Outside 47: [Insert seasonal phrase that will be outdated when this thread ends]

[Shadowcaller]

[Conference Z - Field Facility]

A tent filled with those goblin-magic mages? Suspicious!
That was a lot of guards though, she was pulling way too many without any support!

The only way was forward at the moment though, she didn't even know if these were bad people at the moment but whatever they were doing here didn't seem all that good. Going off a hunch considering these people's really bad vibes the fey-bear makes terrifying roar that will induce those that can hear it with magical fear for a short period. Running or cowering will likely be the next actions for those that fail to resist it. Especially strong willpower or sound/magic cancellation gear will make it easier to resist it.

Nonetheless, then the fey-bear charges into the group of guards and tackle them to the ground. She could take gun-shots while in bear-form, but there were guns and there were guns and she didn't know what kind of heat these people were packing yet.
Anika had kinda forced herself into this combat situation, she didn't want to go back to her humanoid form while having guns aimed at her but she couldn't talk as a bear either. She wasn't even sure what her long term plan was now but taking care of these guards felt like the best move at the moment. She could ponder what to do next later.

[Deathkeeper]

[Neon Facility]

Morne swings the seat of the walker around, firing the guns at the goblins shooting at them while hanging on with one arm. In one hand he clenches a ball of purple light, which glows steadily brighter until after a full 360-degree spin he lets it fly, hissing with void energy in the form of six pellets. They don't fly straight so much as travel in a nauseating zig-zag that happens to keep them going forward. They fly at the gang assaulting Khannie, but despite the lethal nature of them, and their ability to reduce targets to purple ash if they're particularly fragile, not a single one will so much as scratch Khannie.

[Arkhosia]

"I have not been traveling long," Keiko says. "Less than a sennight, I would estimate. But I have seen much, a city of people much stranger and more different to each other than any in my own home." She looks back in the direction of the city she came from.

A Clearing

"The people of this land are... unique, from what little I have seen of it. Such variation in so many wondrous and repulsive manners... it can make one dizzy just thinking about it. But perhaps that a good thing. So many perspectives and all their vast accumulations of knowledge can offer us wisdom beyond the likes of any other." The spirit muses, as she so often had before. "...Apologies if I am too talkative for your liking. You are the first with whom I have spoken to."

[Rebonack]

[Neon Facility]

Void doom!

Not really sure what void doom consists of, exactly, but it seems to do a pretty admirable job of completely ruining the day of those goblins harassing Khannie.

She staggers a few steps, bruised and scuffed here and there, but she's still ready to rock some socks! She dodges through another mob of goblins, delivering a dizzying flurry of jabs and hooks that leaves them reeling. Reeling to the degree that they begin fighting among themselves. She tackles another goblin, the critter a bit bigger than she is, and gives a yell of rage as she hefts the thing off its feet and goes sprinting forward, using it as a shield against the rifle wielding foes! She tosses the now thoroughly blasted goblin at one and plants a stone-shattering punch into the sternum of the other, mashing it into the floor and sending cracks spider-webbing from the point of impact.

...

Ouch.

Khannie seems pretty upset right now.

One of the goblins taking cover behind some crates lobs a grenade in Morne's general direction!

[Deathkeeper]

[Neon Facility]

Void light is the sister to Solar heat energy and electrical Arc energy so likely it’s some form of plasma based on things you’d find in space.

Anyway, you know what’s good at stopping grenades? Autocannons. Morne fires the walker’s guns at the grenade, trying to blast it out of the air, along with the goblin that threw it, and several of his buddies in the vicinity. Machine guns are like that.

[Rebonack]

[Neon Facility]

It sounds suspiciously purple.

If we're using the typical trio of energy types, then it would probably count (more or less) as cold.

Aaaand with Morne's spray of indiscriminate pulse laser fire along with Khannie's savage clobbering, it looks like all the goblins are taken care of!

Success!

Khannie is looking a little wobbly from her beating, though.

"Now we just... we just gotta push open the boss door and beat him up, too," she says, taking a few steps before teetering onto a crate, using it to support herself.

Hmm...

Aside from the crates and the control pillar for the boss door, there's also another alcove clamp for one of those liquid fire canisters set into the west wall. Curious.

[Gnrlshrimp]

[Dragon Mountain]

Damon gives Marshall a very irritated look, taking a step back from the fog. "Why harden the ground? Why not sssoften? Whatever iss in that fog, I'd rather avoid it than try to fight it on itssss termss. If the mud wass made more watery, I could sswim right under all of it." Not that it's necessarily an option for the rest of them, but Damon doesn't seem particularly concerned about that. "Unlesss you have a way to banissh the fog. In which case, go ahead."

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Glen

Dustin takes a moment, trying to figure out if he wanted to continue or not. Two yards...he could get back to the rope with fair ease provided this new floor held out. With that in mind, he lowers himself to the bottom and unlatches his climbing gear. He leaves it hanging on the rope once he's done and takes a moment to rearrange his remaining equipment. He takes another glance around with his flashlight when he's finished and if there is a clear direction to go he'll start walking. If there isn't, he'll just pick a random direction and get moving. "Hello?" He calls out gently. "Anythin' down here?"

Spongy Glen

Yes

Yes

So manythings. Ash keepers. Ashspores. Damp soil and turbid mud. And you.

And you.

The strands begin to... not glow in the dark, but perhaps adjust something about the darkness. They texture the shadows that they trace through and collect deeper dark around them, giving away their shapes even before his night-eyes can come in. The voices too are strange, the antithesis of sound, a patterned silence that conveys meaning into the dark of the hindbrain before the ears can even convince themselves that they hadn't heard that. And in a very real sense, they hadn't.

Do not try your rope. The mud is unsafe to scale, it could bury you. Have you brought The Flame? The capitals fall into place, tombstones into a swamp murky with omen.

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Glen

Dustin pauses, blinking as he tries to figure out how he was being spoken to but it eventually fails to puzzle itself out and he's forced to continue on without knowing. "I...uh..." Flame? Perhaps fire or was it something else? "I did not bring fire with me, but I bring life and light. I don't know what you mean by Flame." He admits. "Um...can you show yourself? I'd rather not be talking to just the air around me." He adds.

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Glen

It must make The Flame. We have punctured The Earth, drained The Water and brough The Air. Flame and Air must take ashenspores away.

What he may have taken for anti-echoes before has abandoned its brevity for imperative, but there is a brief sound of sucking mud and limbs and struggle. Real sounds made by things either living or merely animate.

The light-sucking strands of spidery fungus ripple and part, stretching before shredding into more flying, air-choking strands that spiral outwards from the oncoming duo. As grey as the fungus appears in bright sunlight, these two are black. They move like voids in the air, a uniform blackness that coats long limbs, stout torsos and completely absent heads. They sometimes walk as normal bipeds, though with much longer arms, and sometimes lope like gorillas or wolves, with no distinction between fore and hind legs and no sense as to where they're facing.

The only distinguishing features are that one is slightly smaller in limb than the other, and hunches to make the difference stand out even more.

Ashkeepers are we. The Other is right. Time and again we tend and shape The Ash. Time and again we guide it to lift this cavern from its bed. Now The Earth has split, and it is time and again time. Has The Firemaking been lost to your kind?

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Pit Without A Pendulum

"Oh." Is all he says for a moment as he watches the two come out of the darkness and approach with their duties told. "Well, no. I can make a fire well enough, but this isn't a good place to do it. I need dry stuff to burn and this is all quite wet." He points out, nudging the mud with his foot. "I can make it even if it is wet if I can get back to the surface but...why do you need it? What does it do if I make the updraft needed to carry the spores out of here? I assume that's what the fire does anyway. What happens to the spores after they leave?

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Glen

No No

The spores will burn.

Must burn.

The Ash will catch. They will burn away under here, safe. Reduced to nothing but Flame.

From The Flame The Ashes Grow.

And if The Flame is not lit, the spores will grow up in The Air.

In The Light.

Everywhere.

The shapes are becoming more distinct the more he watches, the voids of their surface going from the black of a moth's eyes to the inky swirls of an octopus' panicked escape. Tiny motes glisten there, mockeries of stars. Or perhaps true stars, as remote and cosmic as the ones in the heavens above.

The Earth will not take to The Fire, but your clothes will. Still dry in places. Cannot take them above now, they must be purged of ashenspores lest they travel with you and root in The Light.

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Pit

"...I think you are truly underestimating how much fire my clothing can make without more to add to it. There is nothing else down here that can be burned?" He asks, looking down at himself. Dustin had accepted that he'd have to ditch his clothing before going up, but he had at least hoped to be able to salvage his far-too-expensive cowboy style muck boots. These had cost him nearly a month's worth of oddjobs and while he didn't own all that much that was fancy, he took pride in all of his pairs of boots.

Still, the two had a good point even if he was doing his best to keep from staring at them so he begins to remove his clothing. "I have stuff on me that can make Fire, but unless the spores are coming from something small then I'm not sure how much help I can be."

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Pit

"...I think you are truly underestimating how much fire my clothing can make without more to add to it. There is nothing else down here that can be burned?" He asks, looking down at himself. Dustin had accepted that he'd have to ditch his clothing before going up, but he had at least hoped to be able to salvage his far-too-expensive cowboy style muck boots. These had cost him nearly a month's worth of oddjobs and while he didn't own all that much that was fancy, he took pride in all of his pairs of boots.

Still, the two had a good point even if he was doing his best to keep from staring at them so he begins to remove his clothing. "I have stuff on me that can make Fire, but unless the spores are coming from something small then I'm not sure how much help I can be."

Spongy Pit

A long limb gestures back, its extremity narrowing to a point that slices through the nearest strands of spidery webbing with ease.

The Ashes are expended.

Carbon all burned up.

You must unburn them with The Fire.

Send them back through The Ages.

Each figure a starfield now, a hole in space that has no physical presence, just the absence of solidity intersecting with the world, they weave together and show something of the past. A world becoming grey over centuries, flaking apart as all becomes ash, compressing under its own fungal weight until...

An impact. And as the meteor tore through the spongy surface, it carried with it the strands. And it was watched. Herded. Guided here by long-lived and longer-limbed beings through subtle currents in spacetime, gravity wells and solar flares.

To a place with honest Fire, where the ashes could be undone time and again, age upon age by new wanderers.

We had no alternative. The Stars would not accept a fuel so wrong, scorning it. The Void could not claim it. It burns backwards through Time. But it takes many ages to grow, suffocated away from Light and Air, and a single touch of The Flame to one strand will burn them all. They are all connected down here, and will burn well and good as they have done before. Time and again Time."

[Deathkeeper]

[Neon Facility]

It sounds suspiciously purple.

If we're using the typical trio of energy types, then it would probably count (more or less) as cold.

Aaaand with Morne's spray of indiscriminate pulse laser fire along with Khannie's savage clobbering, it looks like all the goblins are taken care of!

Success!

Khannie is looking a little wobbly from her beating, though.

"Now we just... we just gotta push open the boss door and beat him up, too," she says, taking a few steps before teetering onto a crate, using it to support herself.

Hmm...

Aside from the crates and the control pillar for the boss door, there's also another alcove clamp for one of those liquid fire canisters set into the west wall. Curious.

Neon Facility

Morne hops down from the walker and goes over to Khannie. He throws a tiny white spark onto the ground which shines brightly. Anyone standing near it before it disappears (after exactly six seconds) slowly regenerates wounds!
"You good there, little lady? They weren't holding back, looks like."
he asks her.

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Hole

Dustin listens, trying his best to not look at the near-eldritch-horror levels of Weird going on, and continues stripping down to his underwear. His boxerbriefs would stay on until he had to abandon the place, but the rest of his clothing gets set on his boots to keep it as dry as can be while he rummages around in the pockets he'd had for his worrystone. He might have been fibbing a bit when he'd said he hadn't brought fire. It just wasn't easily made. "Alright, I get it, I get it, but...uh...one final question." He admits, looking back up at the pair. "How do I get out of here once it is all lit up if I can't go back up the way I came?"

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Mudpit

When The Ashes burn, The Earth will settle. Stabilize. Safe to climb. But if you cannot scale, we will lift you out from the pit for your services.

The two-as-one are mixing as well as oil and milk, dizzying swirls dancing across their not-surfaces before they become two halves of one being, eight-limbed and stretching from one horizon to another. But in the core, the very center, there is something that connects them.

A small point of darkness ringed by dying light, A black hole at about where their navel would be, eating stars and nebulas whole.

Or you may find yourself where you stood before. The Ashes burn backwards through Time. What is done may undo. Perhaps it has before, time and again.

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Hole

"Well, I won't pretend to understand that, but give me a few minutes and I'll have made that fire for you." Having retrieved his worrystone, he slowly and finely shreds his shirt and pants with his knife until there's mostly strands left in a giant mass on top of his boots. It takes him a good ten minutes to get it how he liked it. Only then does he start to make the fire. His worrystone was flint and perhaps the clothing didn't make the best material to burn, but it doesn't take long for a few skillful strikes of his knife to create enough sparks...and finally a cinder.

The handyman blows on the cinder, making it grow and smoke until he finally has a boot full of flaming cloth. With a final sigh, he holds it up to where he was told to ignite everything. A small part of him wondered if this was the right call, but he didn't fancy his chances of leaving here if he didn't do this much at least. Nor did he really expect much in a way of reward. Most of his reason for coming here had been lost anyway after all once the pond was gone.

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Cinderpile

It ends.

It begins.

The fire catches on the end of one of the spidery fungal growths easily, but does not spark into flickering flames. Instead the fire seems to be sucked into the thin, papery substance, devouring it as it turns in on itself. It looks like nothing less than a mouth with teeth of flame ravenously chewing its way up along from where Dustin ignited it. At each branch and intersecting strand it gives birth to more small, strange, inverted flames and what he sees as first a few is an entire army of dividing will-o-wisps, dancing along wires and illuminating the caverns as they scour away their supports, leaving nothing. The spores still hanging in the air are sucked towards the ragged ends they were torn from, drawn back with the inexorable ebbing of the tides of time only to be consumed before they can connect, burning in a twisting, writhing pantomime of paradoxic agony.

It will accelerate.

The loop has been closed.

It will go back through Time to when it landed and begin to grow anew.

And some-this-day you will come again.

Time and Again.

Because you have now, you will again. And forever The Ashes will be contained.

And we will Keep them, tend them, to wait your return in the next cycle. But Then and Now, Time and Again, we thank you.

And this Time, the first Time, we have a favor to ask of you.

The paired void-beings pause, and the roaring of the crackling strands fills the awkward silence of the moment as Dustin may experience the greatest feeling of Deja Vu a mortal being has ever been put through, the time loop closing around him giving him the utter surety that he has indeed done this exact thing before. Or will again. Or is again now.

We are long-lived, but not ageless. We live, we love, we breed, we die. Though this loop will close around us and we will live forever unless it breaks, we would have you take our child beyond its grasp. She knows only this place, but will be a fine companion.

The black hole has steadily grown to encompass their entire being, a blackness that reminds Dustin of his earliest glimpse of him. And from that hole in the air comes a figure. A lady of deepest midnight. Long, slender limbs move gracefully, meeting no resistance from the air as her physical form only slowly gains solidity. The colors of the cosmos drift across her body before laying themselves around her as if made of finest silk, a gown of the sky. Her skin pales and defines to a deep blue-grey before taking its cues from his own and nearly matching his skin-tone, though a bit more pale and delicate.

Her hair is spun coal-black, brightening to the blues of a hot, cheerful flame at the tips, and it is dancing in its own fire before becoming solid strands with weight and mass and hanging in waves down to her mid-back.

And her one visible eye burns like a sun, its pupil the same black hole he saw in her sires, consuming her iris forever with its irresistible pull. Her otherwise slender, boyish form turns and shifts, adjusting to having mass in real space and having to balance against gravity's pull before she turns to face Dustin with eager curiosity. Her age is inscrutable, but by stages she has at least made an effort of crafting an acceptably human and less obviously eldritch form.

"Hello. What would you be called?"

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Glen

"I'll take the best care of your child I can." Dustin promises, not sure what he's getting into. When he finally realizes it though, he gives a swallow. Here he was, standing mostly naked in front of a reasonably attractive Eldritch Horror. And to make it worse, he really couldn't leave with his clothing, not if the spores were as bad as he's being lead to believe. "My name is Dustin. Do you have one?" He asks as the last bit of clothing is removed and tossed aside.

I'm going to be responsible for the next apocalyptic event, aren't I?

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Glen

The other two beings, their task of ages and ages completed, retreat back into the already diminishing network of caverns. Dustin can see that without the ashspore fungus supporting it, the earth is settling back to some sort of level, much lower than when he first came here. And as it does, the earth bubbles up under his feet, uncrumbling, fountaining up as an inexorable, slow geyser that buries his clothing with a flash of unburning fire and raising him to the surface once more.

Already water is beginning to refill the pond, much deeper now that it isn't atop a pocket of air, as the damage is undone. Dustin and his ethereal new companion will have plenty of time to get to the pond's edge and drier ground.

"I do." And for a moment her coy smile says that that is all she intends to answer, but she gives in after only a brief bit of silent teasing, "You can call me Rea, but my full given name is Aulorea. I am sad that your clothes had to be sacrificed to the task. They looked sturdily made, and suited you well." Before she can even finish speaking, her own gown of starstuff begins to evaporate in the autumn sunlight, and she seems irked as she concentrates her will on it to slow the degradation.

"What talents I've inherited from my sires are strained by strong light. If you have a shelter..." She reaches out a slender hand and tries to gently brush his upper arm. He can feel the surprisingly strong heat of her body through that brief, light contact.

[Rebonack]

[Neon Facility]

Khannie stands around near the glowing speck in a daze!

Khannie has recovered some HP!

She gives her head a little shake. "Um, yeah, I'm okay, mister. The boss is in there," she says, pointing at the large imposing door that looms in front of them. It's decorated with a somewhat abstract image that looks rather like a skull if you squint at it right.

Because of course the boos would be behind a door with a skull on it.

Where ELSE would you find the thing?

"He's really really super fast and really strong," Khannie says. "And he's got like this big scythe like the grim reaper, but I think it's actually a fire or electric or fairy type attack? I'm not sure. Sometimes he throws it. And he's got this knife thing on a chain and you really don't want to get hit by that or he'll yank you over and whollop you super hard and you'll black out."

And then he'll take half your pocket change.

The door is probably operated by that control pillar next to it. Though there's also another alcove for one of those weird power packs like the one that was used to access the mid-boss.

[Deathkeeper]

[Neon Facility]

Morne nods. He goes over to fetch the last of the filled canisters.
"Well, it sounds like going into melee is going to be tough. You should try to let me hammer it from a distance sometimes. I'm sure I'll be able to open him up for damage without exposing you to a direct attack." he explains, dragging the last filled canister to the alcove by the boss door.

[Rebonack]

[Neon Facility]

"But how am I supposed to punch him from really far away?" Khannie grouses. Apparently she's not too keen on the whole 'wait for an opening' idea.

There comes a hiss as the alcove lights up, shortly followed by that portion of the wall splitting open and a storage unit sliding out. Nestled in the bed of protective foam are two weapons, sleek and stylish, and a folded cape in dusky grey hues. One is, well, not a sword. It looks somewhat swordish. A handle with a ring-shaped guard, currently empty. Two tines extend from the top where a blade might be, but they aren't sharp at all. Second is a pistol in similar design, ring and tines. Neither of them appear to have a place for power packs or ammunition to get slotted in.

Khannie peeks around Morne at them.

"Oooh, those look neat! I never could get that thing open before."

Mostly because the spheres kept murdering her.

A second storage unit hisses out of the wall a few moments later, this one containing good ol' health packs and...

...ammunition. For Morne's weapons. Not the ones in the storage unit.

Go figure.

[Deathkeeper]

[Neon Facility]

Morne loads up all his weapons, and takes the pistol. Morne very much likes pistols. He hands the sword to Khannie.
"Half for you. Or....I'm no hunter. So..." he goes to pass her the cape as well.

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Glen

Dustin relaxes a bit when he realizes that he's back on the surface and he even lets down what little guard he had. He checks to make sure he's all together and that he still has his worrystone and his knife. When he does, he relaxes even further and begins to try and trudge back to camp. "Thank ya, Rea. I appreciate it. Luckily I have another set of clothing, but if even this weak light is a strain on you, perhaps it is best if you take it." He points out. When he finally reaches his tent he'll grab his bag and begin digging through it, offering her his spare button up shirt and pants. "The tent is only really meant for one person however but you can go ahead and use it as well. It won't be the first night I've spent under the stars."

[Rebonack]

[Neon Facility]

Morne will find the pistol is rather odd.

Nowhere to plug in batteries. Nowhere to feed ammo. There isn't even a trigger on the thing. Grip, weird ring thing, tines and casing. It's certainly shaped like a pistol, but there doesn't appear to be any functionality to it.

Khannie wrinkles her nose when Morne collects it. "You were just saying I should stand back and hit things but I don't have anything to hit stuff from far away and you have like a million guns!" she complains.

That isn't true.

He doesn't have a million guns.

But he has more than one already, and as far as Khannie is concerned that may as well be a million.

In spite of her pouting, the takes the sword and immediately starts, nearly dropping the thing. "What gives! It stole some of my PP!" She examines it, finding a sphere of chocolate brown colored power swirling with softer tan stripes spinning inside the ring in the middle of the weapon. Then the cape gets flopped over her head.

"Ack!"

[Slii Arhem]

Spongy Glen

Aulorea waves off his charitable offers, especially his offer of clothing, and settles down in the tent. Now that she's out of the direct sunlight, her clothing is much more solid and real, and after a moment's concentration it becomes a pair of shorts and a shirt very similar to the one he offered her, but dark grey and fitted to her figure, "Sunlight especially eats away at my ability to make anything real and solid, but once it's made, it will stay as solid as anything else. Even so, I will refrain from doing so unless necessary in the future. As the ashspores have proven, strange things exist in space, and pulling starstuff from the void to weave together into something new... you don't ever know what might be carried along." She shudders briefly, holding her pale, slender arms tightly around her body in a very vulnerable gesture.

"Would it be arduous for you to share the tent with me? I don't take up as much room as you, and two can occupy nearly as much space as one. I should give you the chance to get dressed first." She looks away, conscious now of how long she's been in his unclad presence, "You've been very understanding about all of this, but I still feel like I'm imposing."

[Deathkeeper]

[Neon Facility]

”No, I have five. And besides. No offense little miss, but am not making the assumption that a kid your age can use a gun. It’ll only be a danger to yourself and everyone around you without training.” Morne insists, eyeing his new one. It’s a weird one alright. Maybe an exotic? Maybe it’s based on his energy, like Susanoo.

[UncleWolf]

Spongy Shore

With the clothes declined, Dustin goes about getting dressed. Luckily he'd been smart enough to bring a pair of moccasins and another set of boxer-briefs so he at least felt comfortable. "That's a'ight, Rea. To put it frankly, I'm just a plain mortal with nothing really special about him. No talents except some hard learned lessons on farms and a fair bit of stubborness. If anything is imposing into a world full of monsters, mages, and mystical maidens such as yourself, it'd be me." He points out as he finishes buttoning up his shirt. "I've long since learned to roll with whatever the world decides to throw my way. Just an hour ago I arrived here just to try my hand making a bit of money and food with the various seasonal mushrooms I was likely to find here. Now I'm part of a time loop for eternity and guardian of someone that I'm not quite sure whether or not she is going to start up the next apocalypse or grant heavenly blessin's from above. It is the kinda thing that seems to happen to people though normally not those as forgettable as I am." He admits before pausing a moment.

"Are you hungry? I can at least cook a little."