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[Amperzand]

[To be clear, the radiation isn't too severe.]

[Chevaleresse]

((Well, yeah, but standing in it for a week is notably stupid.))

[TheBiggerFish]

"Yes!  That is also a problem!"

Hopefully, into the mountain?  Unless Spark says it's worse in there.

[LordPorkins]

Porkins examines the moon with his acite Porcine Vision.

[Gwolfski]

Sing a note so high the rock cracks

Sing the insane strawberry song


((hurry up please))

[Amperzand]

(Incidentally, it's the middle of the night and raining. Do you want to wait for morning?)

[Gwolfski]

(Incidentally, it's the middle of the night and raining. Do you want to wait for morning?)

NO!

[TheBiggerFish]

(Incidentally, it's the middle of the night and raining. Do you want to wait for morning?)

((We want to cut there and assume sanity.))

[Amperzand]

(The next update is you arriving there either way, the question is just whether or not you think moving wounded on a dark and stormy night is worth it.)

[chaotic skies]

"Hey, it's my old friend! The satanic ritual moon!"

"I'm joking. That thing is seriously creepy."

Get up, test my body to see how well I'm doing. If I'm fine, help move the wounded in. If I'm not, still help unless I myself need help.

<<I don't think I'm hurt. Am I hurt?>>

[Amperzand]

[Nope. You just needed a few hours of rest after being nuked having a demigod crash near you and having an seizure.]

[Incidentally, you're not just moving them right in the door, it's something like an hour's travel- on rough terrain, to the other side of a mountain -under good conditions, which these are quantifiably not.]

[Chevaleresse]

Wait for morning to move.

[Amperzand]

Remaining on watch through the night at a healthy distance from the camp, Porkins watches the strange lights on the moon through occasional gaps in the rainclouds. They don't seem to be doing much, there are no apparent patterns to them, don't look like any kind of ritual form, nor do they seem to be a cognitohazard, as might be expected from out-of-place lights in the sky. In the end, all he gains from the night's watch is a little philosophical rambling and clothing thick with ash.

As the sun begins to rise, workers and soldiers stir from the tents to begin preparations to return to the fortress auxiliary entrance.

As simple covered biers are created for the wounded and a temporary cairn is stacked for those dead already unearthed, the awful ashen rain finally slackens, leaving the dawn sky blue and clear, but for several pillars of smoke and steam, where the terrible Arrows landed, and presumably remain dangerously hot.

The group finally finishes preparations to leave shortly before noon, and sets off, the worst wounded remaining on their pallets, a meter above ground level, on the shoulders of dwarves.

The journey is long and somewhat unpleasant, with the ground evenly coated in a thing slick of ashen mud. The path taken the first time appears to have been damaged overnight by secondary collapses and small floods, but alternate routes can be found readily enough in the cheering light of day.

One such detour takes the entire winding group several hundred meters up the mountainside, just as their position aligns with a gap in some of the taller neighboring peaks. This, rather unceremoniously, gives a remarkable view of the Dancer's death-site. An impressive crater, surely more than a hundred meters across, about a third of the way up a stocky hill, blackened debris thrown in every direction. Steam rising into the sky, and scattered glinting fragments of golden something. Fragments of the Arrows? Shreds of clothing? The being's ruined body, torn into a myriad chunks? Regardless, the view is memorable, especially with the smaller craters of missed Arrows scattered across the landscape as far as the eye can see.

About an hour after that, perhaps two in the afternoon, the group reaches the mouth of the box canyon that leads to the Auxiliary Entrance. Soldiers man the simple earthworks that guard it, and quarried rubble is already visible, moved up from the mines to begin true fortification. Odd looks are exchanged between ancient goblins and dwarves barely grown into their beards, between veterans in ash-soaked steel and civilian workers in bright cloth.

In the end, every mortal thing who witnessed the Dancer Zha's death and survived sits in a dwarven antechamber beneath the earth, awaiting administrative processing. His Lordship's relief group, apparently more-trusted or considered less-worthy of the stone's protection, remain at the Auxiliary Entrance, contributing to the assembly of new defenses.

Spoiler: Fish (click to show/hide)

Spark continues to periodically inform you of the radioactive situation. It would appear that while counts have gone down notably now that you are indoors, the source of the radiation can also now be determined. After a few minutes to build data, it becomes clear that at this point, the major radiation emitters are those in the room with you. Levels fortunately seem to remain below those which would signal imminent doom, or, happily, the sort that one might expect from the atomic detonation a Dancer's death resembles. The emission patterns are not consistent with uranium, ruling out some accident with the Pitchblende vein, but also are far from the medley of separate patterns one would expect from a natural cocktail of radioisotopes.

[TheBiggerFish]

"Oookay.  So, whatever's outside is radioactive.  That includes some of us, but thankfully it isn't at murderous levels.  We think.

There's some sort of pattern to the radioisotopes that's not necessarily normal.  I think we should forbid the corpse and materials from it until we've figured out if it is that."

[chaotic skies]

"Sounds like a good idea, and everyone underground should be fine until we figure out what's causing this."