Adjo's Journals (15 of N)
Nov. 26th, 2008 11:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bluegargantuaHi,
Here I am, standing within one of the greatest arcane achievements in history and yet its greatness is buried under a mound of dirt, never to emerge and be seen in all its glory. Instead, it’s surrounded by ignorant barbarians who have no idea of its priceless value.
It’s as if the universe delights in setting up these endless metaphors for my life.
Yes, so the howling undead bearing down on us from my last entry. I hopped onto a nearby bier hoping to put a bit of elevation between me and whatever was headed in my direction. I was quite surprised to discover that nothing erupted from beneath my feet, but I was much less enthused to discover that exploding out from the sarcophagi around us were zombie war hounds. Further down the hall a brace of skeletal archers appeared and started peppering us.
The meat shields formed up in a line across the hall and for once I felt they would bear the brunt of the canine attack whilst I hammered them with fell magics. There were two dogs who’d appeared behind us but Reth and Kestrel seemed to have the matter well in hand. A third dog attempted to work it’s way down the side on my flank of the battle, but Alanna was there to fend it off.
At least, that was the plan. Reth completely failed to defend me and a dog jumped up and dragged me down. I blew it off the bier for Reth to handle, stood up brought more fire down on the front line of hounds menacing the meat shields and then blasted one of the skeleton archers into dust. It was at this point, more of those maggot monsters appeared and I had to make some tough decisions about where I would be directing my most potent magics.
Luckily, that little decision was taken care of when Reth yet again failed to stop the zombie warhound from leaping up and shoving me off the bier. So I stood up and blasted him off to let Reth deal with him (again!). There was still another hound in the area, but he was tied up with Alanna.
Or at least he was until Alanna moved off to blast the hound. Reth told her to go help the moron and I supposed that he meant me, but apparently he meant Taras or Thrace or Ander or Hendel or any one of the other meat shields who’d charged bravely forward into unconsciousness. So now Alanna threw good money after bad and went charging off to save them leaving me to be a zombie dog’s chew toy for a while.
In all the excitement I missed the fact that Shay disappeared. It’s as if the universe just stops paying attention to him and he vanishes. There’s a trick I’d love to learn. But that’s all right, our bacon got saved by some random guy who popped up from one of the sarcophagi.
His name is So and he’s an Elf or Eladrain or something. What’s he doing here you might ask? Well, he was exploring some ruins thousands of miles away in another country altogether, found this really long tunnel and wound up here. Sure. Why not? That’s probably exactly what happened. I haven’t had a lot of time to interrogate him on the matter because he spotted some angry ghosts in the distance.
We had reached the end of the hallway and found ourselves faced with a large door. With some fiddling, Kestrel determined that the key was some large, round object. We all turned to Taras who had the magical shield of that captain we dug up in the forest. Sure enough, it fit the lock and was consumed in a fiery burst of light that shot down the hallway and destroyed or drove off the oncoming ghosts.
Once inside, we found a stairwell down which led to another disintegration barrier. This one would only open to the name of the captain’s mother, a piece of trivia not recorded in his journal. I wandered the formidable grounds of my Cathedral of Memory and made an educated guess. Once again, I let Taras do the honors and once again, I was vindicated as the barrier dropped and allowed us access to the hallway beyond.
At the end of this hallway was a baroque set of interlocking platinum plates with a large slot in the middle. There was the usual boilerplate about how disturbing this place would bring death and destruction to all trespassers blah-blah-blah. We had a long discussion about opening the door and continuing or resting up after our protracted fights. Many of my defenders are exhausted and have expended their most impressive displays of martial prowess. I retain a full suite of options, of course, but with my meat shields so depleted (and apparently unable to do their jobs in normal times), I had some concern over pressing on. This had to be contrasted with the very real possibility that another pirate group could reach the prize first. Worse, if another group of pirates showed up at the disintegration door behind us, they would disturb our rest and we’d be forced to go through the door anyway.
After much complaining all around we did what we had to do. The door was pathetically easy to unlock, the slot was a perfect fit for the captain’s sword. The platinum plates fell away (and promptly turned to ash, the bastards). And we entered a large room.
With a flying boat in it.
FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT!
Yes, it almost fills the room and is larger than any of the five entrances into the room (five ways into this room, five entrances into the complex…huh). The ceiling is high but solid. My best guess is that they fitted out this room, landed the boat and then put in the ceiling over the top. We’ll never get this thing out of here. But oh, if only we could. The joy of telling Dunhouse where he can stick it before flying off someplace sunny and warm would be rapturous.
We came in near the aft? stern? The back. We came in near the back. There was an open gantry ramp up to a large door. Over the door was the name of the ship the Dauntless. Kestrel picked open the door and we walked into a small cargo bay almost filled up with a large, heavily armored metal box on wheels. Since there didn’t seem to be any common wagon or carriage driver arrangements I can only conclude that this is another sort of wheeled magical conveyance.
[Here the writing goes blurry.]
Sorry, I seem to have drooled all over myself and these pages.
It was at this point we hear a distant crash and some shouts off behind another hallway. Time is of the essence. Kestrel and Thrace explore in one direction, Reth and I go another and the bulk of the team stays behind to defend the ramp. Ander found some control mechanism to close the rear doors and is working at that. Thrace seems to have found some elaborate defense mechanism. Shoving it out the gun port she also discovered pirates approaching from…starboard? Starboard. And Kestrel found the control room and some death knights.
So now we’ve got angry pirates outside, angry death knights inside, we’re completely beat up and exhausted. Situation is excellent. I shall attack.
[NOTES: FLYING BOAT! Also, despite being dog kibble for most of the fight, Adjo at least still has his daily on hand and over half his healing surges left.]
later
Tom
Here I am, standing within one of the greatest arcane achievements in history and yet its greatness is buried under a mound of dirt, never to emerge and be seen in all its glory. Instead, it’s surrounded by ignorant barbarians who have no idea of its priceless value.
It’s as if the universe delights in setting up these endless metaphors for my life.
Yes, so the howling undead bearing down on us from my last entry. I hopped onto a nearby bier hoping to put a bit of elevation between me and whatever was headed in my direction. I was quite surprised to discover that nothing erupted from beneath my feet, but I was much less enthused to discover that exploding out from the sarcophagi around us were zombie war hounds. Further down the hall a brace of skeletal archers appeared and started peppering us.
The meat shields formed up in a line across the hall and for once I felt they would bear the brunt of the canine attack whilst I hammered them with fell magics. There were two dogs who’d appeared behind us but Reth and Kestrel seemed to have the matter well in hand. A third dog attempted to work it’s way down the side on my flank of the battle, but Alanna was there to fend it off.
At least, that was the plan. Reth completely failed to defend me and a dog jumped up and dragged me down. I blew it off the bier for Reth to handle, stood up brought more fire down on the front line of hounds menacing the meat shields and then blasted one of the skeleton archers into dust. It was at this point, more of those maggot monsters appeared and I had to make some tough decisions about where I would be directing my most potent magics.
Luckily, that little decision was taken care of when Reth yet again failed to stop the zombie warhound from leaping up and shoving me off the bier. So I stood up and blasted him off to let Reth deal with him (again!). There was still another hound in the area, but he was tied up with Alanna.
Or at least he was until Alanna moved off to blast the hound. Reth told her to go help the moron and I supposed that he meant me, but apparently he meant Taras or Thrace or Ander or Hendel or any one of the other meat shields who’d charged bravely forward into unconsciousness. So now Alanna threw good money after bad and went charging off to save them leaving me to be a zombie dog’s chew toy for a while.
In all the excitement I missed the fact that Shay disappeared. It’s as if the universe just stops paying attention to him and he vanishes. There’s a trick I’d love to learn. But that’s all right, our bacon got saved by some random guy who popped up from one of the sarcophagi.
His name is So and he’s an Elf or Eladrain or something. What’s he doing here you might ask? Well, he was exploring some ruins thousands of miles away in another country altogether, found this really long tunnel and wound up here. Sure. Why not? That’s probably exactly what happened. I haven’t had a lot of time to interrogate him on the matter because he spotted some angry ghosts in the distance.
We had reached the end of the hallway and found ourselves faced with a large door. With some fiddling, Kestrel determined that the key was some large, round object. We all turned to Taras who had the magical shield of that captain we dug up in the forest. Sure enough, it fit the lock and was consumed in a fiery burst of light that shot down the hallway and destroyed or drove off the oncoming ghosts.
Once inside, we found a stairwell down which led to another disintegration barrier. This one would only open to the name of the captain’s mother, a piece of trivia not recorded in his journal. I wandered the formidable grounds of my Cathedral of Memory and made an educated guess. Once again, I let Taras do the honors and once again, I was vindicated as the barrier dropped and allowed us access to the hallway beyond.
At the end of this hallway was a baroque set of interlocking platinum plates with a large slot in the middle. There was the usual boilerplate about how disturbing this place would bring death and destruction to all trespassers blah-blah-blah. We had a long discussion about opening the door and continuing or resting up after our protracted fights. Many of my defenders are exhausted and have expended their most impressive displays of martial prowess. I retain a full suite of options, of course, but with my meat shields so depleted (and apparently unable to do their jobs in normal times), I had some concern over pressing on. This had to be contrasted with the very real possibility that another pirate group could reach the prize first. Worse, if another group of pirates showed up at the disintegration door behind us, they would disturb our rest and we’d be forced to go through the door anyway.
After much complaining all around we did what we had to do. The door was pathetically easy to unlock, the slot was a perfect fit for the captain’s sword. The platinum plates fell away (and promptly turned to ash, the bastards). And we entered a large room.
With a flying boat in it.
FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT! FLYING BOAT!
Yes, it almost fills the room and is larger than any of the five entrances into the room (five ways into this room, five entrances into the complex…huh). The ceiling is high but solid. My best guess is that they fitted out this room, landed the boat and then put in the ceiling over the top. We’ll never get this thing out of here. But oh, if only we could. The joy of telling Dunhouse where he can stick it before flying off someplace sunny and warm would be rapturous.
We came in near the aft? stern? The back. We came in near the back. There was an open gantry ramp up to a large door. Over the door was the name of the ship the Dauntless. Kestrel picked open the door and we walked into a small cargo bay almost filled up with a large, heavily armored metal box on wheels. Since there didn’t seem to be any common wagon or carriage driver arrangements I can only conclude that this is another sort of wheeled magical conveyance.
[Here the writing goes blurry.]
Sorry, I seem to have drooled all over myself and these pages.
It was at this point we hear a distant crash and some shouts off behind another hallway. Time is of the essence. Kestrel and Thrace explore in one direction, Reth and I go another and the bulk of the team stays behind to defend the ramp. Ander found some control mechanism to close the rear doors and is working at that. Thrace seems to have found some elaborate defense mechanism. Shoving it out the gun port she also discovered pirates approaching from…starboard? Starboard. And Kestrel found the control room and some death knights.
So now we’ve got angry pirates outside, angry death knights inside, we’re completely beat up and exhausted. Situation is excellent. I shall attack.
[NOTES: FLYING BOAT! Also, despite being dog kibble for most of the fight, Adjo at least still has his daily on hand and over half his healing surges left.]
later
Tom
no subject
Date: 2008-11-26 05:40 pm (UTC)I know!
My admiral hat shall blot out the sun!
Tom