Topic: Web of Life: A Drider's Adventure (Ended) (Read 184901 times)

Liquefied Spleens · « **Reply #3180 on:** August 25, 2019, 06:09:53 pm »

We should hurry up and get that gun. Fix all our trouble in one go.
Dangerous. But if all goes wrong, we'll at least have a gun. I miss those, very practical way of getting something out of the way.
Let's hurry this along, then!
Yunikki is the first to get moving, though people are quick to follow. The general speed of the party has been upped, now that Miriam isn't straggling anymore. She's flying at a low altitude so she won't stand out, but it's clearly a little clumsy. She catches herself on the ground every once in a while, and bumps into you about twice. You're not exactly bothered by the featherweight bumping into you, but it's something to note. You all use the rooftops for now, as there is no large road in the way almost all the way to the smith's house. If his directions hold up, anyhow. . Sometimes, you just have to carry Yunikki over, in particularly large drops. You don't jump the gap, considering you're actually kind of a lousy jumper, but you crawl over it after going down just a tad. Switching your front legs to the other wall with a little stretching. With your size, there aren't many alleyways that are too wide for you. Soon enough, you reach the smith's house. The main luck of the lizard uprising is that there are no birds around here. Lizards are fairly ground-focused, to rooftops are the way to travel. Mind you, the main roads still need to be crossed, and if you move back over the threshold you'll have to deal with harpies again. You can survive a divebomb, sure, but the average human being can't.

The blacksmith's house is surprisingly large, with some clear western architecture present. That shows in the amount of wood, the windows, and the more pointed rooftop. Compared to the compact squares of the rest of this town, it's hard to miss. Despite the clear style difference, however, it's not much larger than the average house. Of course, the main issue is what's visible through the window.
Is that a... cockroach?
One of those cultist creatures? Here? Why the hell would it choose that house!?
Might be Kushan way of taking over a town. Kill the inhabitants, and place your people of power in the houses of other important people. I bet the tower has dangerous things in it...
It used to, yes. Still... if that roach is like the one i killed, this should be easy. Matter of fact...
I can try killing it. I-if I can get a little more energy in...
What about the glass?
A strike would burst it from the speed and heat, but magical lightning is a tad less powerful. It won't pierce, not to mention the wood will prevent some of it going through.
So we need somebody to break the window, is what you're saying?
Exactly. And for little Mirri not to miss. Francine strokes her back a little with the back of her intact hand. You don't need to do more than give a very clear glare. You don't think you'd be able to torture her through snapping her arm, like... like...
Who did that again?
She is an evil woman. Isn't she? F-francine, you mean. It doesn't matter, the point is, Francine looks like a switch was flipped and she quickly makes distance, her face turning pale as she looks at you, trembling.

You elect to keep it simple, and go down there to break the window yourself. If it tries to attack you, well, then you take it out the old fashioned way. You've done it once, you'll do again. This time with style.Mind you, you still had two arms back then, but you'll manage! As you head down, it occurs to you that a sling would have been perfect right now... You need some leather to work with. Your web is a fine material, but not quite sling material. It's a bit too stretchy, throws off your aim. So, with a bird aiming (using her finger) and applying a technique you gave her the basics on. You hope that it doesn't do anything too bad, trying to carry it over, but the idea of applying more mana to a spell (in this case centralized in her arm-well, wing) isn't too complicated.
You get close without issue, and then swing with all your might against the wooden frame. It would take a lot of strength to tear through the solid wood and glass with a cutting implement. Fortunately, you are really, really strong.
The glass breaks apart, along with the frame, and before the roach can run, a lightning bolt flashes through the street and into the house. Rather than one quick squeak and a flash, however, it turns into extended screaming and a bloody lightshow!
You turn to look inside, and see the roach spasming all around while its entire being is covered in blue energy, electricity arcing between its limbs as the light seems to strobe! After a few more seconds of what must be purest agony, the bug finally turns black entirely, and turns into a neat pile of ash. Like it went from solid to dust in just a second.
...OH.

When your party gets down, you note that Miriam looks a little woozy. It's also what makes the click in your mind as to how, exactly, that lightshow happened. Miriam just put all her remaining mana in one blast, and maybe... created a slow-burn? It looked like that bug would have zapped anything ELSE that got close to it, before it expired entirely. Powerful, to be sure, but to use all your mana on it? Not too useful.
Did I do good?
You just pat her head, finding words unneeded. She looks like she's in heaven as she receives the silent praise. Then she stumbles, after which you guide her to the couch inside of the house. Yunikke had to crawl through the ruined window to open it on the inside, but it all worked out.

Where will you begin searching?

Basement
Number one place for work stuff, right?

Bedroom.
Personal effects, right?

Living room
If it's for fun, why not do it in the comfy room?

Kitchen
It's always the last place you'd think to look.

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Egan_BW · « **Reply #3181 on:** August 25, 2019, 06:19:13 pm »

Hmm, interesting.

Clear the house before we start searching for things.

Naturegirl1999 · « **Reply #3182 on:** August 25, 2019, 10:40:51 pm »

Quote from: Egan_BW on August 25, 2019, 06:19:13 pm

Hmm, interesting.

Clear the house before we start searching for things.

+1
The roach might not be the only th8ng inside

Liquefied Spleens · « **Reply #3183 on:** August 28, 2019, 08:19:52 am »

Let's play it safe. Make sure there's nothing else around that might sneak up on us. We'll go through one by one, I'll take point.
The rest of the party doesn't feel like getting ambushed, so they go along with that plan. Sadly, it ends up being entirely fruitless. There was nothing in here except the one cockroach, and you end up wasting some more time that you desperately need. Regardless, at least you feel safe. With the question of safety being out of the question, however, everybody gets a room to look over. You end up taking the living room, mostly because it's the least cramped for your size. It'd probably be a bad idea to grow any further, considering you already need to bend your legs a bit to fit in most houses. You can go lower than your full height with ease, sure, but this is still kind of annoying. Everybody starts looking for a decent amount of time, and it occurs to you that looking through a room with the whole group is likely faster that spreading out, besides. Despite that, you hear Yunikki stomping up the stairs holding on to a collection of papers.
Found them! They were in the basement, behind a cabinet. Used a false wall, but it was already open. He must not have thought that anything would try to steal his stuff at all, despite the security.
Excellent. We've got that, but now we need to hurry the hell up! Those lizards are probably going to start setting up their explosives...
We should have some time! They're going to need to set them up in a way that causes a domino effect. But I sure hope mister Haversam has some parts prepared, or...
We'll cross that bridge when we get to it. Let's move!

There are two ways to head back. You could try making a run for it along the main road. If yuo don't have to go jumping around on the rooftops, things will be much faster. But that does open you up to attacks... Of course, you could leave the slower party members behind, so it's just you and Miriam. You don't doubt that they'll be able to make their way back safely. Of course, then it's just you and Miriam against whatever decides to attack you out on the road. Miriam is out of mana, besides, so she'd just have her speed on her side. Flying is a rather hefty boon to mobility, after all. Maybe you can give her something to defend herself? Or something to help you from above. If only you had Sucy here, she could hook up your flying friend, easy.

What will you do?

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Devastator · « **Reply #3184 on:** August 29, 2019, 02:56:30 am »

Lets go on the alley-route, but lets leave the slower members behind. We don't really have time for any more delays.

Liquefied Spleens · « **Reply #3185 on:** August 31, 2019, 04:59:50 pm »

Right, screw it, I'm going to go as fast as I can. Yunikki, Francine, if you can't keep up, just head to the smith on your own. Time is more important right now.
Right, I'll just go my own way, then. No way I can keep up.
I could follow along, but we both know my stamina isn't exactly sufficient. I'll just follow our friend.
We are not friends.
We could be!
You elect to leave this impending shitstorm, as you don't have time for banter between two decidedly unwitty people. Miriam and you get to the rooftop, and start making your way to the smithy before things go wrong. You elect to go through the alleyway route, which is quite a bit slower than the main route, but you'll avoid patrols if you're careful. Unfortunately, you aren't careful, you are fast. After you crawl you way over a wrong alleyway, you hear some guttural hissing from down below, and a spear is thrown your direction. It misses by quite a lot, and it was kind of going sideways regardless, as the lizard hit himself on the back of the head when throwing the spear wrong. Still, they know you're here.

You keep on running, not stopping to fight, but soon enough some of the lizards are using the main road to follow along with you. With you being slowed down by rooftops, they soon manage to cut you off. Except that, you know, you just kinda move to a different roof. It slows you down, but they can't keep up properly. Still means you have a sizeable amount of lizards chasing you, though, some better at rooftop jumping than others. Some of them get lost as they mistime jumps or end up too winded to continue, but when you reach the smith, you still have a few lizards chasing you! You've lost some time going around the lizards, and you can't very well go inside the smith's house with these lizards following you! You draw your scimitar and prepare to fight off the halfdozen lizards still chasing you.
The first one manages to graze you as it uses its momentum to charge forward with a spear. You twist to the side, but your missing arm leaves you with a blind spot. You simply cannot counter it! However, you still have a selection of legs available, and proceed to trip the charging lizardman as your armor deflects the blow. You have a bruise, not a wound. You can't follow up, though, as two more lizards attack as well. One is unarmed, and is quickly cut down before it can do anything. A quick upward slice from your scimitar does the work, and you are able to parry and slice at the next lizardman. You strike it over the head with your pommel as it is reeling, crushing the skull outright! From behind you, you hear a quick squeak. Turning around, you see Miriam is actually fighting physically! She stomped the tripped lizard's head in with an inhumanly quick stomp of the legs. It crushes the skull instantly, splashing her with chunks and blood. The remaining lizards are quickly dealt with after that, too winded to put up a proper fight. Despite that, they got in two decent licks with their fists, hardly an issue, but it stings a little.
However, you lost yet more time!

You rush inside the smithy, and find the small pigman pretty quick. He's hard at work on something small, considering the little tink tink tink of the hammer. The forge is going at full blast, and the workplace is smokey up above. Every once in a while, a system of pullies opens up a window and blasts the smoke away, a very complex alternative to a simple chimney. You basically throw his plans in his face, and he doesn't get off a wry comment before you ask him, desperation in your voice, if he has a prototype of some kind.
Are you mad? Of course not! I've made a few failures, of course, but even if I had a functioning gun, I wouldn't have a bullet for it! Your design requires specific bullet shapes, and I don't have the tools for it. Were it not for this bloody plague, I'd-
He stops talking when he sees you panic. You put a hand in your hair, and a spider even falls out. You weren't even careful enough for one of them! Oh gods. Ohhh, gods. You placed all your hopes on that! Now what the hell can you do? The cart was a troublesome objective even WITH the hypothetical gun, but your companions are gone as well! You've got nothing, and those bombs are going to go off at any moment. What the hell can you even DO at this point!?

Run to get Sucy
She's bound to have some kind of explosive to counter this, right? Fight fire with fire?

Grab the best armor you've got here, weight be damned, and whatever weaponry there is available.
You don't need to be fast, or even have a good offence. You need to stall them until your companions arrive. Maybe the quarantine zone will notice the commotion!

Grab what weaponry you can get, and take the fight to the lizards.
It's... Not a good idea. But it's the best you've got.

Dash to the quarantine!
If you can't stop it, you can at least warn them! Let's hope they aren't so skittish they'll shoot you if you run in.

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Egan_BW · « **Reply #3186 on:** August 31, 2019, 05:22:07 pm »

Well... things won't get much worse for us in specific if this city breaks quarantine. Maybe, taking into account how dangerous all of these options are, and the fact that we may have a better chance of defeating the actual end of the world than anyone else, we should consider Acceptance.

Devastator · « **Reply #3187 on:** August 31, 2019, 05:24:51 pm »

We don't really need a gun. All we need is a hole in a barrel.. it'll poke through the cloth and let powder leak out. Then we can ignite the powder trail as they move the stuff around. That'll then blow up the barrels. Does this guy have a crossbow?

Olith McHuman · « **Reply #3188 on:** August 31, 2019, 11:54:23 pm »

Don't think we can use a crossbow with one hand (not with any real accuracy, anyway), and Miriam has, what, talons now?

That blanket neutralizes fire magic, but what about a non-magical firebomb? But then there's the issue of actually getting the firebomb to the powder... Miriam could do that, but would have to fly above the range of their crossbows. Would be easy to miss.

Unless that smith has some brilliant idea, I'd say send Miriam back to base to see if Sucy has anything useful while we dash to the quarantine, but I'm not exactly holding high hopes they can help much. Should leave a message for our friends with the smith, but I'm not sure what they can even do. Tell Miriam to be careful though. It's not worth risking he skin for a longshot plan like this.

Devastator · « **Reply #3189 on:** September 01, 2019, 02:16:33 am »

..why not? It might take forever to reload, but we should be able to use a crossbow one-armed. We're.. kinda strong.

Also, we could just hurl a bomb with a sling onto the powder. All we need for that is a bit of leather. This guy should have some kinda oil and a rag, and maybe some powder.

Or we could just try to drag the tarp off the barrels and then ignite it via spell. A hook on a rope might solve it.

Liquefied Spleens · « **Reply #3190 on:** September 03, 2019, 05:15:36 pm »

Sorry for the delay. Computer trouble.

All right, things are bad. But you can still make this work, maybe. You're going to do something dangerous, and if things go wrong anyway? Well, that's it. You'll cross that bridge when you get to it. Right now, you're taking two plans and hoping at least one of them works.
Right. I'm going to arm myself so I can blow that cart up. Miriam, you're going to the base and getting Sucy to help out. Take some firebombs or something, and then we'll see if you can provide air support. We'll meet close to the gate, just try to find me from the air.
Miriam just nods and quickly goes outside to fly off. She's eager to please, if nothing else. Now, of course, you need to arm yourself. The first idea is that you need an alternative way of igniting the powder. Your first plan is a crossbow, but the smith was quick to stop you.
You can't reload that with one arm! Not to mention, your feet can't anchor the crossbow. No matter how strong you think you are, you can't work this thing more than once!
I need something! What about a sling? That should be doable, right?
Yeah, sure. Not easy, but you can keep it locked against your body. Do you know how to use it?
I know how to use a bola, I can figure this thing out.
Sure thing, not too far removed in concept. Just release it earlier. That reminds me-
The smith quickly digs through a pile of scrap and some other things that look a tad too sharp to be tossed around. Then, he finds a large cloth bag filled with bolas!
Nobody ever buys these. Just take them, I'm scuttling this whole shop regardless. On that note, lets get you armed! Follow me.

Through a series of systems that only the smith is able to understand, you work your way through piles of imported weaponry and handmade ones. This man has been working for a very long while, that much is certain. After a while, he hands you a new sword. This one isn't a scimitar, and is instead a more straightforward western sword, the type you're used to. You missed being able to stab, not to mention a more robust crossguard. Scimitars just aren't quite your cup of tea, even if they are excellent at slashing. Weight is better on scimitars, but you can lift just about anything at this point, so its a non-issue. You get a scabbard, as well, but that's just kind of a cherry on top. You decided against heavy armor, so you're pretty much set after you collect some makeshift bombs. He had oil, he had rags and he even had bottles, but these things don't stand a ghost of a chance for actually taking down a lizard. It'll cause a minor burn, at the very best. Just in case you can figure something out, you also elect to take along the crossbow as well. you've got the space for it. The blacksmith found it a waste, but doesn't complain. He also gives you a large collection of ball bearings to toss. It's one thing to use rocks, a decent metal ball will crush a skull outright. With that in mind, however, you're all set. For as far as you can get ready, at least.
You head to the main gate of the city, inevitably passing by the market. You can see Jack is still stomping around, but you avoid her notice by going very far around her. You lose a little more time, yes, but you can't risk it.

When you finally arrive, you see that the lizards are all hard at work. The cart is only halfful at this point! Despite the busy work, there are still plenty of lizards going around guarding the place, and you can't quite see the leader lizard. You're looking at it all from a rooftop, so you're out of sight for now. The cart is in the middle of the street, right against the gate...
They're placing mines through the street now, but they're just going to blow up the cart to get the gate open! You can't even blow up the powder that way! All you can do is set off the mines prematrely, or maybe... You can still warn the quarantine?
Hell with it.
Either you make an assault now, choosing some strategic targets (some of the armed guards are close to a barrel), or you wait it out for Miriam. Maybe she has something?
Or you accept it. Let them blow it up. You'll just help the quarantine guards fight off the lizards. Let's just hope that doesn't attract unwanted attention. Jack isn't that far away...
You pet your spiders nervously, trying to think of what would be the best approach...

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Naturegirl1999 · « **Reply #3191 on:** September 03, 2019, 05:30:11 pm »

set the mines off prematurely

Olith McHuman · « **Reply #3192 on:** September 03, 2019, 10:32:50 pm »

Why are they setting mines in the city? Do they expect trouble? Harpies wouldn't care about these mines, they fly. Or are they expecting Jack to try and stop them? We may want to spend a few minutes looking at their "troop" formation with soul vision.

Naturegirl1999 · « **Reply #3193 on:** September 04, 2019, 09:27:01 am »

They are trying to destroy the quarantine

Liquefied Spleens · « **Reply #3194 on:** September 05, 2019, 11:37:38 am »

You have a goal, but not exactly a plan. Considering how dangerous this particular mob is, I'm going to give you a little extra time to decide on an exact plan of action.

For reference: the individual barrels in the street itself are placed by the houses, and are quickly covered up with whatever's around. This includes sand, stolen tablecloths, clothing, and what have you. while it's still obvious that there's a barrel, it's still out of immeadiate sight. These barrels are placed by the houses. The cart is right by the gate, and will likely blow up the massive wooden gate in a way that shrapnel would be a potential issue for the quarantine holders. You don't know if they're close to the gate or not, after all.
The lizards are still hard at work placing mines, so you could clear out some of them right away.
Something else to consider: the individual powder barrels in the street would aid nothing in breaking the quarantine. Clearly, they have something else in mind...

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Author Topic: Web of Life: A Drider's Adventure (Ended) (Read 184901 times)

Liquefied Spleens

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Egan_BW

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Naturegirl1999

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Liquefied Spleens

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Devastator

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Liquefied Spleens

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Egan_BW

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Devastator

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Olith McHuman

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Devastator

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Liquefied Spleens

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Naturegirl1999

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Olith McHuman

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Naturegirl1999

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