Outside: Grass touch place

[bc56]

Travelling Trouble
Kothar takes more lightning and a punch to the jaw. Now he's starting to look worn down by the fighting. But the first order of business is to twist his head away from the eye gouge and lift the knight away from him so he can attempt to hack the offending limb off with his axe.

Moonstruck
A better idea than it seemed, apparently. "No time! We need to make sure it doesn't possess anyone else!" It's unfortunate that the priest got hurt but if this thing got back to the village and mooncalfized a villager, that would be much, much worse.

[Rebonack]

[Moonstruck]

Cat takes a quick look at the insentient priest before sniffing and hurrying out of the cave. She's also trying to avoid looking totally grossed out by the smell.

Yuck.

Outside the cave she pauses and looks this way and that before appearing confused.

"It isn't leading back to the village or away into the forest. It goes straight into that pond."

She points up river a bit where an earthen dam creates a water reservoir for the village.

Weird.

[Earl of Purple]

Travelling Trouble

The armoured figure is lifted and tries to throw a punch, though Kothar still claims the knight's arm with another burst of electricity. The figure is also revealed by this not to be a skeleton; its flesh is withered and desiccated, but present; a natural mummy reanimated by foul magics and marked with branching scars of multiple lightning strikes. The figure that had been blasting fire winces and grabs their own shoulder as it happens, which certainly distracts from sending fire at the lizard paladin.

The other skeletons also freeze momentarily, giving the wagonfort's defenders a chance to take quite a few down with pikes and musket-butts.

[bc56]

Moonstruck
"Then we should stop it from doing whatever it plans to the town's water!" Sele shouts. She's already running towards the pond. Something bad is surely going to happen if they can't stop it.

Travelling Trouble
Between the injuries to knight and the shock to the controlling necromancer, Kothar now has a chance for a quick breath. Holy light pours out from his hands and washes over him, restoring his injuries and leaving him healthy again. With his vigor restored, he raises his shield back into a defensive stance and readies himself to continue the fight.

[Earl of Purple]

Travelling Trouble

The necromancer who had been shooting fireballs starts to chuckle, before they speak a single word- "Raise." At that word, the skeletons which had been defeated earlier start to rebuild themselves, purple light connecting the bones that had been shattered or smashed as they grip their weapons once more. There's a scream from within the wagon fort, as the defenders find themselves attacked from behind as the flesh sloughs off the bones of their dead and a small group of skeletons emerges within their perimeter.

The undead knight's arm is also crawling towards it, though it's behind Kothar and the knight is unable to use their sword- the two-handed weapon too long to be used in the knight's current dis-armed state. So the knight is staying back, for now at least, as the skeleton with the hoe jabs at Kothar's back once again.

[bc56]

Travelling Trouble
The knight is temporarily out of the fight which means it's time for Kothar to press his advantage. He bolts away from both it and the hoe skeleton at a dead run towards the necromancers, axe and shield upraised. He leaps and swings his weapon in a blazing arc of holy fire at the one who was hurt when the knight was dismembered. That one seems to be controlling the undead, so they'll be the best one to kill first.

[Earl of Purple]

Travelling Trouble

As Kothar runs closer, the taller figure moves to intercept, shedding its robes as it does. It's another skeleton, not a necromancer, although a very odd one- this one has been manipulated and altered in several ways, bearing two sets of arms and with a great deal of daggers and knives stored inside its ribcage, and it throws two daggers at Kothar.

The Necromancer themselves backs away, preparing another fire bolt spell.

[Murkus]

[Hog Heaven]

"Since when did you become an expert on what I can and cannot do while boozed up, huh?" Dena questions. "But, it's not like I mind the 'butch' things. Since guess what? I'm into swords, vehicles and engineering which wasn't exactly the most girly things either last time I checked. You're just so..." She makes a vague gesture at the oni. "...well, don't take this the wrong way but when I learned what the word 'butch' event meant it was with a picture titled 'butch lesbian' and she looked a lot like you. Just, uh, found that funny."

[Hog Heaven]

Tsumi makes an 'o' with her lips. "Oooh, a college girl." She listens to the rest of Dena's explanation just as brightly... and bellows another one of her laughs again when Dena finishes. "She looked a lot like me? Damn. I mean. I'm into chicks, mostly. So I guess it's not really that far off..." She smirks. "You know, some people would get offended, you stereotyping em' and shit. And ain't nobody had the balls to ever call me 'butch'."

"If you're that into 'vehicles' though--" What a funny way of phrasing, Tsumi thinks, "I could take you for a ride sometime."

[bc56]

Travelling Trouble
That's clever. It's not the first modified skeleton Kothar has faced, but it's clever. His shield can easily deflect the knives as he goes into the leap. He should hopefully connect before the mage can cast a spell. He'd like to finish this fight quickly before more of the travellers become fodder for the necromancer.

[Earl of Purple]

Travelling Trouble

The skeleton braces itself for Kothar's impact and is smashed to the floor, as the Necromancer launches one last firebolt before declaring, rather oddly, "I will... I will Evade." At which they disappear.

In actuality, the Vile Necromancer hasn't teleported, as Evade isn't that kind of Aspect, but instead they have turned invisible and shrouded in silence using an ability which isn't exactly magic, and are legging it across the field.

[Rebonack]

[Moonstruck]

Our heroes make haste for the pond and upon arriving they discover-!

Still water.

And a bunch of dragonflies zigzagging around dizzily. Cat frowns at the sight.

"Okay I'm sure it came this way," she says, tromping out into the water up to her knees. "It's here. But it isn't. Like it's just out of reach?"

The sun shines down on the surface of the pond, casting harsh glare and flickering reflections.

[bc56]

Travelling Trouble
One more skeleton down.
Kothar turns towards the necromancer and his shield absorbs the magical flame, glowing red patterns like baleful eyes briefly flaring on its surface.
And then the necromancer disappears. Great. Kothar isn't really equipped to deal with invisibility or teleportation.
He holds still, waiting patiently. Invisible people tend to slip up. They can't hide their displacement of the grass, for instance. Teleporters, on the other hand, would be much harder to deal with, but presumably there'll be a delay long enough to strike back in between teleports. He just needs to wait until he spots an opening.

Moonstruck
Sele has a good guess of where it went.
"It's here." She steps into the pool as well. "Probably lingering in the border of the Pit." She's not exactly sure how to follow it in though.

[Earl of Purple]

Travelling Trouble

Gunfire from the wagonfort proves that the skeletons left behind are still fighting, as the skeleton with the hoe and the others that returned to animation recently advance on Kothar and strike at him with their tools.

The Vile Necromancer's Aspect isn't perfect; it conceals their smell, and most traces of their passage, but not all of them. No footprints, but the grass does move to show their current position.

[bc56]

Travelling Trouble
The approaching skeletons can be dealt with first. Kothar rushes them as they approach, colliding forcefully with one before striking at the others with rapid swings of his axe. He wants to deal with them quickly so that he can go back to watching for the necromancer to make a move.

Japaraita
"Hi, uh, are you from around here?" The woman speaking is not like any normal person. Red skin, black eyes, horns, wings, a barbed tail, and... Other features make her the very image of a succubus. Only her clothes disrupt the visual. With a jacket, long skirt, and a pair of round-framed glasses, she doesn't look like she intends to seduce anyone anytime soon. "I'm, uh, just passing through. On a, uh, vacation, I guess? I'm looking for things to do." Sekhmet neglects to mention that she's only on a vacation because several of her more trusted advisors dragged her off the throne and basically forced her to take time off.

[Thursday Violist]

Japaraita
"Hi, uh, are you from around here?" The woman speaking is not like any normal person. Red skin, black eyes, horns, wings, a barbed tail, and... Other features make her the very image of a succubus. Only her clothes disrupt the visual. With a jacket, long skirt, and a pair of round-framed glasses, she doesn't look like she intends to seduce anyone anytime soon. "I'm, uh, just passing through. On a, uh, vacation, I guess? I'm looking for things to do." Sekhmet neglects to mention that she's only on a vacation because several of her more trusted advisors dragged her off the throne and basically forced her to take time off.

[Japaraita]

The mermaid turns towards the speaker. She then leans out of the fountain, leaning enough that she's practically just balanced on her hips, on the edge of the fountain. "Hi!" she says. She looks Sekhmet up and down. "You a demon? That's pretty cool," she says.

She shakes her head. "No, I'm not from around here. Just visiting, too."

She laughs and waves dismissively. "If I lived here, I'd probably have a better place to be than just in the fountain." Even so, she taps her lips, thinking. "Things to do, things to do..."

The mermaid thinks aloud. "Well, I came from Shadowhaven, which is a pretty big underground city, over that way," she says, pointing in a direction. "Lots of things to do there. You might have to take a bus to get there, though. But if you want to do something here..."

She turns around so she's sitting on the edge of the fountain, and looks around the town. "I mean, unless you enjoy looking for seashells or fish bones, I guess there is a gambling house over there." There's a pretty modest-sized building that doesn't look very flashy, but it does have pictures of different card games on the walls. Also, a picture of a glass of beer. "Or...hm...."

The mermaid spots an elderly guy walking down the street, and says, "Oh! Hey! Old man!" She shouts down the street at him, waving her arm. "Hey!"
The old man turns and waves back.
"You told me about those old ruins nearby, didn't you? It's just downstream, right?"

The old man gives an affirmative answer.

The mermaid turns back to Sekhmet. "So, yeah. There's some ruined castle. Kinda dumb of whoever built it to build it in a place that floods a couple times a year and with soft enough ground that its foundation sank underground, but if you don't like gambling or seashells then you can do some old-ruins archaeology or something like that. I was going to check it out in a couple days after I got new batteries for my flashlight and got bored with playing with all the kids here,"

[bc56]

Japaraita
"Uh," It's not often that someone thinks being a demon is "cool."
Sekhmet doesn't like the look of that bar, and she doesn't gamble anyway. And she's not interested in danger so a spooky flooded castle is right out.
But seashell collecting, that's supposed to be relaxing, right? Just walking along the beach picking up shells? "Seashells sound good. Which way is that?"

[Thursday Violist]

[Japaraita]

Between the mermaid's black-but-almost-red scales and her pointy teeth, she does appear like maybe she could be just edgy enough to call a demon 'cool'. Then again, people don't really get to choose their scale color so it's probably just a coincidence.

She points in a different direction, down the street and out of the town. "Just straight that way, then down the hill," she says. "Apparently, the area below floods a few times every winter," she explains. "So you can find seashells mixed in with the grass and flowers."

And, if Sekhmet goes there, she'll find that to be the case. It's not even a beach, it's more of a salty plains. The air even smells just a little salty, almost like the ocean. But the ocean isn't even visible, since it's far enough away.

The mermaid, meanwhile, thinks about it: actually, it'd be pretty interesting to try to make some jewelry out of seashells. Like, a necklace. She starts planning on how she'll get down there, and moves a little over to get to her wheeled suitcase.

[bc56]

Japaraita
Sekhmet begins walking towards the "beach" then stops. "Uh, do you need help?" She feels sorry for the mermaid. "We're a long way from the water, I mean. Is there anything I can do to help you?" It looks like she wants to come along, but a mermaid can't really get around on land, can she? How did she get up here to begin with?

[Earl of Purple]

Travelling Trouble

In order to attack the skeletons, Kothar needs to turn his back on where the Necromancer stood; the Necromancer who is currently running away, sprinting along the same track in the grass they used to bring their forces to the site of this battle. Killing the skeletons again is easy, and without the Necromancer about to try and Raise them again once killed they remain out of the fight.

[Rebonack]

[Moonstruck]

This is one of those times when the quest journal is really helpful. Not sure what's going on? Not sure what to do next? Just see what the next objective is! Easy peasy.

Checking the journal reveals that the next object is, apparently, to interrogate the villagers about the mysterious Moon Presence in Moon's Eye Pond.

Wow.

That isn't a foreboding name at all, given the circumstances, is it?

"Moon's Eye Pond?" Catherine wonders aloud. "Oooh what you do bet that when the full moon is reflected in it something strange happens?"

It's growing toward dusk, certainly. But it isn't quite dark yet.

[Thursday Violist]

Japaraita
Sekhmet begins walking towards the "beach" then stops. "Uh, do you need help?" She feels sorry for the mermaid. "We're a long way from the water, I mean. Is there anything I can do to help you?" It looks like she wants to come along, but a mermaid can't really get around on land, can she? How did she get up here to begin with?

[Japaraita]

The mermaid unzips her suitcase, and pulls out two small, thick wheels attached to little rods.
She holds them up above her, like she just received them and she needs to hold them up for some reason. "Aha! Off-road wheels!"

As she zips the suitcase back up, she looks up at Sekhmet. "Well...unless you know a way to turn fins into legs, then I don't know if there is anything you can do. Unless you have, like, a grappling hook. Legs or a grappling hook, those are the two things I need most"

She turns and puts her fins on the ground, outside of the fountain. "But." She grunts, and lifts up the suitcase onto her lap, and starts to jam the thicker wheels into the suitcase. "If not," She puts the suitcase back on the ground, lying flat so it's now got all four of its wheels on the ground. "Then that's fine." With her arms, she lets herself down from the fountain to on the suitcase, lying on it like she's on a tiny surfboard trying to swim out to catch some waves, but with her tail curled up so it doesn't drag on the ground. "I mean, I got here, didn't I? If you want to get there, you don't have to wait for me, I'll be fine. I'll catch up eventually."

[bc56]

Travelling Trouble
With the skeletons quickly dispatched, Kothar pauses. Since the necromancer hasn't shown back up, he's probably completely gone. But he needs to check again. He listens closely and sweeps his eyes across the field.

Moonstruck
"Probably. Let's find out what and then put a stop to it," Sele heads back into town. "Quickly, can anyone tell me about Moon's Eye Pond!?"

Japaraita
"Uh, actually, I think I can do that," Sekhmet replies, "Uh, turn your tail into legs, I mean." She considers. "There might be, uh, side effects though. My magic isn't exactly perfectly safe."

[Thursday Violist]

Japaraita
"Uh, actually, I think I can do that," Sekhmet replies, "Uh, turn your tail into legs, I mean." She considers. "There might be, uh, side effects though. My magic isn't exactly perfectly safe."

[Japaraita]

"Yeah, I didn't expect you w-" the mermaid says before she realizes that Sekhmet actually said the opposite of what she was expecting to hear.

She (metaphorically) stops in place (because she wasn't quite ready to start moving yet, so she was already in place).

The mermaid looks upwards at the demon, and flips her fins. "Wait, you said you can," she says to make sure it clicks in her mind. "Sorry, I wasn't really expecting that, since I haven't met anyone who can do mermaid magic that can do that sort of thing."

She thinks it over, but doesn't need to think it for long. "I mean, legs are pretty useful," she says. "It'd have to be some pretty serious side-effects for me to say 'no' to that. Probably not going to trade my voice for it." She pushes up and rotates, so she's sitting on her suitcase instead of lying on it. "But as long as it's not as bad as that, I'm definitely willing to give it a try."

[bc56]

Japaraita
"It's, uh, succubus magic, not mermaid magic. And, uh, no, nothing that bad. Here, uh, let me try."
Sekhmet puts her hand on the mermaid's tail, then pulses with magic power.
The change begins with a tightening sensation across the mermaid's skin, followed by the bizarre feeling of bones and muscles reshaping themselves. Even the mermaid's clothes change, producing appropriate garments to cover a human lower body, if she didn't already have them.
The change isn't just limited to the tail, however. The main side effect of using succubus magic to alter someone's physiology rapidly becomes apparent. The tightness also spreads across her torso as her chest quickly and dramatically expands in size. Simultaneously, her waist contracts and hips expand, leaving her with a figure very similar to the demoness who is helping her. Thankfully, the clothing-altering part of the magic will keep everything at a comfortable fit and prevent wardrobe malfunctions.
"Is that okay?" Sekhmet asks, "I can undo it if you'd rather not have all the..." she gestures emphatically at her own chest.

[Thursday Violist]

Japaraita
"It's, uh, succubus magic, not mermaid magic. And, uh, no, nothing that bad. Here, uh, let me try."
Sekhmet puts her hand on the mermaid's tail, then pulses with magic power.
The change begins with a tightening sensation across the mermaid's skin, followed by the bizarre feeling of bones and muscles reshaping themselves. Even the mermaid's clothes change, producing appropriate garments to cover a human lower body, if she didn't already have them.
The change isn't just limited to the tail, however. The main side effect of using succubus magic to alter someone's physiology rapidly becomes apparent. The tightness also spreads across her torso as her chest quickly and dramatically expands in size. Simultaneously, her waist contracts and hips expand, leaving her with a figure very similar to the demoness who is helping her. Thankfully, the clothing-altering part of the magic will keep everything at a comfortable fit and prevent wardrobe malfunctions.
"Is that okay?" Sekhmet asks, "I can undo it if you'd rather not have all the..." she gestures emphatically at her own chest.

[Japaraita]

The mermaid woman lets Sekhmet do the magic on her tail. She winces and makes a weirded-out sound as her bones and muscles crack and change and move, and looks down as she gains a skirt.

It feels just as strange when more of her body changes, too.

"Huh."
She presses down on her hips. Then she hefts her chest. Then she kicks her legs. "Huh."
She then runs her tongue across her canines, and reaches up to feel the closed gills on her neck, to see if it also changed those or if the changes stopped at just her figure and tail-area. "Huh."

She stands up, standing a little unsteadily. "Yeah! Yeah, it's okay," she says. "Admittedly, it's waaaaaay too big." She also gestures at her own chest area. She tries taking a step, misses the ground, and falls over.

The woman laughs. "Haha! It's okay. Way too big, but at least I can walk! I did say I was good with whatever side-effects, so it's fine." While lying collapsed on the ground, she kicks her legs again. "See?"

That's a pretty confident claim from someone who's lying on the ground.

The woman pushes herself off the ground, and then gets back onto her feet again. She hops a couple times in place to get used to it, gets a little distracted by the bounce of her figure, and then takes a slow and sure step. "Yeah, I think I got it. Pretty good." She takes a slightly-too-large step towards Sekhmet and holds her arms out, trying to grab Sekhmet into a hug. "Thanks!"

Since she hasn't fallen over again, she slowly crouches down to make her suitcase upright, and then stands. "Alright! Time to go pick some shells." The woman starts off to the field, just out of town.


Should Sekhmet also go there: it's a field! Grasses, flowers, and the occasional bush. The smell of salty earth mixed with flowers. Shells of all types, all around: all you have to do is bend down and search under the plants.

[bc56]

Japaraita
Gills and fangs are still present. Sekhmet didn't notice them and so didn't change them. With the talk about things being too big, Sekhmet glances at her own chest which is just as big, if not bigger. "Uh, I guess." She used to be smaller but becoming queen of succubi ended that.
Then hug! Sekhmet likes hugs so this is no problem. But there is one problem. They haven't been properly introduced yet. "I'm Sekhmet."
Then the two of them can head down to the floodplain. Sekhmet bends down to examine some of the shells. She's looking for anything interesting, unusual, or just pretty. "This place floods for a season every year?" She can smell the seawater. "So, uh... sorry if this is a personal question, but, uh, what's it like? Uh, being a mermaid, I mean."

[Thursday Violist]

[Japaraita]

The woman doesn't mind at all that she still has the gills and fangs. They're both pretty neat, so she's glad she has them still.

"I'm June," she replies, "Nice to meet you." she says after the hug ends.

June also bends down to look for shells. Because this place is pretty low-populated, there's a lot of shells. However, animals walking over have broken quite a few of them, so while it's really really easy to find shells it's a bit harder to find perfectly intact ones. However, after looking enough, Sekhmet will definitely find some intact cowrie shells, abalone shells, and bullet-shaped miter shells.

"Oh! I found a sand dollar!" June declares, as she lifts one up. "Yeah, it doesn't flood the whole winter," she says, "but I was told there's a light flood for most of December, and then a deeper flood around February. I'm not really sure how it works, though: nobody I asked in town exactly knew what caused it, just saying something about how their god makes it happen but not really knowing how. I'd bet I would find out if I followed the stream down, though. After I check out the castle ruins, I think that's where I'll go next. Maybe Inside after that, since I was told it's not as boring as it sounds."

Deciding she can't keep on just holding the shells in her hand, she turns to her suitcase and starts digging through it for a container. "Hey, want a bag?" she asks. She hands a small one over if Sekhmet assents.

She looks around for some more cool shells, thinking about how they'd look on a necklace. "Being a mermaid's pretty fun! You should try it sometime if you can," she says. "Being able to swim up, down, everywhere, and see all the cool things in sunken ships and everything, that's really fun." She glances over at Sekhmet. "Kinda like flying, except without the crashing part There's all sorts of cool stuff at the bottom of the ocean to find, too; just gotta be careful of giant fish monsters. Only problem is trying to get around on land, since there's way more cool things to see on land, too."

June looks back down at some flowers and at the base of the flowers for more shells. She counters with a similar question: "What's it like being a demon?" she asks. Since she's convinced the world is a video game and Sekhmet is probably another player, she makes some guesses as to what it would be like. "I imagine it probably opens up some neat places to go to, but also people probably react to you funny sometimes. But it does appear you get some pretty useful magic, so that's a plus."

Japaraita
Then hug! Sekhmet likes hugs so this is no problem. But there is one problem. They haven't been properly introduced yet. "I'm Sekhmet."
Then the two of them can head down to the floodplain. Sekhmet bends down to examine some of the shells. She's looking for anything interesting, unusual, or just pretty. "This place floods for a season every year?" She can smell the seawater. "So, uh... sorry if this is a personal question, but, uh, what's it like? Uh, being a mermaid, I mean."

[bc56]

Japaraita
"Thanks. Uh, that will be good." Sekhmet takes the bag and puts the shells she's found so far into it. "I can, uh, be a mermaid, that's, uh, why I was asking," as a shapeshifter, she can be any species she wants. Since she's doing this "vacation" thing, it's tempting to just dive all the way into a different side of life for a while.

"Uh, it's actually more restricting than anything. Lots of people treat me like less of a person. Either a monster to be feared or a god to be worshipped or an, ugh, object of lust. On top of the other, uh, weaknesses, it offsets the magic quite a bit. Uh, the power to look like anyone is nice, until you realize that the best person to be most of the time is yourself. Flying is a lot of fun too, and controlling fire is useful for cooking and, uh, smithing." Sekhmet doesn't describe her other weaknesses in detail. Maybe she's a little paranoid but she doesn't want June to know how to kill her.

Sekhmet moves on to the next section of field and continues searching for more shells

[Thursday Violist]

[Japaraita]

It's actually pretty fair that Sekhmet doesn't want to discuss how to kill her. After all, June hasn't told Sehkmet that mermaids are weak to getting stabbed in the heart. Granted, most people are weak to that, but the point is that it's pretty normal to not talk about what sorts of things kill you.

Actually, June thinks it's pretty neat how Sekhmet can change herself to become a mermaid if she wants: "That's pretty neat, I'm jealous."

"Oh, actually," June says, "while people don't really treat mermaids as gods, still gotta watch out for being seen as an object of lust. Not so much monsters anymore, I guess, but if you find any sailors that start acting a little too weird, just watch out for them."

As Sekhmet keeps on looking, she'll find some scallop shells.

Also, a sharp murex shell that's had some of its spines broken off. And there's even a broken-off coral piece! That one actually looks pretty cool and unique.

"You know, it's my opinion that it doesn't really matter what you look like, because no matter what you look like you always are just yourself," June says, pivoting the conversation based on something Sekhmet said. At the same time, she gets distracted by her waist and feels it, then hops up and down a couple times again just to feel what her figure feels like. "Haha, this is actually pretty fun. I've never been anywhere near this body type."

...
And, after getting embarrassed by realizing she just spent a while staring at herself, June clears her throat. "So. Um. You said you do smithing? That's really neat, I've tried it out once but I was really bad at it, but I thought that all the different kinds of metals you could make was pretty neat. Do you just do normal smithing or do you make magic metal or anything like that, too?"

[bc56]

Japaraita
Sekhmet isn't surprised by that. Any unusual-looking person will have some creeps interested in them because of it.
She puts the coral and the scallops in the bag but leaves the broken shell alone.
When June starts feeling her altered body again, Sekhmet pauses. "It's fun to be something different once in a while." That's why she's thinking about trying out mermaidism. "Uh, do you need a mirror?"
The topic of smithing brings a slight smile to Sekhmet's face. "I'm, uh, trained as a blacksmith. I've thought about working hellish metals, but I, uh, don't have any practice with them." She's used to iron, steel, and a bit of copper and bronze, not the exotic materials she now has access to.
"So, uh, what do you think is in that ruined castle?"