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[piecewise]

I need to find a old-timer or town historian or someone who used to be a part of the industrial process here so I can find out the history behind the crystal. Ask Adam if spirits are active nearby as well, maybe I can get information from them, despite how cryptic they would probably be even with Adam assisting? But I'll be assuming the crystals are buying time for now, and are symptoms of the real problem, not the problem itself.

Spoiler: Nina (click to show/hide)

Name: Nina Morellis
Appearance: A young, red-haired woman, green eyes, somewhat unkempt. She's had Adam for as long as she could remember, and has a bit of a reputation as a harmless nut. The town guard are okay with Nina though, occasionally getting her help keeping a mage secured by having her drain their mana so they can't cast. Since they don't have a proper magehunter available, having a local civilian channeler they can bring in as needed is a big help. And Nina tries to be on her best behavior with them to keep their relations good. Nina herself works as a healer, living out in the poor part of town, and has an erratic schedule based on the needs of those who want her help. so she has a lot of free time, but also gets woken up in the middle of the night a lot. add in Adam's occasional antics and she doesn't get to have a stable sleep schedule.

Magic Path: Channeler, Invoker.

Materials: Sound, Accelerate
Mana: 3

Strength: D4
Speed: D6
Endurance: D10
Knowledge: D8
Will: D10
Senses: D6

Inventory: 25 gold, a few sacks of food, 2 silver, aqua vitae, Backpack, padded cloak (D4 protection, Light armor), doctor's bag, walking stave, Lantern, Medicine backpack, The healer's handbook, Surgeon's Kit, Excorcist's kit, Doctor's Cloak.

Inhabited by a spirit which takes the form of a floating disembodied limb that constantly melts and reforms into other body parts. She calls it "Adam."

Cabal: None at this time.

Adam responds by slamming himself against the ground repeatedly.
[2v6]
Despite your best efforts, it seems like everyone directly involved in the original labs is dead or at the very least no longer here. The people you do talk to that actually seem to know anything about the pillars think they were to prevent some sort of disaster.

Follow 'The Plan'.

Spoiler:  Écalir Speedwagon (click to show/hide)

Name: Écalir Speedwagon

Appearance: Terrorbirb with mechanical noodle arms
Magic path: Hunting flesh-scroll
Strength: d10+2
Speed: d10+1
Endurance: d8+1
Knowledge: d4
Will: d6+2
Senses: d6+1

Mana: 56
Ongoing effects:None


Magical materials

left Arm: wood
Right arm: Insect 
Stomach: Strong acid
Chest: White Phosphorous 
Left buttcheek: Electricity
Right buttcheek: Lightning
left leg: multiply

TBD: Command

Inventory

Mare's Leg: Lever Action, d8, 5/5 magazine, 45 spare bullets.
Quality weapon (Spear): d8
Longsword with glowing runes
Springy metal warpick: d8
Springy metal knive: d6
Springy metal sword: d6
9 smokebombs

Thaumic flamethrower (5/50 thaum tank, d10 str requirement, armored fuel tank) + extra canisters with compressed gas

Poncho
Sombrero
Fitted armor: d8
Sealer Suit: d4 vs magic
Shield (+1 to protective rolls from armor)

Backpack
100 feet of rope
Bandages
Tattoo Kit
199g worth of gems
doctor's bag
Gladiator Badge
Jade tablets (48-number of words)
binoculars

Ok then, we came up with a plan:

Ecalir tattoos the word, preferably on a patch of his body that'd be somewhat easy to replace if he wants to (so not the face, for example). In the meantime Darwin looks around this room a bit to see if there's other noteworthy things or what the purpose of this place was. Take that jar with us at any rate.

Then we go to the plant sphere. Ecalir will do the first command spell, to get the spirit out of the body (d8 as you said).

If that spells works, he'll hold the jar against the sphere, and Darwin will use sunbro staff to open a small hole at that place (so that the only escape is into the jar). Then Ecalir will use the second command spell (d6) to command it into the jar, then he'll close the jar.

Finally Darwin will open the plant sphere, retrieve the person inside and check her vitals, then we go back to Kaolin proper.

Spoiler: New and Improved Darwin Zeppeli (click to show/hide)

Name: Darwin Zeppeli
Appearance: An old medicine man.

Magic path: alchemist gut-reader
Strength: d4
Speed: d6->d8 + 1
Endurance: d6->d8 + 2
Knowledge: d10 + 1
Will: d8 + 2
Senses: d10 + 1

Mana: 26
2 bottles with 10 thaum each (20 total)
Ongoing effects: 'see through bing bong'

Magical materials

Vacuum!
Reanimate
Sharpen
Viscera
Diamond
Rope
Deathly Light (Radiation)

Inventory

1 sedated bugman

dissection knife: d4
Springy metal knive: d6
Springy metal sword: d6
Springy metal halberd: d8
Curved blade: d6
Icepick: d4
gun: d8 [50 rounds left]
10 smokebombs
thaumic bomb (currently empty)
6 x d8 rifle
6 x d8 sword

Ecalir's old armor: d8 (in use)
shield (+1 to protective rolls from armor)
Sealer Suit: d4 (vs magic)
Warm clothing

Alchemist’s Gear
182 gold 
7 silver
15 kg black biometal

A glass slab with a topographical map of the kingdom carved into it
a bottle of glowing blue sea water, inside protective box with lock
a glass orb with barely visible lotus inside of it, inside staff assembly.
magic coin
Small book
magic compass + map
Gimbal that points towards diamonds (range around 100 meter)
Sunbro scepter

book on normal plants and animals
book on magical plants and animals/creatures
handbook on making weapons&armor, including a list of known types
a detailed account of the Artifacter war
map of the old world
good quality book&pen
good history book
series of good maps of area around Alkahest and the volcano

Paradox snail (inside jar) and things to keep them happy and fed, linked to Ecalir
Extra pair of paradox snails
Doctor's bag
set of ingredients (plants, chemicals and the like) for making poisons or antidotes (21 uses left)
High quality backpack
donkey named Yvonne for carrying
Zomboraptor head
Lantern
several hundred feet of rope
climbing crampons
a grappling hook
iron stakes
net made of rope
several vials with imp fat
20 vials
2x Collapsible rod
10 oil flasks
300 feet of really big, thick, strong rope
100 feet of metal chain
box of metal spikes
pair of binoculars
4 boxes of rags
Medium armor: d6 (not in use)
2 sets of digging tools (for Darwin + Ecalir)
Extra digging tools (for hired workers)
tarps, paint, and other stuff we can use to camouflage things with
2 doses of fast-working anesthetic for knocking out humans
ghost charm
2 weeks of ration
a pair of prongs and a metal jar with a lid for capturing spirits

Alright. [8v5] This seems to be something of a weapons dump. There are other jars like this one buried under the encroaching dirt and grass.

[4+2v3][1+2v1]

The actual confrontation is pretty uninteresting. Mostly yelling at the wood ball and then holding a jar over a small hole. The spells work and the goo is constrained to the jar. You two carry the unconscious lady within back up to Kaolin and hand the jar in to the priests. They even give you 50 gold for it. Everything worked out better than expected and faster than expected too!



HEY NATUREGIRL! YOU'RE BACK!

1.Take a guide and maintenance golem, and... add them to the pile of loot we plan to take.

2.Have the work crews collect all the clockwork robots into one room.  All of them.  Take inventory of all the surviving parts, and figure out how many complete bodies could be pieced together from the parts.  Ekrov looted 35 undamaged mainsprings before, so that's the hard cap for how many robots he can repair, but if there's more bodies than that I'd like to know.

3.Could Ekrov use clockwork to enchant a single robot's brain to obey spoken instructions given to it, without ever acting violently towards anyone?  Idea is to leave one robot with Painting Saeko, as a bit of extra muscle.  Maybe she can do some work recovering stuff while we're gone.

4.Assemble five robots (four if one couldn't easily be modified to leave with painting saeko), leaving them complete but without their mainspring power sources.

5. String out some gold wire from the mana catcher, so that it can be drained without entering the magicoal room, even after Saeko's blocked it off with steel.

6. Try to find a water-summoning thaumic item.  A faucet from the king's room, a sprinkler in the farms, wherever--I just figure they must have an item that summons water from magic, and that'd be a nice thing to rip out and loot.

7. Find the biggest thaumic aircraft that's still intact, and preferably close to the exterior surface so that it's easier to get out of the ruins.  Something like a cargo plane, ideally.  Try to talk to its spirit, while holding high ranking keys, and cast a human-based spell to predict whether it'd be dangerous if reactivated.  If both the talking and the spell indicate that it's safe to do so, give it a small amount of coal and reactivate it.

Spoiler: creepy oracle kid (click to show/hide)

Name: Ekrov Trenian Vyachilad
Description: A noble's son, Ekrov is a boy on the cusp of adulthood, and barely looks it.  His hands are soft, his appearance somewhat unkempt, but his body has toughened from his time on the road.  He's no longer scrawny, though he's still somewhat short--though it's hard to tell whether that's due to age or genetics.  His eyes are calm and constantly look around in absentminded wonderment; he seems continually fascinated, but almost amused as well, as if there's a hidden joke in everything he sees.  He wears a clearly high-quality outfit, but to his credit it looks unusually practical for a noble, subdued brown in color and light aside from thin pieces of light leather in strategic locations, clearly intended more as protection than a fashion statement.  He carries a small backpack, and wears a light cloak that's had an absurd number of little pockets clumsily sewn into it.  He has a very large third eye in the center of his forehead.  It is rotated ninety degrees from his other eyes, and has a glittering gold iris set into an entirely black sclera.  It cannot turn to look at things without him moving his entire head, and is rock solid.  -  Additionally, he has visible veins of glowing magic patterned over his skin, slowly pulsing and flowing.  Mutation: He is quite flexible and springy, kinda like a Champion Yoga contortionist who might also be the illegitimate love child of a snake and a Slinky. In most contexts, this isn't apparent from looking at him, but if he wanted he could totally lick his own elbow...[/b]
Magic Path: Alchemist Sculptor
Mana: 94 (200 thaum carried)
Magic Words: "Animate", "Cloud", "Banish", "Iron", "Human", "Clockwork"

Stats:
Strength: d6-1
Speed: d6+2+1
Endurance: d10+4
Knowledge: d12+5
Will: d6+2
Senses: d12+3

Ongoing Effects:  Has animated a painting of Saeko into a fully existent, physical human.  Five days of animation left.  d4 mana cost for every day after that.

Current Sculpture Materials:
1. Something of perfect roundness
2. Ash from the ruins of a city
3. Skin containing an old scar
4. A book
5. Honey
6. Something that came from beyond the skies

Inventory:
Backpack
Lightly armored traveling outfit (enchanted to d6, from d4)
--Wooden shield (+1 to armor rolls, most of the time)
Steel stilleto (d4 melee)
Merc Longsword (d6 Melee)
Ornamental spring pistol (d6 ranged) [6/6] (30 spare shots)
Alchemist gear
12 gold, 8 silver (Saeko owes him 400 gold...  For someone with d12 sense, Ekrov can be pretty gullible.)
Orb key thing, looted from long dead pilot corpse.
35 (!) Clockwork mainsprings capable of powering full robots
Enough robot pieces to reassemble a full combat robot.  (This may be being cannibalized for the power armor)
Ash from the ruins of Gravid. (sculpture mat)
Text-metal linked to another piece of text-metal, carried by Saeko.
Several small sculptures from Gravid. Idols, basically. Some ceramic jugs and gold jewelry as well.
Two golems from Gravid, one a guide, the other maintenance.  Description here.

A wearable robot exoskeleton, with all the mechanics moved to the exterior.
--Enchanted so that it can be worn, and the mechanical parts will follow the movements of the wearer.
--Plated with the silver anti-magic armor found in gravid, offering almost complete coverage.  Only joints are exposed.
Iron Teleport Rod, connected to another teleporter rod constructed deep inside the ruins of Gravid.  Anyone can use it to teleport between the two rods just by pumping mana into one.
FERROUS MEMENTO, THE MEMORY SKULL!
--Enchanted to only open when the correct passphrase is spoken to it.  Only Ekrov knows the passphrase.
--Enchanted so that Ekrov is always aware of its location and status.


Two broken clockwork robots, shoved in crates.  Details here,  here, and here.  And a question about rewriting their minds here.
A pair of strength-increasing clockwork gauntlets, which were clearly meant to be used by the robots, "seemingly for bending metal".
A strange blunt clockwork circular saw that is extremely effective at cutting through metal.
A  straight bladed clockwork sword, with a slot in the bottom for a power cell.  It is a lightning saber; when properly empowered, it will produce high heat and electrical discharge that will greatly enhance both its cutting power and the damage it causes.  It needs a power cell of the right size; which is basically a charged battery.
A large bag of bomblets, taken from an unexploded clockwork bomb.

Paints, a dish, sands, glitter, water, general scrying supplies.
Pencil + Paper.
Expensive medical supplies.

Sketches of:
Gyrotourbillon's workings
Benedict the Griffon
Detailed but incomplete schematics of clockwork robot people.
Clockwork machinegun schematics.
Simple clockwork tools schematics.
Schematic for a simple remotely-operated alchemist-gear manipulator thing.
Maps to the three caches of clockwork loot buried somewhere between Alkahest and Lake Candentis.
The design and construction for a full combat robot, of the kind found in Gravid.
The structure and enchantment framework of a flying thaumic warmachine, found within Gravid.  Incomplete, due to Ekrov's lack of understanding about how the machine knows what to do.
The structure and functioning of a thaumic rifle, found within Gravid.
Even more sketches on how complex thaumic devices work, in particular dealing with the spirits that animate them and give them some degree of life and sentience.
The full schematics of one of the "Clockwork dragons" that attacked the party at Gravid.
The design and function of thaumic keystones.
The design and function of Gravid's giant thaumic furnace.


TO-DO LIST:
MEMORY TINKER!!!

Clockwork stuff:
Fix a robot
Try to reverse engineer and understand those power pellet crucibles.
Fix the broken machine guns
Look into cloning machine gun ammo?  Probably not something we'll care about ever, but I wanna DAKKA...
Find out where all these clockwork things are coming from.  Apparently they might actually come from Candentis?

Make thaumic tools run on thaum, rather than mana or magicoal.

Cache A: The buried death pellet furnaces, both the unopened ones and the empty opened one.
Cache B: All the unexploded bombs from the wreck, including one that's been opened and had some of the bomblets taken out.
Cache C: The rest of the loot from the wreck, buried inside crates.  Contains:

"A large number of tools (These are what you could call mundane tools like wrenches, screw drivers, plyers, and the like. There are a lot of them in different sizes and shapes but none are hugely rare or valuable on their own. Though they are admittedly well made.)"
"A pnumatic self heating rivet gun and the air compressor for it"
"A sort of 'Jaws of Life' style combination spreader and cutter. Basically a massive pnumatic pair of plyers/snips."
"3 more working machine guns, and a half dozen that are broken in some way"  ((These deal "d12 [damage], if memory serves, though they often roll multiples."))
"About 10 or so big boxes of ammo (there are a lot of loose belts around so the amount isn't exact)"
"A welding system"

1. alright
2. In terms of the full number of bodies you think you can make...17. You MIGHT be able to squeeze that up to 20 if you're really lucky, but those final 3 would be stretching.
3. You could. Though be careful of the wording; it would be interpreting you computer-like and exact.
4. [some rolls] You get 4 out of 5 assembled, the fifth one has some issue you can't place. Probably something dumb like a gear not properly meshed but you can't find the problem.
5. OK.
6. There's a basin in the king's room that creates water using mana. We'll say you take that.
7. The largest you can find is one shaped kind of like a moth: a big pair of wings and relatively stubby body. It looks designed to carry cargo, with space not just in the body but the wings as well. Its mostly intact too, there is some damage to the body but you think it could be patched quickly. The spirit inside is weak, apparently not very smart, but seems capable and safe enough. You give it a piece of coal and check the functions of everything. It seems ready to fly. The only issue is that its at a 45 degree angle in a tilted hangerbay with the doors closed. Need to get those doors open and get the thing "Shot out" of there for it to catch the air and fly. Probably best to get it out, land it, then load and take off.

Last day here, we leave tomorrow.

Ekrov can use the crew today.

Three things on the agenda today.

Use a Strengthen Bird spell to summon a bird with enough intelligence to act as a messenger and return the King's Key to the person I took it from.  Then give the bird the king's key and one lump of magicoal.  Write a short letter thanking the person for the loan, along with, if possible, the commands I've discovered about what the key can be used for.  Include a second letter with information about the upcoming auction.  The bird can either return or go about its business after delivering the stuff for me.

Retry failures.

Second, continue looting the palace.  If that's a dining room, look for cutlery and tableware, plates, cups, tablecloths, etcetera.  These should be very good price-for-weight, and are in more affordable chunks for the individual.  If it's a throne room, find what there is to find.

What I'd like in particular is at least one large mirror, probably for keeping but I'll sell extras if more than one can be found.  Since there were bedrooms and offices, there might be one.  If none is found, more fine clothing is also good.

Thirdly, summon some steel walls.  If I can, top up on mana from the drain point. (been running about four days) Then take up the d10 Wall word from the disassembled force-field projector, and summon some walls to block off and reinforce the mana room.  Use Strengthen Permanent Steel Wall.  Block off the door and drainer..  I don't want the thing to blow up after some kind of gold rush results from us cashing in all this loot in the capital.

If the others make a more permanent arrangement for painting-saeko, integrate their solution.  Block the drainer off if none is made, she can be given additional mana before we leave tomorrow, and we can return via portal to provide a more permanent solution.

Spoiler: Saeko Hirahara (click to show/hide)

Young Japanese woman with a long black braid and a white and red fitted robe with long gloves.  Clothing made of metallic thread.  Large elf ears.  Shark teeth and obligate carnivore.  Bleeds insects instead of blood.

Invoking Empath

Str  d6 +1
Speed  d8 +1
Endurance  d10+4
Knowledge  d8+2
Will  d10+3
Senses  d8 +2

Materials: d12 Ape, d12 Grow, d12 Strengthen, d12 Expand, d10 Permanent, d8 Bird, d6 Force, d4 Ice, d12 Contain
Location: Ruins of Gravid
Status: Fine.  Seriously enhanced hearing.  Magically lightened to about three-quarters weight.

Familiar.  "Benedict"  Cougar/red-tailed hawk, adequate flyer, garage-sized with 120ish foot wingspan.
Natural weapons d10, d10+d6 with swooooop.  Eats 3 gold/day worth of food.  Properly harnessed and well kitted out for riding and baggage.

Str D20
Spd D6
End D12
Kno D4
Will D8
Sen D6

Expedition Status:
Saeko, Ekrov, Zavi.
3 guards, 2 in personal service.
3 assistants and workers.
Excavation tools and equipment.
4 days worth of supplies.
two working machine guns.
Key orbs: Soldier, Technician, Aristocrat, King
Accessable locations: All of lower level of city ruins, save for king door.  Likely access to still-unexplored upper levels.

explored: Through soldier-locked door. leads to..
lower-level maintenance and utility areas.
Armoury
Crop rooms
Hangars
King door

Loot:
Palace gems and jewelry.
8x suits of silk clothing.
8x suits of cotton clothing.
King's wardrobe
26x Thaumic sabres.
56x magic rifles
18x suits of magic armour
Broken magic armour bits.
Thaumic tools
Elements of Sparrow-fighter forge.  Maybe other construction tools.
3x Thaumic wire-laying tools
3x large gold wire spools
Crystal with d12 Cloth.
1x Miniature Fighter-Sparrow Core.
Advanced thaumic personal laboratory+workshop.

3x deactivated golems
6x gold swirly orbs (explosives)
16x telescoping silver rods (portable force fields)
4x big mana rifles
1x rifle with flower petal rod

Art Pieces:
statue of harp-playing waifish girl.
very fine quality evocative bust.
10x miniature furniture pieces from core room.

16 barrels of magicoal. 3d20+10 pieces each, each containing 3d20 mana.
first barrel has 15 chunks.

Items:
The Core to Gravid
Ghost Charm
Alchemist's Gear
Two machine guns! with lots of ammo.
69 mana
60 thaum
151 gold
d8+1 armour: The outfit, and a shield.  Weighs as if it were d4.
magic texting device.
parachute popsicle-stick.
Sealer-suit gloves
Shield.
Adamant Weave Backpack.  Contents are magically lightened via Lightweight spell.
Waterskin
Adamant Weave Cloth.  Sufficient for an outfit or two backpacks.
5kg steel rod
Compass
Goggles
Doctor's Bag
Gold-lined Sealer Suit Bag.
Surgical tools
Magic Spyglass
~200 gold value of gold and silver ingots and precious gems.

Jade tablets with d8 View, d10 Steel, and d10 Speed.
disassembled force-field rod with [Force D4] [Wall d12] and Permanent d10 (inserted into brain.)

Alchemy Supplies

Stashed:
Cable-wrapped steel lockbox with radioactive pellet inside.
Box of painting-golem

Businesses:
Large decrepit building in Galena.
Share in presumptive new Galena mine.

Notes: Improving physical stats with strengthen, d4->d6 is d6, d6->d8 is d12, d8->d10 is d20 or more.

1. Ok
2. -4 mana. Done.
3. A lot of the plates were ceramic and now reduced to powder, but you get as much of the golden silverware, serving platters, and other valuables as possible.
4. You find a large stretched oval shape full body mirror made of silvered iron. Its held in a golden frame with designs depicting the wind goddess and clouds.
5. Done. We'll consider that a 40 mana job to just block everything off with big, reinforced walls. I won't bother rolling since you can't crit fail it really, so worst case scenario is a lot of rerolls.

[Lenglon]

Well this is bad. whatever the crystals are supposed to protect against is probably beginning to overwhelm them. I need an information source!
Well what kind of stuff were the labs for at least? are there any operating records of the labs left behind? Did the labs have to negotiate with anyone in order to operate here? who did they have to report to? If I can't get firsthand information maybe I can get secondhand information or records or SOMETHING I can learn about the darn crystals? They're clearly reacting to SOMETHING but I have no clue what that is!
Stay alert to chances to learn from the local spirits.

Spoiler: Nina (click to show/hide)

Name: Nina Morellis
Appearance: A young, red-haired woman, green eyes, somewhat unkempt. She's had Adam for as long as she could remember, and has a bit of a reputation as a harmless nut. The town guard are okay with Nina though, occasionally getting her help keeping a mage secured by having her drain their mana so they can't cast. Since they don't have a proper magehunter available, having a local civilian channeler they can bring in as needed is a big help. And Nina tries to be on her best behavior with them to keep their relations good. Nina herself works as a healer, living out in the poor part of town, and has an erratic schedule based on the needs of those who want her help. so she has a lot of free time, but also gets woken up in the middle of the night a lot. add in Adam's occasional antics and she doesn't get to have a stable sleep schedule.

Magic Path: Channeler, Invoker.

Materials: Sound, Accelerate
Mana: 3

Strength: D4
Speed: D6
Endurance: D10
Knowledge: D8
Will: D10
Senses: D6

Inventory: 25 gold, a few sacks of food, 2 silver, aqua vitae, Backpack, padded cloak (D4 protection, Light armor), doctor's bag, walking stave, Lantern, Medicine backpack, The healer's handbook, Surgeon's Kit, Excorcist's kit, Doctor's Cloak.

Inhabited by a spirit which takes the form of a floating disembodied limb that constantly melts and reforms into other body parts. She calls it "Adam."

Cabal: None at this time.

[Naturegirl1999]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

 hide)
 Name: Eve
Appearance: 4 ft tall female human with long hear that constantly changes color. She always wears a long sleeve shirt and jeans. She has slightly tan skin and green eyes. most of her right arm is made of aluminum, from her hand to her forearm.
Magic path: Servant Sculptor
Mana: 1
Strength: d4
Speed: d8
Endurance: d6
Knowledge: d10
Will: d8
Senses: d8

Ongoing effects: None

Items needed for current Sculpture

1. An arrow, caught mid flight.
2. A piece of Amber containing a living thing
3. A block of Lead
4. A compass
5. Solidified Smoke.

Spirit: A silver quiver with 2 arrows that looks like a rib cage
Spirit Task: Unknown
Inventory: Doctor's bag, Thick fur shirt d4, Thick fur leggings d4, ghost charm, 100 ft of string, a pry-bar, 9 gold’s worth of food and water, Idol of Flux, 15 gold, a silver quiver that looks like a rib cage, a bow, 2 silver arrows, a sweatshirt, a winter coat, a hat, a pair of gloves, winter boots, snow pants, 3 torches
Materials: Lightsilver, Silver, Stone, Water, Mercury, Erode, Channel

Wake up
“Where am I? What happened? Who are you?”

[Radio Controlled]

Wake up
“Where am I? What happened? Who are you?”

"Kaolin. You got possessed. We are the people who got you unpossessed. Try not to touch strange goop in the future if you can help it."

Alright. [8v5] This seems to be something of a weapons dump. There are other jars like this one buried under the encroaching dirt and grass.

Wait, weapons dump? I thought these were trapped guardian spirits or something. Were these spirits used as weapons in the past? How?

Check around to see if there were more bounties or similar placed for the blobdemon, if so claim them (don't go around shaking people down or anything, mind you).

Then go visit the temple to Alizarin and learn all I can about her, what she likes and dislikes, how to contact her, all that stuff. Also look up info about the sunbro staff, though don't mention to anyone we have it of course.

Oh, and related to that, do we have any idea why those people wanted the sunbro staff to remain separated so badly? Or at least an idea of who they were?

Spoiler: New and Improved Darwin Zeppeli (click to show/hide)

Name: Darwin Zeppeli
Appearance: An old medicine man.

Magic path: alchemist gut-reader
Strength: d4
Speed: d6->d8 + 1
Endurance: d6->d8 + 2
Knowledge: d10 + 1
Will: d8 + 2
Senses: d10 + 1

Mana: 26
2 bottles with 10 thaum each (20 total)
Ongoing effects: 'see through bing bong'

Magical materials

Vacuum!
Reanimate
Sharpen
Viscera
Diamond
Rope
Deathly Light (Radiation)

Inventory

1 sedated bugman

dissection knife: d4
Springy metal knive: d6
Springy metal sword: d6
Springy metal halberd: d8
Curved blade: d6
Icepick: d4
gun: d8 [50 rounds left]
10 smokebombs
thaumic bomb (currently empty)
6 x d8 rifle
6 x d8 sword

Ecalir's old armor: d8 (in use)
shield (+1 to protective rolls from armor)
Sealer Suit: d4 (vs magic)
Warm clothing

Alchemist’s Gear
232 gold 
7 silver
15 kg black biometal

A glass slab with a topographical map of the kingdom carved into it
a bottle of glowing blue sea water, inside protective box with lock
a glass orb with barely visible lotus inside of it, inside staff assembly.
magic coin
Small book
magic compass + map
Gimbal that points towards diamonds (range around 100 meter)
Sunbro scepter

book on normal plants and animals
book on magical plants and animals/creatures
handbook on making weapons&armor, including a list of known types
a detailed account of the Artifacter war
map of the old world
good quality book&pen
good history book
series of good maps of area around Alkahest and the volcano

Paradox snail (inside jar) and things to keep them happy and fed, linked to Ecalir
Extra pair of paradox snails
Doctor's bag
set of ingredients (plants, chemicals and the like) for making poisons or antidotes (21 uses left)
High quality backpack
donkey named Yvonne for carrying
Zomboraptor head
Lantern
several hundred feet of rope
climbing crampons
a grappling hook
iron stakes
net made of rope
several vials with imp fat
20 vials
2x Collapsible rod
10 oil flasks
300 feet of really big, thick, strong rope
100 feet of metal chain
box of metal spikes
pair of binoculars
4 boxes of rags
Medium armor: d6 (not in use)
2 sets of digging tools (for Darwin + Ecalir)
Extra digging tools (for hired workers)
tarps, paint, and other stuff we can use to camouflage things with
2 doses of fast-working anesthetic for knocking out humans
ghost charm
2 weeks of ration
a pair of prongs and a metal jar with a lid for capturing spirits

[Naturegirl1999]

Wake up
“Where am I? What happened? Who are you?”

"Kaolin. You got possessed. We are the people who got you unpossessed. Try not to touch strange goop in the future if you can help it."

“Thank you. I’m Eve, I get mana by helping spirits. What would be a good indicator of which ones to help and which ones to leave alone?”

[Devastator]

Have Benedict pry open that hangar door.  If he can't manage it, try again after a temporary spell to help out.. a Strengthen Grow or just Strengthen to give him more size or muscle.

Ask Painting-Saeko if she'd like to feed the weakened spirits here with mana.  Leave behind one of the barrels of magicoal, and my ghost charm if she agrees to do so.  Give her a soldier's key.

Hide the advanced aristocrat and technician keys in some soldier-locked room.  I don't want to make it permanently impossible for them to be found by taking them away, and the important room to keep safe, the mana room, is secured through other methods.  Keep a second soldier key for myself, and stash at least one spare away somewhere outside where we can give written directions to.

Start loading him up with loot, along with the cargo moth if it should be successfully freed.  Here's the order with which to load him up:

15 of the 16 barrels of magicoal.  Leaving one behind for painting-saeko to feed to any dying spirits.
Minaturized core of the fighter-sparrow.
Hand retrieved gems and jewelry from two passes of the palace and the contents of the core room.
Gold serving dishes and other dining-room loot.
King's wardrobe from the core room.
Full body mirror
Gold wire and thaumic/non-thaumic manufacturing tools from the small laboratory in the core, as well as the gold-laying devices.
The two machine guns.
The special multi-bolt flower petal rifle.
Forty magic rifles, two giant rifles, and the exploding grenades.
All (16) of the force-field rods.
Twenty-four magic sabres
15 suits of the thin, lightweight magic armour
8 sets of silk clothing.
Unidentified manufacturing machinery from forge 8
The 10 pieces of minaturized furnature and art pieces from the Core room.  Do include, as the one not for sale, a statue of or a depiction of the Wind Goddess.

That should be about three or four tons, which is proabably about a fifth of Benedict's weight.

If you don't think it's too much, add on extra art pieces from the palace.

Then, lets go mount everyone up and head back towards the capital, expecting a three-day flight due to Benedict's heavy load, similar to the heavy load of food and water he carried on the way out.

Spoiler: Saeko Hirahara (click to show/hide)

Young Japanese woman with a long black braid and a white and red fitted robe with long gloves.  Clothing made of metallic thread.  Large elf ears.  Violet eyes that glow brightly.  Glowing like a chemical glowstick with a purplish-pinkish light.  Shark teeth and obligate carnivore.  Bleeds insects instead of blood.

Invoking Empath

Str  d4 +1
Speed  d8 +1
Endurance  d10+4
Knowledge  d8+2
Will  d10+3
Senses  d8 +2

Materials: d12 Ape, d12 Grow, d12 Strengthen, d12 Expand, d10 Permanent, d8 Bird, d6 Force, d4 Ice, d12 Contain
Location: Ruins of Gravid
Status: Fine.  Seriously enhanced hearing.  Magically lightened to about three-quarters weight.

Familiar.  "Benedict"  Cougar/red-tailed hawk, adequate flyer, garage-sized with 120ish foot wingspan.
Natural weapons d10, d10+d6 with swooooop.  Eats 3 gold/day worth of food.  Properly harnessed and well kitted out for riding and baggage.

Str D20
Spd D6
End D12
Kno D4
Will D8
Sen D6

Expedition Status:
Saeko, Ekrov, Zavi.
3 guards, 2 in personal service.
3 assistants and workers.
Excavation tools and equipment.
3 days worth of supplies.
two working machine guns.
Key orbs: Soldier
Accessable locations: All of lower level of city ruins, save for king door.  Likely access to still-unexplored upper levels.

explored: Through soldier-locked door. leads to..
lower-level maintenance and utility areas.
Armoury
Crop rooms
Hangars
King door

Loot:
Palace gems and jewelry.
Gold cutlery and serving platters and dining room valuables.  Some porcelain plates.
8x suits of silk clothing.
8x suits of cotton clothing.
King's wardrobe
26x Thaumic sabres.
56x magic rifles
18x suits of magic armour
Broken magic armour bits.
Thaumic tools
Elements of Sparrow-fighter forge.  Maybe other construction tools.
3x Thaumic wire-laying tools
3x large gold wire spools
Crystal with d12 Cloth.
1x Miniature Fighter-Sparrow Core.
Advanced thaumic personal laboratory+workshop.
Decorated silver-backed iron mirror in gold frame with depictions of wind goddess.

3x deactivated golems
6x gold swirly orbs (explosives)
16x telescoping silver rods (portable force fields)
4x big mana rifles
1x rifle with flower petal rod

Art Pieces:
statue of harp-playing waifish girl.
very fine quality evocative bust.
10x miniature furniture pieces from core room.
Other art pieces from palace.  Normal size.

16 barrels of magicoal. 3d20+10 pieces each, each containing 3d20 mana.
first barrel has 13 chunks.

Items:
The Core to Gravid
Ghost Charm
Alchemist's Gear
Two machine guns! with lots of ammo.
25 mana
60 thaum
151 gold
d8+1 armour: The outfit, and a shield.  Weighs as if it were d4.
magic texting device.
parachute popsicle-stick.
Sealer-suit gloves
Shield.
Adamant Weave Backpack.  Contents are magically lightened via Lightweight spell.
Waterskin
Adamant Weave Cloth.  Sufficient for an outfit or two backpacks.
5kg steel rod
Compass
Goggles
Doctor's Bag
Gold-lined Sealer Suit Bag.
Surgical tools
Magic Spyglass
~200 gold value of gold and silver ingots and precious gems.

Jade tablets with d8 View, d10 Steel, and d10 Speed.
disassembled force-field rod with [Force D4] [Wall d12] and Permanent d10 (inserted into brain.)

Alchemy Supplies

Stashed:
Cable-wrapped steel lockbox with radioactive pellet inside.
Box of painting-golem

Businesses:
Large decrepit building in Galena.
Share in presumptive new Galena mine.

Notes: Improving physical stats with strengthen, d4->d6 is d6, d6->d8 is d12, d8->d10 is d20 or more.

[Devastator]

The night before the final day at the Gravid Ruins.

"Hey Ekrov.. do you have time for a quick chat?"

[syvarris]

Ekrov is hunched over a mostly-assembled clockwork robot when Saeko finds him.  Half of the metal of the bot is concealed beneath papers, a disorganized mess of mechanical diagrams and drawings.  He startles when she speaks to him, tumbling back with a loud "Aack!" and dropping a small gear.  It tumbles into the opened chest cavity of the robot, tinking as it bounces around inside, and Ekrov sighs loudly.

"Damn!  Uhm, time... Yes, yes, I have time.  I've only made this one worse over the last hour anyway, I should just stop messing with it..."

He lays back down on the ground, yawning and stretching his arms.

"What did you want, Saeko...?"

[Devastator]

"I'm just.. you know, kinda wondering about the future.

I think it's that painting you animated of me.  It's.. so different than I was back in Japan.  Plus these mutations.."

At this she's kinda a bit shy and reserved, which is ususual as she's normally quite upbeat.

"Do you think you could still like me if I was a bit.. different?"

[syvarris]

Ekrov frowns, staring up at Saeko silently.  A few seconds later, he fluidly rolls over and bounces to his feet.  He steps closer to Saeko, concern written across his face.

"Of course I would!  Nothing could change about you that could make me hate you!  You're still an amazing person, and you've only grown with your experiences--the painting shows that so much!  She's--she's different because she's like a child, without memories.  Without your memories.  You--"  he pauses, looking away and frowning deeper for a moment.  When he looks back, he's wearing a weak smile, and sounds calmer.  "If the mutations are scaring you, we should be able to fix it.  The teeth are simple, and the.. er, the bugs... I'm sure I could figure something out.  Magic is fickle, but it's your body, you have control over it in the end."

[Devastator]

"Heh.  I didn't quite mean like that.  The teeth are definately a bit off and the bugs.. yeah, maybe they should be fixed, but from what I understand, it's a lot of effort to keep them that way.  We can talk about those later."

"..but what I meant is a bit simpler than that.  Where I'm from, well, when you had adventurers, they'd have roles, or jobs, or classes or something.  One person would be good at X, and another would be good at Y, and it'd all add up to being a good team."

"I was thinking that we need someone a bit more like Zavi.  We need someone who is big and strong and tough, that can protect the group, and can fight without using spells.  Here we had Zavi, but she's working for the magebreakers.  When we shot down that airship, well, I had to sit back while the other magebreaker dealt with that attacking robot."

"..and, well, with my magic I could make myself able to do that.  We wouldn't need a magebreaker to do it for us.  I look at you and you're smart and you're skilled, and you're well, not the toughest.  And I wouldn't have you be any different.  And I'm thinking about how different I am here.. well, maybe I should be the Fighter this time, not the White Mage."

"Do you think you'd be okay with me being, you know, taller?  Stronger?  With those wings I had for a few hours the other day?"

[syvarris]

Ekrov's smile falters slightly.  "Ahh..."

"I would still like you, of course I would, that's not even changing yourself much, you're already a very tough person!  But... do you really think you need to do that?  Change yourself?  We have other options, like these robots--" he turns, gesturing back to the metallic monster he had been working on "They don't have minds, or souls, they don't suffer.  If one of them charges into a monster and is ripped apart, it just means I'll have a harder time fixing it.  But, you, I know you're tough, and magical, but..."

Ekrov looks away as he trails off, his expression unknown as he stares down at the robot.  He remains silent for awhile, but resumes talking just before Saeko.  "...You mentioned wings.  Like you had before, like the wind goddess that these people venerated.  Like the daughters of Telcal, supposedly goddesses themselves."

He turns back to Saeko, a small grin creeping back onto his face.  "Goddesses rarely take to the frontline in battle, they have others who fight in front of them, even though they are more powerful than their followers.  They only need to fight during true disasters."  Ekrov smiles, then a moment later seems to realize what he just said.  He blushes deeply and spins back around to look down at the robot.

[Devastator]

"..Well.. yeah, I'd like wings.  Flying is a lot of fun!  And I do have a word for them."

"..I don't know.  I mean, I can make things and have people fight for me, I mean just look at the big lug over there.  (Saeko points at Benedict, who is currently climbing a rock pillar that's part of the temple.)  He can fight okay.."

"Mmm.." Saeko mumbles, not sure how to express herself.

"I don't know.  I mean, yeah, we have other options, but think about that last battle with the dragons.  They weren't too hard, right?  Well, to make that happen we spent mana.  Lots and lots of mana firing weapons, providing temporary boosts, casting so many spells.  And if they were to come back, we'd have to do that again, starting from square one.

Whereas if I was a fighter, we'd have options.  I mean, we can't run around with a thousand mana in us, we'd explode from trying to do that.  So if we got surprised or attacked, well, maybe we'll be dry.  I mean it takes you a good few minutes to get mana from that coal, and it takes me a minute, and it's only good if there are other people around, and they have mana to give me.. if I need it and it isn't there, we could die.  If I was a fighter, well, there's a lot of times we could just handle situations without problems."

"Goddesses.. do you think it'd be a problem to have wings?  I mean, I wouldn't be a goddess or something, just a mage who found a Bird word.  I mean, that's special, but is it that special?  But if you think it's a problem..  I don't know, I want to be able to fly, thats why I had Zavi make me weigh less.  I don't know if I'd want to not have wings."

[syvarris]

Ekrov sighs.  "That's not what I meant.  I wouldn't think wings would be a problem, but you've had them, you would know better than me in any case.  If you enjoyed it, then making them permanent... would be natural, I suppose."

Ekrov turns back around, though his face is still red, and he doesn't meet Saeko's gaze.  He sits down on the robot glumly.  "You're right, I guess.  We should have more ability to fight without magic.  Especially if there is an invasion coming.  But why does it have to be you?  You say you're not special, but... everyone here, myself, Zavi, the workers, we're here because of you.  The people who were saved at Candentis, you gathered all of us, and the mage breakers were the crux, but we were there because of you.  Even ignoring all that, you help people, you heal them.  There's a lot of people who would just be dead if it weren't for you.  It's easy to say someone else would have been there, but I don't think that's true."

"You've made good points, and you're right, you'd be better at it than me, and we can't trust Zavi, and hiring people wouldn't be reliable either, but... if you're the warrior, you'll die first, even if we win the fight.  And you're the most valuable person here, you should be the last to die."

He hangs his head, staring down at his feet.  "Maybe I'm just too tired.  I can't think of any other way you're really wrong, but I just feel like this isn't the right choice.  You're too good of a person to be the warrior.  You can't just assume you'll win every fight."

[Radio Controlled]

Wake up
“Where am I? What happened? Who are you?”

"Kaolin. You got possessed. We are the people who got you unpossessed. Try not to touch strange goop in the future if you can help it."

“Thank you. I’m Eve, I get mana by helping spirits. What would be a good indicator of which ones to help and which ones to leave alone?”

"We don't tend to deal with spirits much so can't give you that much advise on that front. I suggest you talk to the priests here to learn more, they are spirit experts. And maybe talk to a magebreaker sometime if you get the chance, they know how to deal with malicious spirits as well. But as a general tip, not smashing open mysterious urns you found in a sealed-off temple until you have an actual idea of what is in it, or at least making solid preparations to reseal it if it's nefarious before releasing it, would be a good start.

Oh, and while it possessed you that spirit killed some people. You might want to see if you can make amends for that. You may not be able to bring them back from the dead, but perhaps you can ensure no destitute widows or orphans are now left behind."