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Message: <blockquote data-quote="drnuncheon" data-source="post: 545917" data-attributes="member: 96">Returning to the intersection...to the left, the cavern and exit. Ahead, the shaft opens to another cavern at the edge of Harvester's light...to the right, it disappears into blackness."The other cavern," suggests Sen-Jyu from the back, his voice distant and faded.Ahoke shrugs, moving towards the right hand cavern. "Alright," she says, "Let's go see what wonders there are to be seen."  She moves in whichever direction that Sen-Jyu seemed to be talking about.The cave here must have been a copper mine - the wide open expanse of rough-hewn walls is testament to that. Rotted wooden pillars hold the roof up - at least, in some places. In others, the ceiling has partially collapsed, leaving piles of rubble on the floor. Patches of slime glisten on the ground, and a pool of an unnaturally bright azure hue glimmers at the edge of the light.The cavern is large enough that the light does not illuminate it all.  You cannot see the far wall, nor the left.Harvester murmurs softly, "I do not care for cavernous pools..." He approaches slowly, cautiously."... of an unnaturally bright azure hue," adds Sen-Jyu warily.Ahoke pauses, looking at the blue glimmering. "What...?" She pauses, looking around and getting her bearings. "Slime never means anything good," she states authoritatively.The pool is large - thirty feet wide at least at the end that the light illuminates.Ahoke picks up a piece of rock. "Step back." She then tosses the rock and tosses it underhand to the center of the pool. "Let's see what happens."*plorp* - the rock vanishes into the depths.Ahoke hmms. "Well, that was disappointing. Harv, you should go up and dip your toe in, see what happens."Sen-Jyu grins. "I agree. It will probably find you the most delectable of the three of us."Ahoke scowls over at the bright blue thing. "Is that what the brain shards were made out of? And if so... what do we do about it?"Harvester grunts at Ahoke. "No thanks... I _like_ having ten toes..." Instead he looks around for a suitable piece of wood to poke the pool with. A moment's seach turns up a piece of wood - rather rotted and slightly slimy - from one of the collapsed pillars."At the moment? Nothing." Sen-Jyu says decidedly. "I wouldn't even begin to know what to do with it if it -were- some sort of oni-spawning liquid. I think the safest course of action is still to find who's behind the brain-slivers and bring justice to them."Harvester hefts the length of wood after stowing the torch in his belt once more, and pokes the end of it into the edge of the pool, then begins to reach further outward with it.It gets wet.Ahoke nods. "Or kill them," she says agreeably. She falls silent, watching Harvester.The cleric's body blocks the divine glow emanating from the torch, casting weird shadows over the room - shadows that bother Ahoke's vision not at all, but Sen-Jyu's slightly more."I think it's just filled with some sort of underground algae," offers Sen-Jyu thoughtfully. "Very pretty, don't you think?"Harvester drops the piece of wood with a shrug. "Okay. it appears to just be your everyday, normal, bright blue pool of water..." He turns away to look about the rest of the cavern, torch once more in hand.Ahoke hrrms, looking dubiously at the bright blue crap. "Alright. Let's go back into the darkness, and see what's waiting to eat us there."Harvester nods to himself and approaches the nearest wall, and begins to traverse the perimeter of the cavern."Maybe we should finish looking through this room? Or have you already seen everything in it?" Sen-Jyu cocks his head to one side as he looks at Ahoke.Ahoke gestures off into the darkness. "there's another door over there anyway. I'm sure that we'll want to look into it."Harvester ears Ahoke's statement and turns. "Oh? Is that all? Well then, let's check it out..."Ahoke nods, and starts moving in that direction. "Yeah. I just noticed it," she admits. "But it bears looking at."Sen-Jyu falls to the rear again, keeping an eye out as the three approach the door.The doorway leads down a short corridor to another room - one that seems to have been an office, or a prison, or both: a rotted desk lies up against the back wall, while copper chains and manacles dangle from the right. In the center of the room, on the floor, lies a copper statue of a man with a dragon's head, covered in verdigris and limestone that has apparently dripped from the ceiling overhead, making tiny stalagmites on the statue's surface.Ahoke frowns as they move into the room. "It doesn't appear to have been disturbed for a long time," she says, "But this seems to be a bit strange of a place to have furniture... should we try to open some of the drawers?"Sen-Jyu moves to take place close to the statue, preparing to examine it more closely.Harvester nods to Ahoke. "Sure. Go for it." He moves to help at the desk, pausisng to look over the chains and manacle first.Ahoke walks over to the desk, peering at it. She then reaches down to try to remove one of the drawers. "It's locked," she grunts. "The wood is rotted.. maybe I should just smash it open with my club."Harvester looks over after a moment and muses, "Wonder why they had a 'prison' down here... unless it was one of Copperdeath's doings for those he couldn't control..." He nods to Ahoke, "Or just rip it open." He steps back.The wood of the desk crumbles away in front of Ahoke's club, spilling the contents out onto the floor: the rotted remnants of papers, blurred and illegible; a small jar; a wooden box; and a tiny copper figure of a soldier.Ahoke grunts triumphantly, and kneels to look at the jar, the box, and the soldier.Harvester stops the items from bouncing too far, with his foot. He, too, examines them, looking at the box first.Ahoke opens the jar, cautiously sniffing it. "Well, it used to be a liquid, or paste," she said. "But I don't know what it is now. I think it's pretty useless." She glances over to Harvester. "What's the box?"Sen-Jyu looks over the fallen statue, using what light he can to seek out details on it.Harvester murmurs to Ahoke, eyes twinkling as he looks in the box, "A box is normally a container that holds things, with six sides..." His mirth turns to surprise as it is opened, however. "Oh, my... I wonder what these might be... Five crystalline shards, though they differ from the pair we've already found. Larger, duller, and clear..." He reaches in a gloved hand to extract one.Frowning in concentration, Sen-Jyu sheathes Ichido-sama, placing both hands firmly on the statue's forearm. He then attempts to shift it in some manner, as if bending the arm at its elbow.  The arm moves with a squeal of protest, leaving a streak of bright copper where the corrosion has been rubbed away by the motion.Ahoke scowls at the shards. "Oh... so what did they do? Shove them into the brains of prisoners?" She looks over at Sen-Jyu then, when he starts making noise.Harvester shrugs at Ahoke while he nearly drops the crystal as Sen-Jyu's new friend shrieks. He looks over and replaces the shard in the box before stowing it, and reaches out to pick up the toy soldier. "Whatcha got there, Sen?""I'm not sure, but this statue may have once been... articulate. And is still, possibly, hollow." Sen-Jyu seeks further, searching as much with his hands as with his eyes.Harvester looks at Ahoke and clarifies, "Your guess is good as mine... That's my thinking, though." he agrees.Ahoke blinks. "An articulate statue? That's bizarre...." She looks back to Harvester. "Either that or the person that sat at this desk used them on himself. Or herself."Harvester shudders at the thought and raises the soldier to study it. "That'd be... ow. That'd definitely be 'ow'."Harvester whistles softly, then rises to face Sen-Jyu and the statue. "Uh... Sen? Can you step back a sec? Want to try something..."Sen-Jyu rises, stepping one pace back from the statue while he waits for what the Harvester intends to do.Ahoke takes a step back as well, as if expecting exposive action, for some reason. Maybe she knows Harvester too well. Maybe she's paranoid.Harvester holds up the toy soldier, "Completely untarnished... and complete with tiny joints... Maybe..." He slowly raises the right arm of the toy.Harvester grunts as he meets resistance. "I don't want to force it... maybe the statue's too corroded? He looks over the statue's current positioning and compares it to the toy. "I'm thinking this," he raises the figure, "controls that." He pushes the arm a bit harder.Eyeing the Harvester, Sen-Jyu says, "I think, if you're assuming that that is some sort of puppet to manipulate the statue, that the eyes -- or whatever -- of the statue need to be returned to it. Right now, its eyesockets are hollow." Shrugging, he adds, "That is, if I knew anything about magic."There is a bit more resistance, and then something inside the figurine gives way, and the arm flops freely. The larger statue does not move.Harvester says, "Oh, *&%#. That was so wrong..."Ahoke frowns, and starts looking around the room for statue eyes. "I don't /see/ any eyes. Maybe the crystal shards would make it work?"Sen-Jyu grins. "As I said, if I knew anything about magic... perhaps the Harvester can see whether or not either toy or statue are magical."Harvester sighs and nods at Sen-Jyu. "Should've tried that first." He sets the figure down and begins to cast.As Harvester sets the figure down, it stirs, and begins to march back and forth, the broken arm hanging sadly at its side as the other swings back and forth. Occasionally the right arm twitches a bit, but that is all.Ahoke blinks as the soldier starts marching around. "Umm... that isn't normal. Is it?" She looks up at the other two, truly bewildered. "My tribe /never/ had anything like this."Sen-Jyu clears his throat, then nods knowingly to Ahoke's question. "Magic," he states.Harvester blinks and looks at the marching figure. "Wha...." He grunts in displeasure at his barbaric heavy-handedness, then reaches up to his ear and removes something. He holds a little 'hearing trumpet' in his hand. A nod, the it is replaced. He reaches down to pick up the figure again for closer study. "This is magical, yes. As is the earring taken from the elven woman's ear."  As he picks up the figurine, it stops moving.Sen-Jyu kneels by the statue again, 'massaging' the joints to limberness as he did with the first. The echoes of squalling metal bounce off of the walls.Harvester sighs and gently rotates the loose arm, hoping that something inside catches it back into place. The arm swings merrily 'round and 'round.Ahoke scowls at the Harvester. "You were planning on revealing this earring to the rest of us at some point?"Harvester shakes his head to himself, then blinks at Ahoke. "Eh? Uh.... sorry. I found an earring, guys?"Sen-Jyu grins at Ahoke. "We all keep secrets. He just reveals his in time."Ahoke glares at Sen-Jyu, but keeps her own counsel. She turns her gaze back to Harvester, and waits.Sen-Jyu returns merrily to the statue and his cacophonic metal-on-metal screeching.Harvester shrugs a shoulder. "It just appeared to be an interesting earring. And I _did_ tell you the moment I learned its value, didn't I? So chill..." He carries his torch towards Sen-Jyu and the statue to look more closely.Sen-Jyu asks, "Do we have something that we'd care to place in this statue's eyesockets? Anything? If either one of you found some eyes that might fit this, you should speak up now."The magical glow from the torch appears to be dimming as the spell approaches its end.Ahoke continues scowling, and then turns to walk to the doorway leading outward. "No, I have found no eyes," she says stiffly.Harvester examines the eyesockets, then frowns at his light. He sets the torch down and quickly extracts flint and steel, attempting to set the torch alight with proper fire.No more storing it in his belt...the pitchy head of the torch catches a pair of sparks that the cleric is able to blow into actual flames."Hmmm," Sen-Jyu says, standing and prodding the statue with his foot. "No eyes for you. Sorry, friend." He looks about the rest of the room for possible niches for eyes."Maybe you're supposed to use your own eyes," muses Ahoke, looking around.Harvester glances towards Ahoke as she leaves, then searches.Ahoke does not, in fact, leave, but stands in the doorway.Ahoke sighs, looking over at the desk for a moment, and then clumps into the room. "There's something shiny, anyway," she says, approaching the desk. She reaches behind it, feeling around.Harvester turns to watch Ahoke, "Yeah?"Ahoke scowls, looking at the item. "It's not eyes, though." She holds up a beautifully made mirror - copper of course, covered with corrosion. She peers into the surface, trying to get a view of herself through said corrosion.Ahoke hmmphs. "Must've been an elf or something staying here." She brushes some of the crud off of the mirror. "It's going to have to be polished to be used properly.Harvester's head tilts as he regards the mirror. "Heh. Should be worth something, though..." He holds out the oty soldier. "You want to hang onto this, or shall I?"Ahoke glances from the mirror to the soldier. "You can, I don't want it crawling around inside my clothes." She looks down at the mirror, and then pockets it. "Hopefully this isn't an /evil/ mirror," she says, as if every other mirror she's run into has been.Sen-Jyu thinks about Ahoke's comment seriously for a moment. "I'm not sure that it would matter -- mirrors are notoriously inanimate."Harvester places the soldier into a pouch with a laugh. "I don't know about evil, but can say it ain't magic..." He looks at the empty eyesockets again. "Y'all wanted to put the crystals in this thing?"Ahoke looks over at the bigger statue. "It can't hurt to try, I guess? At the worst, we'll feel really silly. Or it will become animate, and kill us all."Harvester shakes his head. "Won't work. Maybe we'll find something somewhere else, that'll fit." He jerks a thumb outwards. "Want to push on?"Sen-Jyu smirks faintly. "Which would be much more interesting than it's been already."Ahoke mmms, and nods, moving to the door. "Onward. I guess we should explore the rest of the cavern, and then go on out to that shaft that we haven't looked at yet."Harvester follows the dwarf, once more.Ahoke moves back out into the cavern, and starts prowling around the outer perimeter.Harvester skirts around the edge of the large cavern as they pass through, his eyes picking fruitlessly through the flickering gloom.Ahoke ummms. "Guys? Stay away from the slime..."Harvester's foot was about to step in a patch, and he pauses, leg poised in midair. He steps back. "Why?" He moves further still. "What's with the slime?"Ahoke umms again. "I just kicked some wood into it... and the slime dissolved the wood. Really fast."Harvester blinks and regards the slime curiously now. "Really? How very interesting..." He takes a piece of wood and tosses it into a patch.The other patch - a bluish-green color - merely splatters a bit, leaving the wood unharmed.Ahoke scowls. "It did! I swear." She tosses a piece of wood into "her" patch to prove it.Harvester frowns, then picks up another piece of wood and moves - carefully - to Ahoke. "Which patch did it?Ahoke points at the offending algae patch. "that one," she said accusingly, as if it had just dissolved her foot."  "Ahoke's" patch does indeed melt the wood, the slime growing as the wood is transformed.Ahoke hmms. "Good thing I didn't decide to take a swim, get cleaned up. I was considering it, since one doesn't ever want to go into battle already dirty."Harvester peers at the patch thoughtfully, and murmurs, "What distinguishes this patch, from that, aside from its disolving ability...""Well. Wood-dissolving slime. I wonder what other purposes that could solve?" Sen-Jyu grins at the other two as he observes their scientific experiments.Harvester hmms to himself, then pulls out his pack. A bolt is extracted and the metal head is touched to the patch of algae.Harvester glances to Sen-Jyu, "Well, if it doesn't dissolve metal or glass, I intent to take some... I'm betting it'll hurt flesh..."Ahoke hmms. "Maybe that's what was in the jar, back in the other room."Harvester glances to Ahoke, "How's that?"The metal, too, slumps away as the slime begins to dissolve the bolt, working its way up towards Harvester's fingers.Harvester releases the bolt after trying to gauge the swiftness of the action.Ahoke shakes her head. "No, the stuff in the jar wasn't green. It was probably some kind of salve or something. I left it behind. But..." she says, "I guess that means that we won't be taking the slime with us?"Harvester remains thoughtful, then extracts and empty glass flask. He lowers it carefully, so that the edge of its lip touches the 'slime'.  The glass seems to be unharmed by the stuff.  He ponders aloud. "The trick will be to get this into the flask... Any thoughts? He examines his belongings."And... why are we getting this into the flask? Am I missing something?" The spirit blood pipes up with this rather innocent question.Ahoke shakes her head, not appearing to want to get near it. She looks over at Sen-Jyu, nodding her agreement. "I can see where it would be good to melt your enemies, but I'm not sure it's worth the risk of a leak."Harvester laughs softly in response to Sen-Jyu's query. "Imagine the efficacy of this stuff on flesh..." He nods to Ahoke, "I intend to be very, very careful..."Sen-Jyu flicks one hand in indication of Ichido-sama. "I think I can imagine the efficacy of many things on flesh. Thing is, one can be trained to use a sword. A little harder not to cut yourself with a glob of slime."Ahoke waits for Harvester to do his collecting, and starts prowling around again, looking at the cavern in all of its dank glory.Harvester sets the flask on dry ground, and finds some wood. He attempts to scoop and drip some slime into the flask, throwing the wood back into the patch - carefully - if it makes it way towards his fingers too swiftly.  A dollop of the slime is shoved inside the flask, along with the piece of wood, which melts happily into greenish sludge.Harvester sighs, in satisfaction, an exhalation of breath a sign of his relaxation through the process. He stoppers the flask carefully, then pulls out a ball of sealing wax to close the flask up tightly. He studies the container carefully, for signs of decay, then decides to coat the entirety with rapidly cooling wax.Harvester says, "I think I'll only do the one..." says the priest, as he opens an empty pouch and wraps the flask in cloth to place it inside. Sen-Jyu shakes his head a little. "Why you're even doing the one is beyond me. You mentioned something earlier about 'borrowing trouble', and now seem to be quite cheerfully ignoring those very words. Far be it for me to point these things out, however." Grinning, he looks at Ahoke. "So, fearless leader, back to the shaft?"Harvester laughs softly as he gently pats the pouch and follows, "It may cause trouble, yes, or it may avert some..."Ahoke nods. "Yeah," she says. "I haven't been able to find anything else." She does take the long way around the cavern though, giving everything a once-over."Hold," Sen-Jyu says suddenly, pausing by one of the other pools of slime.Harvester stops, and looks at Sen-Jyu. "What is it, Sen?"Sen-Jyu points to a flat rock next to the pool. Upon observation, some lettering is written there.Ahoke mmms. "What's it say?"Harvester shakes his head and reads it aloud, to Ahoke:Here lies Corum Mosstoes, dissolved before we could savehim. He was a friend and a hero. We know the child wastaken to the tunnels above us; we continue on as Corum would have wanted.                              Deke Forgeman                              Caliandra Stormhold                              Petros BellsonSen-Jyu sighs a little. "The halfling woman is going to be very unhappy."Harvester nods in agreement. "At least we're on the right track, though..."Ahoke nods, sighing. "Yeah. Maybe the heroes will continue to leave us clues, assuming that the rest of them don't fall into algae pits..." She looks at the marker with something akin to pity, and then turns. "To the shaft?"Sen-Jyu ponders, "Child? Not children? Which child could they mean?"Ahoke shrugs. "I guess there's only one way to find out," she says, moving towards the way back to the juncture.Harvester glances over. "Which was the last child taken?"Harvester nods as Ahoke moves off. "Right. Let's go and ask."Sen-Jyu ponders this. "Not sure. It probably was the first child taken -- assuming they mounted their expedition immediately after."Sen-Jyu follows Ahoke, too.Harvester pauses before moving away from the marker, "Hey, Corum... Say hello to the Lord for me..."</blockquote>

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