Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

For in-universe game play. Journey through both familiar and foreign settings, explore lost ruins and forgotten cities, and try to bring light to the darkness of the world... or, you know, blow stuff up. Either way.
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Graybeard
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

Post by Graybeard »

Whatever "amorous" ideas Anna-Lisa had had disappeared quickly as soon as she saw what Jade was doing.

Neither Khoo nor Anna-Lisa were fighters by nature, far from it. Khoo, however, had seen enough combat (or even weirder non-combat stuff that also involved gross violence) in the past few months to have grown, at least partially, the thick skin that is necessary when swords begin to swing and bullets and blood begin to fly. Anna-Lisa ... hadn't. Yes, she probably should have before signing up for the outing with this group. But that wasn't the way it worked.

The attackers themselves were no big deal. Every Sashi Mu graduate learned the basics of a Force Bolt, and between Khoo's recent sort-of-combat experience on the one hand, and Anna-Lisa's tendency to super-size everything magical on the other, the four attackers on them were swept away as though they hadn't been there; not killed, not necessarily at least, but pushed by the Bolts deeper into the forest. Much deeper. Enough deeper that they'd need a map and compass to get back to the main battle, if they ever did make it back, or were alive(?) at all.

Anna-Lisa's eyes got wide at this success, and she flashed a big, incredibly ill-timed grin at Khoo. "Sweetheart, do you see what we did? You and I? I think I'm ..."

And only then did she notice the messy end that a skeleton-thing was meeting courtesy of Jade's expropriation of its weapon.

Her facial expression changed instantly. "I think I'm... going to be sick," she got out, before she did exactly that ... all over Khoo.

In the mess and ensuing chaos, neither noticed that the large pack containing Anna-Lisa's "enhanced" Pocket DImension was beginning to glow oddly.

[OOC: I had something planned for this that became completely OBE by the rapid development of the combat, which, it is fair to say, would have gone rather differently if I'd been around. I'll try to catch up, but please work with me here.]
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Jack Rothwell
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

Post by Jack Rothwell »

OOC Tbh, I didn't think the pace was that rapid. Only one of the vine-skeletons had fallen by the time Khoo and Anne acted, and Jade was doing a delaying action before that to buy them time. But apologies, stepping on your creative toes wasn't intentional bud. /OOC

Jade had unsuccessfully stifled a girly shriek at force bolts screaming past her. She barely pulled herself together before the sword wielding revenant was upon her. The blacksmith was knocked to the ground as the vile, vine thing tried to pull itself up her body, forcing her to discard the rusty halberd in favour of stopping the minion from jamming it's weapon into her ribs.

"Little-help-here!" She gasped.
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Graybeard
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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[OOC: No problem. The "entertainment" that Anna-LIsa was going to provide can happen later. /OOC:]

"Little-help-here!" She gasped.

That, at least, Khoo could do. He picked up the rusty halberd and gave the vine thing a mighty whack -- well, as mighty a whack as muscles not used to fighting could give. It seemed to do something useful; Jade was at least starting to scramble to her feet, and the thing wasn't attached to her any more. He whacked at it again, with similarly uncertain but apparently positive results, and Jade could (and did) take it from there.

He staggered back to where Anna-Lisa was standing transfixed, although he noted that she wasn't so out of it as to neglect casting a Hygiene spell on herself. He reckoned his own Hygiene could wait for a more auspicious moment, since he still had no idea what was going on with the battle (but was pretty sure it wasn't good) and needed to look around to get his bearings.

"Wh-what was that?" Anna-Lisa gasped as Khoo reached her side.

"Uh, we're in combat, sweetheart." Aargh -- I used that word again.

"Oh." The backpack was still glowing, but Khoo didn't notice, watching instead a mad light start to rise in Anna-Lisa's eyes. He prepared to duck and cover to avoid whatever magic she was about to use ...
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Alberich
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

Post by Alberich »

Udo, wrestling with his immediate opponent, had shifted its lightweight form around as a shield, so that its mindless companion kept hitting it instead of him. A lucky/unlucky gysarme swipe severed some vital vines, allowing Udo to wrest away its war hammer. With a joyful shout he flung aside one sinewed skeleton and smashed the other's skull.

As with Jade's first opponent, severed vines above the waist didn't stop the legs of Udo's continuing to fight.
Udo caught a kick in what kobolds call the coojahs. But he grabbed that leg, broke it with a fierce blow of his hammer, and rejoined combat with the gysarme-wielder. The skeleton wasn't especially fast or skillful--it was, after all, mindless, which is why the smashed skull wasn't slowing it down any. Udo knew he could take it in time.

He couldn't see what his companions were doing. But the sounds and lights told him there was violent magic going on, and it had to be from those sorcerous lovebirds, Khoo and Anna-Lisa. Radiant Love was crushing Laughing Death. So Udo gasped out "Yeah! Get 'em!" and kept up the fight.

[OOC: Never fear! There is more opportunity for violence and high weirdness coming up.]

[OOC2: Gray - as JR said, glad to hear you're well. Welcome back! JR - let's tease him a lot, 'cause we've got him on the spot.]
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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This isn't working, a discouraged Khoo thought as he hefted the halberd again to fend off another vine-thing that was moving toward Anna-Lisa. They seemed all but impervious to physical damage, and it wasn't clear that the Force Bolts had accomplished much. Fire might work, but pyro-thaumaturgy had never been his forte, and he did not want Anna-Lisa to uncork one of her own fireballs, which would take out the bad garlics, er, guys, but would probably incinerate the whole forest, with themselves in it. So what might ... And then he had a brainstorm.

During his moment of blessed quiet back at the smithy, he'd noticed in his Tsuipedia reading that some kinds of mushrooms produced what a reference called a "potent natural herbicide." Included in these was a common edible he'd seen along the trail. He'd served them often enough during his restaurant days to be confident in recognizing them, even in a slightly dried-up state, which in any event would help for what he had in mind. [OOC: Life imitates art. I'm a wild mushroom devotee, and the one in that article is indeed quite common in forests, and quite edible. /OOC:] "Here, hold this," he told a surprised Anna-Lisa as he handed her the halberd -- she was nearly his own size, and he knew, stronger than she looked -- and he rushed back down the trail.

As he'd hoped, he was only gone for about two minutes, returning with an armful of oyster mushrooms that would have fetched a fair number of tsuis at the now-defunct restaurant in the Tower of Artifex. Good; none of the vine-things had come close to his girlfriend (he'd about given up on avoiding that terminology by now) while he was gone. "You can drop that now," he told her, "but be a dear and conjure me up a couple of gallons of water, okay?"

Anna-Lisa still hadn't figured out what the pole arm was for, so she complied quickly with the first part of what Khoo told her. The second part, however ... "But i don't understand. What good will water do --"

Another quick "hush and listen kiss," then Khoo said, "You don't have to understand, love. Just do it. Now." Another plant-thing was looking like it might be ready to grow on them, so to speak, and there was always Udo to rescue...
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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The vines, being undead, were somewhat resistant to the Tsuirakuans' herbicide--it retarded their growth but didn't kill them outright. But when they couldn't grow over Jade's arms, she could get at her knife and slash them.

Udo, meanwhile, had hammered more fractures into his last opponent, so that it rushed forward to try an entangling attack. And the last, unbroken leg of his first opponent picked that moment to trip him up, possibly out of pique at being thought "mindless." As if to say, I can still outthink you, breather. Udo was tearing at the vines and broken bones with the spike on the back of his hammer and scrabbling for his boot knife--he might well triumph in time, but that wasn't to say he couldn't use a little help right now.

* * *

Out of sight, but in a direction Jade had marked, the strange mage was hurrying back towards his lair. (He thought of himself as The Harvester of the Dead of Eschderte, but as of yet the adventurers did not know it.) His mutterings were wordy, hostile, repetitive, and in archaic language--yet there was one that would have interested Jade and her companions, could they have heard it:

"Is it thirty-five, or is it thirty, it is many, many years since any prying meddlesome intruder passed the Trial of Persistence, many indeed, as they mark the years, yet many more still since any passed a further Trial. And further Trials it will take before they learn the Secrets, oh yes, and whatever ephemeral frivolous nonsense toys they seek, even the Persistent one. And if they fail the next? Then they can replace the bones they have broken, yes truly indeed they can..."

The undergrowth of this place was subtly friendly to him. When the fight was over, it would certainly be possible to follow him. But not to catch him quickly.
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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All but one down, Khoo thought with some satisfaction. It did not escape him that the one remaining vine-thing was fighting Udo, some distance away ... but Anna-Lisa's "conjuration" of water would take care of that, in a way he would never have expected, except in hindsight.

Really, what kind of person would include a Super Soaker in their packed gear for an outing like this? When he asked for water, he'd expected that his girlfriend (there was that word again) would pull a plain bottle of drinking water out of her "special" Pocket Dimension, and either use that or, more likely, have it as the basis for a spell that grossly enlarged it. They'd mix the herbicide, and then he'd cast a Wind Sprite to disperse it on the enemy fuchsias, er, forces. But Anna-Lisa had pre-empted -- as usual. Maybe she really did have room for a submarine in that thing.

In fairness, Anna-Lisa was sharp enough that when Khoo displayed the fungi, she knew exactly what to do with them. Magic flared from their hands and pulverized the fruiting bodies into the water that already filled this improbable weapon. After shaking it once or twice and a bit of magical heat being applied to the exterior (Khoo remembered that from the Tsuipedia article), it had been just a matter of hosing down the vine-things, mostly at a distance. The Super Soaker's range was sufficient that when they'd finished, Khoo was able to expend the last of the herbicide on Udo and his antagonist. The stream of water impacted with a sploosh (Udo himself taking a fair bit of it, but it was supposedly non-toxic to humans), and Udo was left to do the rest.

This time, Khoo felt no discomfort at planting a celebratory kiss on Anna-Lisa the moment things quieted down (temporarily). Anna-Lisa, of course, responded in kind. "Score one for us!" she shouted happily once the clinch was released, and after a brief Hygiene spell to clean the Super Soaker out, she opened the Pocket DImension to put it away ...

... And that was when they realized that coming from that same Pocket Dimension was a faint but clear human voice.

"HEELP! Get me out of here!"
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

Post by Alberich »

Predicting the outcome of this battle required no forsythia foresight. The natural herbicide gave Udo the extra edge he needed, and his knife finished the work of cutting up the hostile vine. From the look of things, "Jasmine" was accomplishing the same. It seemed that these undead plants didn't "live" long after they were cut off from the earth--even the black-flowered vine that had suppressed Udo's staff was withering into normal deadness. It would be easy to slice away.

His recent kick to the vitals put the ooooo! back into Udo. Whether any kindly soul would lay hands on this injury was an open, but very doubtful, question. It might be nice to just lie back for a minute, close his eyes in meditation, and intone the mystic word "Omibalz"--but then Udo heard a female cry for help. A Noble Knight Protector like himself couldn't ignore that. So he dragged his dripping-wet carcass over where it came from. and stretched out a hand to help.
Last edited by Alberich on November 22nd, 2017, 7:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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[OOC: So here's Udo's "reward" for waiting patiently while all this stuff gets written for other characters! ;) ]

A look passed between Khoo and Anna-Lisa. Living things, including humans, could, in principle, travel inside Pocket Dimensions. However, except for familiars and the specially outfitted, large-scale Pocket Dimensions on airships, it just wasn't done. The problem was that the Pocket Dimension could only hold as much air as its volume allowed. For a normal, air-breathing being (familiars not being "normal" in this regard, as they could subsist on magic, rather than oxygen, if need be), that meant either that the creature being transported would require essentially no air, as something in hibernation or a cold-blooded snake or frog might; the time in the Pocket Dimension was so short as to make it not worth using the thing; or an exceptionally large air volume had to be present, the accommodation made in cargo airships where supplemental oxygen always traveled in the in-hold Pocket Dimensions with any living things. Otherwise, there was too much risk of suffocation for that kind of travel to be routinely used. (This said, Khoo would later wonder whether the "prototype" Anna-Lisa had been given might be intended for use by a Tsuirakuan three-letter agency of some kind, to infiltrate covert agents into hostile territory. Fortunately, this didn't occur to him at the time.) [OOC: EDIT, much, much later: see this moment as the thread advances, literally years (in real time) later.]

"I think we'd better check that out," Khoo said hesitantly. Anna-Lisa didn't hesitate at all, however; she popped the pack back open and activated the Pocket DImension ... and Khoo saw that it was, indeed, big enough for a small submarine, or at least the submarine's air supply, to fit in, because out stepped a young woman, little older than Anna-Lisa to all appearances.

She was wearing the kind of outfit a lower-middle-class Tsuirakuan would wear when traveling if she wanted to give the impression of greater sophistication than she really had; in other words, something fairly tacky. Her slacks were routine enough, although obviously intended for city use and with a few more bits of faux jewelry attached than was fully tasteful. Her blouse had a plunging neckline, the better to suggest the, er, assets that she'd blown her first real paycheck on getting thaumatically enhanced. Being not totally lacking in taste, and also having been told that Rinkaiel might be cooler than Tsuirakushiti in the evening, she wore a jacket to cover said assets -- partially. However, this girl being not the greatest authority on Tsuirakuan (or Rinkaielian) fashion, the jacket was studded with considerably more sequins and baubles than would be tasteful in most of the civilized world. Her shoes were clearly made for traveling on city people-movers (or simply standing behind a counter at the business where she worked) rather than for hiking in the Mushroom Woods or other wild places. A rather beat-up purse was strung over one shoulder; she hadn't had the wherewithal to upgrade that before leaving Tsuiraushiti, which was just as well. In her right hand she held a shopping bag that would eventually prove to contain a figurine of a cowboy, also covered in rhinestones.

And in her eyes, set in what was undeniably a pretty face (it ought to be, considering how much effort she'd made to put it on), there was a look of utter astonishment mixed with terror.

"Wh -- where am I?" Fumiko Otani gasped. And then, laying eyes on Udo: "HEEELLLP!"

[OOC: I'll write more about Fumiko for the "NPC Gallery" shortly, as she is most certainly an NPC, to be, um, used by whoever has the urge. For the moment, refer back to here for her basics. Note that, appearances notwithstanding, she is not a hooker; she just doesn't know how to dress for travel, never having been out of Tsuirakushiti before in her 23 years of life.]
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Jade, for her part, had succeed in wriggling free from the stricken skeleton at Khoo's intervention and exploded its head to powder with the last two bullets in the chambers of her revolver. The blacksmith was currently pulverising it's spasming body with enthusiastic stabs of her knife and stamping down on it's ribs with her boots in stereo.

After all, it had been a trying a couple of days and she needed to vent her stress some way.

"Take that you bastard!"

" "HEEELLLP!"


At the sudden scream jade wheeled around to find the unexpected new arrival.

"Err... hello?" She volunteered, then, fully taking in the scene of the recent carnage. "This is probably exactly what it looks like."

Not a helpful greeting, given the newcomer's obvious distress.
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