill bit. As he takes a step back, he spares a quick glance over his shoulder to see how his young friends are doing.

Ah, they appear to be pro wrestling. Well, he's dead.

"Let's talk this over," he suggests with a sprightliness he does not feel as he takes a few steps back, the berobed skeleton implacably silent, its blue eyes blazing brighter if anything. The drill advances. "Okay. You're the strong and silent type. I respect-- guh!" He trips on a broken weapon and falls back onto his butt as the buzzing drill looms over him, the shrieks of its rusty metal rivalling that of the specters. "Wait, I can't die like this. There are so many women I haven't yet disappointed!"

As the drill closes in, Ivo can only regret that no one was there to laugh at his last joke. He winces, instinctively shutting his eyes, unable to muster the will to keep them open. But seconds pass and no pain comes. Slowly he opens one eye, only to see a bizarre sight: the skeleton apparently wrestling with one other specter, what appears to be the ghost of a long-haired middle-aged woman in ritual garb somehow holding the fiend in place.

"Reize!" Ivo tries to shout over the sound of the drill. In his hurry, he doesn't even look back. "The Crux! Get the Crux! The piece is in his hand!!!" Indeed, the skeleton with eyes of blue flame continues to clutch that rod in its bony grasp, what appear to be diamonds in fact the fragments of a star.

The Full Moon Swing blasts all six specters against the walls of the tunnels, their forms flickering as they moan in distress, some of them partially crumbling from the impact. Yet none of them disperse, and slowly they begin to recover and gather themselves, preparing to close in once more on the combatants...

Link Art: Full Moon Swing



Anna has a good grip on Reize's hands and the boy is taken around the world for the swing. Normally, he would do a backflip with the aftermath of his kick following through. However, this time, the cutting aftermath of his foot follows through the full twist as the surrounding spin strikes all of the skeletons around.



Unfortunately, they start forming back together. "...Ugh." As he winds back and spins to his feet, he tries to recollect himself. His eyes drift over towards Anna and then abck to the skeletons. "Oh!" He hears Ivo's words.



Turning around, the boy spins and he starts darting towards the garbed skeleton fighting against the ghost of the long-haired, middle-aged woman. He gives a quick dash, boosting his speed as he zips past the two.



He reaches out to snatch the rod from the bony hands.



....And give a knee to the noggin while he is at it.

As Reize shakes off his dizziness and launches himself at the drill-mounted skeleton, it bares yellowed teeth, its blue eyes blazing with preternatural rage, its pale jaw opening wide like the mouth of the underworld--

Only to be smashed shut by the boy's defiant knee, the fiend's skull snapped back, loosening the rod from its grasp. The very moment that Reize clasps it and tears it free, his vision seems to fill with a field of white...

...

"Aurora."

The robed woman stands before him, seemingly flesh and blood, her robe dyed the rich white and reds of the druid's shrine. The symbol of an owl can now be seen emblazoned upon her breast. Her round face is warmed by a gentle smile at the sound of the voice that emanates from Reize's pendant.

"Forgive me, Sun-Touched One," she says softly. "I failed in my task. Upon reaching these hills, I came across many wounded from their excessive labors here. I could not bear to abandon them. But when the merchant who drove them so learned of the arm of the Crux within my possession, he coveted it and built this terrible machine." Grief etches her features. "To think that he would fuel it with the very souls of those who died digging out this mine... when the miners learned of this, no words of mine could stop them from taking up arms. And the result..."

She trails off.

"You... you never failed, Aurora," Kernunnos says, the eidola's voice trembling. "Never once in your noble life. And we... will finish what you began."

Her final smile is sweet.

...

When Reize's vision returns, he has landed safely. The drill has stopped. The specters are gone. And the skeleton he struck has crumbled into dust. Ivo is glancing around with mild perplexity and immense relief. He opens his mouth to speak. But the first words that are spoken are not his.

"Reize.... Thank you."

> Kernunnos' Affinity Rank has increased to 2.