Sagiro's Story Hour Returns (new thread started on 5/18/08)
- Thread starter Sagiro
- Start date
1...and lo, a silence fell across the land. For the update was over, the message board grown still.
2 And a voice spake into the chasm, saying thus: I am the LORD. I am the roller of fractional dice, the maker of dead goats.
3 I am He that has too much time on His hands. I am the Politically-Correct killer of merriment. In Me does all life wither and look dejectedly at the floor. In Me songs die and hopes are dashed into bland meaninglessness. In Me does the ego splinter. In Me is the source of magic, and I am That which shatters a really good wisecrack beyond all hope of repair. I, the LORD, do all these things.
4 And the lake was still and silent, and nary a ripple moved across it that was not Shrugged at most blankly.
******
Hm. Decent writing, no?
2 And a voice spake into the chasm, saying thus: I am the LORD. I am the roller of fractional dice, the maker of dead goats.
3 I am He that has too much time on His hands. I am the Politically-Correct killer of merriment. In Me does all life wither and look dejectedly at the floor. In Me songs die and hopes are dashed into bland meaninglessness. In Me does the ego splinter. In Me is the source of magic, and I am That which shatters a really good wisecrack beyond all hope of repair. I, the LORD, do all these things.
4 And the lake was still and silent, and nary a ripple moved across it that was not Shrugged at most blankly.
******
Hm. Decent writing, no?
Sagiro
Rodent of Uncertain Parentage
Sagiro’s Story Hour, Part 267
Killer Magic Rats
The first thing that occurs to Aravis and Grey Wolf when the rage subsides is that it’s uncomfortably hot, standing so close to a wall of fire. It’s not long before it and the various blade barriers vanish, leaving the Company in a suddenly quiet cavern. Grey Wolf takes a few steps and picks up Bostock.
Grey Wolf! What happened to you?
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Grey Wolf grumbles.
You were not yourself.
“That would be an accurate summary, yes.”
You seem to have recovered. Are we out of danger? Are there more foes to be slain?
It appears not. The giants fled either in the direction from which the Company arrived, or into the vertical shaft in the ceiling, and there’s no sign of them returning.
“Who wants healing?” calls Dranko.
“Me!” says Kibi, eager to be first in line. Then, always practical, he adds: “Let’s not forget to collect the loot!”
The chain-things and null shadows left nothing of value behind, but a search of Guztha’s corpse nets four magic items: a mithril shirt, a silver ring, an ebony wand, and a short sword. What they were hoping to find – but don’t – was some correspondence to or from the Emperor. (In fact, Guztha had never returned to Emperor Naloric after his first failure. One does not go before the Emperor with a vital task unfinished if one expects to live. No, having realized he was up against casters, he had gone for the null shadow globe and a pair of ragewind tokens before picking up the scent of the Company again and planning an ambush.)
“I told you he had a backup plan,” says Morningstar.
“I wonder how he found us again so fast?” muses Aravis.
“I think it’s your blood,” says Kibi. “I think he just... knows where you are.”
There’s a flurry of random discussions while some more healing is applied. Bostock manages to convince Grey Wolf not to decapitate Guztha’s body out of hand. There’s talk of casting speak with dead on Guztha’s corpse but it never gets further than that. There’s also the worry that they’ll possibly be leading more pursuers right to Cranchus, but Aravis points out that there’s no use worrying about that as they can hardly turn back now. They should just go as quickly as they can to minimize the danger.
These conversations cease as Dranko holds up a hand and motions for quiet. In the silence that follows, everyone hears a noise from the ceiling shaft. It sounds like a giant is slowly descending the ladder – maybe trying to sneak down and away now that the fighting has stopped.
Dranko readies his whip, moves to stand near the ladder and starts counting meaningfully downward from five. The giant responds in his foreign giantish tongue, and while his voice sounds panicky he keeps descending, until he finally drops down into the cavern next to Dranko. He looks down and raises his club.
“You know,” says Kibi. “You still look like a rat.”
Dranko practically smacks his forehead. “Oh, for the love of...”
He strikes several times with his whip, though only to subdue. The giant, faced with a vicious whip-wielding rat, grabs the ladder and flees for his life back up the shaft.
“You’re going to be single-handedly responsible for putting their whole race off of rats as food,” smirks Grey Wolf.
A thorough exploration of the back of the cavern reveals an exit tunnel, which, after it bends a few times over the course of fifty yards, ends at a thick wooden wall with a giant-sized door. They retreat back to the battle-cave where Morningstar spends fifteen minutes praying for a new find the path. Hiding as best they can at the original front-end of the cave, they hear the sound of the giant again, dropping down from the shaft. No one thinks it’s worth bothering the poor thing at this point, and they listen to its retreating footsteps as it runs toward the giantish door. They hear a loud banging, followed by some giantish talk and a door creaking open. A few seconds later they hear it close again, followed by the noise of a bar dropping.
No surprise – the find the path indicates they need to go through that door after all. It’s only a matter of minutes to walk back to it, at which point Aravis casts gaseous form on himself and slips underneath to see what’s on the other side. He sees a giant sitting in a huge chair with his back to the door. He doesn’t see Aravis, but does seem nervous and generally on the alert. Aravis slips back under the door, and there’s a brief discussion on how to proceed.
Kibi finally activates his Ioun stone of tongues and shouts out:
“Hey, Mr. Giant over there! We’re going to pass through. We don’t mean you any harm. Er... unless you get in our way.”
“Who’s that?” barks the giant. They can hear the sound of him jumping up from his chair.
“Who do you think it is?” asks Kibi.
“I don’t know,” answers the giant.
“You’ve noticed strange things happening recently, right?” prompts Kibi.
“Um. I haven’t seen anything, but... are you a rat?”
“Maybe I am a rat,” says Kibi menacingly. “Maybe I’m the ghost of every rat you giants have ever torn limb from limb or bashed with a club!”
“What?” replies the Giant, now sounding confused.
“I think that’s too much for him to understand,” says Aravis.
Kibi sighs. “Let us through, and we’ll just leave you alone. We won’t have to break down your door or hurt anyone.”
“You can’t break the door,” answers the giant. “You’re a rat!”
“Are you going to do what we ask, or not?” asks Kibi. “You’ll regret it if you don’t...”
“Shoo!” barks the giant. “Shoo!”
Aravis cracks his knuckles. “Are we ready to go?”
There are nods all around, and Aravis casts disintegrate on the door. The entire thing turns to dust. The bar falls with a clank and the giant leaps back.
“We warned you!” says Kibi.
The giant stares down at the pack of rats and the remains of the door. A moment later he is running away down the tunnel, screaming at the top of his lungs. “Help! Killer magic rats! Help, help! Killer Rats! Killer magic rats!”
“That was awesome!” says Dranko.
“Most impressive,” Grey Wolf agrees.
“Do you think these things work for Crunchy?” ponders Morningstar.
“I think it’s possible he enjoys having them there,” says Aravis, “though I doubt they work for him.”
Dranko chimes in. “My theory is that, now, in this point in time, Cranchus is evil. That’s why he has evil giants working for him. And it’s going to fall to us to turn him good.”
“I don’t believe it,” says Kibi, affronted. “I’m sure he’s good.”
They continue on, following the find the path. It leads them through a snaking giant-sized tunnel which eventually opens into an truly enormous bowl-shaped cavern, easily several hundred yards on a side. They are up near the lip of the bowl, looking down upon the wooden and stone buildings of a giantish town.
“A ha!” says Dranko. “That shaft leads to their goat farm up on the surface. They drop down the goats for food to feed the village. It also explains how the bad guys got there before us. They came down the goat shaft.”
According to Morningstar’s spell, the best way to proceed has them going around the rim of the cavern, avoiding the town altogether. They can hear some commotion in the town, and in the light of torches they can see a dozen or so giants gathered in a central square. Kibi strains to hear, and it sounds like one is explaining that there might be an attack of super-rats, and they need to be prepared to defend the town. There’s laughter at this notion.
“Just go back and get the goats, will you?”
Kibi stifles a laugh.
* *
The way out is much like the way in. This time the giant guarding the door is facing them, but word of the invading rat army hasn’t yet gotten this far. It eyes the rats with detached interest.
“Let us through!” demands Kibi.
The giant looks around. “Who’s there?”
“We’re the magic rats!” says Kibi. “Let us through.”
“Talking rats?”
The giant stands and takes a step toward them.
“Open the door, and we’ll never bother you again. Otherwise we’ll blow your door down and rats will attack your village!”
The giant chuckles. “You’re talking rats... talking rats... heh.”
“I’m warning you,” says Kibi. “Let us...”
The giant reaches down to pick up Kibi, but Dranko is ready for this. He whips the giant’s hand, and the giant yanks his arm back in pain.
“Ow!” he bellows.
“Let us through,” says Kibi.
The giant peers down at the assembled rats.
“I’m going to have to discuss this with the chief,” he says nervously.
“He won’t believe you,” says Kibi. “It be easier for everyone if you just let us through.”
The giant reaches down again, this time for Kibi’s nonexistent tail.
“Hey,” says the giant, puzzled. “What the...”
The next warning shot is a lightning bolt from Aravis.
“Aargh! Hey!”
“We warned you,” sighs Kibi.
“Er... right,” says the giant. “Um... wait here! I’m getting the chief.”
And with that, the giant takes off running toward the town. A few minutes later he’s going to be surprised at how seriously everyone in Smashtown takes his warning.
While the giant flees, the Company uses the giant’s chair to reach and lift the bar on the door. On the other side, Aravis casts arcane lock on the door once they’re through.
Find the path leads them down yet more giantish tunnels, always sloping downward, always getting just a little bit warmer. A few minutes later they find another wall-and-door blocking the passage, but it’s long been abandoned, the door hanging open and the chair rotting.
On the other side, the find the path starts to waver, even though it’s not due to expire for many more minutes. This seems like a good place to stop for the day and set up rope tricks.
“Ordinarily I’d complain about being stuck in this featureless room again,” says Flicker, once he’s climbed the rope. “But it’s hardly more claustrophobic than outside, and it’s much cooler.”
They use the opportunity to identify the magic items taken from Guztha. These include a greater ring of cold resistance (which he had acquired specifically because of Morningstar), a wand of spell immunity (which was specifically to insulate himself from dimensional anchor), a mithril shirt, and a +3 short sword of sure-striking.
* *
Morningstar’s find the paths may no longer be functioning, but as there’s only one way to continue the Company decides to press on until they reach a branch in the tunnel. For another hour the passage heads gently downward, and everyone is starting to sweat.
“Kibi!” exclaims Scree suddenly. “Do you feel that? It’s... it’s a little like Het Branoi. There’s Earth Magic coming from somewhere.”
Kibi stops and concentrates. Yes! It’s faint, but he can sense it in the rock around him.
“Hey!” he says out loud. “It’s kind of thrummy around here.”
“Describe ‘thrummy,’” says Aravis.
“Like Het Branoi,” explains Kibi. “There’s Earth Magic here.”
That prompts Morningstar to try casting another sending to Cranchus, but there’s still no reply. It’s hot enough now that the casters make sure everyone has an endure elements active.
They forge ahead and downward, leaving the giants far behind. (Not surprisingly, there is no sign of pursuit.) They start to see beetles in greater numbers, and a thick lichen growing on the warm tunnel walls. It begins to creep into some of their minds that they might have missed some concealed branch and be headed for who-knows-where, when Dranko (still on point) sees that up ahead the tunnel opens into another large space illuminated by a ruddy glow. Scouting ahead he finds that the cavern is huge, extending past the range of his darkvision in all directions. More significantly, though, this new cavern is bisected by a tremendous chasm, a hundred feet across and at least that deep. A river of lava runs along the chasm floor, and it’s this that provides the illumination. Dranko peers down into it and feels the heat blast upward into his face.
A bit more scouting reveals that there’s no way out of the cavern (aside from how they came in) on this side of the chasm. There’s a broken-off stub of a stone bridge that extends maybe twenty or thirty feet over the lava-filled ravine. Dranko casts detect magic and finds that the bridge is real and solid enough, for as far as it goes. He laments not having Kay around to check for traps.
When the rest of the party gets the all-clear from Dranko, Morningstar arrives firsts and casts three thought captures at the foot of the bridge.
The first thought: It’s going to take forever to smash this bridge.
The second thought: I hope Smash is right about the things not flying.
She guesses that both of the these thoughts are from one of the giants.
The third thought is from Dranko: Nope, not an illusion!
Kibi examines the broken bridge, musing on its strength and construction and what it must have taken to destroy it. He makes the mistake of using the word “buttress” within earshot of Dranko, who immediately starts to chuckle.
“Buttress. Kibi said Buttress. Hee hee.”
Grey Wolf rolls his eyes. “At least you’re good looking,” he says to Dranko.
Bridge or no bridge, the Company doesn’t consider the ravine much of an obstacle. They use wind walk to drift out over the chasm toward the far side.
They’re thirty feet across when the spell starts to fail.
...to be continued...
Killer Magic Rats
The first thing that occurs to Aravis and Grey Wolf when the rage subsides is that it’s uncomfortably hot, standing so close to a wall of fire. It’s not long before it and the various blade barriers vanish, leaving the Company in a suddenly quiet cavern. Grey Wolf takes a few steps and picks up Bostock.
Grey Wolf! What happened to you?
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Grey Wolf grumbles.
You were not yourself.
“That would be an accurate summary, yes.”
You seem to have recovered. Are we out of danger? Are there more foes to be slain?
It appears not. The giants fled either in the direction from which the Company arrived, or into the vertical shaft in the ceiling, and there’s no sign of them returning.
“Who wants healing?” calls Dranko.
“Me!” says Kibi, eager to be first in line. Then, always practical, he adds: “Let’s not forget to collect the loot!”
The chain-things and null shadows left nothing of value behind, but a search of Guztha’s corpse nets four magic items: a mithril shirt, a silver ring, an ebony wand, and a short sword. What they were hoping to find – but don’t – was some correspondence to or from the Emperor. (In fact, Guztha had never returned to Emperor Naloric after his first failure. One does not go before the Emperor with a vital task unfinished if one expects to live. No, having realized he was up against casters, he had gone for the null shadow globe and a pair of ragewind tokens before picking up the scent of the Company again and planning an ambush.)
“I told you he had a backup plan,” says Morningstar.
“I wonder how he found us again so fast?” muses Aravis.
“I think it’s your blood,” says Kibi. “I think he just... knows where you are.”
There’s a flurry of random discussions while some more healing is applied. Bostock manages to convince Grey Wolf not to decapitate Guztha’s body out of hand. There’s talk of casting speak with dead on Guztha’s corpse but it never gets further than that. There’s also the worry that they’ll possibly be leading more pursuers right to Cranchus, but Aravis points out that there’s no use worrying about that as they can hardly turn back now. They should just go as quickly as they can to minimize the danger.
These conversations cease as Dranko holds up a hand and motions for quiet. In the silence that follows, everyone hears a noise from the ceiling shaft. It sounds like a giant is slowly descending the ladder – maybe trying to sneak down and away now that the fighting has stopped.
Dranko readies his whip, moves to stand near the ladder and starts counting meaningfully downward from five. The giant responds in his foreign giantish tongue, and while his voice sounds panicky he keeps descending, until he finally drops down into the cavern next to Dranko. He looks down and raises his club.
“You know,” says Kibi. “You still look like a rat.”
Dranko practically smacks his forehead. “Oh, for the love of...”
He strikes several times with his whip, though only to subdue. The giant, faced with a vicious whip-wielding rat, grabs the ladder and flees for his life back up the shaft.
“You’re going to be single-handedly responsible for putting their whole race off of rats as food,” smirks Grey Wolf.
A thorough exploration of the back of the cavern reveals an exit tunnel, which, after it bends a few times over the course of fifty yards, ends at a thick wooden wall with a giant-sized door. They retreat back to the battle-cave where Morningstar spends fifteen minutes praying for a new find the path. Hiding as best they can at the original front-end of the cave, they hear the sound of the giant again, dropping down from the shaft. No one thinks it’s worth bothering the poor thing at this point, and they listen to its retreating footsteps as it runs toward the giantish door. They hear a loud banging, followed by some giantish talk and a door creaking open. A few seconds later they hear it close again, followed by the noise of a bar dropping.
No surprise – the find the path indicates they need to go through that door after all. It’s only a matter of minutes to walk back to it, at which point Aravis casts gaseous form on himself and slips underneath to see what’s on the other side. He sees a giant sitting in a huge chair with his back to the door. He doesn’t see Aravis, but does seem nervous and generally on the alert. Aravis slips back under the door, and there’s a brief discussion on how to proceed.
Kibi finally activates his Ioun stone of tongues and shouts out:
“Hey, Mr. Giant over there! We’re going to pass through. We don’t mean you any harm. Er... unless you get in our way.”
“Who’s that?” barks the giant. They can hear the sound of him jumping up from his chair.
“Who do you think it is?” asks Kibi.
“I don’t know,” answers the giant.
“You’ve noticed strange things happening recently, right?” prompts Kibi.
“Um. I haven’t seen anything, but... are you a rat?”
“Maybe I am a rat,” says Kibi menacingly. “Maybe I’m the ghost of every rat you giants have ever torn limb from limb or bashed with a club!”
“What?” replies the Giant, now sounding confused.
“I think that’s too much for him to understand,” says Aravis.
Kibi sighs. “Let us through, and we’ll just leave you alone. We won’t have to break down your door or hurt anyone.”
“You can’t break the door,” answers the giant. “You’re a rat!”
“Are you going to do what we ask, or not?” asks Kibi. “You’ll regret it if you don’t...”
“Shoo!” barks the giant. “Shoo!”
Aravis cracks his knuckles. “Are we ready to go?”
There are nods all around, and Aravis casts disintegrate on the door. The entire thing turns to dust. The bar falls with a clank and the giant leaps back.
“We warned you!” says Kibi.
The giant stares down at the pack of rats and the remains of the door. A moment later he is running away down the tunnel, screaming at the top of his lungs. “Help! Killer magic rats! Help, help! Killer Rats! Killer magic rats!”
“That was awesome!” says Dranko.
“Most impressive,” Grey Wolf agrees.
“Do you think these things work for Crunchy?” ponders Morningstar.
“I think it’s possible he enjoys having them there,” says Aravis, “though I doubt they work for him.”
Dranko chimes in. “My theory is that, now, in this point in time, Cranchus is evil. That’s why he has evil giants working for him. And it’s going to fall to us to turn him good.”
“I don’t believe it,” says Kibi, affronted. “I’m sure he’s good.”
They continue on, following the find the path. It leads them through a snaking giant-sized tunnel which eventually opens into an truly enormous bowl-shaped cavern, easily several hundred yards on a side. They are up near the lip of the bowl, looking down upon the wooden and stone buildings of a giantish town.
“A ha!” says Dranko. “That shaft leads to their goat farm up on the surface. They drop down the goats for food to feed the village. It also explains how the bad guys got there before us. They came down the goat shaft.”
According to Morningstar’s spell, the best way to proceed has them going around the rim of the cavern, avoiding the town altogether. They can hear some commotion in the town, and in the light of torches they can see a dozen or so giants gathered in a central square. Kibi strains to hear, and it sounds like one is explaining that there might be an attack of super-rats, and they need to be prepared to defend the town. There’s laughter at this notion.
“Just go back and get the goats, will you?”
Kibi stifles a laugh.
* *
The way out is much like the way in. This time the giant guarding the door is facing them, but word of the invading rat army hasn’t yet gotten this far. It eyes the rats with detached interest.
“Let us through!” demands Kibi.
The giant looks around. “Who’s there?”
“We’re the magic rats!” says Kibi. “Let us through.”
“Talking rats?”
The giant stands and takes a step toward them.
“Open the door, and we’ll never bother you again. Otherwise we’ll blow your door down and rats will attack your village!”
The giant chuckles. “You’re talking rats... talking rats... heh.”
“I’m warning you,” says Kibi. “Let us...”
The giant reaches down to pick up Kibi, but Dranko is ready for this. He whips the giant’s hand, and the giant yanks his arm back in pain.
“Ow!” he bellows.
“Let us through,” says Kibi.
The giant peers down at the assembled rats.
“I’m going to have to discuss this with the chief,” he says nervously.
“He won’t believe you,” says Kibi. “It be easier for everyone if you just let us through.”
The giant reaches down again, this time for Kibi’s nonexistent tail.
“Hey,” says the giant, puzzled. “What the...”
The next warning shot is a lightning bolt from Aravis.
“Aargh! Hey!”
“We warned you,” sighs Kibi.
“Er... right,” says the giant. “Um... wait here! I’m getting the chief.”
And with that, the giant takes off running toward the town. A few minutes later he’s going to be surprised at how seriously everyone in Smashtown takes his warning.
While the giant flees, the Company uses the giant’s chair to reach and lift the bar on the door. On the other side, Aravis casts arcane lock on the door once they’re through.
Find the path leads them down yet more giantish tunnels, always sloping downward, always getting just a little bit warmer. A few minutes later they find another wall-and-door blocking the passage, but it’s long been abandoned, the door hanging open and the chair rotting.
On the other side, the find the path starts to waver, even though it’s not due to expire for many more minutes. This seems like a good place to stop for the day and set up rope tricks.
“Ordinarily I’d complain about being stuck in this featureless room again,” says Flicker, once he’s climbed the rope. “But it’s hardly more claustrophobic than outside, and it’s much cooler.”
They use the opportunity to identify the magic items taken from Guztha. These include a greater ring of cold resistance (which he had acquired specifically because of Morningstar), a wand of spell immunity (which was specifically to insulate himself from dimensional anchor), a mithril shirt, and a +3 short sword of sure-striking.
* *
Morningstar’s find the paths may no longer be functioning, but as there’s only one way to continue the Company decides to press on until they reach a branch in the tunnel. For another hour the passage heads gently downward, and everyone is starting to sweat.
“Kibi!” exclaims Scree suddenly. “Do you feel that? It’s... it’s a little like Het Branoi. There’s Earth Magic coming from somewhere.”
Kibi stops and concentrates. Yes! It’s faint, but he can sense it in the rock around him.
“Hey!” he says out loud. “It’s kind of thrummy around here.”
“Describe ‘thrummy,’” says Aravis.
“Like Het Branoi,” explains Kibi. “There’s Earth Magic here.”
That prompts Morningstar to try casting another sending to Cranchus, but there’s still no reply. It’s hot enough now that the casters make sure everyone has an endure elements active.
They forge ahead and downward, leaving the giants far behind. (Not surprisingly, there is no sign of pursuit.) They start to see beetles in greater numbers, and a thick lichen growing on the warm tunnel walls. It begins to creep into some of their minds that they might have missed some concealed branch and be headed for who-knows-where, when Dranko (still on point) sees that up ahead the tunnel opens into another large space illuminated by a ruddy glow. Scouting ahead he finds that the cavern is huge, extending past the range of his darkvision in all directions. More significantly, though, this new cavern is bisected by a tremendous chasm, a hundred feet across and at least that deep. A river of lava runs along the chasm floor, and it’s this that provides the illumination. Dranko peers down into it and feels the heat blast upward into his face.
A bit more scouting reveals that there’s no way out of the cavern (aside from how they came in) on this side of the chasm. There’s a broken-off stub of a stone bridge that extends maybe twenty or thirty feet over the lava-filled ravine. Dranko casts detect magic and finds that the bridge is real and solid enough, for as far as it goes. He laments not having Kay around to check for traps.
When the rest of the party gets the all-clear from Dranko, Morningstar arrives firsts and casts three thought captures at the foot of the bridge.
The first thought: It’s going to take forever to smash this bridge.
The second thought: I hope Smash is right about the things not flying.
She guesses that both of the these thoughts are from one of the giants.
The third thought is from Dranko: Nope, not an illusion!
Kibi examines the broken bridge, musing on its strength and construction and what it must have taken to destroy it. He makes the mistake of using the word “buttress” within earshot of Dranko, who immediately starts to chuckle.
“Buttress. Kibi said Buttress. Hee hee.”
Grey Wolf rolls his eyes. “At least you’re good looking,” he says to Dranko.
Bridge or no bridge, the Company doesn’t consider the ravine much of an obstacle. They use wind walk to drift out over the chasm toward the far side.
They’re thirty feet across when the spell starts to fail.
...to be continued...
blargney the second
blargney the minute's son
dun dun DUNNNN...
Zaruthustran
The tingling means it’s working!
Wow, nice "Doh!" moment.
KidCthulhu
First Post
Brogarn said:*envisions Wile E Coyote cartoon*
Tell me... the players didn't happen to have picket signs with "UH OH" written on them, did they?
No, we had tiny comedy umbrellas.
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