The Verdant Sea

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Earl of Purple
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

The arrow hits Adrie. It enters his neck and lodges there. He gasps, chokes, and falls to his knees before faceplanting in the dirt.

He's still alive; despite the arrow in his larynx, he's hurt but not exactly injured. They might note that he twisted slightly as he fell to avoid driving the arrow deeper into the wound; or that he's not bleeding, instead a black ichor is slowly bubbling around the arrow; or that he doesn't smell of blood, instead smelling more like old mothballs. He's going to wait until somebody approaches and touches him before he reveals his ruse.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Rebonack »

[The Shallows]

It turns out these people aren't nice at all.

"Clean shot," the visible figure says, approaching as he pulls the cloth and skins away from his face revealing a thing that is only vaguely human. A too wide mouth, too big teeth, inhuman eyes. A monster of some sort, clearly. He moves toward the fallen 'body' and leans down to grab Adrie as the brush shifts nearby, a second figure stepping out into view just as swaddled in obscuring clothing as the first.

No doubt this pair is the source of all the bones.

Definitely not manticores, though.

Manticores don't leave bones behind.

Or so the stories go.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

As Adrie's grabbed, the man moves. His head tilts back unnaturally far and a long, black, chitinous organ shoots from his mouth to jab the other monster. It's got enough rigidity and strength to penetrate most kinds of clothing, so unless there's something under the rags it should contact flesh and probably penetrate, unless the castaway has unusually thick skin. The telson injects a concoction of a mild neurotoxin, a quick-acting paralytic agent, an anaesthetic, and a lingering antibiotic; so he should slump to the ground, unable to move, and lose the ability to form memories or feel pain until the paralytic wear off, whilst they remain in good health for the next few days thanks to the antibiotic giving their immune system a boost. In an adult-sized humanoid, this would take about seven minutes; the visible figure may respond differently.

Once injected, the telson retracts and Adrie stands up, picking the carved stone up as he does.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Rebonack »

[The Shallows]

Wow!

Everyone is full of surprises today!

And the first figure is now full of poison, among other things.

The OTHER figured doesn't seem very happy about this. Within the span of about six seconds she has nearly that number of arrows whizzing through the air toward Adrie. She doesn't shout. Or yell. Or even make any angry noises. Just a patch of arrows let fly.

She really isn't aiming at any particular part of Adrie, just firing at the torso area in general. Shooting him in the neck obviously didn't do anything (or at least not ENOUGH) so may as well branch out a little, right?
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

Adrie grunts and stumbles as the arrows hit his torso and chest, though none of them seem to penetrate far, mostly bouncing or skidding off. He's oozing from more places, so they've had some effect at least, but for now Adrie's throwing the carved stone at the archer, ducking low and scuttling forward on all fours. He's surprisingly quick like this, and a much harder target to hit. He's going to try to sting her as well, with the hopefully-non-lethal telson concealed within his face.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

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[The Shallows]

There's a little problem here for Adrie.

The first of the two hunters didn't expect him to be able to paralyze people with a death tongue. But the second just saw him do it and is ready for-

Well. Maybe not a rock begin thrown at her. She manages to sidestep it and readies another arrow, but then Adrie is skittering toward her and the low profile makes landing a shot far more difficult. She doesn't run away, though. Oh no.

Instead?

She leaps and grabs a low branch before hauling herself up. And then, with practiced ease, begins jumping from branch to branch. She doesn't know how well Adrie climbs but she figures it won't be as well as her.

Maybe?

The first hunter remains paralyzed on the ground.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

The archer is correct, he can't climb as quickly as she can. So Adrie scuttles back to her downed companion, and drags him into their shelter. He'll pat the guy down, take his shoes and any weapons he's carrying, and extend his ovipositor to lay some eggs in his abdomen. So long as he's still paralysed, he won't be able to remember anything Adrie does- or feel the eggs being implanted in his abdominal cavity. There's four; they'll take a while to hatch, and longer still to mature to the point they're old enough to leave- during which time, they'll eat each other until there's one or maybe two left. He's likely to suffer from an increased appetite, pica, weight loss, and occasional pain or numbness as they move around, as they also excrete some anaesthetic. Hopefully, the archer can't see what he's doing to her mate; last thing he wants is for her to kill him because she thinks he's not him any more.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Keeper »

Falling Down the Stairs

Kol wobbles back onto his feet, nursing his bruises. Still, that giant monkey monster thing isn't going to kill itself. Kol does his best to lift the sight of the rifle up to his eye and fire his remaining spear-rounds into the monkey's back while it's busy with Ash.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Recaiden »

[Wading]

"Bye, spiders." he quips as he stumbles on down the hill.

Ah, ruins! This is more like it. Just like back home in <somewhere, surely>. Buildings, made by some long-gone and unprepared hand, now forgotten. What place could be more comfortable?

However, before he investigates the ruins proper, something else demands his attention. Water flowing up? What convinced it to do that?
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Re: The Verdant Sea

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[Wading]

The spiders don't reply to the quip, probably because they can neither speak nor understand languages. They understand chemical trails and the vibrations caused by distressed prey, but that's about it.

Ruins prove to be fascinating, but less of a draw than the water flowing uphill nearby. To be fair water acting in defiance of gravity is definitely an unusual occurrence and worth investigating further. There doesn't appear to be any immediately obvious reason for it, really. But if our hero checks this little stream along with all the other little trickles of water burbling out of the marsh and up the hill nearby he'll find that they're all flowing in the same direction. The little streams don't meander the way that water usually does, taking the path of least resistance. Instead all the streams are moving in a straight line toward...

Something.

Though what that something is?

That isn't immediately clear.

Our hero could climb to the top of the hill and take a look, maybe? Maybe the source is just over that rise and all questions will be answered!


[The Shallows]

Time for horrible parisitoid arthropod babies!

The paralyzed hunter doesn't do much of anything in reaction to all this, but that's kind of the point isn't it? Our stabby pal will come away from this encounter with some shoes, a well cared for steel knife, and the bow along with eight arrows if he feels like absconding with that as well. When he leaves the enclosure he'll find that the forest has fallen dead silent again. He'll likely have the uncanny feeling that he's being watched, given that the other hunter has already made it quite clear that she's pretty great at hiding.

There are still a number of odd things nearby. Such as that huge vine covered stone head and the ruined gas station with pumps half buried in the mud.

Or...

He could always go deeper.

He might even manage to find someone who ISN'T going to try to kill and eat him. That would be novel, right?
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Recaiden »

[Wading]

No, there's no hurry in following the water. He sees the direction now, that it's all being pulled it.
He can go there later.

For now, the ruins are calling to him! Metaphorically. And so he heads towards those stone pillars sunken into the bog. What was this place?
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

Adrie does take the bow and the arrows, though he's not too confident in their use at least if he has them his eggs' host won't be able to shoot him quite so easily. He also pulls the arrow out of his neck, and rubs it until it stops leaking. That gets added to his new quiver.

After a glance at the canopy and a quick look to see if he can spot his potential follower, he'll head away from the wreck and towards the petrol station. If he's lucky, there's going to be several different exits and he can use it to break the trail, and if not perhaps he'll find other useful stuff inside. Although he doubts it, so close to where he knows people were living.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Gold »

Ash is, predictably, launched away by the explosion. "FUUU-" Her expletive is cut short by her hitting the ground, getting a mouthful of dirt which she promptly spits out.

Ash is now even dirtier than she was before, she can't get the taste of soil out of her mouth, and has pins and needles all over. Not her best day. "Why won't this fucker just die already!? Are we missing something or what? "
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Re: The Verdant Sea

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[Falling Down the Stairs]

Missing something?

Possibly.

This ape is one of those 'Welcome to Dark Souls' first bosses that you aren't supposed to be able to beat who just mulches you when you're starting your adventure. Such foes CAN be overcome but it's a difficult, trying process. Hence why the ape won't just die already.

Speaking of dying! Sune picks himself up after being flung into the marble column, shaking a bit. Parts of him look twisted and broken but they're snapping back into place and it looks pretty unpleasant. With a feral snarl lightning begins crackling over his body as his fur stands on end thanks to the charge, making him look simultaneously VERY poofy to a silly degree as well as a bit intimidating.

Honestly lightning powers and fur really aren't a great combination if you want to be taken seriously.

Regardless! A white-hot bolt of lightning leaps from Sune's body and twists across the ape right as Kol spears him from the other side!

The ape, as might be expected, doesn't like this.

It reacts by gripping its club with both hands whilst beginning to SPIN. And then like a giant smelly top of death begins bouncing around the ruins wildly! Our heroes should REALLY avoid getting hit by this as it would likely shatter all their bones. Having non-shattered bones is ideal for most people.


[Wading]

What IS with those ruins sunk in the bog?

There are several large sandstone blocks sticking out of the water here and there, so it isn't difficult to hop from one to the next if our hero doesn't feel like getting their socks soggy. Are they wearing socks? If so avoiding sogginess is a good plan. There's nothing worse than hiking with wet socks.

...okay there is.

But as far as vaguely annoying and potentially harmful hiking irritations go, wet socks rank pretty high on the list.

Regardless!

Onward!

The interior of the ruins are... well. Initially not THAT interesting. Just a bunch of pillars about an arm-span apart holding up a roof. More of a monument than anything else. But after walking through the pillars for a little bit our hero might begin to quickly notice that something is off. Despite the ruins looking maybe thirty feet wide from a distance the forest of stone pillars seems to stretch much further than that-
-and looking over their shoulder reveals that they stretch much further behind.

Hmm...

Troubling.

Each of the pillars sports four vaguely ghoulish faces pointing in the four cardinal directions. A tiger, an ape, a board, and an ox. There are similar animal carvings on the floor. At each pillar the depictions are the same, but the direction they carvings FACE are different. Hmm... this is probably some kind of puzzle, isn't it?


[The Shallows]

And so some arrows are removed.

That's a normal thing people do. Pulling arrows out of themselves and adding those arrows to their inventory. Rebo has seen people do it in Skyrim so it must be a common activity.

No one APPEARS to follow the weevil as he moves toward the gas station, but it has already been established that the other hunter is quite adept at moving through the trees without being seen. They might be following him. Or they might be waiting for him to leave so they can check on the OTHER hunter. It's anyone's guess, really. No way to know for sure.

The station itself is a mess.

Half sunk in the mire, windows broken, strangler figs gradually consuming it. Given another decade or so one could probably walk right past it without even realizing that it's there.

There aren't any fetishes nearby like those the hunters had apparently staked out their territory with, which is odd. It isn't that far away from their shelter. Maybe they avoid it for some reason?

There are several interesting things nearby. The fuel pumps, of course, might be a pretty good source of flammable liquid. There are also several desolate cars and trucks of various sizes and models nearby, all in about the same state of decay. Then there's the market itself which might contain useful food or supplies.

Or dangers.

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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

Adrie is, perhaps, not a person. He'd insist he is, however most people are not compelled to paralyse other people so they can inject eggs into their bodies. The compulsion to breed is less insistent, though now he's left some eggs behind in the hunter the compulsion is lessened. Until the next batch are ready to be implanted. Speaking of, if the hunter does go to check on her mate, she'll find him awake but unresponsive until the poisons wear off after seven minutes of the sting, so there's maybe five minutes left after Adrie left? And he won't have any memories from just before the sting until he wakes up. He might remember talking to Adrie, and seeing him collapse with the arrow in his neck, but might not remember walking over and getting stung. Unless he's got a literally supernatural memory, or a passenger in his head that watches everything and isn't linked to his blood supply.

If Adrie were from a decade or five later, he might recognise the fuel pumps and try harvesting oil derivatives from them. But he's not, he doesn't, and chances are the fuel's dissipated anyway. Either evaporated or leaked through a hole in the tanks. Instead, he's going to peer into the windows of the cars and trucks to see if there's anything interesting inside- ignoring the boot, as he's assuming they're locked. He pulls the knife out, to ensure it's ready to use, in case something jumps out at him from the cars or the building.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Keeper »

Falling Down the Stairs

Kol is just Some Guy he isn't equipped to handle giant spinning monkey monsters!
So naturally he cowers behind a sturdy looking stone column.

Luckily, it is not knocked over by the spinning monster because that would result in him being squished.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Recaiden »

[Wading]

Ah. He's found himself in some sort of endless hall trap.

Ignoring the puzzle for now, our explorer turns and walks back the way he came. Admittedly, he didn't keep track of how many pillars he passed on the way in. Maybe he can still just sort of...walk back the way he came?"
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Gold »

[Falling Down the Stairs]

"..."

Ash is initially speechless when the ape lets it rip and spins to win. Then, she comes to her senses and turns into a spider just in time to scamper up a tree and stay out of the baboon's blood circle. She constructs a web connecting a few of the taller trees in the forest, so that she may move between them should the ape fell one or two in its centrifugal fury.

While she's up there, she has the beginning of an idea. If there's some way to trick the ape into charging in a straight line, she could set up a web between two trees and the ape would charge right in and get stuck. Damn, that might be the most thinking she's done in maybe a month.

Ash webs herself through the trees to get to the one nearest Sune, then shimmies down it in human form to ask "Psst. Wolf-kid. Uh... nice furdo. Anyways, I thought of a plan. Do you know if there's a way to convince this ape to charge in a straight line? Wave a red flag or something? Hey, it works on bull sharks."
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Re: The Verdant Sea

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[The Shallows]

Ah, good ol' car looting.

That's always a classic.

Adrie discovers a family of quail (who are startled by his presence) and a skeleton (who is not) when he checks the first vehicle. Considering the damage to the back of the skull and the rusted gun in the skeleton's lap it is pretty clear how the skeleton met their demise, though the reason for it might not be immediately obvious. Should he pick up the firearm he'll find that it's so corroded that it's useless.

Alas.

Maybe he could throw it at someone?

The other cars have doors left open, as though someone fled from them and left the cars unattended.

Something... dangerous happened here?

And possibly horrible enough that at least one person decided to take their own life rather than face it.

Definitely not encouraging.

There's some canned food and plastic water bottles in the back seat of one of the cars, quite a few actually. There is not, however, a can opener. Maybe there's one in the trunk?

As Adrie is searching he may notice some swift movement out of the corner of his eye. Something fast and low to the ground. Maybe about the size of a dog? Should he look he'll find that nothing is there.


[Wading]

Endless hall traps are just terrible.

Wander around aimlessly until you die of dehydration.

The WORST.

Our hero tries doing a heel turn and going back the way he came! He'll find more of the same. Pillars, animal faces, and animal tiles. Lots of sandstone. No giant spiders. This is probably a puzzle of some sort. Stupid dungeon puzzles. Why can't they just have normal floor plans that make sense?

...probably to keep interlopers out.

But if the point is to keep interlopers out why leave clues of any kind?

Just doesn't make any sense.


[Falling Down the Stairs]

Come on, Kol. When has a little bit of death ever been the end of someone's adventure?

The ape (thankfully) smashes into the pillar Kol is hiding behind and causes the whole thing to shudder before bouncing off like a top and spinning away in a different direction. Honestly this doesn't make much sense. There's no reason why a spinning monster would be bouncing off things like an old DVD screen saver. But then again this whole forest doesn't make a great deal of sense.

Ash discovers that the best way to avoid getting run over by a spinning ape is to be out of the spinning ape's reach. Really not a bad plan.

And speaking of plans, Sune is still running around lobbing the occasional FLOOF bolt at the ape! They just keep getting deflected by the spinning staff, though. Somehow. At the question he woofs out a, "No."

Darn.

Oh hey the ape is still spinning around and bouncing off things.

He's moving pretty quickly but thankfully there's cover aplenty in the overgrown marble ruins.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Recaiden »

[Wading]

Well, that's simple. You want to filter the interlopers.

You must be this good at puzzles to lope.

That sort of thing.

The man sighs, but then shrugs - the ruin isn't too bad as far as places go. For his first attempt at engaging with the puzzle, our explorer looks for places where the same animal faces itself on adjacent pillars. Maybe stepping between those will have some effect? Or maybe there'll also be matching tiles nearby. 4x2 animals means...well, he doesn't know yet. Oh, can he turn the pillars, by pushing on the faces this way and that?
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Keeper »

Falling Down the Stairs

Well, at least Kol is semi-safe behind this pillar.
...
He's out of ammo again so he better do something.

The next time the ape passes by to slam into his hiding space Kol pops out to give it a good jab in the arm with his spear to release its energy again.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

Adrie does recognise firearms and the damage they can do, though if it's semi-automatic he won't really know how to use it- the earliest were starting to appear, I think. If it's a revolver, he'll take it and look it over before tossing it back. He doesn't have a bag, but he'll gather some of the food tins and head towards the building, though he changes his mind after he's spotted the movement. Instead, he'll climb onto the car he's nearest and stand up, having a look around from that improved vantage point.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Gold »

[Falling Down the Stairs]

"Goddamnit."

Ash climbs back up the tree as a spider, webbing through the forest as before so that she can see the ape but isn't at risk of being on a tree when it's hit. Passing arachnophobes would not want to look up right now.

Seems she's just going to wait the spin attack;out'
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Rebonack »

[Wading]

It doesn't seem like there's a strong connection between loping and puzzles, though.

Maybe the people who were supposed to be in here had the puzzles explained to them or something?

Anyway...

Time to fiddle with the puzzle!

Trying to shove on the animal faces doesn't make them move, so that probably isn't the answer. The animal face tiles on the floor don't move, either. Though one could probably pry them OFF the floor if one really felt so inclined. After looking between faces and tiles for a moment he'll likely notice that a meandering path of boar tiles stretches from one boar face to another a few pillars down.

That might be significant?

And there IS a two by two square of ape faces over there. And a three by three square of ox faces next to it.

AND there are a pair of tiger faces pointed at each other THERE but the tiles between them don't match at all.


[The Shallows]

The weapon is in fact a revolver, though it is so corroded that the drum won't even turn.

BUT WAIT!

WHAT WAS THAT!

Onto the hood of a car the weevil goes and from that vantage point he'll see-!

Forest.

Lots of forest.

And one ACTUAL bird this time sitting on a branch of that tree over there. Dark brown with an orange belly that has a black V on it. The bird gives a low, metallic trilling noise. Sounds like the same noise the two hunters were using to communicate.


[Falling Down the Stairs]

The ape gets stabbed in the arm!

He shrieks with rage and drops out of his spin attack and-!

Oh wow.

He looks really dizzy.

Teetering around and stuff.

Sune uses this as an opportunity to LEAP onto the back of the ape and begin biting the heck out of him! Gnar gnar gnar!
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Keeper »

Falling Down the Stairs
Kol jumps out of cover, trying to move around a bit so he can get a clear shot of the Ape's front without any risk of hitting Sune. Once he does he levels his re-transformed rifle and fires at where he imagines the ape's heart is. Or at least its lungs.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

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[Falling Down the Stairs]

Ash climbs back up the tree as a spider, webbing through the forest as before so that she can see the ape but isn't at risk of being on a tree when it's hit. Passing arachnophobes would not want to look up right now.

When the Ape is dizzied, Ash leaps from the trees and follows in Sune's footsteps, landing on its side and trying to pump as much venom into the ape as she can with her fangs.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Recaiden »

[Wading]

Okay, not like this.

However, a three-by-three of the same tiles is very unlikely. It almost has to be part of a pattern. So he heads over to the center of that grid, and looks around from there.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

The Shallows

Huh, there's a bird that sounds like the hunter's mate. Adrie tilts his head to one side, and narrows his eyes. He'll stare at it to make sure it knows he's spotted it, and then jump off the car and head into the petrol station ruins. He'll turn to glance back at it quite often, so hopefully it won't disappear on him whilst he's got his eyes off it. It's also possible whilst he's distracted by the bird, something worse will come up and surprise him.
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Rebonack »

[Falling Down the Stairs]

Our heroes descend upon the ape with great fury and strength!

Mostly via biting but there's a bit of shooting going on there, too.

But this doesn't last for long. Oh no! Certainly not!

Because the blue ape is slowly beginning to GLOW a virulent shade of green as steam begins curling from his fur!

One would think that all the biting and ripping and shooting and poisoning that's going on at the moment would be enough to drop this dumb monkey but the thing STILL isn't going down! Stupid boss monkey.


[Wading]

Okay!

To the middle of the ox grid!

Our hero walks right over to the middle of the square and as soon as a foot comes down on them the tiles sink a good three inches, shortly followed by a mechanical clanking sound, shortly followed in turn by horn-like stone spikes popping out of the center of each of the tiles. Thankfully the tiles aren't that big, so there should be plenty of time to hop out of the way before getting perforated by the trap.

Looks like that wasn't the solution.


[The Shallows]

The bird sits there on a branch, being a bird. After trilling a few times it flutters down to the forest floor and begins scratching about at the leaf litter while making bird noises. PROBABLY the hunters were just mimicking the bird's call to make it less obvious that they were communicating with each other. Or maybe it is some sort of really nefarious bird.

It isn't immediately clear which is true.

Moving toward the station and glancing back at the bird now and again, Adrie won't notice any changes in its behavior-
-though he will notice a flicker of movement again out of the corner of his eye. Something low to the ground. Something red.

Once more when he looks there will be nothing.

Some brush is swaying as though a creature had moved past it.

It's probably nothing. No reason to even think about it.

Adrie moves into the ruined gas station and discovers a wealth of supplies. There are many shelves here loaded down with bagged food, old coolers full of room-temperature soft drinks, and a plastic case full of masses of mold that were probably donuts at some point. Honestly it looks much like any gas station mini-mart might, except for the fact that parts of the roof are missing and vines are growing all over the walls. There's also a skeleton slumped up against one of the walls in old, tattered clothing. A rusted shotgun lies next to the remains and the rib cage is sort of... exploded outward. There are several... spikes? quills? Stingers? Something hard and black and chitinous stabbed into the wall near the skeleton. Several more lodged in the skeleton itself.
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Earl of Purple
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Re: The Verdant Sea

Post by Earl of Purple »

Shallows

Adrie suspects the latter. He's not a fan of this movement he keeps seeing, either. The first thing he'll do upon entering the station is head to the skeleton. He's not good at figuring out how long ago someone died or how (although he suspects the chest is a clue), but there's a shotgun here and he'll check that, see if it's loaded and if he thinks it's good enough to fire. Even if not, he'll try pulling one of the spikes out of the wall; he's got a knife, but something like this might come in handy regardless.
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