Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Jack Rothwell
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Jade had managed to crawl forward and pick off a few more of the thorn firing flowers in the aftermath of the students destructive demonstration. At the sound of the bellowing voice the blacksmith had paused to reload and consider her options.

"15 left. " She muttered in regard to her bullets, and then:" Just give me back my damn sword already! No one needs to get ventilated!"
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Jade's expert marksmanship had also taken out a few of the black, magic-sucking flowers. She figured there was now a "corridor" on the left side of the field, such that the mages with her could reach the leftmost opening (the new one created by Khoo's "nonmagic magic stone cutter") without having their protective shields or other magicks drained into the dark blossoms and used to strengthen their enemies. This was probably a good thing as there was a lot more than fifteen bullets' worth of opposition scattered around the rest of the field.

There was one thornflinger left on this side--a large, twisty, stalky thing with a bulbous top, but it was out of effective pistol range, besides being partly shielded by a line of trees.

Her words had less effect than her shots. Her entirely reasonable proposal raised nothing more than an echo. The only voices came from among the trees behind her, where she'd left two more-or-less amorous couples waiting. A spell called Restore Focus would be good right about now.
Last edited by Alberich on December 1st, 2017, 4:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Spots were swimming in front of Khoo's eyes again, although this time it wasn't merely magical exhaustion, but also, what Anna-Lisa was preparing to do to (with) him. "Uh, not the time, sweetheart," he murmured as the sounds of a Contraception spell continued behind him. He turned to assess the tactical situation, deciding immediately that it was simply unknowable. Then he got an idea. He'd have to rebuild a little personal energy for it, but a five-minute nap (not a full-blown love-making session followed by an hour's snooze) should do it. It would still work better if both he and his girlfriend (he was getting resigned to that concept) participated, however.

He called over to where Jade was concealed, "I might have something here, but it's going to take a little while. Try to lie low for about ten." Then he gulped and turned back to Anna-Lisa ...

... Who was snoring peacefully, having fallen asleep apparently in mid-spell.

He turned back to Jade. "More than ten, actually. Fifteen. Maybe twenty." He lay down on the browse bed that Anna-Lisa had somehow created -- physically, magically, he wasn't sure, although the sudden appearance argued for magic -- and started his own nap. Like most magic users, he had essentially an internal clock that (usually) wouldn't let him sleep longer than he wanted to while recovering from magical exhaustion, and he "set" it for fifteen minutes. That should be enough to recover some usefulness.

He drifted off to sleep wondering what the consequences of a half-cast Contraception spell might be.
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Udo's weapons were leaning against a tree (which lay between him and the battle zone) so that both arms could encircle Fumiko while he calmed her. Of course she wanted to go home, he understood, but the only way home was forward. They'd need to stick together. His protective instincts, her scent, the feel of her whoah-yeahs against him, were telling him they should make a little home-from-home right here...

Another part of him, the part that would never leave the old days at Fort Samiware, kept him alert for orders from "Jasmine." She wasn't Sergeant Orimoto, not by a long shot she wasn't, but she was the boss and she did have the right to his services. Just as soon as she told him what she wanted. In the meantime, as long as she wasn't saying, what matter if he waited for his orders over here? (At the position of attention, Fujimori!)

* * *

Watching through his antique scrying pool, the Harvester nodded--as if in approval--at the Persistent One's expert clearing of the dangerous and obstructive flowers. But the Trial of Prowess was not yet over, not while they had not gained the building. And if she joined the others in this obstructive timewasting dithering, well, he had ways to impose the consequences for that!
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Jade acknowledged Khoo's advice with an affirmative yell and ducked back down to the undergrowth. She sighed and began muttering to herself.

"If someone had told me a week ago I'd be fighting killer plants controlled by an insane wizard... I'd have been highly skeptical."

Whether or not Jade's patience would hold for Khoo's plan, that was another issue altogether.

OOC Spoiler alert: it won't./OOC
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Someone else's patience was running lower faster. And his powers were not limited to the field, where the out-of-pistol-range thornflinger waited beyond the trees to impale the unshielded unwary. The Harvester of the Dead of Eschderte couldn't hear through his antique scrying pool--but he could see well enough what was going on, and it was not a bold engagement with the Trial of Puissance.

"These meddlesome children," he muttered to himself, "imagine the time for woodland half-sleeping lovemaking idleness is upon them. One must teach in full measure the possibly-fatal-exemplary lesson of the dangers of dawdling through the Trials!"

* * *

Khoo was well into his regenerative amorous nap. And Udo was making progress a little further back, where the forecast was moving from a comfortable Early Thaw to Warm conditions with Light to Moderate Snog. Forbidden magic intervened.

With a sound of splitting earth, a little further back in the woods, several large fungoid lumps broke from the ground, each the color of dead fish bellies and twice the size of a footstool. As they reached full size they broke open and a wave of stench swept over the adventurers--the most horrible in this part of the world, compost from a devil's herd of terminally sick cattle who'd been feasting on rotten onions and garlic, aged to perfection in a charnelhouse. If any stench would wake the dead, this was it. (No one had time for the thought: And maybe that's how botanical necromancy was born...)

The five humans were able to get their masks on quickly, but these offered only limited protection--it was awful, nauseating, eye-watering, and (as Udo thought) an industrial-strength boner-killer. Or maybe boner-murderer. No, wait, make that boner-Battle-of-Kuroden. No, scratch that--not that scratching would help--this was boner GENOCIDE! And it was not acting alone.

From deeper in the forest came ghostly green lights, bounding Udo's way fast--too fast to flee. Udo snatched up axe and staff and got Fumiko behind him. She huddled against the tree, squeezed her eyes shut, clutched her cloth-masked nose and mouth, and labored to breathe as little as possible.

From another side...but still in the forest...came an awful shaking and rustling, as of ogre-sized monsters made of thorny shrubs coming right for Khoo and Jade, but no one could see what was really there yet. Magelight and moonlight would make it clear soon enough.

Simply running into the open field to escape the stink and monsters would be unwise. There was still a thornflinger back there, quite ready to take potshots at any humans who exposed themselves. Back here among the trees, the dangers were closing fast. What could they be, and what would the adventurers do to them?

[OOC: Feel supremely free to add to/flesh out the advancing horrors, as well as what the PCs are doing about them....]
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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OOC:
Khoo was well into his regenerative amorous nap.
Huh? They didn't actually do anything "amorous;" Anna-Lisa fell asleep in the middle of what, in her ... unique world, probably passes for foreplay, and Khoo barely even noticed. He's just in the middle of a mage's power nap and should awaken soon. (Anna-Lisa, being less experienced with such things, will be out a little longer.)

I'll try to write something tomorrow -- Elke would be doing something that may affect goings-on, although she's not getting anywhere close to the woods -- but don't smear Khoo's good name :twisted: or Anna-Lisa's, well, whatever.
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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Neither the advancing horrors nor the stench roused Anna-Lisa from her slumber; after all, she'd had plenty of experience dealing with Saiko Mesuinu and her own synthetic horrors (and, as importantly, her perfume). Khoo, however, hadn't planned to nap for more than half an hour regardless of circumstances, and he was well awake as soon as the threats appeared. The stench was the least of their problems; a couple of relatively weak Wind Sprites were enough to drive it into the anti-magic zone, and whatever happened to it from there wasn't his problem. (He could only hope that it was a problem for whoever had been yelling through the hole in the wall, but there were no guarantees.)

The advancing monstrosities were a different matter. He didn't think that even the biggest, baddest Force Bolt he could muster would do much about them, and otherwise, offensive magic wasn't his forte. Well, there was someone else in the party who was better equipped with that, it was fair to say ... He gently shook Anna-Lisa awake.

"Mmmf?" she said sleepily, then her eyes got big, with a grin to match. "Oooh! Foreplay!" She started to disrobe, but didn't get very far before Khoo stopped her. "Sweetheart, no time for that. We need some Fireballs here." He gestured out into the woods where the sounds of the advancing horrors could be heard.

Anna-Lisa's eyes and grin got even bigger. "YEAH! Best foreplay in the world..." She was instantly on her feet and starting to rally magic.

-----------

Meanwhile, something Elke had reluctantly set in motion (literally) some hours earlier was starting to bear fruit, such as it was.

No way was she going into that forest alone and without a clear picture of what she was facing. The "alone" part was something she'd have to deal with, but the reconnaissance part was a different story ... even if it involved dealing with a scion of the Eisenfaut's arch-nemesis, the Gewehr.

She knew about Layla; back when the late Peter had seen his underling as a potential recruit for the Convergence's "Terror of the North" role (it seemed a lifetime ago, even though it had only been a few months. John...), unknown to the Gewehr capo, she'd done a little fact finding of her own, and had discovered the young woman's current whereabouts even though she'd been rejected for the Convergence role. She'd also discovered that Layla now had a Gewehr boyfriend who had an invisible airship ...

And, following an Elke-to-Layla crystal ball conversation that neither had ever possibly imagined having; the discovery that Layla was interested in burying the hatchet (although she did not learn why); and a promise of certain ... considerations if she could get Ace to fly a reconnaissance mission for her, that airship was now droning, audibly if still invisibly, over the Mushroom Woods, having a look around from half a mile or more in the air.
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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OOC should be back to this tomorrow. Sorry for the delay /OOC
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Re: Farrel- Vengeance in the Mushrooms Woods

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[OOC: Hope to get you guys back soon! But this can all be slow-paced while reality gets served. Meanwhile, although I don't expect Layla to play any major role in this thread, she has been mentioned ... and there's a stinger at the end for JR. This is kinda long, but:]

Meanwhile, in Rinkaiel:

"Mom, I had the weirdest crystal-ball call while you were out," Layla told her mother, who was coming back from town to the vineyard with a wagonload of supplies (and Joe).

"Not just an advance order for next year's rosé, I take it?" Faye joked.

Layla did get a chuckle out of that, echoed of course by Zachary. She'd been particularly chagrined by the quality of the light red wine from the grapes she'd "inherited" this year, and she couldn't figure out how anybody could stand to drink the stuff ... which hadn't kept it from selling out in a few days once the lushes of RInkaiel learned about it.

She got serious again. "I wish. No, it was from this woman in the Eisenfaust I'd never heard of ... but she'd heard of me." Faye made an instinctive move that would have been toward a pistol if she'd been carrying one, but Layla held up a hand. "No, it's okay, she says whatever truce they worked out with 'the late Peter' -- her words -- is still on. And in fact, she asked us for help with a thing."

"The late Peter," Faye reflected. First news we've had confirming that he's dead, although we've suspected it for some time. That's fascinating. "And what is that thing, and what are they going to do to make it worth our while?"

"A night-time reconnaissance mission by Ace." Faye blinked in surprise, and was about to say something, but Layla stopped her again. "Yes, I know, he's over in Isabel getting some upgrades. But she knows that too --" and I wish to Luminosita that I knew how -- "and she says the recon job is closer to there than to here, some place called Ester that's in the no man's land between -- our outfit and them."

That caught Faye's attention; she'd heard of the small town, and had heard some odd rumors. She also noted Layla's choice of words; not "us", but "our outfit." The attempt to maintain some distance from the main part of the Gewehr was still on. "And?" she prompted. "How does Ace feel about all this? And again, what's in it for us?"

"Ace is fine with it," Layla continued. "He wants to get in some night-time proficiency flying anyway, and it's just a flyover. As for what's in it for us, long story, but it's at least an extended truce, a lot of money -- and some news about Peter."

Now that really grabbed Faye's attention. She made an executive decision that she was fairly sure the rest of the Gewehr brass would back if necessary. "Well, this sounds interesting. I think we can go with it, as long as Ace is on board -- what?" she interrupted herself, thinking she'd correctly interpreted Layla's expression, as indeed she had.

"Oh, he is, Mom. I already talked to him about it. But you know what the weirdest thing of all is? He says he's already been approached by a couple of the Silver Hands people about this -- and one of their own wants to go along with him."

[OOC: And on that note, over to you, JR; you'd been talking earlier about following this with another thread or two about Leo or Eve or some of the other Silver Hands. If you want to grab this and run with it, be my guest!]
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