Several hours had passed, though the only evidence of it were distant rumbles as the Rift rearranged itself judiciously. There was no sunrise, no sunset, no stars tracking across the sky. Their shadows did not lengthen or fall short. Their watches never worked, their batteries eaten away by the Rift's energy-hungry atmosphere. Only their Negaverse tablets kept time.
People ached after so many hours without rest, but youma did not. Radon did not. Ever vigilant, the once bat-like creature began another shapeshift while the coalition of Negaverse teams slept in their cobbled-together tents. The wings and skull remained intact. Its body, which it kept mostly obscured during the Negaverse's investigation, had lengthened with chitinous growth. Its body became articulated, with another dozen legs thin and brittle, pointed and jabbing with every march across one of the latticed paths. Its arms wore the wings vestigially as they shaped into a crab's pincers. All down the height of its spine was brown fur, ending in loose tufts at the end of its segmented, milling body.
It waited near its original perch. Its new body, however cobbled together, could traverse the dodgy rock-hewn paths and hold onto their undersides without plummeting the hundreds of feet to the basin below. Its red eyes scoured the area for signs of the Negaverse's crew, ever waiting, ever watchful.
It hadn't looked up, however. In one of the myriad holes lining the Scar's sheer cliffs, a group of agents stirred. Bid forth by a peculiarly cheeky youma, they would be directed down to the interlocking paths where the target youma waited. They would have but one opportunity to drop down and catch it unaware -- if they thought it worth attacking.
Quote:
Welcome to part 3! Time to nab some scales and get outta Dodge!
This last thread is set up as a battle, but your character does not always have to be attacking. There will be points in time where it may be more beneficial to not attack, and points in time where it may be more beneficial to go all-out.
Information about the creature will be revealed each round. Rounds will (hopefully) be every 24 hours, RL permitting. The next post will open the thread to the participants who were posting in the Repose thread.
Please refer to the combat mechanics in this post if you have any questions! Please note that commanding a youma will not work on the boss.
If you're quoted into this post, your character was with Lumi in the Cache. Lumi has ushered your character out, and they have a vantage point over the latticed paths that the Tracking team treaded. You have the opportunity for an aerial surprise attack. Add +10 to your first roll if you choose this option.
The word was a sharp whisper that broke through whatever other quiet conversations that had been happening as they stumbled out of the anglerfish youma's den. Sylvite stopped short, and she held out a hand to try to get the others to stay back, too. She glanced over her shoulder at them, eyes open wide.
"Look!"
Maybe she wasn't a hunter, the way that Cybele was. Maybe she hadn't gotten much of anywhere bargaining for lamps earlier, either, but if Sylvite had one skill, it was spotting things that were interesting, and she was definitely looking down a very interesting thing right now.
The way that the youma had fur and bug legs and crab feet all at the same time was suspicious enough, but not completely unexpected when half of the youma around looked like a mishmash of animals. It was big, though, and its aura stood out even down here, where everything was Chaos.
"That's gotta be it, right?" She stepped forwards, closer to the cliff's edge, and she looked down towards where the youma was skittering around. There were five people here, and only one really hurt. Those numbers would be iffy if they were trying to kill it, but that wasn't the point. "Just gotta grab some scales and then we can go to actual bed. Plus we can ambush it, if we're quick."
She watched as it continued to climb. They only had so much time. "Yeah," she said, and then she was off, sprinting the last few steps to the stone edge.
Her daggers flashed against the shadows as she dove into the crevasse.
HP: 75 Damage: 1d8 Magic: * * * Spring Water Eruption! (3/3) * * * Raging Spring Water! (2/2)
DMG: 1 + 10 (surprise round) = 11 (gg fulgurite)
Fulgurite hadn't been sure where they were being led, but all he knew at this point was that he had well enough of the Rift. He wanted to go home. Sleep. Maybe eat a proper curry. Madras curry, perhaps. He was fairly sure he had the proper fenugreek in his pantry--
Sylvite's words broke through his musing, and he followed to where she pointed; some monstrous thing--though he supposed everything in there was monstrous to some degree--made of fur and some kind of bug covering and so many legs it made Fulgurite feel a bit uneasy. He supposed that was suspicious. It seemed suspicious enough that Sylvite had decided it was what they were tracking down.
"You think so?" asked Fulgurite, following her with steps that were a bit warier than his normally impulsive nature. "I mean, it feels oppressive as <******** in this place had enough of an energy pulse to flatten the ordinary person, but Sylvite might have been onto something with this thing. Felt strong enough to be something a sovereign might want to chase down.
Which was enough for him as much as it was enough for her.
Fulgurite dashed after Sylvite, planning to deliver quite the wallop.
(He did not, but. Perhaps it was the surprise that counted.)
Any protest Prehnite could’ve conjured died on his tongue, beneath a silent breath that hid a curse as he watched the flashes of pink black and blue go up to the edge; over it.
Such a cursed mission.
As if prying a scale form the creature would be the end of it. Lurking behemoth that it seemed to be, a twisted auric nightmare of a thing. Prehnite could only tsk prissily. Bite his tongue and follow after the General and Senshi before him.
Calling for backup became an afterthought - that they had the tablets at all and summarily failed to use them time and again was beyond him - not that he was any better than the rest. Not willing to waste the opportunity now that everything was suddenly in motion.
Serrated trowels out, gleaming with poisoned steel, he dropped off the ledge after them, and silently aimed for the creatures hide.
Strickenized
stari_maga
echossweet
indigo_plateau
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Strickenized generated a random number between
1 and 3 ...
3!
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Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2021 12:41 am
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Youma Radon? HP: ???/??? (-47) Notes: This doesn't look like the bat that you remember.
Its legs were mining picks against rock as it moved. This way or that, each motion sounded like the uncoordinated hollowing out of a quarry. It hadn't gone far; it only paced restless.
Then a few creatures fell on its head. A senshi, a Captain, a General, each little pinpricks of pain as it felt their weight reach its back. It screeched its startle, its voice unchanged from when it was more wholly a bat, and it shook its newly lengthened body to dislodge them. Nasty little things, those Negaverse agents — always hunting it, for years now. Small wonder that they wanted to do it harm.
Another shriek prefaced its lashing out. Claw used for a bludgeon, it struck out at Prehnite — aimed to send him flying. The more it knocked off the latticed paths to their deaths below, the more it would never have to face again.
The rest of the group — however hale, however rested — would finally come into view. Carried in large part on the backs of spiderlike youma, they were delivered the hundreds of feet up to the interlacing paths, where they last met their suspected youma. The creature was already engaged; part of the missing team was there, just beginning to put it down. It had already seen them; none would manage a surprise attack.
Quote:
Everyone else, welcome to part 3! Please refer to the first post for creature description and other information.
Your character spent the night in the Rift. They might be rested. They might be the opposite of rested. They might want to leave as soon as their legs can carry them back out of this cursed place. But the one thing standing between them and freedom is their target.
The tracking team figured out the target. This means members of the Tracking team get a permanent damage bonus (+3) due to familiarity with the terrain and the monster. They may also forfeit a damage roll per round to look for weaknesses / make deductions.
The target knew they were coming. Enough discourse occurred around Radon that it knew the teams were onto it. Thus, there is no surprise attack.
Please refer to the combat mechanics in this post if you have any questions! Please note that commanding a youma will not work on the boss. Please assume that your character has recovered in full and has all instances of limited-use magic.
For corrupted senshi: If your character has attack magic, roll as normal, multiply by 10. This youma cannot be instantly dusted by senshi magic.
...Wasn't that... Leifite stared up at the absolutely giant youma. She stumbled off of the moving trolly of spider youma - oh she was not going to think about that and made an attempt to hit the bat...youma... thing. Radon, or whatever it was.
Given that Leifite had only a horse brush to her name, and only knew how to fight on damn roller skates, she was less than useful...
--
Haymitch - HP:50/50 - 1d6+2 Damage: 8
Haymitch did not trust the spider youma train that took them up to where their quarry was, preferrign to stay glued to Lionel the whole ride up. He hopped off once they stopped, hissing loudly at the giant youma. Oh it was so big oh by Mau... He looked up at Lionel, righting his little hat.
"Be careful and don't die!" said the small kitten, tail and rear end already wiggling as he prepped to pounce on the bat youma. Sharp claws and teeth out, he sank his little spears into the youma and tried to maul it.
There was something about riding on a giant spider that Ransomite idly reflected could almost be... magical. In the right light. If you squinted.
He was not afraid of spiders, but riding a spider was not exactly high on his list of lifetime goals. It had no place on his bucket list, for one. But damn if it didn't make things more convenient, considering Ransomite was not at all the rock-climbing sort.
He did not like the shrieking noise he heard before they rounded the corner, and he liked it even less when he saw what had probably--he assumed--made the shrieking noise.
That was a lot of legs.
Ransomite wondered if it was too late to take a road-trip on spider-back--
It was assuredly too late for arachnid-facilitated escapades, so Ransomite slid from the party's transport to land more-or-less steadily on the ground. He went for his weapons, nonthreatening though they were, and gave jabbing them at the youma a go.
If this adventure on the backs of spidery youma had taught her anything, it was that she was not particularly fond of spiders. They had a lot of legs and it was ... unsettling. She could appreciate that spiders were furry, she guessed. Made the ride to what was in the distance--that didn't quite look like what everyone had been talking to, for one, it was longer, the other, it had more legs--a little less unsettling.
It had more legs than the spider youma.
Perhaps she liked the spider youma.
The night prior felt like a long distant dream that she desperately wanted back; she had no interest in fighting this terrifying thing in front of them and honestly just wanted to go home. She spotted Ransomite taking a jab at it with -- oh, no, were those Christmas ornaments? -- and offered a, "Ahoy!" from where she stood, a greeting she realized afterward didn't make any sense with any of the situations they were in at all--
She balled up her fist and attempted to punch at the very large and very too-many-legs youma.
Nembus was fairly sure that landed; she had never been terribly good at fighting.
amasis
mention, also seafaring greeting
Seiana_ZI
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Shanyume
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Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2021 8:23 am
Captain Lavendulan HP:75/75 Dice:1d8+3
Lavendulan wasn't sure if she should be happy that the tracks she had found in fact belonged to the youma they had been searching for. Radon was a frighteningly intelligent youma, capable of communicating through moris code and weaving believable lies that almost made them pursue the wrong youma instead.
One thing that they had been warned was that the youma they sought was a changling and it seemed that the bat had already stayed morphing into something else. Those harrowing looking legs were definitely a reason to be concerned. While one youma had already been thrown, or dropped, off the side of the cliff and Laven worried that there may be similar incidents if they weren't careful.
Rather than immediately joining the fight, and undoubtedly risk the increased ire of General Aquamarine, Lavendulan both scanned the area, incase she had missed something before, and watched Radon as he moved hoping to notice a weakness of sorts since it appeared to be mid-change.
Quote:
At a truck stop for the next few minutes to finish my next tag. Will be at Sequoia National Park tomorrow and Yosemite the day after. I expect to have internet again Wednesday afternoon/evening. Open to interact but I'll be slow as I'm on vacation.
Shanyume rolled 1 8-sided dice:
6Total: 6 (1-8)
Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2021 8:46 am
Super Corrupt Sailor Meridiana HP:75/75 Dice:1d8 - non magic Damage: 6
To say the corrupt was terrified was a vast understatement. This youma was unlike the feral beasts she had encounterd before. Her magic was not made for fighting, it could do no damage and likely do little in aiding them in its defeat. Not to mention her reluctance on having its attention focused on her.
In the past her target was usually unable or unwilling to attack but there were few who broke through the trance and she paid the price for it. Never head she tried it on a youma before and in truth, she didn't really want Radon to be her first test subject.
Instead, the Senshi of the Succubus picked up a rock, her default weapon of choice since corrupts were not equipped with actual weapons like their agent counterparts. It was palm sized, smaller than a baseball, and a bit lopsided to boot but she threw it at the youma before retreating several steps backwards to avoid those legs.
Quote:
open to interact but will be slow
Shanyume
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Sara Draconia rolled 1 10-sided dice:
1Total: 1 (1-10)
Sara Draconia
Wheezing Loiterer
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Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2021 10:08 am
General Chalcanthite HP:100/100 Dice:1d10 +4 Damage: 5
Even though his team had tracked and found clues to find this youma, it still hadn’t prepared him for the thing that laid ahead. The fight began now and would hopefully end with the ultimate goal of scale collection happening. Drawing his bow felt like the right thing to do, he was on edge being in the Rift this long and didn’t want to stand by as others also took action.
Although he was a General, his arrows were inconsequential to the large youma. It was still the only thing he could think about with his mind clouded by anxiety.
The youma was bigger than it had looked from the cliffs, a few stories up. That meant it was strong, too. When it shook itself, Sylvite went flying.
It turned out all those nights she'd spent jumping around off rooftops and flipping off of park equipment had come in handy, because she was able to reorient herself in the air and nail a three point landing, only sliding back a little over the broken rocks on the cavern floor.
She started to hear other voices. It turned out the rest of the group was here, which was good, because again, super strong.
That didn't stop Sylvite from sprinting back up to it, though, and jabbing a knife deep through a crack in its chitinous armor.
Jet hopped off the spider-like youma that brought them up to where they’d first seen the youma they were hunting. But it was clear that it had already shifted shape again. Jet preferred the bat creature, although neither was good.
“Careful with your footing,” Jet said as he held out a hand to Aquamarine to help him off the youma that carried him up. He was still watching the youma as it shrieked and attacked those that attacked it first, although his eyebrows were furrowed.
“It doesn’t look like it’s going to fall easily. Not with those legs. We need to figure out what weakness it has, if it has any,” he mumbled mostly to himself because that was pretty obvious.
“Arles,” he asked into the shadows where his personal youma took residence, his teeth seeming to glow in the creepy hue of the Rift. “See if you can find out if there’s any place it hasn’t shifted into… that…” Jet made a face as he looked at the youma once more, not entirely sure what to classify it as. An insect? A crustacean? Hopefully one with weak armor, but they were trying to get its scales.
Having me sniff around for weaknesses? Your uncoordinated group of misfits is the weakness right now. But I will look,Arles spoke into Jet's mind and the minds of those around him within normal hearing distance, and flashed a wicked grin before disappearing into the shadows once more.
Taenite rolled his shoulders, trying to figure out the best way to do this and involve as few of their allies as possible. Well, he supposed there was no point in holding back. They needed to weaken this youma enough to get its scales without dusting it, and it looked pretty darn strong. Might as well see if it was weak to fire.
“Fire whirl!” Taenite called out after positioning himself along the pathways where he could easily jump one way or another in case it retaliated. “Oh, heads up guys!” he called with his hands cupped over his mouth. Hopefully the others would see a spinning vortex of fire and get out of the way.
He really hoped they got out of the way, because there was only so many places the fire could go along the paths, and he didn't want to file incident reports once he got back to Negaspace because his already questionable magic tended to get out of hand. For now it seemed to be behaving.
Quote:
Sailor Scout Attack: Fire Whirl Similar to a dust devil, a thin pillar of flames is drawn up from the ground. It is about seven feet high and two feet wide. It can be controlled to move quickly across flat surfaces, but cannot go through obstacles, such as a car. While it is possible to dodge out of the way if quick enough, the heat can still be felt when close as one would feel real flames. While the fire does not leave permanent damage to humans or animals, clothing and objects can be left charred, and the anyone caught in the flames will feel the sensation of burns (up to second degree) until the flames disappear. Players may choose to take lasting damage at their discretion. The magic lasts for thirty seconds and can be cast twice.
