Random Banter D&D 3.5e Campaign IC, Thread II

[AtlanteanTroll]

Niro approaches Alphonse. The silver in your hair suits you. Shouting down the hall, But maybe Silver knows how to reverse this?

[Teddy]

Bear Tass limps through the door to inspect the room the Timestealer came from.

[LaZodiac]

"Lady Tass, I will be with you but for a moment, I must talk to our be-tentacled friend" Alphonse says, sounding a little weird about hearing his voice aged to this degree. He'll then head back to Silver, not caring the superficial wounds of being strangled.

[Amidus Drexel]

Generator Room, Lower Level

Alphonse

You open the door to the generator room, but Silver is gone - though the tools they were using to operate the generator (the glass tubes and spare wires, that is) are still here. Additionally, the sound of sparking from the lizards upstairs has returned.

--
Deeper Holding Cells

Tass

The door at the end of the hallway of cells opens into another hallway of cells. Some of the cells are made from exotic materials - you see several cages made from silver. A soft glow emanates from two of those cages, roughly outlining the shape of some species of big cat. Closer to you, the front wall of an adamantine cage lies in pieces on the ground; the stone at the edges of the cage have been chipped and aged into pebbles. The back wall of this room is made of a dense-looking, dull metal.

The floor is covered in a thick layer of semi-transparent sludge - but if you turn your head to see it from a different angle, it looks almost like molten metal. Standing barefoot (bearfoot? ) in it burns your skin - a feeling that gets more uncomfortable the longer you stand there. A thin layer of the time stealer's scintillating oil rests on top of the sludge in the remains of that cage.

[LaZodiac]

"Ah, Mr Silver? Where are you?" Alphonse calls out, wondering where the unsurprisingly craven scientist has gone. Furthermore, where was Aya? Alphonse calls for him as well. "Oh, and Aya? Where are you as well?"

[Amidus Drexel]

Generator Room, Lower Level

Alphonse

You receive no response, even if you shout at the top of your lungs. The shocker lizards upstairs fizzle and spark a little more intensely, apparently agitated by the noise.

[LaZodiac]

Alphonse will call to his allies "I'll be just a moment, I need to see if our betentacled friend knows of a way to cure this damned ailment of mine" and walks up to the top floor of this.

[AtlanteanTroll]

Niro frowns — a comical exaggeration given his lack of practice. That coward. I didn’t trust it before, sitting idly by knowing someone was being tortured, and now it’s run off at the first sign of danger. Coward.

[Amidus Drexel]

Generator Room, Upper Level

As soon as you reach the top of the stairs, the lizard closest to you bristles. Arcs of electricity jump from the other three lizards to it, and a ball of lightning covering most of the room explodes with a loud ZAP-BOOM, electrocuting you and charging the silver rod connected to the generator below. More magical condensate spills out of the machine, further obscuring the lower level of this room.

You can hear a soft, distant crunching sound from the direction of the alchemical laboratory - like someone breaking sticks. The lizards continue to crackle with static...

OOC: Alph takes 39 electricity damage, reflex DC 14 for half.

[LaZodiac]

Alphonse will attempt to roll down the stairs to avoid the lightning. After dusting himself off, he will (in a bit of a gruff mood) hurry down to the others. "So, we can't go back upstairs. As just an aside."

Spoiler

Show

(1d20+4)[19] reflex save!

[Teddy]

Tass lumbers back to the circular room to try the west, giving Alphonse an odd look when passing by.

[Amidus Drexel]

Summoning Room

Tass

As you leave the deepest level of cells, a large portion of the grey sludge wipes off of your feet and evaporates, the rest congealing into little balls on the floor.

The room to the west has a subtle, smoky smell, like a combination of burnt incense and wax. Surrounding the four concentric magic circles are small puddles of dried wax, which outlines a shape resembling a nine-pointed star. The magical condensate pools in the center of this room, twirling in time with your movements.

To the north is a slightly ajar door with the word "RECORDS" carved into it. The south wall contains a door with a heavy steel padlock on it.

To the west, there is an open door, through which you can see what looks like the silver room from upstairs - the pile of silver bars, the glass apparatus, and the grinder with the leg bone attached to it are all there. The floor of this room, however, sits about knee-height above the floor of the summoning room (and indeed, the rest of the lower level of the complex) - below, level with your feet, you can the floor of another room.

[Teddy]

Rowr?

Bear Tass makes small growl of curiousity and crouches in front of the door to the silver room, looking down the small gap under the floor.

[Amidus Drexel]

Summoning Room

Tass

You notice a soft glow emanating from the center of the floor under the displaced silver room - closer inspection reveals that part of the floor is recessed another foot or two into the ground. If you crane your head forward, you can just make out the outline of a silvery-orange pool beneath the swirling magical condensate.

[LaZodiac]

Alphonse will grurmbly walk over to the room marked RECORDS and carefully make his way inside.

[Teddy]

Tass, in a fit of inspiration, sticks her paws under the floor of the silver room and tries to lift it with her full bear strength.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

Strength check: (1d20+9)[18]

[Amidus Drexel]

Records Room

Alphonse

As you open the door to the records room, you are immediately accosted by a flurry of parchment scrolls tumbling from a shelf above you. Some of these look like they might be spell-scrolls, though you don't really have the knowledge to say one way or the other. Once you sort yourself out and move the pile of scrolls now covering the floor, you take in the room.

It resembles a small office, complete with a desk that looks too big for the door, as well as wooden shelves covering all of the walls. Sitting on the desk is an empty inkwell, a few quill pens, several pages of Johnathan's nigh-on illegible handwriting, and a star chart dated "March 6, CI 47" - a date also present in an entry of Johnathan's diary.

Attached to the underside of the desk are a few small safes - one with a copper lock, one with a gold lock, one with a cast-iron lock, and one with a platinum lock. If you bend down to take a closer look, your hand brushes against something cold and hard that you can't see - perhaps another safe?

--
Under the Silver Room

Tass

Though it takes you a few minutes to get a good enough grip on the floor to move it, you're eventually able to shove the silver room back into its original position on the first floor. Now that you have a little better view of the area, you take a look around. This room has almost exactly the same dimensions as the silver room, plus a few inches on either side so the walls can move up and down. There is a broken door to the north; the top half of the door is completely destroyed, and the bottom half isn't in very good shape either - as if it's recently had to support a lot of weight. The room beyond appears to be a closet of some kind - it's small and empty. To the west, there is an archway intersected by a sheet of iron that looks like it came from a wall of iron spell.

[LaZodiac]

Alphonse will get down and investigate what the cold object is, first off. He'll also call over to Bela and Lucas "Excuse me, Pela Lucas, Sir Bela, come over here a second. I'm in need of your assistance in studying some things."

[TheWombatOfDoom]

Lucas clears his throat, still distracted by the remains of the beast that stole years from his companions. "Pere, Alphonse," he corrected automatically. Lucas proceeds to the records room to assist Alphonse. "What exactly can I help with?" he says, studying the room. "And other than your age, do you require some healing?"

[LaZodiac]

"I could do with a little healing, though I can manage for now. I need help studying these scrolls and stuff, some appear to be magic in nature I'm just not sure of it myself." Alphonse gestures towards the various scrolls and such he placed back up on the desk.

Spoiler: OOC

Show

I'm at 41 health out of 79, I'm not sure if that's hurt enough to justify being healed but it probably is.

[Teddy]

Tass looks at the iron wall, concludes that she probably can't break through it, and walks back to the summoning chamber to study the padlocked door. If the lock or bolts look flimsy enough, she'll try to rip them out. Otherwise she'll simply attempt to smash through the door itself.

[Amidus Drexel]

Records Room

Alphonse

The invisible object feels like a metal box, about the same size as the other four - and running your hands across it finds what might be a lock or a keyhole. If it isn't a safe, it's the most safe-like non-safe object you've ever come across.

--
Lucas

Most of the scrolls aren't spell-scrolls, and between the esoteric nature of what you presume is their content and Johnathan's absurdly bad handwriting, you're unable to make out much. One particularly long scroll vaguely resembles a map, though nothing on it is labeled. There are four spell-scrolls, but you're not sure what they are - all of the scrolls are at least a few pages long.

The safes Alphonse is looking at seem like they might go with the keys you picked up in the workshop...

OOC: Deciphering the spell scrolls will require a spellcraft check for each one, or a casting of read magic.

--
???

Tass

The lock is solid enough, but the wood isn't strong enough to prevent you from ripping out the hinges.

Beyond the locked once-door is a room reminiscent of the laboratories upstairs - a few tables dot the center of the room, and large glass tubes line the outer walls. Most of the tubes are empty, but a few of them are filled with the same grey sludge that covered the floor of the deepest set of cells. The floor of this room is covered in little grooves that slope downward towards a deep trough on one side. This trough has some residue in it, but otherwise is empty.

A table near the back wall of the room has two metal bowls, one filled with about a gallon of this liquid, and the other with approximately two quarts of the time stealers' scintillating oil. There is a sheet of instructions on that table in neat handwriting, interspersed with notes by Johnathan.

1. prepare 16 parts Qtc to 7 parts AEx in steel vessels

mk surc ratios cxact, elsc othcr creutrcs rcsut ---DNAGER---

2. mix slowly, stirring w/rod until uniform
3. concentrate spell energy until mixture glows; can expend conj/evoc. spells or capture ambient energy w/concentrator or by FoW.

thc gcneratr nw prvidcs arnplc ambicnt encrgy for fow to bc viabl

4. introduce live specimen to mixture. gloves are advised as normal for Qtc handling to avoid timestream-related injury

livc specirnen mst be lcsser in volumc tn mixtr, elcs #5 oftn fails

5. suffocate specimen in mixture, submerging as much of its body as possible
6. wait for automaton to take shape
7. Issue commands w/FoW. The automaton will be under your control until it re-syncs with the timestream, upon which time it will dissolve.

lngst-livcd autmtn is ~6h, FbCI48

[TheWombatOfDoom]

Lucas pulls out the keys he took. "I think I have the keys to those safes." He notices Alphonse feeling around the air and reaches down to see if he can feel something. "I have an invisible key here as well. Lets get these open, shall we?"

Lucas uses the key to unlock the safes, starting with the invisible one. He takes care to pocket the invisible key once he uses it so as not to lose it. He will continue unlocking safes until he A. ignites a trap or reveals something he deems dangerous, or B. has unlocked them all.

[Amidus Drexel]

Records Room

Lucas

Each safe opens cleanly with its matching key, with a quiet click.

In the copper safe, there is a short, dimly glowing glass rod.
In the gold safe, there is an unassuming piece of folded canvas - removing it from the safe reveals it to be a medium-sized tote bag.
In the iron safe, there is a bag of powdered silver, suitable for a number of spells.
In the invisible safe, there is another portable door pendant, identical to the one Niro carries.

None of the keys work on the safe with the platinum lock, and it sits resolutely closed beside the four others.

[Teddy]

Tass leaves the untouched laboratory room and moves walks back to the blockaded living quarters to try and clear up the hole in the wall a bit further so she too can get through.

[LaZodiac]

"An interesting series of finds indeed, Pela Lucas. Especially with the invisible safe. You may take the necklace, I believe by my understanding of magical items if I were to take it, it would interfere with my cloak." Alphonse says, though he will take the tote bag and put the rest of the loot inside of it. He'll then eye up the platinum safe that they didn't have a key for, trying to judge how heavy it would be. "Also, be sure to collect any of the scrolls that look of use, I've a feeling we may need them."

[Amidus Drexel]

Passage

Tass

With your bear strength, you're easily able to move enough rubble to clear a bigger hole - and beyond, you can see a dark hallway with an open archway to the north. Light and magical condensate filters through small holes in the ceiling (maybe half an inch in diameter).

The end of the passage is blocked by a sheet of iron intersecting an archway. It looks like it's from a wall of iron spell.

As you look on, a small, human-shaped rainbow cloud floats out of the room to the north. It mimes drinking tea, then makes a rude gesture with its hands and begins to fly around in circles.

--
Records Room

The tote bag doesn't seem to get heavier as you add the items to it; this is most noticeable with the heavy bag of silver.

The safes don't look terribly heavy - you'd guess that even if they were lead (which is probably the heaviest thing you would want to make a safe out of), they wouldn't be more than 20 pounds or so, plus the weight of the contents - maybe a little unwieldy to carry around, but ultimately not that heavy. They do seem to be secured rather tightly to the desk, though.

[LaZodiac]

Alphonse makes a mental note to, when they're done, remove the safe from it's desk-y embrace, and will head off to where Tass is to help investigate, slinging the bag over his shoulder and tucking it behind his cloak. "Ah, Lady Tass. I believe we've found a bag of holding of some sort. Have you found anything of note? Growl once for no."

[TheWombatOfDoom]

Lucas bursts into laughter, as he takes the necklace and puts it on. "Pere Lucas, Alphonse." Lucas corrects a second time. "Pere is a term for "Father". However if you insist on Pela, I could call you the Jode Dragoon?"

Lucas takes the 4 magical scrolls, the one that somewhat looks like a map, and a few other scrolls at random, for good measure.

[LaZodiac]

"My apologies, Pere Lucas. I think this 'old age' debacle has finally caught up with me." Alphonse grumbles.