Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="JollyDoc" data-source="post: 6779699" data-attributes="member: 9546">Coup de Tat24 Calistril, 4716 - 27 Calistril, 4716 Boris stood alone in the hours before dawn inside the temple of Gozreh. He had lit a single candle and placed it on the altar."That for you, Zula, thunder-voice lady," he said, sniffing. "You always good to Boris, and Boris hope that, wherever you are, someone there to cook you good food like Boris."The little goblin had already visited a local orphanage in Enganoka earlier that night and made an anonymous donation in his friend's name. He turned away from the altar and made his way back through the sanctuary. Tomorrow, he and his friends were departing for Shuryo Onsen, the daimyo's hunting lodge. They were going to assassinate the governor, and Boris had no problem with that. He held anyone who served the Jade Regent responsible for Zula's death, and had made a vow to himself and before her patron, Gozreh, that he would kill every one of them.___________________________________________________The companions made their final preparations in silence, saddling their horses and strapping on their gear. The shock of the loss of Zula was still a raw nerve to all of them, and they tensed at every odd noise and stray shadow, wary that the assassin could be anywhere. So it was, that when a middle-aged, bald Tien man wearing a blue robe belted with a wide girdle approached them, all of their hands went immediately to their weapons. "Please," the man said, showing empty hands, "I mean no harm. My name is Akiro Higashiyama, and I was sent to you by a vision from my goddess, Shizuru. I know that you," he nodded towards Ameiko, "are the last scion of House Amatatsu. Long ago, I too was descended from royalty, though I assure you, I lay no claim to the Emerald Throne. I only wish to see the Jade Regent deposed, and the rightful ruler take her place.""Why should we trust you?" Haroldo hissed, his sword already half out of its scabbard. Akiro pointed towards the samisen slung across Ameiko's back."Your instrument, my Lady," he said. "Use it. Find the truth in my words."Ameiko eyed him for several moments, then drew out the samisen. She strummed several chords, and her eyes clouded over. A moment later, she snapped back to reality."The Eternal Scion," she said. "That is what you are called"I have been called this," Akiro nodded, "among many other things.""You are samsaren," Ameiko continued, "one of the reincarnated. But yout skin...?""Not blue," Akiro smiled, "or at least not that you can see. I have found it beneficial to disguise some of my features. There are some who do not trust people who have lived many lifetimes.""Including me!" Haroldo growled."Easy, my friend," Ameiko laid a hand on the big warrior's shoulder. "We can trust this one. The samisen does not lie. You have arrived at a sad and perilous time, Akiro. You may regret the onus placed upon you by your goddess.""Perhaps," Akiro shrugged, "but if I do not survive, there is always another life to be lived."______________________________________________________________Shuryo Onsen lay in the wooded hills east of Sakakabe. The laborers working on it were housed in a camp connected to the lodge by a narrow, sloping footpath, which served as the only way to traverse the rugged terrain without considerable difficulty. It was in those deep woods that the companions found the 9 Pawns. The ronin had placed a large stack of logs on top of a slope overlooking the footpath so that it could be toppled to form a roadblock. It was their plan to take out a few of the guards along the path, and then cut the logs loose to create a roadblock, by which point Ameiko and her friends should have reached the lodge and could begin their assault. The leader of the ronin explained that he and his men could exploit the favorable terrain to keep at bay the soldiers in the camp, who otherwise would rush to help their lord once the alarm was raised. He also advised approaching the lodge from the rear entrance. It would be the least heavily guarded.Lucian led the Scions to a low hill overlooking the lodge itself. It was a sizable wooden building surrounded by a stout wooden palisade. A single gate in the south wall of the palisade connected to the footpath, while a double gate in the north wall gave access to the hunting trails of the forest.  Lucian could see over the wall from their vantage point, and spotted a small rear door in the lodge."There," he pointed. "Everyone gather around me."His companions did so, and the oracle mentally measured the distance between them and the door, then added an additional twenty-feet or so to his calculation. He spoke a prayer, and the group vanished in a flash of light. When they reappeared, they found themselves in an interior corridor inside the lodge. The door Lucian had seen was now behind them.  Lining the corridor were rice-paper shoji doors on both sides. From behind the nearest of these, voices could be heard. More voices came from further down the hall. Sandru crept stealthily to the near door."Did you hear that?" a low, rumbling voice asked from the other side."No, I didn't hear anything," another voice replied, distracted. "I asked not to be disturbed.""Probably nothing," the first voice said. "One of the men coming to report progress on the latrine, or some such. I'll get rid of him.""Bound to find out sooner or later," Haroldo whispered from behind Sandru as he reached out to slide the shoji panel open.A few low tables and comfortable chairs were scattered throughout the large room beyond the door. Martial banners decorated the walls, and paper lanterns hung from the rafters, softly illuminating the chamber. A huge, blue-skinned hulk of a creature stood on the opposite side of the door, a large tetsubo resting on one shoulder. Behind him a figure dressed in head-to-toe, green o-yoroi armor leaned over a table with several parchments unfurled on its surface. The giant blinked in confusion for a moment as he saw Haroldo and the other companions gathered in the hall beyond him. Then he grinned broadly, small tusks protruding from his undershot jaw."This might require your attention after all, Lord Sikutsu," he said.The giant raised his massive club, but before he could even think about trying to swing it, he cried out in pain, and his left knee buckled beneath him. Behind him, Boris, who had crept into the room under cover of his invisibility ring, tumbled away, his wakizashi blade dripping blood from where he'd thrust it into the soft space behind the oni's kneecap. As the giant fell hard onto that one knee, Haroldo's sword met him, stabbing deep into his chest. From behind the blood-rager, Lucian's bow twanged as a single arrow sank into the oni's throat. At that moment, the air in chamber began to hum with power. An instant later, a dozen figures suddenly appeared throughout the room. They were humanoid, but their heads were those of large ravens, and they bore black feathers instead of skin. They were armed with katanas and wakizashis, and they quickly began to fan out and surround the companions."Oh frak!" Haroldo cried out. "Fall back!"As his allies did so, the blood-rager called up his limited magic to release an explosive ball of flame into the room. It instantly incinerated the shoji walls, but the raven-headed guards all leaped nimbly clear of the bulk of the blast. Sikutsu and the oni were not so evasive, and the fire scorched them thoroughly."Nicely done," Akiro said from beside Haroldo. "I never expected one with your...skills...to be capable of such feats. Allow me to demonstrate a few of my own abilities."The wizard shook back his sleeves, spoke a few arcane words, and hurled a green-tinged ball into the midst of the chamber. It exploded into a great conflagration of liquid acid, but where any of the companions stood, the energy seemed to flow around them, excluding them from the blast. Most of the guards still managed to avoid it, but a few bore smoking burns upon their skin. More importantly, once the blast had cleared, the big oni lay dead on the floor.The battle boiled out of the chamber and into the corridor and another adjoining room, revealed once its paper walls had been burned out of existence. The tengu guards were fast and accurate with their weapons, and they had the companions outnumbered two-to-one. Still, these were no ordinary assassins they were dealing with, and the Scions began steadily whittling away at their numbers, while at the same time keeping Sikutsu from the thick of the battle by forcing him to seek cover from both Miyaro's and Lucian's arrows. Suddenly, a door on the opposite side of the room opened, and a number of human samurai rushed through, quickly surrounding Sikutsu in a protective ring. Akiro threw another acid ball into the melee, but this time, he also excluded the samurai from the blast, as well as his companions. When the smoke cleared again, Sikutsu lay unmoving on the ground."Your daimyo is dead!" Ameiko called out to the samurai. "You are free of his tyranny! Pledge your loyalty to me, the rightful heir to House Amatatsu, and you will be honored warriors in my army!"The samurai looked at one another dubiously, and then down at their fallen lord. As one, they turned the blades of their katanas towards their own bellies."No!" Ameiko screamed, but it was too late.The samurai, in unison, thrust their blades into their bodies, disemboweling themselves in ritual sepuku. The remaining tengu did not give up so easily, and the battle pitched back and forth for several more minutes before the last of them finally died. "Listen," Haroldo said, cocking his head as the din of the melee faded.In the distance, they all heard it. A hunting horn sounding."We need to go," he said. "We have done what we came for."Ameiko looked, grief-stricken, upon the fallen samurai, then shook her head once."Yes," she said. "We have done enough."</blockquote>

Verification