"Right, good. I figure travelling with someone's better than alone, and I can always just put you back in that storage if we run into trouble. Oh, and before you ask, you're not going back to your village, not that you'd want to anyway. Got overtaken by some sort of supernatural cordryceps fungus or something, I had nothing to do with it but it'd probably be hazardous to someone not like me. Ever fancied visiting El? We're going there, or thereabouts. Let's go, shall we?"
After setting things straight, let's the both of us start going down that path I saw.
He nods readily to all of your suggestions right up until you mention the wondrous land of El. He preambles this with profuse apologies, afraid to ask a rather silly question, but isn't El some 200 miles away? You pause. Maybe. But if so, you'd suggest to start walking sooner rather than later. Road's right there, after all. He looks as well. The blazed trail, you mean? The blazed trail, ah! Yes, you can go on the glass road! He glances back at the town of Anglefork. Preferably speedily!
And it is indeed speedily that you mosey along over the ruins and onto the road. It's fairly smooth going as you wander into the night, the road lacking any particular signage as it winds through the forests and the hills, its rough outlines making it look more like a lava stream than an actual path.
[The Blazing Trail: 5]
It does not take long at all for you to see an outline in the distance as the woods, having initially deepened for a good few miles, start to rapidly thin again, and it is a little after dawn when civilization is once again within sight, with Alphonse trailing exhaustedly behind you at this point, not daring to slow down as your murder-thought nips at his heels. The black path continues on between several farms with uncultivated fields stretching on for quite a distance, and beyond them you see a village surrounded in a tall wooden palisade, a gentle river meandering past it to the southwest as the blazed trail circles the palisade exactly once and follows it very closely. Behind the village you see a tall mast of shining copper, a white-and-gold banner emblazoned with the radiant image of the sun flying from it.
Hornsweir, your companion says weakly. Best not go there. Maybe, he says as his knees begin to give way, maybe you can stop in one of the farms? Nobody lives there anymore.
Leif sighs. This is a very bad monday.
Wiggle and worm my way in direction that feels mostly like north.
[The Veins of the Earth: 5]
Fortunately for you the tunnel widens as you crawl northward, committed to at least that much in the way of direction. Water flows in underground brooks and tiny troglodytic fauna nibbles at you every now and then before you chase it off with a stern word. You manage to get to your single foot and start jumping ahead, a gallery of split earth opening up ahead of you, trapped bats flying every which way at your approach, scattering into a myriad passages from the ceiling which has now grown rather incredibly tall.
The river continues on here underground now that the crevice seems to have closed up, rushing water at the bottom of a hundred-foot drop, both sides bridged by quasi-natural-looking connections of stone. It is about as dramatic a cave as you've ever seen, with stalactites menacing from above and blue, glowing torches lining the walls, illuminating the rather long gallery in a faintly mystical light that plays tricks with your eyes as mindsight and regular vision overlap and fight for dominance of your mental focus. Tunnels lead every which way from here, some with torches along their sides and quite a few without, and most of them not even accessible from the floor of the gallery, instead serving as little balconies, presumably for unseen figures to watch you. Not that any appear to be around as you check the various vantage points and hop around the place, still leaking blood all the way. Maybe if you shout for them or something.
Hm, there's got to be something else in here I can use as a weapon. I begin rummaging through drawers and cabinets.
[Tools of the Trade: 5]
You root through the desk for anything at all useful for the noble art of murder, and mostly find writing supplies of various kinds in the first few drawers - there's a drawer full of quills of varied sources, with a fountain pen mixed in here and there along with a strange-looking stylus that reminds you strongly of pencil lead in texture - a pen from El, the doctor says as she looks over your shoulder, folding up her steel feather fan and tucking it into her dress. Like writing in charcoal, but far more precise. Erasable too. She grabs a couple of quills as well as the pencil for good measure - you never know.
The next drawer is filled with many sheets of parchment as well as wooden tablets, clay tablets, and a single sheet of brown paper. The doctor helps herself to these - always good to take notes, wouldn't you agree? She tests out the El-pencil on a sheet, producing a quick doodle of the mysterious skull she couldn't identify while you look through the rest of the drawers - the next one is filled with various containers of what you assume is ink - most are black or blue-black, but one is very definitely filled with some kind of processed blood, and another, altogether newer-looking one is filled with very definitely unprocessed blood in a highly inexpert fashion and seems to have dried up and scabbed over completely.
Then there's the rather large drawer next to the three smaller ones, taking up two thirds of the desk's underside - it takes a bit of pulling to get it open, and it quickly becomes apparent why as it opens with a clatter - within you see a now somewhat disorderly collection of tools of ascending size - a miniscule silvery gaunt-ivory letter opener catches your eye, and a set of small bone cutters with little curly spirals on their blades, and an absolute multitude of scalpels - beyond that are kitchen knives that have very obviously been brought here from somewhere else, and a sizable hunting knife that you'd feel very comfortable threatening a mugger with, its handle made from a frighteningly large tooth. But the problem object complicating the opening of the drawer looks to have been what you can best describe as a scimitar, a broad black curved blade that seems to have been wedged into the drawer diagonally in a way that's left deep gashes in the otherwise immaculate woodwork of the desk.
The scimitar looks to have been caught in some kind of fire in the not too distant past, and is perhaps not the sharpest thing, but once you manage to pull it out it has the look of a proper sword, nicely balanced and almost a joy to swing through the room in a way, the way it sings making the doctor spring suddenly to attention. Oh, fascinating! Is that never-made? She goes up to take a closer look - why, seems like it could be, perhaps of sand people origin from the shape? Hard to tell with how filthy it is, of course.
"Oh! Mind the toxic waste pool! Looks dangerous?"
Warn them. Maybe kick the thing when it's down.
[A Ranger's Duty: 2 vs. 3]
Aha, the pool! Thank you for the
arglblargleargh, the ranger says as the creature on him takes advantage of the distraction to sink its teeth into his throat something fierce. He starts punching it back in the side of the throat, but this seems far less effective. You decide you should do something.
[Saving The Day: 5+1+1 vs. 4]
So you kick the bastard thing right in the ribs before it gets too far in the savaging, the beast giving a surprised yelp as it lets go of the poor ranger with a mouthful of dust and leather and rolls uphill a moment before the incline pushes it back, just in time for you to kick it in its impertinent bat face and break a good few teeth in the process. It stumbles back again, this time far more precariously as it teeters on the edge of the pool, looking very much stunned.
Haha, the ranger yells and points with one hand on where absolutely no blood is coming out of his torn throat, got the thing right and proper in the gullet! Go in for the kill! Use the fork, man!
Oh, dear; that's probably not good. Listen.
You'd think it's not good at all, actually, but the two road workers seem absolutely delighted. The feticheur waves her arms and shakes her stick, and the giant jumps up and down and twirls about. You look to the horizon, and see that it's very visibly and spottily darkened. A few minutes pass as you begin to make out the details, and the buzzing gets louder and lower-pitched, the beating of thousands of wings as a plague of airborne beetles bears down in your direction, resolving into a solid black cloud in a matter of minutes.
The mummy on your back lets go suddenly, and starts crawling along the road at a rapid pace, seemingly eager to escape before the feticheur steps over and places a foot on its helmet, the infirm creature unable to move further as a result.
Leif Erikson, Miner
- Itchy Woolen Britches (worn)
- Wounds: 3
- Traces of Mischief: No Arms
- A Word: INEVITABLE
- A Word: APOCALYPSE
- Body Count: 228
- Mead of Poetry (5 shining revelations remaining)
- Enders' Friend: The Grave of Red Clouds Parting
- Inscribed Wooden Stylus
- Iron spear
- 1.03 gp
- The Box: ?
- Induced Lucidity: the Aftermath, or the New Beginning
- Compatibility: Minding
- Tricks of the Mind: Perception, Memory
- Tricks of the Mind: Engagement, Negation, Abstraction, Prestige
- Tricks of the Mind: the Self, the Other
- Gods of the Underground: Did You Just What
- A Visit From The Stork: Is What You Yes
- The Voracious Dark: Two Deals Made
- The Voracious Dark: The Promised Sixth
- Moth's Flight: the Way to Rise
- The Miracle of Life: Wayward Rabbit
Eileen Minett, Vinyl Collector
- Linen stoat shirt (worn)
- Stoat trousers (worn)
- Comfy slippers (worn)
- Never-made scimitar (blackened, slightly dull)
- Tooth-handled hunting knife
- Black leather boots
- An assemblage of amber and amethysts
- Silver thread-necklace
- Onyx spiral earrings
- 2 oaken rings
- Rusty, bloodstained knife
- A Word: HUNGER
- A Word: SYNTHESIS
- A Weapon: Explosive Cysts
- Grenade Jumping: A Solid Technique
- The Good Doctor: Secret Histories
- Higher Tonight: There And Back Again
Jack Daniels, Karate Man
- Red and gold vest and breeches combo (worn)
- Leather boots
- Rubber mattress (filled with water)
- 14033 gp (in sack)
- The Queen's Guard: Actual Asset
- Powers of the Beyond: Gardener of Thoughts
- Garden of Thoughts: the Stoat-Magistrate
- Dusty Wooden Speaking-Trumpet
- Crossbow Bolt (in throat)
- A Word: REND
- A Word: SILENCE
- A Weapon: Murder-Thought
- Uncoupled: Strength
- Wooden Door
- The Winding Path of Inspiration: Run Like Hell
- Tower of the Mind: Endless Well of Mystery
- Induced Lucidity: A Garden Well-Tended
- Elongated Affairs: Enemy of the New State
- A Place In History: Vastly Unreliable
- Anglefork Castle: the Great Worm
- 2 rats, crushed
- 1 rat, strangled
- 1 rat, live
- Travels In The Fourth Dimension: Sunday ± 2 Days
- Doomstones: So High Up But Such A Bitter View
- The Majordomo: A Great Divide Between Us Now
- The Voracious Dark: Decreasing Demand
- The Voracious Dark: More Specific Requests
- The Good Doctor: A Vague Memory
- Body Count: 3
Thomas Minstep, Insurance Agent
- Ranging fork (wielding fiercely)
- Troubles In Anglefork Town: Bearer of the Sword
- Wounds: 1
- A Word: ABSENCE
- A Word: GOODBYE
- Tooth-needle
- The Doom Guard: A Productive Discussion
- A Weapon: The Sword They Fear
- Traces of Mischief: Whole-Body Radioactive Burn
- A Bowl, Black and Knobby
- Tight Leather Pants (worn)
- Incredibly Tight Blue Dress (worn, mutilated, mildly provocative)
- Travels In The Fourth Dimension: Sunday, July 25th, 409 S.D.
- The Good Doctor: An Island of Sanity
- The Queen's Guard: A Reward Well Earned
- The New Queen: Lasting Gratitude
- Lonely Roads: The Man, The Legend
- The One They Fear: A Satisfactory Contract
- The Box: Absolutely Delightful
- A Boy's Life: Out Back
- Body Count: 2
Oscar Wilde, Chemistry Teacher
- A Word: REVELATION
- Traces of Mischief: Glowing Facial Rift
- The Serpent's Egg: Dissemination
- Body Count: 4
- Bog mummy (wearing metal helmet)
- Time-ender's measure (wrapped, processing? stopping?)
- 10 m of rope
- Half a candle
- 1 rat, skinless and smoked
- 6 gp
- Poor Misshapen Dice
- Lock of Hair (unidentified)
- Iron nail, unused
- An Inauspicious Key
- Burlap Foot Wrappings (worn)
- Burlap Hand Wrappings (worn)
- Moth-Eaten Hat (worn)
- Respectable Brown Skirt (worn)
- Old Brown Waistcoat (worn)
- Bright Yellow Tunic (worn)
- A Wealth of Burlap Ribbons
- The Winding Path of Inspiration: The Less Dangerous Friend
- Fuligin Gates: A Delivery for the Town