[IC] Erde Chronicles

[Spore]

https://i.imgur.com/oc0W1IY.jpg

It is a rainy evening in the slums of Sector 6. The rain is beginning to cease, but the normally very loud and bustling district is a but more muffled. Most people took shelter from the rain after setting out various containers to collect rain water. Water supply and water treatment has never worked properly before, it really got worse in the last two weeks, with foul water coming from faucets and many drains not properly removing sewage. Several citizens have already complained to Shinra officials. Their responses ranged from an official statement trying to rectify the situation to downright verbal abuse by security officers threatening violence.

District 6 is filled with war orphans and widows, with all the soldiers of fortune seeking coin, refuge and home in a land destroyed by the war against the Shadow Lord. While Midgard also resisted the Shadow Lord, it tries to remain neutral in the upcoming conflict between the free nations and Garlemald. Genius architects from the Shinra corporation combined scavenged Garlean magitek with the beast tribes magics to create something more; mako energy. The first reactors quickly created enough energy to power a whole city, but it also empowered Shinra to create weaponry and a security force that could rival small countries.

You however are on the night before a great mission. Your benefactor Cid, a pragmatist Nu-Mou scholar searching for old artifacts requires you to do her literal dirty work. In exchange you have arranged a generous payment, and as a special treat before the venture you have convinced the scholar to have a night out drinking and eating in whatever stalls and drinking booths the District 6 market has to offer. The rain is slowly ceasing, and the stalls are happy for customers. The streets are slowly filling again, but the dirt below your feet is still soft and sticks to your boots. The air smells like rain mixed with hearty food and drink. Several shops are in want of your attention.


Pumpkin Potage
Beef Stroganoff
Scallop Curry
Aldgoat Steak
Apple Tart
Baked Onion Soup
Parsnip Salad

Wutai Chai (various teas)
Crimson Cider
Frozen Spirits
Apple/Grape/Carrot Juice
A newly fangled drink called coffee


This is your first foray together, you have worked for Cid in smaller groups or alone before, so it would be feasible to give your best impression.

Please introduce your characters with a small description of what they look like including casual wear. You can remove armor and weapons, nothing will happen in this portion of the game, unless "paranoid adventurer" is already part of your character's personality. :smallsmile:

That, or you pull yourselves into trouble.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton is one of the first to arrive that night by the simple expedient that District 6 is more or less his home.

Though Cid is kind enough to provide basic lodgings for the new recruit, the former street rat spends more time on the streets then he does indoors in the spartan room he was given.

Anton stands over six feet tall, and a battered and torn duster wards off the last of the evening rain from his clothing – scuffed combat boots, jeans and a shirt with the logo of the local blitzball team – the Midgard Maulers.

He doesn’t bother with a hat, and the rain slicks his short hair to his skull and drips from the point of his once-broken nose and the tip of his chin, but like the rest of locals, he doesn’t pay it much mind.

A jagged scar interrupts the stubble along the length of his jaw, the remnant of an old wound that must have laid his face open to the bone. But what draws the eye first is his blue eyes – literally glowing with their own light and most visible when he walks through the shadows between sputtering street lamps.

Showing a shopkeeper a chit with Cid’s sigil on it, he grabs a portion of beef stroganoff and a crimson cider and settles in to lean against a wall near a street light where he is visible. Cid had given him a packet of information for the mission ahead, and it included descriptions of the other mercenaries who were tapped for the work ahead. He keeps an eye on the crowds – especially at knee height. The tonberry with a cowboy hat sounded like he’d stand out the most.

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki arrived at the market shortly after. Walking around carefree with a lack of awareness of his surroundings he preserves his energy while entertaining himself wondering what kind of people he'll be working with.

Standing at barely over 160 cm, Yuki appears in weathered black jeans and boots, an unbranded gray t-shirt, and a comfy looking oversized robe. If you didn't notice the ears, he'd look hardly any different from a young Hume with purple eyes and silver hair.

Yuki reaches a stall and shows his sigil before helping himself to an apple tart and coffee. Soon after, he began walking in circles while thinking about what he might encounter today.

[Merilan]

C'mon. Breathe, Eskha, breathe...

Eskha appears at the marketplace not long after the other two, a somewhat diminuitive Xaela Au Ra with gray scales, light skin and black hair tied into two ponytails with a traditional-looking hair ornament from where she hails, the Steppes, and has a headband covering her forehead. She looks a bit skittish and anxious, and well aware of it even as she browses some of the food stalls. She's wearing Steppes robes today, which doubles as a raincoat due to its hardy nature. She stops at a vegetarian stall selling their pumpkin potage, and picks up some apple tart as a dessert alongside it after showing Cid's own sigil.

She sits down nearby and begins to eat quietly, which coincidentally puts her near Anton and Yuki as she looks up to them. She waves quietly, but then looks back down at her food.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton recognizes Eshka, even more so when she waves at him and makes his way over to sit at her table. He sits carefully on the bench across from her, the aged wood groaning under his weight as he settles above the legs on one side. He waits for her to finish a mouthful of food before extending a hand.

“Name’s Anton. Good to meet you. You’re the one with the flash sword-gun?” He says to break the awkward silence after it grew for a few minutes.

Don’t draw attention that she’s an Impy too loud, oaf, or you’ll get a riot going he berated himself.

[Bayar]

Vanya shuffled around the market stalls, picking up some chai and scallop curry. Spotting Cid amongst the crowd, she moves towards the group.

"Greetings Cid, thank you for the treat." Then, turning towards the others in the group, she pulls down her tan hood, revealing a pair of slightly twitching mithra ears covered in light violet hair with eyes to match.

"Greetings, I am Vanya, travelling healer. Pleasure to meet you all."

[tonberryking]

Easy to miss, and hard to not be nervous around, there's a tonkin sitting like a lump of crumpled laundry with a fish tail on a stool in the same food stall as Eska and Anton. Holding a Pumpkin Potate bowl up to his head, he's been softly slurping the entire mess down his unseen gullet. If he was on the ground, he'd be hard to spot but for the gray cowboy hat sloped on his head that's been keeping him almost dry through the entire storm. When he puts the bowl down, to regard the other two youths, it is completely empty, his pale yellow eyes looking over them, and the sigil that gets flashed around.

"Oh. I see. You must be some of the other of the other operatives, correct?" his "voice" is nearly monotone, yet incredibly nebbish, "Pleased to meet you. You may call me Bert." He continues to stare, but doesn't offer them either of his hands. Usually when a tonkin holds up a limb people get nervous...

[Merilan]

Eskha swallows a little as people manoeuvre closer; she regards Anton with a nod, but then says, "That's me. Eskha, it's... nice to meet you three," she finishes pushing out after the hitch, shaking his hand. She's probably only pushing twenty at most; she didn't do much but finish basic training in Garlemald before everything she saw got too awful, and she took off. It's also relatively common knowledge that she's from Garlemald and deserted, and has a third eye underneath that headband, but... she keeps that on the down and low in public.

Bert's hat and look definitely get her attention for a moment. She quietly thinks it looks kinda cute, and it's nice to know a friendly Tonberry!

[Dakrsidder]

A few minutes after it began, Yuki ended his trance and notices the group of misfits a few meters away. Considering there's a good possibility they're the ones he'd be working with, he considered introducing himself. The only issue is he finds introductions boring, but at the same time, he doesn't want to interrupt, especially when he has no idea what's going on. As he had just finished his coffee, he decides to walk towards the stall for a second cup.

After taking a step forward, he tripped on some trash, but using the momentum, he flips back onto his feet. He whispers to himself "physics has nothing on me" before taking his more creamer than coffee beverage and getting into a position to subtly observe the group.

[Spore]

https://i.imgur.com/hKVcVGR.jpg

Cid is a small esoteric Nu Mou woman. Normally the small mammalian creatures are covered in fur, but without pronounced hair, but somehow Cid is sporting a blonde mane. Whether or not this was a wig you dared not try to ask yet. Her heart-shaped glasses are rose-tinted and her general appearance marks her as anti-war, though you have heard stories of her magic and research helping the war effort.

The scholar was just trying to leave as the smell of exotic dishes and her favorite drink, Garlean Absinthe caught her nose. Sitting a bit away from your group trying not to interrupt, she shortly waves when she is thanked for the food and drinks. As you warm with each other a bit, Cid finishes her drink. With a newly poured one in hand, she walks towards you, her path already being curved by staggered steps. She waves all of you to join her.

You guyssz need to loosen up. she says, clearly drunk of a single shot of liquor. Marie? Bring us ze pipe. before downing her second drink. Wat we do needs trussst. You need to trust each other an me, to....to... Cid lost her thought, staring at a lamp for half a minute. Marie, the bar maiden interrupts you with a cylindrical contraption made of glass. It is similar to a vase with a burner attached to the lower side. A mouth piece is attached with a small hose. Cid unpacks a small tin can filled with spicy tobacco and a small paper bag filled with different herbs. She empties the tobacco into the pipe for now, leaving the other things for later.

As the boss, she takes the first drag of it, coughing heavily, but sitting happily after. It smells like cigars after the smoke went cold for a bit, but with a hint of cinnamon and oranges. She offered the next willing group member the pipe, but not after enchanting the mouth piece with a self-cleaning charm. Two small elementals made of pure water take turns splashing the mouth piece with elemental water.

Erryone now. Take a puff and introduce yourself. That's an order! For a moment you can hear the stern and direct advisor you know in her voice before she smiles contently.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton is the first to take the water pipe from Cid’s unsteady fingers and takes a deep draw. The smoke burns almost pleasantly in his throat and lungs, and he exhales it in a long plume into the night sky above them, letting the taste of the spices linger for a moment.

“My name is Anton. I’m a Dark Knight and I’m trained as a linebreaker. I prefer a two handed weapon so I can put my weight into the swing. Aside from that, I know a few tricks to play the enforcer - I can bluff and I’ve been told I can be intimidating.

Otherwise, I grew up on the streets around this District, and I’ve survived running the sewers once - I’m looking forward to having a weapon this time. And a light.”

He holds the mouthpiece out for the next to speak.

[Merilan]

Eskha looks a little startled as Cid comes around, looking already pleased as punch. "C-Cid, I think the drink's already getting to you," but the hookah soon comes and she looks towards the mouthpipe after Anton introduces himself. She sags dejectedly, but then accepts the mouthpiece and takes a draw--

And starts coughing uncontrollably, wheezing as she turns to one side. "E-Eskha, gunbreaker..." Wheeze. "I can act in both close combat and at range, and I'm not bad at handling machines and technology..." She might start crying anytime soon.

So she passes it to the next person, since she's busy dousing her throat in pumpkin soup to try to clear it.

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki turns towards Cid and smiles before saying, "If I wasn't so curious about trying that thing, I would've tried debating you on the order."

He then takes the mouthpiece from Eskha and inhales as much as his lungs allow him to. Not long after, he's on the floor having a coughing fit and finding himself unable to get a word out, so he just lays there for a while.

About 20 seconds later, he jumps to his feet seemingly fine despite what had just happened. "Introductions are lame, but I'm Yuki. I dabble in time magic and recently picked up a gun although I'm not a good aim. I can manage some support, a bit of damage, and I have a pretty decent reaction time.

Besides that, I don't remember much anything, but sometimes my subconscious can save the day. Oh, also this floaty thing follows me around."

He then passes on the mouthpiece and goes back to his coffee.

[Bayar]

"Oh, um ok." Vanya receives the hookah, takes a puff of it and exhales the smoke through her nose. "Owowow, that hurts! Seen smokers doing that before, turns out it's a bad idea."

After regaining her composure, she continues: "Like I said, my name is Vanya. Healing is my area of expertise, I can conjure up lights and clean water. In dire situations, can climb on structures and provide reconnaissance."

Passing the pipe towards the next person, Vanya returns to her tea.

[tonberryking]

Bert thinks better than to protest, though he covers his mouth with his hand holding the pipe as he takes a pull. For a moment nothing happens, and then thick plumes of smoke erupt from either side of his head where ears would be on virtually any other humanoid.

Probably best not to ask...

"Well. That was unusual... But you may call me Bert. I am very proficient with knives, and am also good with...other capabilities." he doesn't elaborate, but he tugs on the rim of his hat out of habit, "I do not wish to divulge anything any further in public, but rest assured I will have all of your best interests at heart out in the field."

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton can't help but chuckle at the antics of the others, particularly as Bert apparently breaths through the sides of his head? Anton concluded it was better not to ask, but filed it away as 'interesting tidbit about tonkin'. It was obvious the rest of the group had never encountered the cheap sort of tobacco that was bought, bartered, scavenged or stolen by the slum dwellers - in comparison this was quite high quality.

The Hume did keep a wary eye on Cid's pouch - tobacco was one thing, but he'd rather not have his mind clouded the night before a mission.

[gac3]

Queso hurried over to the table with their plate filled with as many different foods as they could get it with Cid's generosity. Seeing that the group has already started and is passing around some sort of pipe, they squeezed in a seat near the end of the line.

They are wearing a simple dirty and stained outfit with a shining thick belly warmer and a chef's hat. A giant fork hangs off their back and a frying pan hangs from their hip.

They spend the time waiting for their turn using their massive tongue to grab and eat different foods of their plate, the tongue never really going all the way in their mouth. When their turn comes they consider taking a bite out of the pipe but since no one else did, they just took a puff and smiled.

"Sorry I late. Food so good here. I Queso. Apprentice chef. Good goblin. I eat monsters. I have tricks. I cook for you. Nice meeting."

After a moment of pause, he passes the pipe on and continues eating.

[Spore]

Cid shakes her head seeing the shyness and reserved nature of the group. I picked you for your skills, but you need to work as a group if you are to succeed. she claims openly, unafraid of consequences. And maybe as friends. she adds. The place became more crowded as the evening went on, with other clients give the table with the Qu and the Tonberry a wide berth. It took less attention for Shinra Security to search your person and staying place, though the passerbys took to themselves or ignored you completely. If anything, Eskha looked positively normal in this group of half-breeds, monsters and next to an eccentric Nu Mou liberal.

As Cid retreats, the hands you the keycard to a warehouse at the outer wall of the city. As you leave for the night, or stay to party, you nonetheless find the warehouse in a desolate part of town. You enter, and inside you find a handful of crates of varying sizes. They are mostly empty, though some are filled with basic scrap that a skilled engineer could use to at least jury-rig their own contraptions. Cid had given you money for sleeping bags and adventuring supplies, and with her lab still unknown to you this was the only free place you could decide to stay. That, or you could get a room uptown. The deal was to secure and bring any artifact to the warehouse, and you could use it as a sleeping place too.

Please post a pic of your character in Discord or on your sheet if you haven't already. Also post a marching order.

[Gyrfalcon]

With only a few Gil to his name, Anton is one of the ones who sleeps at the warehouse. The following morning, he begins to gear up. The combat boots remain, but now armored plates are strapped over the tops of them to make it less inviting for a foe to shove a blade in his foot. Quilted leggings and gambeson provide some protection from crushing blows, and then an old set of battered but otherwise functional scale mail tops that off. His gauntlets have been modified with a series of brutal spikes jutting from the knuckles, and a hammer swings at his waist. A brutal looking great axe leans against the wall next to where he's sitting, giving his helmet one last inspection before the team is ready to descend into the sewers.

[Merilan]

Eskha notices some of the passerbys treating them oddly, frowning quietly to herself at that. If anything, she doesn't treat them particularly oddly; they're going to work together, and that's that. She's kind of curious what 'monster cuisine' is like, though...

She accepts the keycard and, much like Anton, she doesn't have much Gil to her name, so she decides to crash out with her sleeping bag here. Some of the scrap draws her eyes, and her gunblade does still need repairs, but it's going to require more parts than what's available here.... in the morning, she too gears up, dressed in a white coat that layers over a light chain shirt with thin plates of both leather and metal, with slim pants and boots covering them. She's definitely working in a less armoured, and more mobile category than Anton. Her gunblade -- a battered-looking Garlemald model, slightly modified with the Imperial markings and manufacture info sanded out -- is strapped at her side, and she has an almost gauntlet-like buckler armed at her right hand.

She loads the cartridges into the gunblade, and nods. "Ready whenever."

[gac3]

Queso happily naps on a pile of whatever in the warehouse. Their tongue hanging out onto the junk. They snore slightly through the night. When morning comes they roll off their pile and literally bounce to their feet. They strap on their belly warmer and sling their giant fork to their back. They then make their way to stand by the sewer entrance.

"Ready. Hungry. We go now?"

[Bayar]

Vanya spends the night with anyone else that stays at the marketplace, eating drinking and chatting. When the time comes to call it a night, she contemplates going to her parent's place but decides against it. Not only is it in another sector but with the composition of her newest mercenary group trouble might spring up at any time. So she joins the rest of the party at the warehouse where she sleeps atop a couple of crates.

The next morning, she's wearing the same clothes as the day before, with a rod attached to her belt. "I'll do my best !"

[Spore]

As you spend your night however you please, you make your way to the sewer entrance. The area is poorly maintained, between several warehouses. Partially abandoned, partially maintained, nonetheless most of the structures seem to be in disrepair. The war took many ressources, and while the quality of life in Midgard was not that poor, the buildings were still in poor quality.

As instructed you manage to avoid major attention from the officials, as you descend underground. Cid told you to follow the unmistakable smell of death and rot, but for now you are overwhelmed with the smell of fecal matter, mixed with a damp badly ventilated area. As you entered the northern-most maintenance tunnels at least one thing is clear. You ahve to go south. You manage to get your bearings and organize a single file line. Crossing the main canal filled with sewage several times, you begin to notice movement. You cannot pinpoint it, and as you walk in the shine of whatever light sources you provide, Vanya, quickly followed by Queso and Yuki notice something ahead.

A group of unusually large and aggressiverats is scurrying along the walkway and two bats hang on the ceiling in the north walkway.

https://i.imgur.com/pVExO9Q.png
Queso, Yuki and Vanya noticed the creatures first. You get a surprise round (so move or standard action).
Eskha is fast enough to get her full turn in before the monsters act.
Then I will cluster the monsters as a group. Then we take our turns in blocks.

===>>> Surprise Round for Vanya, Queso and Yuki (in any order) vs. flat-footed opponents
Full round for Eskha

[gac3]

Queso sees the bats hanging from the ceiling and pushes their way past Vanya and Yuki.

"Yum! Food!"

They lick their lips as they brace themselves for an attack, opening their mouth wide while looking at the bats.

Using a move action to move fifteen feet to the right in order to place Queso closer to the bat enemies than the other two mages.

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki sees the filthy creatures attacking and casts moment before attempting to blast a rat with his gun. The gun misfires as he moves 10ft backwards.

"I just fixed this hunk of junk how did it already misfire.."

As he gets in place, he feels immeasurable disappointment.

[Bayar]

"Watch out, vermin !" Vanya tries to warn the rest of the group, while trying to shoot holy energy from her rod at the nearest bat.

Attack: 20
Damage: 3

[Merilan]

"I feel that pain a lot," Eskha remarks to Yuki as his gun misfires. She feels it quiiiiite keenly, from personal experience. "Vanya, I'm following up!"

She hefts the magitek gunblade up and takes aim; the miniature magic reactor inside whirrs to life as it enchants the bullet within, and it fires in a brief spew of flame. After her shot's fired, she runs her hand through and continues to enchant her clip.

Full-round: Attack the bat Vanya fired at
Roll: 1d20+5 (20) -> 25
Crit confirm: 1d20+5 (4) -> 9
Damage: 2d6+1 (3 1) -> 5

[Spore]

Eskha's bullet hits the tiny bat. It drops onto the dry and dusty service walkway. Queso moves forward, pushing its friends to the side to stand in the way of the flying critter. It advances and delivers a nasty bite onto its rotund head.

In the south the rats advance. They hiss like a cornered cat and lunge at both Anton and Bert. Almost crushed under Anton's boots, the rat cries in frustration as the other rat finds purchase in the Tonberry's soft flesh. You flail and can remove the rat, but not before it taking a hefty chunk of green out of you.

To make things worse, along the edge a small orb of fire with a cartoonish face on it appears. It looks around happily, blowing fire onto Eskha, who turns her gunblade around to deflect the worst of it.

https://i.imgur.com/ntbs9uQ.png
Queso takes 1 damage.
Bert takes 3 damage.
Bomb misses Eskha with its Fire spell.


===>>> everyone is up

[gac3]

Queso flinches from the bite and the irony and tries to snap back. They let out a soft groan as the bat dodges out of the way.

"Food spicy."

He takes a moment to prepare for his meal, drawing his giant fork.


Standard action attack. 12 roll.
Move action to draw Qu Battle fork.

[Gyrfalcon]

Hate. Rage. Disgust. All the negative emotions that sapients could express, and it all fed into the Darkside. It was so easy to tap into - a heartbeat to will it, and the Dark flooded through him. It oozed from his body and weapon, ethereal flames of red and blue. Blue flames burned in the shadows of his helmet.

Anton swung his axe back, focusing on the giant rodents biting at his feet. One had found its mark in tonberry flesh and was shaking its head, trying to jerk his small companion around. “Cleaving. Hold still.” Anton said, his voice distant and monotone as most of his attention went to mastering the forces surging out of his body. He swung, axe low to the ground as its edge met rat and with a surprised half-squeak, cut straight through. He rotated with his hips, axe picking up speed as it went. He was still inexperienced, and failed to rotate the axe fully with his movements. The blade hit the next rat side on, but as it was transformed from static to high velocity, the wall that interrupted its journey made that a moot point.

“Caster’s open!” Anton called.


Swift: Activate Darkside
Standard: Cleave

Rat #1: To Hit 17, Damage 9
Rat #2: To Hit 22, Damage 14

Anton takes 1 damage, AC -2 until next round and is healing-immune until Darkside ends

[Merilan]

"On it, Anton!" Eskha shouts as she barely guards against the Bomb's fire attack, worrying about her ammo cooking for a moment; once she sees it's fine, though, she proceeds onward to strike at the centre-mass of the creature -- but finding it more elusive than she expected.

Move: 3 east to the Bomb
Standard: Attack on Bomb
Hit: 7

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki bitterly whispers, "must be nice having such a cool gun" as he magically mends his gun and hopes for better luck in the next encounter.

[Bayar]

Vanya tries to hit the orb of fire with a bolt of holy energy, but her aim is completely off.


Attack of 5, won't bother rolling for damage.

[tonberryking]

Bert simply took the sleeping bag offered to him and flopped onto his belly on top of it, arms splayed out as he tips his large hat down over his eyes and doesn't make much in the way of sleeping noises other than his tail quietly and methodically swishing. Very. Slowly.

In the morning, Bert just rises up and resumes moving, doing whatever sort of routine a tonberry is wont to do after waking up, but even he seems staggered by the sewers, tilting and nearly tumbling over at first encounter with the smells. A tug on his hat and he rights himself.

"Ow"

If only things went as cool as he tried to make it seem. Being bitten by the rat has him once more silent, but violently flailing around. If the rat biting him has been taken care of, Bert simply advances, both his serrated knife and a kunai drawn, before he swings and stabs at the closest monster he can reach. Which might be the bomb...


TWF attacks:
[roll0]
[roll1]

Damage:
[roll2]
[roll3]

Bleed Damage if applicable:
[roll4]
[roll5]

[Spore]

As the brave dark knight taps into his inner hatred, he finds it incredibly easy to hate sewer rats. Unlike their pet counterparts they are filthy, rabid and they did just bite his new friend. With one fell swoop he cleaves the left and with the remaining splatters the right one onto the wall. Bert uses this opening to advance in the usual slow methodical way of Tonberries after being somewhat dramatic. He stabs once and hits, but sees the Bomb dodge out of the way of the kunai's slash. It grins as it grows bit a considerable amount and instead of its firey eyes, the number three appears. To underline the idea, the Bomb floats over Bert's head into a more disadvantageous position cornered by the adventurers.

On the northern walkway, the bat flaps around Queso wildly so the mouthful adventurer fails to pinpoint it with their fork. Instead the bat bites the Qu again.

Queso takes 1 damage.
Both rats die. Bomb takes 3 damage. Its counter is at three.
Bert has an opportunity attack (no flanking yet as the triggering tile is not considered flanked)
https://i.imgur.com/GQSuzKi.png

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki looks up from his mending to see how the party's doing and sees a floaty creature. He suddenly realizes it's a bomb and is shocked by the lack of caution. "Do you guys have a death wish? That thing will explode after being hit three times or when it dies and will jump at you when it does"

[gac3]

Queso hears Yuki's warning and decides there is only one thing to do. They shoot a dirty look at the bat they still haven't managed to kill and drop their giant fork to charge through the water towards the bomb.

"I eat now! Stop explosion. Give gas but be fine."

They open their mouth wide again and take a big bite of the bomb, trying to shove as much of it into their mouth as possible.

Move 3 squares south.
Bite attack 18
Bite Damage 7
Grab attempt: 11

[Merilan]

"O-okay," Eskha looks more than a little surprised as the revelation that the creature can explode comes out, and even more when Queso's reaction is to go eat it. She decides to back out and step over the pipe to get next to Vanya. "I'll take care of the bat..."


Move two north
Standard: Shoot the bat
Roll: 14
if hits
Damage: 8

[tonberryking]

Bert doesn't offer any encouragement or shock to the offer of eating the monster, he just swipes his serrated knife at it again.


Attack:[roll0]
Damage:[roll1]
Bleed?: [roll2]

[Bayar]

"Explode? What do you WAIT WHAT? EAT?" Vanya couldn't really parse that last bit of information. All that she knew for certain was that the cook rushed off towards the flame orb, leaving her exposed to a menacing bat. She tries her best to hit it with a holy orb.

Touch Attack 13
Damage 3

[Spore]

Bert's swipe goes too low as the Bombino passes him. Anton punts the firey orb into the mouth of Queso who desperately tries to swallow it. Behind the others a combination of a radiant orb and a bullet finishes the life of the remaining bat. As the bomb's existence on this plane ends, it enlarges the Qu further and further, and its crescendo ends in a muffled blast, it burns but you wonder why you bothered so much.

Queso takes 1 damage (saved).
Knowledge (Nature) DC 17 for Queso to learn the Bomb spell.
You may also investigate the rats and bats for other spells.
Sadly there is no loot yet.

You continue your way south of the sewers. You pass many outlets, but gladly the refuse processed here is "just" industrial and not human waste, so the air smells like a mixture of chlorine and sulfur. The dark and damp sewers are occasionally lit by a magically lit exit sign, but what disconcerts you that aside from your own light sources, the small river of refuse starts to faintly glow a very light blue. Those magically talented of you quickly switch their attention to it, and it is clearly charged with magic, but only weakly.

You wander for the better part of an hour along such a major sewage line, as you can sense a vile presence ahead. As if cut by a knife, the river of magical waste turns a bubbling purple, and the sulfur smell is suddenly acccentuated by the sweet familiar smell of rot. You notice your stomachs turning, even Queso who until now was unfazed. Anton and Vanya have a very distinct experience.

You clutch your head as you can feel voices wallowing in agony. Any person would have been able to tell you this place is unnatural, but there is something more to it. Not only the land's magic is suffering, there is also something...something inside, and in pain. You vision goes black, and you can see small specks of light in the distance. It is as if they were stars in a night sky, only the blackness of the sky is replaced by an inky miasma of sickness. You see a single mote of light being doused in sickly purple waters, and the waters parts and vanishes as if absorbed by the nexus.

You can sense a number of creatures made of holy energies ahead, constantly assaulted by darkness. The more you look at it, the more it looks like a nexus of white magic, assaulted by a constant stream of death and decay.

You see Vanya suffering pain on your left as the selfsame energy washes over you. You feel sick too, but in a different sense. It is a familiar feeling, if you might hazard a guess, the energy is the same you noticed when mako infused yourself. Except now it is not magic and emotion corrupting a human, but it is chaotic magic hitting something of a nexus of magical energy.

You can make out half a dozen undead up ahead. And frankly you can smell them too, so you assume these are not fully decayed. Not all at least. To make matters worse you can sense something flapping above, and it is absolutely bigger than the bats from earlier.

[Bayar]

"Ugh, my head !" Vanya clutches her head and almost vomits from the vision. "Whatever lies in front of us, I am not sure. But it feels like holy beings, slowly being corrupted by something. Be on your guards and try not to touch the purple water. Got a bad feeling about it."

Just to be sure, she casts a protection spell on herself.

Casting Mage Armor on herself.

[gac3]

Queso rubs their belly after swallowing the bomb. A big smile on their face as they lick their lips. They then make their way over to where they dropped their fork. They pick up the fork and glances to the others before eating the bats as well. Feeling satisfied for the moment they sniff the rats. They don't smell good but food is food. They glance to the others.

"Take rats? Eat later?"

Listening to the party, Queso either leaves the rats or carries them along with them. Either way they happily reform their spot at the back of the line. When the smell hits and Vanya warns of enemies ahead, Queso prepares to cast a spell.

"Holy? So no eat?"

Use a standard action to cast beastial fang. But not until we are ready to do something since it only lasts a minute. Queso will wait until he thinks the weak stomachs are done discussing the plan.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton is pretty sure the last few moments of the battle will feature in recurring nightmares. He had grabbed the Bomb and helped stuff it into Queso's nashing mouth, his armored gauntlets bearing fresh scratches from the Bomb's scrabbling nails. What would haunt the Hume was the visceral terror in the Bomb's eyes as it disappeared down the Qu's gullet. Luckily, its dying explosion didn't even cause Queso heartburn,

As the last bat falls, Anton takes deep breaths and calms the fires of his Darkside, letting them dissipiate. For a brief moment, he almost hears a catchy tune, and an urge to stand in line with the others and do a victory dance strikes him before he waves away the notion. Instead he makes sure to clean the blade of his axe and take stock of himself before they continue down the tunnel.

He falls into line next to Vanya and the the two quietly discuss what brought the odd mixture of enemies at them. Anton suggested that the Bomb was hunting the bats and rats, and their vicious attack was attempting to fight their way through new enemies ahead rather then face the one behind.

Before Vanya could respond, the 'stream' next to them changes color to a bubbling purple, and the smell of rot turns Anton's stomach. As Vanya clutches her head, he grabs her shoulder tight to prevent her from pitching into the bubbling mess below their feet, fighting to control his stomach and breathing. Memories from his recent past boil to the surface, and he takes panting breaths as he struggles to bring his emotions under control.

"This feel like Mako poisoning. Too much magic, too much... emotion. But its not inside me this time. Its like its been done to something nearby, a fountain of magic that is spewing corruption fed into it back out. I agree with Vanya, we need to be careful. I survived Mako poisoning once, but a lot of others didn't." Anton said to the others.

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki watches Queso charge through the sewage and swallow the bomb with a smile on his face, forgetting about the bat which goes down soon after. After the excitement from witnessing the event wears off, he makes a mental note of possible sanity levels but doesn't say anything and continues forward, still a little sad he didn't end up doing much.

When the party encounters the river, Yuki is startled by the bright light shed from it and takes a second to readjust. Just as he adjusts, he's hit by the rotting stench of the now bubbling purple river, causing him to cover his nose. After hearing Vanya's warning, he becomes curious about what else is lying in wait. Perhaps they're close to an artifact, explaining why this encounter seems so dreadful. Hearing Queso's question, Yuki replies, "sometimes holy people are bad people and bad people are good to eat".

Yuki then looks forward for a short while, thinking about possible angles. "What is everything we know about what's ahead of us and do we want to learn more? If we could get an idea of numbers, creature types, and how the enemies are positioned, that'd be nice". He then reels the Ioun Wyrd back in and prepares to cast a spell.

Although the river seems to be described as dim light, mana vision interacts with magical light in a few ways, such as dim becomes bright

Once we decide to attack, Yuki plans to cast prescience offensive as a standard action on the person with the highest attack bonus, which appears to be Eskha

[Merilan]

"This smell..." Eskha feels herself wanting to retch, but her expression turns to one of concern as Vanya doubles over. "You okay, Vanya? Don't push yourself..." A pause, as she listens to her explanation. Holy beings, being slowly corrupted? But this smell is... Anton explains that it reminds him of Mako poisoning. That's never a good sign.

"They're undead, I'm sure of it. About..." She rubs her chin, thinking from the footsteps she saw. "About a half-dozen. Also, there's something nasty and big up in the air -- and it's a lot larger than the undead, that's for sure."

Eskha reloads her gunblade, and infuses the bullets as she activates the miniature magitek reactor. "I can shield some of us with the residue from the gunblade's magic - it won't last long, though."

Want to use Brutal Shell to create 7 temp hp to some frontliners before we go - they last 1 minute, so maybe only 2 people or so?

[tonberryking]

After the battle Bert tosses both his tiny blades spinning into the air before holding up his be-robed arms and each knife drops into a sleeve with an odd 'click' noise, apparently secured before he trundles onward. It turns out when risking nausea, a tonberry's flesh turns a blueish green around the cheeks, but Bert stoically keeps his breakfast (or dinner) down, taking heed of what the others say.

"I will go on ahead and investigate. Quietly. Most living beings find my kind to taste awful, anyway. Not very good nutrients either..."

How someone so slow is so sneaky may remain a mystery, but Bert tries not to be seen by anything living or dead...


And now with my stealth at "Holy Balls," I shall attempt to sneak around

[roll0]

[Spore]

Bert takes the lead and sneaks inside. The darkness covers his stealthy approach, silent as only a Tonberry can be. With the added benefit of not wielding a lamp one would just run into his blade headfirst if they were to engage the hatted little creature.

As you approach, a sight beholds your very eyes. The glowing stream flows around and under a small island at the end of this sewage river. Atop the island, a large oak is standing, but you struggle to see it in a large cloud of brown miasmic smoke. It is crowned in brown and beige rotting leaves, with many of them falling off. The tree grows them back, green and fresh, at a rapid rate, but they quickly turn brown and drop off. This results in an almost romantic view of falling leaves, as they drop into the sewage river and get quickly pulled underwater. The roots of the oak cleanse the water, readily accepting the corruption and cleaning the water, but you are unsure how long the tree can withstand this abuse.

Shinra started their water treatment plants right before the war. Of course they must have also use the water for forging weaponry against the Shadowlord, so part of it is necessity. But this seems like wanton abuse of natural ressources.

On your side of the dead-end however you see green and black oily oozes forming from the clouds and puddles along the walkway, in front of where some brightly yellow forms of pure light clash with an almost humanoid looking spectre of darkness. The bright elementals seem to be loosing as the dark entities are supported by zombies that seeming form out of thin air.

To make matters worse, there are two big headed flying fiends visible to Bert dancing around the tree. They seem to be starting to cast some spell.

Bert's excellent scouting has given you the upper hand. You may engage at will, casting a single round of spells however will alert the forces to your presence.

https://i.imgur.com/qGV1pJZ.png

Some general knowledge rolls tell you that the bright things are holy elementals, the dark ones are shadow elementals. Their elements are opposed to each other, and they are supposedly immune to poison or other physical injuries. Holy magic will be very effective against the shadow elementals. You know zombies well, they are weak to fire and and holy magic, and they also resist slashing weapons. The oozes are a complete mystery to you. I guess use a high pressure washer?

You can learn Blood Drain from the Shadow Elementals if you can get any amount of "physicality" from them.
Zombies give you sickening Breath.

[Gyrfalcon]

After the party discussion, Anton takes a breath and cinches his helmet tight. His axe remains on his back and draws his hammer, which promises to be more useful against the zombies.

”Odin watches over those who strive.” he says quietly, half to himself.

He is the first to move, using the fighting creatures inattention to move closer. As they notice his presence, he roars to draw attention from his companions and charges the nearest zombie.

surprise round: Move SE1, S3.

Round 1:
Swift: Activate Darkside
Action: Charge SE 2 squares, hit zombie

Attack Roll: 16
Damage Roll: 12

[Merilan]

Eskha draws one last breath to try to keep the rest of the stench out, and nods as she readies herself and proceeds further towards the edge of the platform, intent on taking aim at the winged imps. "Let's get this started, then..." she whispers. She readies the gunblade, and takes aim and fires -- only to find her opponent quite a lot more elusive than expected.

Move: 4 east
Standard: Attack rightmost imp
Attack: 6

[Dakrsidder]

"Here's to doing something cool..." Yuki says with a waning smile before magical clarity washes over him. He then moves over to Eskha before mumbling something, giving her a quick tap on the shoulder, and moving onto the bridge. There he uses a neat trick he picked before shooting at the closest dumb looking big head he could see.

Surprise:
Moment as an immediate action
East 6
Offensive prescience as a standard action on Eskha

Round 1:
South east 4
Attack roll standard action (19) touch on closest big head fiend
Damage roll (5) + Sure Shot (4)

[gac3]

Qu licked his lips as he made his way towards the battle. He was rushing toward a zombie, fork held ready to attack but Anton beat him to it. So he instead made his way to the next zombie he could see.

"Food!"

He lunged forward stabbing at the zombie. Realizing he was between the two elementals he turned his head and let out a big hiss at the shadow elemental next to him.

[
Surprise round:
Move 6 squares south.

First Round:
Move two more squares south and one to the south west.


Attack Zombie:
16 to hit for four damage with the battle fork

[Bayar]

At the sight of the elementals, Vanya couldn't help but feel like Cid might have had too high expectations of them. Then again, it was a big group of mercenaries. For now, she moved into position and tried to gauge the effectiveness of holy power against these creatures.

Move 6 squares S
Ranged touch attack with holy power rod: 19
Holy Damage: 4

[Spore]

Anton taps into his darker side once again and starts to suffer the consequences. The inner rage he feels however is easily transferred to his first victim, an undead zombified soldier with an almost blue hue to its dead skin. The blade rips out the creature's guts, but the loss of organs does not deter it. It retaliates, but its teeth find no purchase in Anton's armor. Bert waddles closer to the creature and stabs it, leaving a much bigger impression. Vanya arrives at the scene, her rod held aloft. Her magic surges within her and forms a magical orb at the tip of her rod. It shoots inside the shadowy figure, ripping out a big chunk of its darkness. It shrunk a bit.

Queso stabs the zombie with their fork. Its meat has the consistency of jerky, but the injury likewise does not stop it from biting. It crashes through your belly warmer, and into your soft flesh. The culinarian is being eaten. It bites down harder, and you can just flail enough to force it to let go.

The zombies resist slashing weapons, you just learned the hard way.

In the northeast, Yuki cleanly shots an imp out of the sky. It drops instantly in altitude, so Eskha's shot misses its mark as she aimed at where the creature was, not where it goes, a rookie mistake. As it hits the floor, you hear a small crack, it might have broken some twigs, or bones. You're not sure.

The elementals go at each other. As they are polar opposites, the clash of the energy beings results in nothing. Darkness eats light, light illuminates darkness. Thanks to Vanya's intermission however the dark form seems weaker than its holy counterpart. Zombies approach from the fog, as do a few more oozes. The imps spread out. One joins Bert and Anton in their melee, though you can hear a haunting melody, and you have to focus your mind in order not to start dancing.

Vanya deals 6 damage (4 x 1.5) to shadow elemental.
Vanya is hit by magic ooze for 5 damage.
Queso is bitten for 12 damage 'critically', then flailed on by the magic ooze for 4 damage.
Elementals deal 10 and 9 damage to each other. They shrink to medium size as they weaken.
Anton deals 12 damage to the zombie, which is reduced by 5 points to 7.
Bert stabs the zombie for 2 damage. You need to flank properly for sneak attack dice. The second roll was a miss.
Eskha misses, but Yuki downs an imp with 10 damage It takes 2 fall damage.
Imp 1 casts Dancehall Haze on Bert. DC 13 Will Save or spend a turn dancing (Anton and Bert).
Imp 2 casts Fire at Yuki for 2 damage.
Imp 3 casts Fire at the newly spawned Holy Elemental for 8 damage.
Imp 4 flees.

https://i.imgur.com/RqyDCBh.png

[Dakrsidder]

"Someone saw that right?" Yuki says in shock, surprised he actually nailed the big head and killed it.

He then looks in Anton's direction and sees him doing a dance. Thus, Yuki half heartedly imitates it so that he doesn't lose his current rhythm in battle but has a bit of fun. During this he resets his gun before making a spin and pointing the gun directly at the big head most far right while using the same trick as before. "Pick a god and pray".

Move:
Reload gun

Standard:
Attack action (18) touch
Damage roll (8) + sure shot (3)

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton tries to remain focused, but as the strains of unearthly music float over him, they capture his attention and ensnare his mind. For the next seconds, he is trapped in a memory of dancing after a blitzball game. Those particularly well versed in the Midgardian nightlife of a few years ago would recognize what followed as a well executed Hill Gigas Hustle. To everyone else, it would look like the stomping and flailing of your average mosh pit.

[Bayar]

The joy of striking the shadow elemental and seeing it weaken was short lived. Her Qu companion seemed to have a death wish and an ooze and zombie were targeing her. Vanya needed to put some space between the enemies, but was also considering staying close to the front lines to be able to heal someone who needed it. She takes a step back and tries to zap the zombie near her.

5 ft step NE.
Ranged touch attack the zombie that was in melee with her: 3 (natural 1)
Won't bother rolling damage.

[Merilan]

"Yeah, I saw it!" Eskha says to Yuki, before stepping down to try to hunt one of the imps going after her companions. C'mon, let this one hit...


Move 4 south
Standard: Attack imp closest to Bert
Attack roll: 18
Damage roll: 7

[gac3]

Queso stabs at the ooze as it passes into their area. This is not good. They grab one of their emergency snacks with their tongue and swallows it down.

"Yummy. Much better."

Now that everything they needed to eat was next to them, Queso dropped their battle fork and drew out their wok. Then taking a look at the zombie that just tried to take a bite out of them, Queso snapped at it. Letting out a roar as it happened.



Reminders: I'm one square North of what was depicted and my fork did piercing damage to the zombie, not slashing.

Ooze would have had to move through my threatened space with more than a 5 foot step to get to melee range with me so I'm going to roll the AOO and if I'm wrong because of some ability the ooze has, then don't count it.

AOO on OOZE: 17
Damage... 3 Piercing

Swift Action: Second wind to recover 16 HP
Free Action: Drop my fork
Move Action: Draw my combat wok
Standard Action: Bite the Zombie:
Attack: 11
Damage (unlikely with that roll): 6 damage (it doesn't say where I get my bite ability what type of damage so unclear)

[tonberryking]

While Bert twitches for a split second, he remains uninfected by the dancing, and his gaze slowly, ominously turns to register the imp's location. A dangerous gleam twinkles in his eye before he rolls up into a ball, tumbling towards the sewer walkway's edge and then swings up both his knives to try to shiv the imp. This'll teach them to start dance off competitions!


Acrobatics check:
[roll0]

Attacks:
[roll1]
[roll2]

[roll3]
[roll4]

[Spore]

Vanya jumps back and fires a panicked shot at her undead assailant, but the orb of light goes wide and impacts the grimey walls harmlessly. The undead are too slow to catch up and attack, but the ooze just grows into her direction and slams her, but only impacts her divine shield.

Anton's first opponent tries to bite the moshing hume, but he bounces too hard to the beat and doesn't allow neither of the undead to find purchase in his meat. Bert and Eskha finish the imp together, which drops but drops into the magical river, with a precise bullet and a rather spectacular move for a Tonberry, something most of you have just seen from blue hedgehogs. The water gurgles and glows, the tree's twigs shake in protest on accepting the demonic prey. Your instinct tells you to wrap up the fight quickly.

The Qu finds himself in a predicament, surrounded by enemies he chooses to push past its personal limits, and tap into the calories within. Wounds heal, the mind mends back together. But now you know you must feed! Queso defends themselves with their assortment of cooking utensils, but switches to his trusty chompers, narrowly missing the zombies, but opening himself up for a nasty counterattack. No food this time!

A whole load of nothing for monsters this turn.
The zombie assailing Queso bites them for 9 damage. (Bite is slashing damage.)
All other attacks missed for some weird reason.
Vanya is threatened again, but moving prevented the zombie from attacking (it's too slow).

https://i.imgur.com/Huze109.png

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki replies with a smug look on his face "That's good to hear, especially considering most of them are taken care of on this side. Perhaps the others require being shown what's up." He then resets his gun before blasting the last visible big head while hoping the others aren't having a hard time.

Move:
Reload gun

Standard:
Attack roll (17) touch
Damage roll (5) + sure shot (2)

[gac3]

Queso's eyes burn with the fires of rage and hunger. With a quick splash of oil into his wok, it also burns with fire. He swings the burning wok at the Zombie next to him and follows through with another bite at it.

"I not food! You food!"


Swift: Light up my wok.
Full attack action:
Wok: 8 (didn't even roll the damage because that's so low)
But my -5 bite got: 14; damage 4 slashing

[Merilan]

Eskha starts working her way down, to at least be close enough to support the group if they need her to be engaging in close quarters. "Just don't get cocky," she remarks to Yuki as she aims for the last remaining imp. Fire!


Move 1 southwest, 3 south
Standard: Shoot remaining imp
Attack roll: 20
Damage: 8

[Gyrfalcon]

As the imp dies, so does its music and Anton snaps back to reality. His face flushes red with a mixture of anger and embarrassment, luckily hidden by his helmet. With a wall of enemies in front of him, he drops his hammer and swings his axe from his back, turning the motion into a single cleaving chop at the zombies in front of him.


Free: Drop light hammer
Move: Draw greataxe
Standard: Cleave zombie S and SE

Rolls:
Attack S: 14
Damage S: 10

Attack SE: 12
Damage SE: 14

-2AC, healing immune

[Bayar]

"These things are persistent ! Maybe if the darkness things are defeated, the zombies will be too." Continuing to back away slowly, Vanya tries to hit the shadow elemental again.

5ft step NE
Ranged touch attack the smaller shadow elemental: 10
Holy Damage: 4

[Spore]

Yuki peers into the future once more, seeing the trajectory the big head takes and shoots them. It drops. But you see another downed enemy moving again, as if their fiendish flesh knitted back together. The holy elemental douses it in holy energies as it tries to rise and it falls flat again. The demon evaporates into white dust. The Garlean soldier sees the threat drop and immediately turns her attention towards the south.

There, with one fell swoop, Anton fells two zombies, leaving Bert to fend for himself against an ooze. He fakes moving towards Anton and as the flan extends itself towards the place where you move, the Tonkin snaps back, jumps to the south and kicks the puddle into its new place. It tries to lunge after Bert, but wise to the flan's slow movement, he dodges easily by simply hopping. Vanya dodges her assailants and shoots at the shadow elemental but its darkened exterior is still too much for a glancing blow. The zombie yet follows as does the ooze, and the latter does douse her in corrosive material. The acid is not too bad, but the blunt force takes the wind out of her lungs for a moment.

The smaller shadow elemental vanquishes its glowing counterpart with a well-directed attack on its core. A silvery orb without glow, akin to a large glass bead filled with smoke drops to the ground. The larger elemental notices Anton as a threat and throws an orb of darkness his way. In the chaos however it misses entirely. At the forefront, the troubled culinarian takes a big bite out of the zombie. If they expected it to taste like dried meats, or rotting garbage, they are surprised this tastes very artificial. Queso is reminded if the first time he entered Midgard. The city smells like ozone, its air tastes like smoke, like a mix of chemicals. The same is true here. Both monsters retaliate by punching into its soft belly.

In the meantime the water creates some metallic sheen where the imp dropped into it.

You have heard of leylines going through the lands, where mana is concentrated enough to warp nature around it. Creatures usually steer clear of it, but there is the odd animal that drops in and gets warped. If the mana is untainted these are usually evolutionary steps, or things that combine creature aspects, such as a Chimera combines dragon, lion and scorpion. For a demon however, there is no evolution, but they do increase in power the darker their motifs, the more sinister their essence. And this pool is corrupted.

The fact that earth oozes are around here suggests this is a place where you are close to the essence of earth.

This is no ordinary tree. It grows without sunlight, in fact it shouldn't glow on its own, and the magic stream is not the reason it does glow. Closeness to the essence of earth might mean you are close to an earth crystal, a mythical object meant to balance nature.


Yuki deals 9 damage towards the imp.
Holy elemental downs the rising imp and coup de grace's another one.
You discover imps heal over time.
Bert repositions the ooze between him and Anton.
Eskha deals 8 damage to the ooze following Vanya.
(I redirected Eskha's attack to aid Vanya in her fight unless you want to execute the downed imp so they stay dead. I hope this is acceptable.)
Vanya misses the shadow elemental and takes 7 damage (6 blunt, 1 earth damage) from the ooze.
Queso takes a bit out of the zombie for 4 damage. They take 4 and 5 damage.
https://i.imgur.com/w8xGNvY.png

[gac3]

Queso saw the holy elemental go down and let out a long belch or rage. This was not going well.

"Oh no! Time for spice!"

With that they exploded with a roar of fire that washes over the creatures around it before dropping to the ground, bleeding.


Self Destruct
HP= -1
Bleeding
1 Fire Damage to everything within 10 feet of me.

[Dakrsidder]

With a smile on his face but soulless eyes, Yuki replies, saying "it's not that I'm arrogant, it's just that I have never hit anything this many times in a row, so I used the opportunity to cover up that constant pain. By the way, that imp that fell into the sewage is probably turning into a super imp given some time". He then resets the gun once more and aims at the ooze near Bert, but without much faith it'll hit this time.

Move:
Reload gun

Standard:
Attack roll (6) touch
Nigh certain that's a miss, thus no damage roll

[tonberryking]

While he's still not exactly fast, Bert's reflexes are bordering on the absurd. He brandishes his knives, and while he's pretty sure the ooze can't be doinked in the deadly way most others are, Bert still tries to help, thrusting his knives into the gel and swishing them around, hoping he can churn the beast to death.


Attacks: [roll0] [roll1]
Damages: [roll2] [roll3]

Bleed (?) [roll4] [roll5]

[Merilan]

"Um... okay," Eshka blinks a few times, but focuses on where Vanya's being crowded on. "Vanya, I'll come help!"

She hurries to her side, and slashes away with her gunblade at the zombie nearest to her.


Move: two southwest
Attack: Zombie one south of Vanya
Roll: 18
Damage: 4, slashing

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton takes a moment to take a deep breath, ignoring the flash of dark magic that splashes across the ground nearby, sizzling ominously. Queso is in trouble, and with a shout explodes like a bomb. Behind the Hume, Vanya continues to attempt to dodge attacks, but is taking hits from the ooze and zombie chasing her. Helping Queso means helping Vanya first, and he turns away from the ooze to take on the zombie chasing her, joining Eshka as his brutal axe chops alongside her agile slashes. "Let keep it up, everyone!" he says to try to encourage his companions, though in truth they're doing great at taking the fight to their enemies.


5-foot step 1 N

Attack Roll Zombie: 11
Damage Roll Zombie: 15

[Bayar]

Seeing that both the light spirit and her comrade go down enraged Vanya. "That is ENOUGH !" With a burst of holy power, everybody nearby should feel their wounds getting healed. "Stop hurting my friends !" she says, while continuing to slowly back away from the zombie and ooze.

Pulse of Life Limit Break heal: 13 hp for every ally within 30 feet
Every ally also gets 1 round of Fast Heal 2 and any unconscious ally that gets up to positive hit points immediately gets up on their feet without triggering AoO's
5ft step NE

[Spore]

Queso sees themselves surrounded and tries what they have learned just half an hour ago. They inhale and focus their mana on pumping themselves up and up. The Qu grows and grows and explodes in a red flame orb. Heat is generated as fast as it dissipates, and a wave of hotness washes over the vile undead and piles of excrement. You hurt them, but surely you also made the area smell like burning feces. After the fact, Queso drops into the sand, their life pooling underneath them.

Distracted, encouraged or simply ignorant to their fallen friend's sacrifice, Anton chops the zombie in half and Eskha intercepts the ooze, cutting a huge chunk out of it. Bert's knives swirl in the dark green jelly and mixes a few parts of it, none are very effective. It retaliates by punching the Tonkin with an uppercut. You look to the north as Vanya surges in defiance, a light washing over all of you. Queso is risen from its lying position, slowly flying to their feet again, awoken and not bleeding anymore.

In the east, the pool roars in defiance, waves of sewage crashing onto the artificial basin. The large shadow elemental reaches Queso, but not before piercing Vanya with a spear made of pure shadow. The forces of evil advance throughout your ranks.

Anton kills the zombie and thus Eskha moves onto the ooze. Vanya heals everyone saving your lives, but is immediately crit by a Dark spell for 20 damage (4 HP + 13 healed -20 means you are at -3 HP, with fast healing). Bert and Yuki are both missing sadly.

Zombie and Ooze provoke an AoO by Queso (who dropped their weapons with the unconsciousness, but a bite attack is fair game). The Shadow elemental moves in to threaten Queso.

Zombie bites Queso for 9 damage, leaving them at 4 HP.
Ooze hits Eskha for 5 damage (1 of them earth damage)
Shadow Elemental hits Anton for 7 shadow damage. Roll DC 13 Fort save of be dimmed for 1 round (20% miss chance, 20% fail chance on vision based skill checks, light spells remove this.)
Ooze2 hits Anton for 5 damage (1 of them earth damage)
Ooze3 hits Bert for 4 damage (1 of them earth damage).
https://i.imgur.com/RJSIxhF.png

[Gyrfalcon]

A scream cut short from behind signaled one of his fellow mercenaries down. A wall of oozes and elementals separated him and Bert from Queso, and their blows slashed through and past his armor, leaving trails of utter cold where sensation once was. Anton’s breath came in ragged gasps. There was no escape - the oozes could keep up, the elementals could strike at range.

The water was boiling, and something terrible was coming. There was no way out, but through. For another, these were thoughts of despair, but Anton felt light, as everything fell away to purity of purpose. Kill these monsters, and stay alive.

He gripped his axe tighter, and spoke to the enemies, a promise of carnage.

[Umbran]”You will all die, screaming into the Abyss!”

He sweeps forward, cleaving at his enemies once again as his Darkside feeds on the carnage.

Swift: Second Wind (+13 HP)
Standard: Cleave

Elemental Attack: 14
Elemental Damage: 11

Ooze Attack: 12
Ooze Damage: 10

[Dakrsidder]

Having had lost his rhythm, Yuki keeps his mouth shut and allows the enjoyment to run its course. As he resets his gun, he notices the intense emotions everyone else in the party has while fighting to the death along with the impending doom growing larger and feels the urge to watch, but he ignores it and shoots at the same ooze as before.

Move:
Reload gun

Standard:
Attack roll (11) touch
Damage roll (2)

[Merilan]

"Vanya, no!" Eskha exclaims with surprise, grimacing as she redoubles her efforts on trying to push through what's left of the monsters. If only she had some kind of healing potion on hand... what could they do now?


Attack Ooze
Roll: 23
Damage: 7, slashing

[gac3]

Queso's collapse after exploding seemingly bounce them right back to their feet. They take a bite at a running slime monster and then bend down to pick up their frying pan. They took a mental note, exploding makes you feel great.

Quickly some more damage was dealt though and they take a swing with their frying pan at the attacking zombie.


Aoo:
9 attack
Move: pick up weapon
Swift: light pan
Attack:
15
5 bludgeoning damage, 4 fire damage

[tonberryking]

Bert looks at the oozes, and then at the smaller Shadow elemental... He doesn't think he has very good odds, but neither does Vanya.

Accepting his fate, Bert once more tries to roll away from the oozes, come up along side Vanya as he tries shivving the smaller shadow thing.


Do i need two acrobatics checks to get to a square next to Vanya?
[roll0]
[roll1]


Attacks:[roll2] [roll3]
Damage: [roll4] [roll5]

[Spore]

The death knight curses their foes with a threat, the veiled creature responds. Anton's light reveals it to be a shimmering core that exudes black vapor.[Umbran]: Remove....us. Cleanse... the shadow elemental pushes out before wailing onto Anton. The knight misses, and his momentum lets the attack against the ooze go wide. The elemental seems to restrain themselves and miss Anton. Another ooze hit glances Anton's shin protectors.

The oozes are easy enough target practice for Yuki though. Slow and incredibly grounded in their movement, it is easy to hurt them, though the inexperienced shot enjoys any hit. Eskha surges in and finishes the corrosive bile for good. As you cry for help, you see a light in the distant move, then flickers before appearing right in the middle of you. Its hands appear to cup shimmering blue pure water. The liquid is splashed onto Vanya.

Thank you, bringer of light! it says, turning to Anton. Another dark spear from up south pierces through its center at removes much of its essence. You can feel the elemental's life force being ripped apart, it reverberates within you.

Something shakes the earth as the swirl in the basin vanishes. A moment later a gigantic leech emerges in front of Eskha, apparently ready to strike at the person who killed their imp self. Queso vanquishes their zombie foe by swinging their pan at it, dousing it in frying oil. It sizzles; smells like bacon!

Holy Elemental uses Healing Spring (https://www.finalfantasyd20.com/magical-items/alchemical-items/healing-spring/) on Vanya, unspoiled water from the fountain to grant her Fast Healing 2 for 5 rounds.
It gets hit by Dark for 16 damage.
Eskha and Yuki murder Vanya's attacker, securing the area momentarily.
Queso kills Zombie, as does Bert kill their enemy with the blades, finally stirring whatever controls it to death.
Big Shadow Elemental provokes an AoO from Queso.
https://i.imgur.com/mqbqhDe.png

[Dakrsidder]

Seeing the super big head emerge from the sewage, Yuki tries to identify it to no avail. Despite this, he recontinues his cycle of resetting his gun uninterrupted, then aims at the weakened shadow elemental Anton is stuck with while seeing a surge of luck coming his way.

Move:
Reload gun


Standard:
Attack roll (20) (16) touch
Damage roll (8) (3) + sure shot (5)

[gac3]

Queso is stunned having a few seconds reprieve where they weren't actively injured more. Knocking out the zombie cheered them and they turned to the big elemental next to them and unleashed with all of their might.


Attack of Opportunity; 22
Damage 5 bludgeoning and 1 fire

Whole turn spent missing.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton sees Queso land a smash with his flaming wok on the elemental as a bullet slashes past and blows the elemental in front of him apart. Debating his choices takes a moment - Queso can take care of himself, and the demon leech is closer. Anton turns towards it and chops with his axe at its slimy hide, seeking a weak point.

[Umbran]”Hey! You lost your wings and you smell like crap!” he says, attempting to taunt the demon away from Eshka.

5-foot step NW
Attack on Demon Leech: 18
Damage on Demon Leech: 17

[Merilan]

Eskha lets out a surprised yelp as the leech suddenly emerges from underneath the ground, but regains her courage momentarily. "Thank Nhaama," she murmurs as Vanya is healed by the holy elemental, and then focuses her efforts on the leech - a swift strike!


Attack leech
Roll: 13
Damage: 6 slashing

[Bayar]

Briefly regaining consciousness after the elemental's brutal attack, Vanya quickly casts a cure on herself and grabs at her rod while trying to get her bearings again.

Casting cure for a 14 heal. By my calculations Vanya is at 13 hp now.

So, since she is now no longer at 0 hp, she's no longer disabled and can also make a move action, right ? If yes, Vanya will grab her rod back.

[tonberryking]

Bert's just acting like a little rubber ball, bouncing away again, trying to come to Anton's aide and finish off the demon leech. He comes in low, of course, and spins both knives before trying to gut the hideous creature.


Attacks: [roll0] [roll1]

damage[roll2][roll3]

sneak stab [roll4][roll5]

bleed? [roll6] [roll7]

[Spore]

Another precise bullet pierces the corrupted elemental's form. It seems his knowledge of the future makes sure the dark energies stay dispersed. As the elemental casts its spell, another pan bonk hits it, filling the area with the impossible smell of burning shadows. The newly arrived holy helper burns out the corruption further by assaulting it with holy energies. The shadowy form diminishes.

A few steps to the north the fight against the corrupted demon takes place. Eskha's slash does not quite pierce its slimy exoskeleton, but Anton's blow finally does. The beast roars in an otherworldly fashion as a tonkin appears behind it, stabbing it twice lacerating large portions of its hide. Instead of blood, some dark green shimmering ichor spills out. It snaps at the Tonkin who nimbly just bounces up making the demon miss. In a few seconds it went from healthy and murder happy to being on its last legs.

The amount of reprise awarded to Vanya allows her to open her eyes and use her white magic to steady her vision once more. She pushes herself up on her staff and is standing again.

No damage for the monsters this turn.
You destroy and diminish two elementals, and you take the grub from full to nearly dead.
https://i.imgur.com/srTGlM5.png

[Gyrfalcon]

The tide of the battle was firmly in their favor, and Anton feels a wild grin on his face as he continues to hack at the leech, but unlike his first strike, his axe bounces off its rubbery flesh, leaving nothing more then welts.

Attack roll on Demon Leech: 9

[Merilan]

Eskha wrenches her blade back and grimaces, saying, "This one's quite hard to pierce... I'll have to try harder!" She steps down near where the fallen zombie corpse is, and continues to strike.


5-foot step one south
Attack: 11 (13 if flanking with Bert? Not sure)
Damage: 12 if hits

[gac3]

Queso swings wildly at the shadow elemental hoping to finish it off but really just looking ridiculous.

[Bayar]

Vanya gets up and tries to holy orb the leech, shooting wildly.

[Dakrsidder]

Watching his bullet rip through the elemental's core and extinguish its flame was surprising and delightful for Yuki. Seeing how injured the super big head became after the party ripped on it, he felt a tinge of pity as thus far it hadn't hurt anyone. Despite this, the super big head was still a super eyesore that had overextended its stay and therefore needed to be dealt with, so he reset his gun and sent a bullet its way.


1 NW
Move:
Reload gun


Standard:
Attack roll (14) touch
Damage roll (5) + sure shot (1)

[tonberryking]

"I got this..."

Bert tries to finish off the demon with his knives, trying not to get too full of himself, which could lead to a mistake or death by hubris... Just stab the monster to death and THEN gloat about it.


Attacks: [roll0][roll1]
Damage: [roll2][roll3]
Sneak Stab: [roll4][roll5]

[Spore]

You lot scramble to finish this exhausting ordeal. You focus everything you got on the demonic maggot, but Bert is the one that really does it in. The creature rears its ugly suction cup face and rises once again to cough up green bile. Finally it drops. Bert starts stabbing the down creature in earnest again and again, holding it down, making its twitching body stop moving. More to the south the corrupted elemental is vanquished by a precise shot of Yuki, but not before destroying another holy creature, leaving back another smoky pearl.

This ceases your fight, and even though the corruption continues, the immediate threat has been vanquished. As you investigate the area, you happen to find a grove amidst the small island surrounded by the mana, or mako stream. A large oak the height of a large electric power pole stands amidst, its bark purple in color, and its leaves various little gems. Strewn about you see the desiccated corpses of slowly rotting adventurers, who apprently tried to defend themselves on the island. One of the adventurers's hand holds an well-kept axe that despite the rot of the body seems to hold up well. Something either preserved it, or rotted the corpse faster than usual. Neither option seems out of the world seeing as you are in a cold and damp area along a magical tree.

You investigate further as a thundering dark voice rumbles in your heads.

I THANK YOU OVERDWELLERS! BUT YOUR QUEST IS FAR FROM DONE. CEASE THIS CORRUPTION AND YOU WILL HOLD AGAINST THE SHADOW, THAT CAME BEFORE. GIVE YOUR CARETAKER THIS! SHE SHALL KNOW.

An amber colored crystal, about the size of your heads hovers briefly in front of you before vanishing. You know by heart you will be able to summon it in times of need.

You level up! maximum HP/MP and class features are gained immediately, spells and current HP/MP are adapted once you rest. Additionally, the first time you drop to 0 or below, the earth crystal will activate and give you fast healing 5 for 2 turns.

Loot:
- two holy orbs worth 500 gil each. Queso can also eat one to learn Holy Bolt (https://www.finalfantasyd20.com/magic/spells/h/holybolt/), you can acquire the gem 3d4 hours later from the facilities.
- a variety of gems amounting to about 1700 gold (selling gems will generally be able to combine appraise and diplomacy to find out exactly how much those are worth, and where to sell them and how).
- a twig of the earth shrine: it is a +1 stone earth power rod (what a word!) that has 4 charges. By expending one charge, it allows the holder to cast Stone Call. It can also transform as a move action from Power Rod to a club enchanted with the Shillelagh (https://www.finalfantasyd20.com/magic/spells/s/shillelagh/) spell. Spending an hour in meditation with the rod allows a white mage to add the spell Stone to their spell list.
- an old and decrepit logging axe with runes engraved onto it. A L I C E It is masterfully wrought, but Yuki senses an aura of hunger and otherworldlyness to it.
- two pistols, one of which is broken, with the firing mechanism jamming, and the other destroyed, worth scraps.
- a pair of keys, with a Shin-Corp logo on them, and the number 17.


Your options include:
Holybolt from eating and passing the pearl.
Touch of Terror from a shadow elemental
Sickening Breath from Zombies
Dancehall Haze from Imps.
Eating any ooze or the maggot to infect yourself with diseases and get internal bleeding from acid damage.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton drags his helmet off and takes deep breaths, his short hair plastered to his head with sweat. ”Well done, everyone. We beat some tough odds. Yuki - good shooting, that elemental in front of me was a tough shot.”

As they investigate under the trees, he drives the spikes of his gauntlets into the imp’s skulls to ensure they stay dead.

Once they’ve assembled the gems, he eyes them uncertainty. ”I’m not great with gems, but I know a guy in this sector. His name is Locke, and he claims he’s a treasure hunter, but I’m pretty sure he’s just a thief. But he’s always dealt straight with me and if we sell these to him, I’m pretty sure he’ll cut us a better deal then others would.”

Strangely, he gathers the shadow elemental pearls together, though after a moment he holds one out to Queso if they want to eat it. ”During the fight, one said to me something about removing it, and said the word ‘Cleanse’. Do any of you know if such a thing is possible?”

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki watches as the opposition takes their last breath, then looks around at the corpses piled up but is surprised to see no one from the party died. "Seems this drama had a happy ending. Then again, this is the starting line. I will say that was probably a one time thing for me. No way am I getting that many hits in a row again."

As the party discovers the treasure, Yuki becomes surprised to see so many valuables scattered around. "I've got to take a look at those magic weapons. Although I don't recommend touching the axe just from a glance, you can tell it's bad news, but with a closer look I'm certain it's cursed. I can try to mend the broken pistol afterwards. It should be worth quite a bit. As for cleansing, I have a theory, but I'll need a sec."

Skillful moment on planes (28) + a mote of time (2)
Spellcraft on twig (9)
Spellcraft on axe (25)
Mending could be used on broken pistol

[Merilan]

Eskha too looks particularlly winded, though she takes the time to reload her gunblade just in case. "Yeah, I'm winded. Sorry for letting you down, Vanya. I'm glad that elemental helped at just the right time."

As they go to investigate, Eskha spends a bit of time in prayer to the Dusk Mother to the fallen adventurers. She can't do much more for them, but she likes to think it might put their spirits at a bit more ease. She sounds a bit groggy when a dark, booming voice suddenly speaks in their minds, though.

"Cleansing...ceasing the corruption, I mean, I assume the electric company's at fault here?" Eskha thumbs towards the oak. The sewage. "These Shinra keys probably can get us somewhere..."

18 Knowledge Technology - Eskha wants to see if she can figure out how Shinra's role fits here, directly or indirectly, to causing this situation.

[Spore]

Anton thinks about the corrupting aura, and having bathed in such toxic waste before, he knows it can be survived but does take a toll on one's body. The deathknight mutilates the bodies of the imps, who are slowly fading away to dust anyhow. Their essence is drawn to the earth crystal. He further notes there are numbered compounds for Shinra, where they store weapons and spare parts. The area is moderately patrolled by Shinra guards.

Yuki however has more ideas on how to resolve this. The earth crystal is actually meant to balanced out the natural elements, along with the fire, wind and water crystal. Furthermore the lightning crystal gives the cycle power to continue, while the ice crystal stabilizes the system. If one is imbalanced, the whole system slowly crashes. Normally the earth crystal could even take in these huge amounts of waste and cleanse it. In fact it gives all of earth its cleansing property. This is why rotting corpses become fertile soil. As you investigate further, it seems not only is the earth crystal used as a waste disposal, it is also used as an energy source. Shinra claims the power is geo-thermal energy, pumped heat from the core of the magma filled star. Where in fact it is residual energy from this leyline nexus. If this is to continue, in a few years there will be crop failure, in a decade or two there will be dead and dying lands, until not even the soil can retain water and the whole area will slowly convert to being a desert. Purification at the moment is impossible, not before Shinra stops their heinous activity.

The twig is a twig imbued with the elemental power of earth. It is a +1 earth power rod, that can cast Stone Call for 1 charge, it has 4 charges and regains 1d4 charges at noon. If the last charge is used, the rod has a chance to crumble to dust. Furthermore it allows you to cast Stone using your MP as a first level spell.

The axe is a +1 ominous (https://www.finalfantasyd20.com/magical-items/magical-weapons/ominous/) greataxe. It holds the ravenous spirit of a soul eater, though in its current state it remains barely conscious and unable to actively exert its will. Reducing a creature to 0hp with this weapon kills them immediately and devours its soul, gaining a charge of power. Yet, you can sense some humanity left in the blade. The axe is found with 6 charges. As a swift action you can spend an action to expend one or more charges and gain 1d6 hit points for each charge expended.

The axe consumes one charge at dusk every evening. If there are no charges in the blade remaining, the axe instead consumes a portion of your soul. Your alignment shifts one step towards Chaotic Evil. Once it reaches Chaotic Evil, your soul is consumed by the blade, and you begin carrying out its will, seeking ever more souls to consume so that it may awaken fully once more. Once 66 further souls have been absorbed by the blade, it evolves further.

This weapon is cursed, and you can only rid of it by way of a Remove Curse or similar spell.

Eskha notes that mako energy should theoretically be a sustainable and clean energy source. It however doubling as a waste disposal and energy source is what causes the pollution. The solution presented is efficient and cheap, but nonsustainable, and every engineer worth their money would realize this.

Mending the pistol is an option, and it leaves you with both a masterwork hand gun and a battered hand gun which can be repaired with [roll0] gil worth of replacement parts. You can however use its parts to upgrade your rifle to be not battered anymore. Doing so requires 4 hours of work and a working station or appropriate tools (else the time doubles).

Queso notices these oozes are not usual flans which would be coagulated droplets of earthen resin. They are acid filled piles of magical waste, trying to burn anything they come into contact with. Eating them is not advised. If you could find a way to be resistant to their acidic nature eating them would probably help the earth shrine immensely.

[gac3]

Qu makes they way around the battle field, collecting small bits of the enemies to snack on while they make their way back out of the sewers.

They also spend some time contemplating the issue of the oozes. Best bet would be to get some earth resistance and come back and lick the plate clean.

While the others gather up the loot, Queso helps in whatever way is needed.

"Sorry friends. I not eat enough. Will eat better." Queso feels bad for not getting any indulgences as well as feeling as though they didn't properly kill enough things during the fight.

Queso decided to do most of the heavy lifting and throws most of the loot in a bag they sling over their back. They pick up their battle fork and use it to carry the dangerous axe without touching it.

[Bayar]

Vanya joins Eskha in prayer over the dead bodies around the tree.

While studying the items, a thought occurs. "They appear to have been equipped with some good items, but in the end that wasn't enough. Were they freelancers ? Were they sent by Shinra ? Or does Cid know about them ?

As for the treasure: "I would very much want to study that twig, it looks useful. If it turns out that it isn't that useful, we can always trade it in later."

[Merilan]

"So typical. Go with the cheap and destructive option, kick the problem for people down the line," Eskha mutters to herself. "They're both draining the crystal as a power source and using it as waste disposal system and it's not going to last. I don't know how long, exactly, but this has to stop." For a moment she dreads the idea of going up against Shinra when the Empire is already after her, but... she can't just turn a blind eye to this.

She looks at Vanya. "Maybe... we found some keys, right? Maybe they were soldiers or engineers sent down here to check. I guess there's no way to tell for certain, their corpses are so mangled."

[tonberryking]

"Do you think that the keys unlock some sort of facility or station down here?" Bert looks up at Eshka with a faint sense of curiosity to his telepathic voice.

"Not that I particularly wish to stay down here, but we could search around to see if they unlock anything now, rather than come back (again) later..."

[Dakrsidder]

"How unfortunate..." Yuki mumbles. "If everyone has grabbed what they wanted from the trove, we should probably consider what to do next. If you want to continue searching to find a use for the keys that works for me, I'm confident I can run faster than most of you when it comes down to it. Personally, I'd say the best course of action is a quick search. If nothing turns up, we should either do a more thorough search later or try to find information on them elsewhere." He then turns his attention to the broken firearm and attempts to mend it magically.

[Spore]

You make your trek back relatively unbothered. Maybe they smell the death and blood on your hands, but most wild critters leave you alone. As you pass manholes and sewer grates you can hear the bustling district above you. You decide to look for a relatively undisturbed one and you emerge in fresh air in a back alley. People largely ignore you, after all if they don't see you they don't have to say something. For everyone else you have a large intimidating dark knight and a very illustrious group going. As you go up, Queso doesn't manage to pull the large sack of gems through the tiny manhole, and as they succeed in pulling up the treasure the bag lands on a metal trash can lid and scares a cat.

http://slffvii.com/wiki/images/b/ba/Shinra_MP.PNG

A patrol of Shinra security notices you. It is three officers, obviously on lunch break. One slender tall one holds a slice of pizza, another one has a beverage in his hand. The young rookie is checking his gear and is actually armed while a fat one holds a remote controlling a magitek armor remotely.

https://www.finalfantasyd20.com/wp-content/uploads/magitek-300x300.png

Oy, OY MATES! Where you got that gems from? The piece of pizza is dropped but the last eating officer looks like they're not parting with their drink just yet. Youse gots 30 seconds to explain! he says.

[Merilan]

"*Excuse* you," Eskha wearily grumbles, "But we're contractors from the Shinra Science Division sent to check on the electric node *and* wastewater outtake down in the sewers, and no one told us we'd be facing that many monsters downstairs and we barely escaped with our lives, so if you'd *please* let us take a shower and report the hazardous byproducts of these findings--" she gestures to Queso, "--that would be extremely appreciated."

She's hoping Anton and the others can back up her half-truth here, since she's feeling pretty anxious speaking up.

[tonberryking]

Bert looks between the Shinra goons and Eshka, before acting the gentlemen and steps between her and them. There seems, perhaps, to be a dangerous gleam in his eye as he stares down (stares up?) the troopers, as if they would need a whole lot more mecha and maybe some WEAPONS to deal with him.

"You heard the madam. Now, please do yourselves a favor and kindly back the @#$%! away, sir. We're trying to take out the trash."


[roll1d20+10[/roll] Intimidate

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton steps up next to Eshka, covered in blood and waste from the fighting and a weary look on his face.

”We need to get these back before Professor Hojo blows a gasket. One of his eggheads thinks that these are crystalized Mako and wanted a lot of samples to study. We’re hours overdue because the monsters down by the project were in a frenzy, and anyone who makes him wait risks being part of his next biological experiments. I don’t know about you, but I had nightmares after cleaning up after one.”

Bluff : 24
Knowledge(Local) : 23

[gac3]

Queso nods at what the others are saying before dramatically licking their lips and flashing their teeth, which hopefully still have bits of zombie and bat and the like stuck in there like spinach.

"Yes. Need shower. I hungry. Need dinner."

They pull out the rat from earlier and bites off it's head while they stand and wait. They hold the rest out to the operatives.

"You want some?"

[Bayar]

Vanya decides that it might be prudent to simply let the others try and talk their way out of it. Too many cooks spoil the broth and such. Instead, she'll use the time to see if there's anything that might be useful around if it came to combat.


Knowledge (Local): 16
Knowledge (Technology): 8
Perception: 22

[Spore]

The guards look at each other. Tonberry have a reputation for violence and this one seems to be able to intimidate the rookie, who seemingly reared for a fight. The veteran magitek handler was more reserved, but didn't give us as easily. Yet as he recognizes Anton's trademark glowing eyes, he starts to hesitate, willfully nodding ahead to your fabricated story. Eskha clearly knows more technological words than the patrol knows Midgardian legislation combined. And no one really wanted to touch the Qu eating a diseased rat.

Alright, everything seems to be in order. the middle guard then summarizes. If anyone is starting to miss some valuables, we make sure to direct them to the Shinra bureau of complaints. He cackles, as Shinra is known to ignore or flat-out intimidate complaining cityfolk. You are allowed to pass.

Going to Cid's compound and to the place where the keys fit that you just found is roughly the same direction, though you pass the place where the keys belong to. It is warehouse 17, one of 8 warehouses in the area that belong to a mysterious foreign company. Rumors are they have bought places in every district, as they need safehouses for something illegal. Maybe organized crime comes to Midgard. The people say it could be dangerous, others say Shinra needs opposition as the de facto leaders of this city and welcome outside forces. Because what else are liberators but criminals for the dictators.

Where do you go? Do you go to your compound? To warehouse 17? To Shinra central? Do you go shopping directly? Do you split up?

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton and the group make their way past the guards, with the Death Knight keeping a bored, slightly weary expression on his face. Once out of sight, they take several twists and turns, the locals using their knowledge of shortcuts to make sure that they lose anyone tailing them. Finally, he lets out his breath in an explosive sigh of relief, and then begins chuckling.

"Wow, I can't believe that worked! I'm not sure what combination made them decide that we weren't worth hassling, but good job everyone. Queso, Bert - excellent work on being intimidating. Eshka - good job selling the science side.

Now, we should decide what we want to do. The Warehouse we have the keys for is along this route, but I think we can better tell the Boss that we were talked to by one of the elemental forces of nature. I don't know about the rest of you, but that's way above my paygrade. While we're talking to her, she might be able to help with the waste around the Earth Tree, figuring out what to do with that axe, and some info on the Warehouse and the group that owns it."

[Merilan]

Eskha looks like she could just fall over by the time they're out of the guards' sight. "I'm glad you all were there. I've never really been able to convince people all that great, I just choke up. Anyway, that axe is real bad news... at the very least, we should ensure no one gets their hand of it, if we aren't going to uncurse it." She rubs her chin. "We should report in, then prepare ourselves first for the Warehouse from the funds we'll be able to get from our haul this time. I know I could use a shower and some rest."

[gac3]

Queso looks at Anton confused.

"I intimidate? I offer friendship and rat."

They then looks down at their filthy clothes.

"I also shower. Good chef is clean chef."

[Dakrsidder]

"Bureau of complaints my ass... Their service is worse than my attention span" he says with a sigh. "Well anyways, the consensus seems to be rest before going to the sketchy warehouse. In addition, we should get as much information from Cid as we can as Anton mentioned, see if she can remove the curse on the axe, and make use of the haul, including the scraps which could be used for an upgrade." As he speaks, he makes sure he hadn't misplaced the key to the other warehouse.

[Bayar]

"I am so proud of you all! When that patrol came, I was sure we'd have to fight them. Next time though, we should probably either stick to sidepaths, either split the haul so as not to draw more attention to ourselves. We should probably go see Cid first, then let me see about mending any wounds we might still have. "

[Spore]

Agreeing to visit your employer and caretaker first, Anton decides on the wise path of not directly going to the warehouse. A few blocks after the fact you recognize a mechanical orb with a flexible camera embedded in it following you. It is held aloft by two two tiny wings flapping almost nervously. Using a few shortcuts through alleyways, one of which forces you through a wooden fence moving around two corners in quick succession seems to make it loose you.

Certain you have lost the spy for now you enter Cid's compound. As you agreed, she is waiting in between a few crates, but most of them were opened now, revealing some kind of laboratory. The technology seems to marry organic structures and magitek readily. A large console with many exotic buttons and displays are connected to two glass pods, both filled with a clear blue liquid. One has a lid to be flipped open, the other has inside what you recognize to be a white crystal.

White Crystals are known as Auracite. They are composed of clean white or astral mana. Different to black or umbral mana, which is used to destroy and deconstruct, auracite stabilizes and heals.

The duality of astral and umbral magic is also why undead and living creatures react differently to superficially similar spells.

The pods are held aloft by vine-like tree branches covered in green leaves and pink blossoms.

Wat did you find, my children? Cid says in a manner that befits a mother. Phew, you smell. she says as she opens her grimoire. A magical circle appears beneath you, and one by one you are cleansed of filth. She sniffs at the Tonberry again. Oh my you got bitten something fierce. White magic envelops her and she touches the tonberry before enveloping you in light. She then turns to the Miqote Mage. I can teach you, for a price.

Everyone is healed by 10 hit points. Cid succeeded at a Heal check to find out Bert has been suffering from filth fever.
You may learn all white magic from Cid for half the cost up to 2nd level.

Bert needs to roll a DC 12 fortitude save to get rid of Filth Fever next morning. The Heal skill can provide a +4 bonus to this check if you manage to beat the disease's DC. Gladly Bert's symptoms are subtle enough so you think you have 3 days before anything serious happens.

Cid looks at you expectantly.

[Merilan]

Eskha keeps a keen eye on their mechanical spy without looking too obvious about it, detecting the make and model and where it's likely to have come from. She relaxes a little, but at the same time looks on in awe by the time they arrive at Cid's laboratory. "Wow, this is a real neat setup... I want a lab of my own someday too."

She makes a face at the news of Bert's illness and sighs. "Good thing we can get you treatment before anything nasty happened, Bert. I'm glad."

On the topic of what they found, though... Eskha explains what they found - the earth crystal, how it'd been used as both a power source and a waste disposal system, and how it was failing -- some of the items they'd found down there, including the cursed axe... as well as the keys to the warehouse they found. And the rumbling, ominous dark voice that spoke in each of their heads.

"We're gonna inspect the warehouses with the keys we found next. I wanna make some repairs on our goods too, with the stuff we found... ...also, a shower and laundry, first of all."

26 to identify the mechanical spy

[gac3]

Queso nods along to the story.

"Also I remove acid. Need help. Acid harm giant tree. Bad news."

[Dakrsidder]

As the details of the expedition were being explained, Yuki wandered around the laboratory closely observing its contents, while holding back the impulse to touch anything. Having realized there wasn't any mention of the battle, he blurted out "You forgot to mention there were these two big shadow elementals with a ton of zombies, acid oozes, and imps and in addition, when one of the imps fell into the sewage they turned into a big leech I so hope we're getting extra for that". He then pauses before whispering "Then again I hardly took any damage besides a little fire while everyone else was on the brink of falling over..."

[Bayar]

"There were also remains of another party that was less fortunate than us. Possibly Shinra, unless you'd know anything about them. Found this magical twig that most likely belonged to one of them." Vanya shows Cid the Twig of the Earth Shrine. "Haven't had the opportunity to study or test it yet."

[Spore]

Merilan ponders a while about the orb. As little as you have seen of the bit, you assume it is very sophisticated in design, lacking the rough exterior of first generation magitek. With a shell not forged but cast in a mould, you have to assume it comes from a factory. It might be of Garlean or Shinra design, that much you could make out. You have cause to expect either with your encounter with ShinSec and your past with the military. In any case, it is a clockwork spy, a tiny drone meant for reconnaissance. It is short-range technology as it does not sport an internal power source, you assume its origin is within the sector. Its range is limited and similarly it can only be in use for up to an hour without recharging meaning the danger is gone for now. It features no weaponry nor any meaningful way to interact with the area, but they come as audio and video spies. You are fairly certain you have encountered a video drone.

Cid smiles motherly at the praise of her lab. Hush, this is nothing. It surprises me a garl like you is impressed by such a laboratory. You know not if she meant to say gal, girl or Garl-ean. No, I have known bigger and better places. This is just a makeshift station. But it does the trick. If you have a sample of the corrupted place, we can analyze it and see what's wrong. I see Queso has already checked the acidity. In many ways cookery and chemistry are alike, you know.

The Nu Mou turns to Yuki and listens in earnest, even to her tiniest whispers. That does sound grueling. I would not have picked you if I weren't sure you were up to the task. And some people even on a battlefield should stay back and not get their coats bloodied. Dying or injuring yourself for the sake of fairness is naiveté.

Having the twig thrust upon her, she examines it. Her eyes go wide with surprise. This is a twig of an Ablathian oak tree. How did this come into your possession? She pushes her heart-shaped glasses down and her eyes glow in the same clear blue color the liquid in her tank does. And infused with the essence of earth itself. Those trees grow hundreds of malms to the north, and you found this underground? This can only mean you found a leyline of powerful energies. You say a tree grew underground? This is likely whatever Shinra is interested in or using already.

Cid pauses to think. Closing her eyes for a good 15 minutes, she leaves you to think and respond to yourselves, though any loud talking would quickly prompt her to raise her hand and buzz an almost bee-like sound into the air, as you disturb her thinking.

Zere is no way around it. We need to find a way into a Shinra science division building and find a data base about local projects. Their archives are centralized meaning you can get more info about this in any laboratory that employs scientists of B clearance. These labs have heightened security, but they are not military compounds. Be cautious but do not expect heavily armed resistance.

Do you have anything else to report?

[Merilan]

Eskha has a sad smile at Cid and says, "Well... as a half-breed Garlean, they don't treat me too well back in Garlemald. I didn't get to use the nice laboratories the honour students doing engineering got access to. A sample of the corruption... would the axe suffice, do you think, Anton? If not, perhaps one of the gems...?"

While Cid contemplates, though, Eskha shares news about the spy camera. "That spy drone's a pretty advanced piece of work... it might either be Shinra or--" A pause, "Garlean in design. Whoever deployed it is definitely nearby - it's got enough power for about an hour and no less, so they couldn't have deployed it from pretty far. It also can't go that far from its source, so we're probably fine for now." She pauses. "There are audio and video models, and I'm pretty sure the one we saw was a video one -- so they'd have caught what happened, but not what we said."

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton holds out one of the Shadow Elemental cores. "During the fight, I managed to speak to one of these elementals. It could only say a few words, but it seemed to want to be cleansed in some fashion. After the battle, we found a cursed axe, but Yuki seems to think there may be a way to cleanse it. It traps a powerful creature, and killing souls will empower the weapon. I'd like to know what you think the possibilities are with the weapon. I could use it, but I'd rather not accidentally manifest a powerful demon in the middle of Sector 7 or turned into an enslaved serial killer."

The hume hesitates for a moment and runs his thumb along the scar on his jaw before deciding to voice the Moogle in the room. ”And Boss? After we killed the monsters, a crystal manifested and spoke to us. Told us to tell you. Since then, I’ve felt like something is looking out for me.”

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki froze before blinking a few times while processing what was just said. "Just to be clear, you're essentially saying we're going to break into a Shinra building? I didn't see that coming but that sounds great but just how exactly do we get in and out without becoming known criminals?." Yuki begins pacing back and forth pondering it. "Even if we could quell their attempts to resist, they'll probably be able to identify us and there could be repercussions if Shinra is salty about it."

He then remembered there was another matter. "How pressing is this by the way? There is that warehouse we planned on going to. The question is which would come first. In addition to that, we should probably get the goods we intend to get soon for preparation."

[Spore]

As I have feared. Greater powers are watching you. I am not exactly a friend of either Garlemald nor of Shinra. If they can connect you to myself, things will become much much more difficult. She puts two pearls into your hands while holding a seashell in her left. These are magical link pearls. They are connected to this shell and will allow you to talk to each other and to me. The pearls have a limited range of a malm, but only need some magic to be used. They can however connect to the shell at any range. Any mage can put them into their ears to talk to me.

Cid lays her eyes upon the axe. Her eyes widen, then her interest is piqued. A long few minutes pass before she says something again. Not a demon yet. she starts. This is the soul of a person, but the weapon features a rift to the Abyss as well. If you succumb to the curse, you feed the demon and eventually the soul will be consumed instead of yours. One can offer a replacement soul, or murder to feed the demon. If it stays untouched eventually the demon will remove itself from the weapon.
If one however picks it up and resists the curse for long enough they can close the rift, send the demon back and free the soul. Cid's paw moves over the axe's hilt just a hair's breadth away from touching it. Say, do any of you know someone called Alice?

Finally turning to Yuki, Cid becomes completely unable to be read. Her face shifts from sorrow to concern back to her usual business self. Ah yes, cold and calculating as ever. Not a hint of a smile comes across her face. Well, I promised you payment, so here it is. She hands each of you a small purse with fifteen golden coins. 1500 gil for each of you.

Then she smiles. I am not saying you have to fight to get inside. As you said you bluffed your way out of a ShinSec patrol once. Surely you can infiltrate a science facility without drawing too much attention? You have the means to disguise yourselves now.

And no, the earth shrine, as I will call it, is suffering but if I suspect this has been going on since the war against the Shadow Lord, it will not worsen for weeks or even months. The corruption is a concern, but these are corrupted earth and light spirits, not summons from the Abyss. You can tackle your objects in either order.

Cid goes to leave the compound, but pokes Queso in its stomach. As far as disguises go, I would something do about them.

[gac3]

Queso looks around when Cid jabs them and then nods. They take their apron and tie it on like a cape and pull their chef hat further down on their head while holding the frying pan in front of their face with their tongue.

"Disguised. Also, who Alex?"

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton frowns at the axe with a sense of unease stirring as Cid talks.

"One of my friends was named Alice, a Viera. A street rat, like me - we ran together with another kid named Thomas - guy was nuts for magitek. We all got caught up in the same sweep and put through the experiment. After we escaped the sewers, she was saying she'd had enough of Midgard and planned to take off. Its a common name though... or does the name on the axe change with the soul in it?"

[Merilan]

Eskha taps her forehead gently and says, "A replacement soul... we could've found the body of a serial killer down there, for all we know." She gratefully accepts the payment, and thinks on the topic of the warehouse. "A disguise would be useful. Going late when most of the workers have stopped their shifts would also make sense..."

[Dakrsidder]

"What did you do to get on their bad side?" Yuki looks at Cid in awe wondering what might've been done.

As the topics changes to money he felt a bit of guilt and confusion watching Cid's internal conflict but was glad to see so much money. "This is more than I expected now I'm pretty close to being able to afford one of those damned assault rifles only one thousand four hundred and sixty two to go." Based on the lack of dread and the presence of glee, one could guess he hadn't realized how far it still was.

"Makes sense. I also agree that going at night sounds good, especially considering it's superiority to day."

[Bayar]

Vanya's eyes widen at the amount of gil she just received. "You mentioned that you could teach me things ? Well, I would be interested in that cleaning spell. And one or two pointers on some of the more tricky ones."

If Cid could teach me how to cast either or both Magical Cleaning and Magical Hygiene, that would be perfect. Otherwise, I can wait to get them naturally through levelling up.

And for level 1, Wind Runner and Air bubble might come in handy.

The mithra takes one of the link pearls and places it in her left ear. After making sure it's snuggly fit and won't fall off, she continues: "Disguises. We could always pretend to be a field team with some experts from far away lands or something of the sorts. Or a field team that is bringing some new 'specimens' for research. "

[tonberryking]

[roll0]


Bert seems surprised by some of the revelations and introspections from the rest of the team.


"You mean those meanies in the sewers aren't normal? I thought they were regular denizens of the waste tunnels..." he shrugs, also seemingly nonplussed about his disease catching, "Well, we have a key to a Shin-Ra warehouse. Is it possible that the drone user was operating out of it? It would be the only please we can easily check and what better place of operations than your own garage? So to speak."

The cowboy-berry tugs on his hat, finally, with a huff.

"I don't think a disguise will help me all that much, though; I can just sneak in if I focus hard enough; hardly expect they'll spot me." ...is he...petulant about the idea?

[Merilan]

"I'm not great at hiding, so I'll opt for a disguise," Eskha murmurs. "Also, I don't... think so? We found those keys down in the sewers, so if it did belong to the drone operator, that'd mean they lost their keys down there..."

[Spore]

These parlor tricks? Cid brushes off the reques to learn cantrips. If you want more of those, you need to invest in your dexterity (https://www.finalfantasyd20.com/feats/class-feats/extra-cantrips-or-jingles/), not ask me. They should come on their own.

As for more spells of air and wind? I can teach you alright. But maybe the spirits themselves can teach you. She hands you what looks like dried leaves, a small bag of it. Smoke this and the elements themselves will teach you them. But take your time and listen well.

You have a limited number of cantrips. You can however swap them out as part of the level up if you fancy it. Otherwise refer to the above feat.

Besides Cid does not have the time to teach, nor does she do normal spell scrolls. You gotta smoke your spells with her.

As Cid leaves you with her magitek and more questions than answers, you rally yourselves and decide to go shopping. Midgard is large, and the amount of untrustworthy mechants is even larger, but luckily Anton knows a guy. It is a damp evening, the rain of yesterday is draining slowly, showing dry caked dirt on the boots of many people, at least those who can afford shoes. District 6 is still a place of the poorest but showing compassion or generosity quickly makes you the target of bandits and pickpockets.

Soon Yuki notices someone shadowing the group in earnest, and as he tries to confront the shadow, he quickly appears in front of the formation, bowing. Eeeeeeey, Anton my man. I haven't seen you in ages. I take it you want something from me? You usually pass this place twice if you want something.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/26/6b/37/266b37c8522b875a0b37e418882ee241.jpg

At his side there is a long rapier made of the purest gold. with rich gems adorning it. He must truly be a great adventurer.


It's a magical letter opener.

This seems to be a magical blade, glamered to look like a rapier.

This is Excalibur, a legendary sword used by a certain king of knights. There are many legends surrounding this sword such as, "pulling the sword from the stone would mark that one as king," or another that states that "a fairy will grant the sword to the one who holds the right to become king." Various legends offer different descriptions, but they all have one thing in common, which is that whoever gains this sword will become one that will leave their name in history.

Something seems off. Despite being from an age of kings and knights it is a much more modern rapier. Is it a shapeshifting blade?

this is actually Excalipoor, not Excalibur. It is a cursed blade with unerring accuracy and the penchant to styling itself after the wielder's wishes. It does however never deal any lethal damage, nor will it carry any magical enchantments. Instead it is envious of other weaponry, destroying and removing it from its wielder.



And who are these pretty pretty ladies in your company? I can tell you have taste! he says overlooking the obvious monstrous party members as well as the men. My name is Locke, adventurer and treasurer aplenty. What can I do for you tonight? As you explain your predicament, he guides you along a zigzag path through the sector before ending up at a rundown shack near the outer walls.

It looks like an abandoned hut, but as he raises a lid, you can see a smorgasbord of various bits and bobs. The actual hut is tiny, but Locke enters the building and doesn't come back until a good 5 minutes were gone. He brings you:


Two old Shinra ID cards,
three medium sized ShinSec uniforms (MW parade armor; +2 to cha skills in Sector 6)
three batons (MW saps) and riot shields (tower shields) of ShinSec.
Maneater: a small serrated blade inlaid with rubies and sapphires. (+1 Human-Bane Dagger)
Shish Kebab: an iron fork (and spoon!) that turns slain enemies into life energy (+1 Vampiric Battle Fork)


I can give you a good price on that. You are fairly certain he is right, since this looks like items that are likely hot good.-

[Gyrfalcon]

Before the group leaves the warehouse, Anton resolves an internal debate. With a growl, he grabs the cursed axe, shuddering as the shadows wreathed around it lash around his hand and forearm, disappearing into his body. Reflexively his Darkside rises, shadow and flames battling for a moment before both fade. "Alice... I'll be pissed if you show up in a week and shake those dumb bunny ears at me while laughing at me getting myself cursed like this. But Odin damn me if I don't find who killed you and did this to you and shove this axe down their throats." Turning to the rest of the party he frowns. "As for you all... I'm first come first serve on freeing souls, so don't go and get yourselves shoved into cursed weapons unless you want to be left waiting."

When the group encounters Locke, Anton laughs and embraces the man in a quick bro hug and fist bump. "Locke! Still the ever successful 'treasure hunter'", he says, applying a decent dose of sarcasm to the words, though he admires the ornate rapier. "Surprised someone hasn't tried to lift that letter opener off of you to melt down."

Once they look over what Locke has to offer, he nods to the man. "Not a bad haul, but hot my man, very hot. Shinra doesn't like it when their people go missing." the big hume says, fingering a bloodstain on one of the uniforms "And it's not the safest to keep these things around for too long. Lucky for you, we have some gems that'll be safer to fence, but let's talk price for this stuff."

[Merilan]

"... we'll keep a lookout for you, all right, Anton? Tell us when it gets too much," Eskha encourages, as Anton takes hold of the cursed axe. She's hoping it's not the Alice he knows either, but... that seems kind of cold and cruel to the Alice that was inside this axe all along. Such evil weaponry...

She folds her arms and sighs quietly when they approach Locke. Great, a womaniser... she hates those types. She focuses on the goods instead, particularly the ID cards. How old are they? Do they have an expiry date listed? What does she know about how far they can take them, if they have any kind of electronic unlocking permission?

Roll: 19

[tonberryking]

Bert stealthily puts himself and his impressive hat between Eskha and Locke, blinking his bulbous eyes at the treasure hunter without much sympathy for his attempts to woo anybody in the party.

However...

Pardon me, Sir. But what do you want for the bejeweled knife? I remain dubious if you would offer it at an affordable rate."


[roll0] Diplomacy
[roll1] Sense motive to see if he'll pull a fast one, or is BSing us.

[Dakrsidder]

"Quite unlikely I'm going to find myself in a cursed weapon anyway. If I die, it'll probably be nonmagical and messy." It's uncertain how serious Yuki appeared to be, but he was laughing the whole way.

"What a sneaky guy seems fairly simple too, not that there's anything wrong with that, although that sword seems interesting." He eyes the sword for a while before his eyes stray to the haul and is intrigued. "Is this one of those haggling things? If so, then how about starting at 1.5k gil? That's the same as market price full armor for the dagger. I have no idea how you obtained these goods, but considering the rest of these goods seem radioactive, it's likely the same there. Considering the enhancements, it's unlikely Shinra is happy they're missing and it's quite possible they're on the lookout. There's also the fact that it's quite unlikely you'll find many people who can afford goods like these in the slums, meaning it'll be nigh impossible to get these off your hands without a good discount." While making his case, Yuki briefly examines the ID cards.

Linguistics (11)
Appraise (18)

[Spore]

Anton finally touches the weapon. The axe immediately feels familiar. Not only does the anger and darkness inside it grip him, there is a sense of belonging and calmness, wreathed in the anger and hunger to feed on souls. It feels good. So good in fact he is unwilling to part with the weapon for now. As you look down, you seem to notice tendrils gripping your hands, but as you blink twice, they are gone.

You are pretty sure the ID cards would hold up on visual inspection granted you needed to get a decent photo. The cards look legit enough, but Eskha is sure the cards could be reported stolen, and swiping them could set off a minor issue for the group. Nothing you could not avoid with a little diplomacy or just being very annoyed.

Bert senses Locke's loot is indeed very hot stuff, but as long as you conceal it a bit you should have no trouble keeping it. He is a bit nervous selling to you as he hasn't sold to you yet. His prices will be heavily reduced as he seems to prefer a big buck rather than keeping loot for longer.

Alright, the dagger is a favorite of mine. Four kays and it's yours, little girl. He turns to Vanya, and suddenly notices no one spoke but the Tonberry's words appeared in his mind. He jumps a few feet back and points at Bert. Did....did you just talk in me mind? STOP THAT.he squeals, with his last words raising an octave as he squeaks like a scared mouse.

He ruffles his shirt and stands up to Yuki's request. Four hundred and a promise for no mind talk for the lot of Shinra Gear. Fourthousand for the dagger, and I throw in the weird fork thing. Locke tries to move his whole stash.

[Merilan]

"These IDs... look, they're electronic cards with a specific serial ID," Eskha points out. "This is the kind of card you swipe to an electronic reader, which will probably beep since these cards'll be marked stolen or missing. That far out in the warehouse, we could probably push through with a story, but it won't be smooth sailing as we hope."

[Dakrsidder]

Yuki appears amused by how shaken up Locke got by hearing Bert. "You look as if an archdevil whispered in your ear that's gotta suck. Four thousand and four hundred for it all sounds good to me although I can't guarantee you won't hear voices." He says this while holding back laughter.

"I was expecting potential problems to arise, but this one is a minor inconvenience. Technology is often unreliable, but if nothing appears out of place, it's quite likely we'll get in anyways. I wonder when these were stolen. If it was more recent and discrete, maybe they'll still work."

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton nods in agreement with Yuki - two magical weapons and a pile of Shinra gear for disguises is a good trade.

For their side of the bargain, he hands over the gems and enough Gil to cover the reset. Once both sides have their new possessions, he looks at Locke. "You know, I have the feeling that we'll be coming into more items like these gems, and maybe other odds and ends that might interest a treasure hunter like yourself. We could benefit from a steady merchant and someone who knows how to find what we're looking for. Right now, if you can keep your eyes open for an assault rifle, another knife, a set of full plate, and a method of resisting acid damage alongside whatever else you find, we'd appreciate it."

He steps closer to the thief, his tone still friendly. "Of course, we're putting a lot of trust in you. Trust that you aren't ripping us off on prices. Trust that you aren't selling cursed goods or things that'll land us immediately in hot water. Trust that you aren't going to turn around and sell us out for a quick profit."

He smiles, but it doesn't reach his eyes. "Now, having a Tonberry talk in your head? That's scary. The thought that you'll be fast asleep one night, only to feel a weight on your chest and the last thing you see when you open your eyes are two glowing eyes in the dark and a voice in your head? Good for a nightmare. But see, the Tonberry isn't the worst thing that could happen to you - you'll be dead, sure. But see the Qu? He eats monsters - alive. I helped shove a Bomb into his mouth, and let me tell you - it didn't want to die that way. But that's still not the worst thing that could happen if you narc on us."

Anton pats the axe slung over his shoulder, and the smoke forms around it, appearing as a skull whose jaw drops open in a silent laugh as it fades. "Some bastard killed my friend and shoved her soul into this alongside a demon. Any apparently anything I kill with it gets its soul torn out as fuel to protect her. Now, I don't know yet if having your soul eaten hurts more, but you don't get phoenix down sprinked on your body and get up after that."

He reaches out and grips Locke's shoulder for a moment. "So keep that in mind if your greed gets the better of you. Its far better that we work together and you can make an obscene profit from what we find and selling us what we need."


Intimidate - 23

[Spore]

The nonchalant smile is gone from Locke's face. He swallows heavily and takes in a deep breath. His mood sours instantly and a disapproving frown over him. He would look annoyed or even disappointed, but his shaking legs betray the security he tries to display. Take the Shinra gear for free, if you must, and consider this a warning. The guards who owned these went missing a good two days ago, but I don't buy from just anyone. They are probably alive and held somewhere. If they made it back to base, they are probably either fired or incarcerated. In any case, they know the cards are stolen. Do not use them on electronics. Use them as identification. as for the weapons, I don't know where they got these, and they are not cursed to my knowledge. Not that I am a mage of any capacity.

It is fourthousand, take it or leave it. He takes a step aside, as if expecting Anton to take the gear by force. He stretches out his left while his right hand rests on his weapon already.

[Dakrsidder]

"No need to get down in the dumps. You were already paid for the Shinra gear and no one complained about the price." As Yuki continued, his eyes showed signs of disappointment. "That information however, is something you should've shared when the topic was brought up. The fact that you're only now sharing it after being shaken up speaks of your character. If there's ever a next time, I hope for your own sake, you're up front about these things. If you feel defensive when your buddy tries to convince you to make mutually beneficial trades, maybe you should reconsider your way of going about it just a tip."

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton holds up his hands in an unthreatening fashion. "No, Locke, I'm not looking to shake you down. As my friend said, we agreed on a price and we'll pay in full, though the information that the IDs are known to be stolen rather then an overdue patrol would have been nice to know ahead of time."

He points to the bag of gems that makes up part of Locke's payment. "Keep in mind that we're likely to come across a lot more like those. Working with us will help make you richer, and we're a likely group to unload a lot of your fenced gear to. but if Shinra happens to ask about anyone like our group... well, its better for everyone that you've never seen us, yeah?"

[Merilan]

"Yeah, I mean, we figured that bit out..." Eskha remarks, though she looks a little antsy as Anton gets a little more intimidating and the tension in the room goes pretty stiff. "Look, I'm sorry for my friend. I know he means well, he's just looking out for you -- you know you're not going to get an easier sentence if they find out you're connected to us -- Shinra's more ruthless than that. We're likely to be going up against them more from now on... and I wouldn't like to see you get caught in the fray for any reason."

Eskha's going to play peacemaker to try to diffuse the tension in the room. Roll: 19

[Spore]

Friend, I thought you smarter. Locke tries a disarming smile. Of course stuff like that gets missing and not noticed. But I do not work alone, and the less I say, the less it costs me reputation.

You're a right pain in my butt, Anton. But your friends are alright, so I let this slide for now. He hands you the items you requested and touches everything himself. See? No curses here. And no, I will not answer where I got the other stuff from. Elegantly he jumps from your reach onto the shack's roof. If you want to find me, just ask the Golden Chocobo's owner for a job in exchange for a room. They'll ask you to exterminate rats in their basement. He tips his bandana to the ladies and is off across the rooftops.

You return to the compound to rest and recuperate. You even manage to find a barrel and some fuel to set up a romantic burning trash can. Eskha makes sure there is an opening for the smoke so you do not poison yourself while the fire burns merrily though you reckon the fire would have to burn long and strong to affect you in any way. You are more or less rested depending on how you accomodate yourself at night as you continue the next day.

You assume the key you have in your possession matches a warehouse in the outer District 4. You have to cross District 6 which is the lowest worker accomodation and cheapest entertainment and markets, throughout District 5 which is a mercantile quarter of sorts. Proper citizens with ShinCorp authorization can shop in bright and clean shops, but cool and sleek design makes humanity almost feel out of place. It is designed for image and reputation more than its inhabitants well-being. As insincere as the shops and buildings look, as reserved are its customers and residents. You see sleek machine-produced coats buttoned up to cover parts of faces, too much make up, many sunglasses and so many hats. You cross town into District 4, which houses the largest airship port in the area as well as enough space to potentially accomodate half the nation's supplies in a single place.

Your key fits the warehouse 17. ShinSec patrols the area heavily. While not exactly breaking and entering, a bunch of weirdos entering a warehouse is bound to be suspicious.



Along the ShinSec guard patrols you notice a few dock workers with different overalls from ShinRa. Not colored in the orange and yellow colors of the company, these are red and blue. Most if not all dockworkers have some kind of headgear. Bandanas, hats, beanies and headbands are used to keep off rain and sun alike.
You notice a dockworker taking off their hat and fanning air into their face. He is immediately elbowed in his ribs by his coworker, a stern talking follows you cannot make out
Are you mad? The captain told us never to take off our caps. one worker chews out the other in a harsh whisper.


This is the harbor area. Shinra obviously has the largest warehouses, but private investors and companies also have their shares here.
You heard rumors of Shinra securing a few warehouses for items that should never be connected to their company. Of course those who speak up too loudly are quickly silenced. Not by murder of vanishing but they usually tend to become very quiet and shy all of a sudden.
Last month a giant investor Asina Medical who profitted heavily from the war veterans of the Shadow War, started to set up shop in Midgard, much to the dismay of Shinra's board of directors. They immediately blocked their imports, claiming tax issues and shortly after announcing a Shinra Medical division.

You notice the complete lack of a magical aura on most of the dock workers. This is completely normal for anyone not capable casting spells. But some of the workers have small boxes in their pockets and tiny specs of magic in their ears. Magical jewelry exists and is not that expensive but the sheer amount of it surprises you.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton sleeps fitfully that night, despite the deep weariness from the day's fighting. His dreams are plagued by memories of his friends from his past, but the bunny-eared Viera girl fades into mist in each of them, as if she had never existed.

He wakes with the dawn, bleary eyed as he goes through the routine of maintaining his gear as the rest of the group stirs and goes through their own morning routines.

Anton throws his duster on over his combat gear, letting the large garment do some work at concealing that he's fully armored, and carries his weapon slung in bulky sports bag over his shoulder. While the axe's handle sticks out, keeping the imposing blades of the axe head out of sight reduces the attention from ShinSec patrols. Leaving District 6 behind, he likewise turns up the collar of his coat to hide the lower part of his face, in particular the identifiable scar along his jaw.

Reaching District 4, he advises the group to not linger in front of the doors. Instead they walk in a loose order that allows one of them to stealthily confirm that the key fits and can turn the lock on Warehouse 17 and move on before their interest is noteworthy.

"Shinra has some off the books warehouses in this district - black sites and storage for things that'd be damaging to link to the company. Its an open secret, but no one dares speak up because they get 'reeducated' if they make too much noise about it." he says quietly as the group strolls through the warehouse district. The big hume is aware of the number of workers on the streets, as well as the constant presence of ShinSec patrols. "If this is one of those black sites, we don't want to be seen going in if we can help it. Let's see if the warehouse has other entrances out of sight - otherwise we need to wait for a lull or tonight when there'll be less eyes on us. Worse case, we can see if we can sneak Bert in and have him open a way from the inside for the rest of us."

[Merilan]

Eskha spends some time replacing the now-worn parts of her gunblade that she's carried from her days to the Empire, thanks to the rifle components they've found; it takes a lot of time, and even more painful memories from back then. It's not glamorous, but she also manages to sort out the fire and ensure there's proper ventilation -- no use dying of smoke poisoning long before they get to their goal.

Eskha also searches for a basic scientist's getup -- lab coat and everything, and a pair of non-prescription glasses to go with it. As they pass through the districts, she takes note of how District 5 reminds her of home: a place where the image of the glory of the Empire takes priority over the well-being of its citizens. It sickens her.

"Let's keep an eye out for any identifiers on the crates they're moving in, while we're taking advantage of daylight," Eskha suggests. "If we can figure out what this place is for, it'll help our cover story, should we need it."

With that in mind, Eskha begins a quiet patrol of the warehouse to keep an eye out for alternate entrances, as well as whatever goods she can spot.

[gac3]

Queso spends cooks a meal for everyone before turning in for the night. In the night they sleep peacefully in a position that looks horribly uncomfortable to anyone who might see them. Queso still is somewhat doubting the likelihood of successfully sneaking into the place. While Eshka does their patrol, Queso will look for a spot in which to watch the guards and try to learn anything about their patterns or maybe gaps in their guarding.

During any discussion of plans or sneaking past the guards, Queso will offer up the following idea.

"I make guards dance. Good distraction. Can't catch us and dance."

[Dakrsidder]

"That was some experience... I sure hope he was an anomaly."

When they got back for the night, Yuki messed around a bit with some components and tried to set a fire, forgetting about the poisonous smoke before abruptly falling asleep. The position in which it happened was a bit unpleasant, which made him a bit sore getting up. There wasn't much prep for him to deal with, so once he awoke, he was ready within a few moments.

While traveling towards District 4, he's amused by all the gimmicks of other districts, especially considering how funny citizens look.

Once they had gotten near the warehouse that matched their key, Yuki realized something was off. "While the dock workers themselves are insignificant, many of them appear to have the same set of magic items on. In addition, none of them are allowed to take off their caps based on what I saw. Considering this and what Anton mentioned, I'm almost certain they have monitor devices. This means if even one of those workers sees us, Shinra enforcement is likely to come at us. Thus, we should be careful about getting in." Yuki continues looking around for more anomalies in addition to a route that evades them.

[tonberryking]

"Well, I know one way to do some reconnaissance."

Bert does the unthinkable--though that seems to be a regular occurrence for the tonkin, if one is being honest-- and removes HIS hat. His cheeks turn slightly darker green like a blush as he hands the hat to somebody.

"I think, however, that I am too short to see certain things, but I won't let that stop me. Someone please hold my hat so they'll think me a regular lost tonberry and not a dangerous person of interest."

So saying, Bert just... stealthily walks to the warehouse they need to go to, give or take a stop or three...



Bert rolled a 3 on his perception in the OOC, but let's see if he can sneak around and run across anything without being spotted:
Stealth [roll0]

For the most part he's trying to path a safe course for the others to follow and or try to find anything that could cause a distraction if it's otherwise impossible for anyone but him to stealth this part.

Stealth [roll1]

[Spore]

You try to be as inconspicuous as possible, scoping out the warehouse and surroundings. Especially Bert is almost not detected. The others do a decent job at pretending to look around, as Yuki mentions the amount of magical items loudly. Vanya's twig does pull an equal amount of attention. You see a Shinsec patrol gesturing you to come closer and about four workers from the compound go inside the warehouse as a result.

Bert uses the distraction to use his magic knife to cut and squeeze through a hole in the chainlink fence. He is covered on one side by the huge warehouse, has a few trash cans and discarded wooden crates for cover. He sees a way to ascend to an opened window in the hall, probably to increase air ventilation to those otherwise badly air conditioned buildings. On the other side he can see trouble brewing for Yuki and Vanya.

Anton is close by and keeps low profile though one wrong move and the towering man with an axe on his back would surely be the center of attention.

Our third group, Merilan and Queso oddly enough are the ones that pull the least amount of attention. You can assume either livestock is a common occurence and ignorant passerbys mistake Queso for an ornate import for some rich person, or that in this area where adventurers and other lowlife enter Midgard to make a quick buck a Qu is nothing out of the ordinary.

I do a few group rolls every now and then. You're bound to pull attention somewhere.

You scan the area, and rather than Shinra emblems or plain boxes, there are some boxes branded with the linked chain of the Garlean Empire. Below this, the words Asina Med. are written in Garlean font.

The weapon can feel the adrenaline pumping in Anton's body. It requires to feed, a primal want, not even a thought. Just as you feel hungry or tired, the axe wants for murder.

[Gyrfalcon]

For the moment, Anton keeps his low profile - no one seems to be focused on him specifically and he draws on his long experience as a Midgard slum dweller to blend in as another local keeping tabs on what the ShinSec are doing. His interaction with Locke had reminded him why he had never been the smooth talker in his previous occupation - he had a knack for riling people up, even when that wasn't his intent. Instead he fell back on old habits and kept a close eye on Yuki and Vanya. Hopefully they'd be able to talk themselves out of their unwanted attention. If not, he was there to step in and provide backup.

As his adrenaline begins to pump, he forces his Darkside to remain quiet, only to find that his new weapon has a hunger of its own. Currently the sensation is wordless, but he can feel the weapon's bloodlust. Hopefully he won't need to do anything in front of dozens of witnesses that the axe might approve of.

[Merilan]

Eskha's blood freezes as she spots the crates with the linked chain of the Garlean Empire -- Asina Medicine, in that unmistakable Garlean font. Was this a warehouse for a Midgar branch of a Garlean company? That promises trouble, but it also begs the interesting question of exactly why a Medical company's warehouse keys were found near the earth crystal in the sewers, beside a Shinra operation. Something is definitely rotten in the state of Midgar.

"Garlean," she points out to Queso, "The trappings are unmistakable. I didn't know Asina Medical was one such company..."

It looked like there was trouble, though, and the Au Ra creeps up behind a nearby crate to observe what's going on.

[Dakrsidder]

Having been forsaken by some vengeful god of luck, Yuki began to feel dead inside. As he looked around, he found nothing but disappointment, unable to avoid the encounter without causing potential difficulties. Due to how grim the circumstances appeared, he just moved forward awaiting his impending doom.

[Spore]

A smaller patrol of a young androgynous person and an older overweight officer with a handle bar mustache approaches Yuki and Vanya. Aye, you lot. Get lost, loitering is forbidden. You either check in with the immigration office or you go to your designated work, but you cannot stay here. The lot's off limits for you.

The younger one scans your weaponry, then whispers something into the ear of his patrol buddy. He chuckles. Ehehehe. You lot are mages, are ya? Do ya know the guys that turned Glenn into a frog? Sodding mages think they own us. He pulls Vanya by her throat to her. The younger guard tries to pull at his arms, but to no avail. Are you crazy? Remember what the corporal said! No display of force next to... he looks at the warehouse. here.

Chunky grabs Vanya via combat maneuver 13 vs. her CMD 12.

[tonberryking]

Bert, rather than infiltrate the warehouse, tried to get back over to his friends seeing that they were in trouble, but arrives too late before they're assaulted.

...Luckily! He is bereft of his hat and is therefore able to pass for a normal tonberry... by attempting to stick up the guard at knife point!

"Pardon me, but I couldn't help but notice you've left yourself open. ...Grrrr. Hisss. I am a tonberry and I like to eviscerate the too-talls. Be frightened."


[roll0] Stealth to sneak up on the older guard and get a knife up against his kidneys or something.

[roll1] Intimidate
[roll2] Bluff (I'm a real tonberry! Boo!)
[roll3] Disguise (Because why not?)

[Dakrsidder]

The sense of dread Yuki felt simply turned to disgust as he cringed at the stupidity of the big boned mook. "Are you mental? That was quite possibly the stupidest and most revolting thing I've seen someone do. You know nothing about us or what we're capable of, yet the first thing that came to mind was to inflict violence. To make matters worse, it is against you, your allies, and your employer's interest."

He then sighs and decides to stop with those few despite having a few more. "Either way, we were just passing by and saw something interesting. I don't know what you're on about, but I suggest you think carefully about the next action you take."

[Spore]

Seeing a knife pressed against his lower back makes the man loose his grip. He was armored security, but not stupid. The voice appearing in his head along with the white face his younger friend pulled made him retreat. He pulls back a few feet, carefully avoiding any swipes from the tiny murderer. I am not sorry for what I did. If you want to amend for your kind's misdeeds, come to the harbor administration. If allowed to, they will flee. People pass by you pretending not having noticed the incident. In areas such as this you kept your head down, and your mouth shut. Especially if Tonberry, axewielding maniacs and mages turning people into frogs were involved.

A few moments later you regroup a block away and have a moment to share your knowledge out of the eyes of the general public or hired dockworkers. The warehouse has a guarded main entrance. Three armed soldiers with rifles patrol it, but the hangar door is wide open. Inside you could see an elevated metal walkway to the left going to the end of the hall. It has a smaller walkway pointing towards the middle of the warehouse, seemingly to house an airship and to load an elevated compartment. On the right side Bert assumes there is a small office with a larger tilted window (it basically spins on an axle going through the middle of it, and is able to be locked in a closed position. One can reach the window by climbing a few trash containers on the right side. Inside and in the "courtyard" area of the warehouse you can see the boxes Eskha noticed. The contents of the insides are however a mystery to you yet. You are unsure if the building has a sewer access route that can fit through normal sized or even smaller creatures.

[Bayar]

Vanya spends some time smoking Cid's herbs and meditating with the twig to learn Stone, Air Bubble and Wind Runner. Once regrouped with the party : "Those are some nice uniforms. Oh, that gives me an idea! I was itching to try my hands at tailoring, perhaps in the future, we could make our own disguises."

will write the rest here

"Oww, bastard. I so despise people like that guy, abusing what little authority they have. You mentioned Asina Medical ? I heard they were trying to open a branch in Midgard until Shinra put an end to that and started their own medical division."

[Merilan]

"You okay, Vanya?" Eskha seems worried. "That was a rough encounter. Take it easy. Also, yeah..." She glances back. "Those crates are definitely from Asina. Which... I mean, that doesn't line up, exactly... if Shinra put a stop to their expansion plans, what're we looking at, here? Leftover stock from then? What're their keys doing by the Earth crystal, next to Shinra power outlet and waste output, unless..."

She frowns. "It could be sabotage. We could be looking at corporate espionage between the two here. But I'd expect their crates to be unlabelled, if they're pulling something underhanded. Or perhaps... as a medical company, they're trying to research the regenerative properties of the crystal, like we saw... under Shinra's noses...? Something doesn't quite add up."

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton frowns to himself at Eshka's description.

It sounds like we need to get a look inside those crates to find out what they're doing here. We can probably slip in through that office window that Bert found, but then I think at least I should stay there. Eshka needs to look in those crates and Bert can sneak around and look for anything else of interest.

If the alarm gets raised, I can help reinforce whoever is in trouble, but the longer we can go without starting trouble, the more we can find out."

[Dakrsidder]

Hearing what the others said made Yuki frown. “I was hoping that we’d be fighting failed experiments that Shinra wanted to hide from the public while looting victims. However, an important question to consider is, even if we managed to pull this off successfully, what would we even do with it? My guess is it’ll be information related. While I like knowing things as much as the other guy, what would we be able to do with it?"

“Once that’s cleared up, there’s the question of whether it’s currently worthwhile. I'm referring to things such as our chances of success and the risks of failure. I’m sure Bert is fine and on the assumption that my casting doesn't cause a problem, I could make sure I don’t fail, but I’m not sure about everyone else. As much as I’d love to know what they’re up to, I’m not sure about how worthwhile it is. I’d be more confident if we had more experience.”

[Merilan]

"The way I see it, there's two probable outcomes - Asina Medical is brazenly operating where they shouldn't be, or... more likely, Shinra is appropriating Asina Medical property after ousting them for their own ends -- given this is a Shinra warehouse," Eskha responds to Yuki after some more thought. "Which... could be useful leverage on our end, but... I'm not inclined to play that game against a corporation with much more funding and resources than us."

She shrugs. "It's all speculation without knowing more."

[Spore]

As you converse in a bigger pile for a few minutes, you pick out a hooded figure sneaking around the compound at the wall side Bert used. A number of three intricate finger gestures akin to magic later the person vanishes, but the Tonkin can hear their footsteps rising and the figure climbing inside.

Moments later a large explosion happens straight down the street. You look over there and a humanoid shape falls down, scorched by fire and still ablaze. A small person with a wide-brimmed hat with a rod adorned with a crystal pulls from their vantage point atop another warehouse. Guards quickly rush to help the victim.

[Gyrfalcon]

Anton curses as the explosion rocks the warehouse district, sending everyone into high alert. ”Son of a submariner!”

The presence of someone breaking into the same warehouse they wanted to investigate solidifies his resolve. ”If we want to learn anything here, this is now our one and only chance. Come on or hang back, but now is the time to move.”

Done talking, he heads for the window entrance into the warehouse, letting the person screaming on fire attract attention.

[Merilan]

"This is reckless...!" Eskha grimaces, but she knows full well that if they leave it too long, the warehouse will become the scene of a crime -- one that'll virtually become inaccessible to them. She follows suit into the window entrance.

[Dakrsidder]

As the sneak thief makes his way in and a burning corpse falls, Yuki stands there dumbfounded. Once Anton and Eskha dash at the opportunity, he blinks a few times before a thought passes his mind. “This must be the plot of some sinister god, but gosh darn it, I’ll have to go through with it.” With that, Yuki follows the two from behind.

[Spore]

As Anton peeks inside, he sees less chaos than anticipated. Each 'dock worker' seemingly has a certain position, and some are pulling rifles from smaller metal crates mounted at the west and east walls while two are designated with sealing the entrances. In the courtyard you hear a magitek loader revving to bring the merchandise inside. The foreman is inside a little windowed bureau atop the warehouse, with a hand on his ear and another hand on some controls. You can see the hooded figure appear behind him hitting the boss man and dropping him.

Eskha knows the protocols. This is not some workers who fear for their lives. These are trained professionals, some paramilitary or soldiers.


This is a basic maneuver. Secure the facility, defend and call for backup.
You notice there are some civilians aka hired helps involved who are kept outside by threat of the armed guards.The Garlean Empire does take no priority in protecting non-Garlean lives in situations like these.

Yuki can hear remarkably little screams of anguish or fear. Either civilians cavated the premises, or they were removed already. You notice the mage appearing atop the building again, this time exploding the northern console to close the gate. It is covered in a salvo of rifle fire, some of which is dodged or absorbed by a magical shield.