Thirteenth Age: The Bridge
Dec. 26th, 2015 09:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
james_davis_nicollPresent:
Virgil the Tiefling Sorcerer. “Amnesiac”. Didn't used to be a tiefling.
Ren the Dwarven Bard: tall for a dwarf, with red skin
Percival the (ancient) Forgeborn Commander, the perfect Dwarven companion bot.
Ewoud Thon, Human Fight. Just mustered out. Broke.
Blunder, Human fighter (NPC)
Nabit the Gnome (NPC)
As the group carefully makes their way along the ledge—a slice in the slug's flesh made ages ago by the giant's weapon—they can see the dust of fierce activity far below on the desert: the desert goblins are coming to visit. And the sound of quarrels snapping past their heads lets the murder hobos know the goblins have crossbows. The only refuge is on the far side of the bridge.
But something, a flock of somethings, is fluttering around in the middle of the covered bridge, attacking something unseen through a gap in the roof. Ren identifies them as stirges. Ren knows enough about stirges to know they are Bad News. He is considerate enough to share the good news.
Still, the stirges might not kill the whole party, while the nomads definitely will. The group makes its way across the bridge as quickly as they can, given the condition of the decrepit structure.
Two stirges are busy sucking the last blood out of two unfortunate goblins. Spotting Ewoud, one of the stirges clambers onto the human, testing his armour with its proboscis. Percival tries to discourage the stirge with a sword thrust, narrowly avoiding removing Ewoud's ear. Ewoud simply runs the stirge through, In the scrabble to deal with the stirges, Blunder and Ren get tangled up in each other, which surprisingly is not enough to keep Ren from breaking into an inspiring song.
Virgil begins to spark and smoke as he reaches out to gather power; there are always little pockets of mana to draw on, although which kind varies from place to place. Here it is fire, perhaps a relic of a passing ifrit.
Nabit courteously declines to deny the rest of the party glory in battle, remaining out of the way while trying to look as unappetizing as possible.
The roof conceals most of the party from the stirges at the cost of concealing the stirges from the party. Virgil places one glowing hand on a part of the roof where he thinks he can hear a stirge on the other side.
“If I may, sir,” said Percival, as he moved Virgil's hand to a section of the roof that actually had a stirge on the other side. Percival looked as satisfied as a machine can as a large section of roof and a stirge exploded in flames, then leaned forward to run Ewoud's attacker through.
Ren strikes a particularly dramatic note, at which point three of the stirges explode. Resonance is a harsh mistress. More of the roof flutters away. The bridge rattles but doesn't collapse... yet.
Despite the sputtering and crackling as Virgil begins to harvest more power, Ren hears an odd thumping sound from the goblin end of the bridge. Risking a glance, he see the giant spider land in the midst of some very startled desert goblins. The last few weeks paralyzed in the dragon's lair have been emotionally tiring for the poor arachnid; she seems inclined to work it out with some vigorous exercise. Body parts fly through the air, none of them spider parts.
While it is nice to have something distracting the goblins, the force of the spider's landing sends a ripple down the rotting bridge. More sections fall off. Rather inconveniently, the ripple passes by the party just as Ewoud thrusts at a stirge, bouncing him out the side of the bridge.
On his way off the bridge, Ewoud manages to grab a support rope. Percival retrieves the human before he can fall.
The group reaches the far side of the bridge. No more quarrels are coming their way, since the giant spider is occupying the full attention of the raiding party, which is considerably less numerous than it was. While there are reinforcements down on the plains, the warriors seem oddly reluctant to climb up to die for the greater glory of their leaders, something the war leaders take as a personal affront.
The nearest way into the shanty town built on the side of the giant is a trap door in the bottom of a shack. As the group approaches, the trap door opens and two town goblins peer out. Nabit negotiates for the party (while Virgil, having donned many forms and fluent in many of the languages of those with souls, listens to make sure Nabit isn't selling his companions down the river).
The townies are not averse to granting the party shelter, if they can pay the fare. That fare is the safe delivery of their leader, Fellkin. That would be one of town goblins the group left back in the dragon's larder. Back on the far side of a rickety bridge. On the other side of a small army of nomads. And a giant spider.
And if the timing is bad, a dragon.
Virgil suggests focusing on the three goblin war chiefs, since the other warriors, the ones not scattered across the landscape in bits, seem to want to leave if that becomes an option. Virgin then concentrates for a moment and hurls a bolt of what turns out to be negative energy at one of the leaders; presumably the spot on the giant's flank under the trap door has seen a lot of violent death, as that is the source of negative energy. A distant figure down on the plains flies apart as the moaning bolt reaches it.
Everyone with a ranged weapon plinks away at the figures with the most impressive helmets while the party makes it way back across the bridge. By the time they reach the far end, none of the nomad goblins unlucky enough to have been in the first few waves are alive. There's an awkward pause as the party and the spider look at each other, then with a merry wave of a goblin's leg, the spider rappels down to the ground, to play some more.
Considerately, the spider left drop lines of spider silk everywhere, which means climbing back up into the larder is merely difficult and not suicidal. Neither Virgil or Ewoud have experience in climbing so they remain on the ledge to guard against the nomads. Judging from the sounds coming up from the desert, that's not likely to be an issue.
Fellkin does not mind having an honour guard back to his shanty town. Sadly, one of his foot-soldiers is still pretty woozy from the dragon venom. He slips and tumbles down the side of the slug. Percival leans out to snag the goblin as he passes by the forgeborn. A fine gesture, except by the time the goblin reaches Percival he is moving quickly enough to knock Percival off the side of the snail.
It's a long, long fall down to the ground.
Percival stands up, brushing off the remains of the bugbear he landed on. By this point there is only one war chief alive, along with an entourage who have been very strongly selected for caution in the last few minutes. Doing his best to look as though he had not been seriously damaged by the fall, Percival demonstrates a flashy sword move, then points out the surviving leader that as the only person of significance to return to his tribe alive, he can make the official account of the encounter say whatever is most flattering to that leader. If he leaves now. Otherwise, history will be told by those goblins who weren't sliced in two by an irritated forgeborn.
As the remaining goblins return to their camp to enrich their people's rich folklore with amazing tales of courage in combat against a sea of giant spiders and worse, Percival does his best to convince the spider that he is a friend. The spider accepts a dead goblin as a gift.
Very luckily for the forgeborn, the spider does not take it as a nuptial gift in the manner of Pisaura mirabilis and so things do not take an awkward turn. Instead, the spider sweeps Percival off his feet and bounds back up the side of the slug to where the party is waiting. Dropping Percival off, the spider backs off carefully and then scurries off on some urgent errand.
Fellkin is very impressed that the forgeborn survived.
Back in the town, the group discusses their next move. The goblins are pretty sure Nabit's sister is in the dragon's lair, high above the shanty town. Any course of action that involves acting fighting the dragon is suicide. While the group is not averse to saving her (Virgil in particular is sure it's the sort of thing a legitimately good person like himself would want to do), any rescue will be a quick in and out, no combat involve.
At least, that's the plan.
Virgil the Tiefling Sorcerer. “Amnesiac”. Didn't used to be a tiefling.
Ren the Dwarven Bard: tall for a dwarf, with red skin
Percival the (ancient) Forgeborn Commander, the perfect Dwarven companion bot.
Ewoud Thon, Human Fight. Just mustered out. Broke.
Blunder, Human fighter (NPC)
Nabit the Gnome (NPC)
As the group carefully makes their way along the ledge—a slice in the slug's flesh made ages ago by the giant's weapon—they can see the dust of fierce activity far below on the desert: the desert goblins are coming to visit. And the sound of quarrels snapping past their heads lets the murder hobos know the goblins have crossbows. The only refuge is on the far side of the bridge.
But something, a flock of somethings, is fluttering around in the middle of the covered bridge, attacking something unseen through a gap in the roof. Ren identifies them as stirges. Ren knows enough about stirges to know they are Bad News. He is considerate enough to share the good news.
Still, the stirges might not kill the whole party, while the nomads definitely will. The group makes its way across the bridge as quickly as they can, given the condition of the decrepit structure.
Two stirges are busy sucking the last blood out of two unfortunate goblins. Spotting Ewoud, one of the stirges clambers onto the human, testing his armour with its proboscis. Percival tries to discourage the stirge with a sword thrust, narrowly avoiding removing Ewoud's ear. Ewoud simply runs the stirge through, In the scrabble to deal with the stirges, Blunder and Ren get tangled up in each other, which surprisingly is not enough to keep Ren from breaking into an inspiring song.
Virgil begins to spark and smoke as he reaches out to gather power; there are always little pockets of mana to draw on, although which kind varies from place to place. Here it is fire, perhaps a relic of a passing ifrit.
Nabit courteously declines to deny the rest of the party glory in battle, remaining out of the way while trying to look as unappetizing as possible.
The roof conceals most of the party from the stirges at the cost of concealing the stirges from the party. Virgil places one glowing hand on a part of the roof where he thinks he can hear a stirge on the other side.
“If I may, sir,” said Percival, as he moved Virgil's hand to a section of the roof that actually had a stirge on the other side. Percival looked as satisfied as a machine can as a large section of roof and a stirge exploded in flames, then leaned forward to run Ewoud's attacker through.
Ren strikes a particularly dramatic note, at which point three of the stirges explode. Resonance is a harsh mistress. More of the roof flutters away. The bridge rattles but doesn't collapse... yet.
Despite the sputtering and crackling as Virgil begins to harvest more power, Ren hears an odd thumping sound from the goblin end of the bridge. Risking a glance, he see the giant spider land in the midst of some very startled desert goblins. The last few weeks paralyzed in the dragon's lair have been emotionally tiring for the poor arachnid; she seems inclined to work it out with some vigorous exercise. Body parts fly through the air, none of them spider parts.
While it is nice to have something distracting the goblins, the force of the spider's landing sends a ripple down the rotting bridge. More sections fall off. Rather inconveniently, the ripple passes by the party just as Ewoud thrusts at a stirge, bouncing him out the side of the bridge.
On his way off the bridge, Ewoud manages to grab a support rope. Percival retrieves the human before he can fall.
The group reaches the far side of the bridge. No more quarrels are coming their way, since the giant spider is occupying the full attention of the raiding party, which is considerably less numerous than it was. While there are reinforcements down on the plains, the warriors seem oddly reluctant to climb up to die for the greater glory of their leaders, something the war leaders take as a personal affront.
The nearest way into the shanty town built on the side of the giant is a trap door in the bottom of a shack. As the group approaches, the trap door opens and two town goblins peer out. Nabit negotiates for the party (while Virgil, having donned many forms and fluent in many of the languages of those with souls, listens to make sure Nabit isn't selling his companions down the river).
The townies are not averse to granting the party shelter, if they can pay the fare. That fare is the safe delivery of their leader, Fellkin. That would be one of town goblins the group left back in the dragon's larder. Back on the far side of a rickety bridge. On the other side of a small army of nomads. And a giant spider.
And if the timing is bad, a dragon.
Virgil suggests focusing on the three goblin war chiefs, since the other warriors, the ones not scattered across the landscape in bits, seem to want to leave if that becomes an option. Virgin then concentrates for a moment and hurls a bolt of what turns out to be negative energy at one of the leaders; presumably the spot on the giant's flank under the trap door has seen a lot of violent death, as that is the source of negative energy. A distant figure down on the plains flies apart as the moaning bolt reaches it.
Everyone with a ranged weapon plinks away at the figures with the most impressive helmets while the party makes it way back across the bridge. By the time they reach the far end, none of the nomad goblins unlucky enough to have been in the first few waves are alive. There's an awkward pause as the party and the spider look at each other, then with a merry wave of a goblin's leg, the spider rappels down to the ground, to play some more.
Considerately, the spider left drop lines of spider silk everywhere, which means climbing back up into the larder is merely difficult and not suicidal. Neither Virgil or Ewoud have experience in climbing so they remain on the ledge to guard against the nomads. Judging from the sounds coming up from the desert, that's not likely to be an issue.
Fellkin does not mind having an honour guard back to his shanty town. Sadly, one of his foot-soldiers is still pretty woozy from the dragon venom. He slips and tumbles down the side of the slug. Percival leans out to snag the goblin as he passes by the forgeborn. A fine gesture, except by the time the goblin reaches Percival he is moving quickly enough to knock Percival off the side of the snail.
It's a long, long fall down to the ground.
Percival stands up, brushing off the remains of the bugbear he landed on. By this point there is only one war chief alive, along with an entourage who have been very strongly selected for caution in the last few minutes. Doing his best to look as though he had not been seriously damaged by the fall, Percival demonstrates a flashy sword move, then points out the surviving leader that as the only person of significance to return to his tribe alive, he can make the official account of the encounter say whatever is most flattering to that leader. If he leaves now. Otherwise, history will be told by those goblins who weren't sliced in two by an irritated forgeborn.
As the remaining goblins return to their camp to enrich their people's rich folklore with amazing tales of courage in combat against a sea of giant spiders and worse, Percival does his best to convince the spider that he is a friend. The spider accepts a dead goblin as a gift.
Very luckily for the forgeborn, the spider does not take it as a nuptial gift in the manner of Pisaura mirabilis and so things do not take an awkward turn. Instead, the spider sweeps Percival off his feet and bounds back up the side of the slug to where the party is waiting. Dropping Percival off, the spider backs off carefully and then scurries off on some urgent errand.
Fellkin is very impressed that the forgeborn survived.
Back in the town, the group discusses their next move. The goblins are pretty sure Nabit's sister is in the dragon's lair, high above the shanty town. Any course of action that involves acting fighting the dragon is suicide. While the group is not averse to saving her (Virgil in particular is sure it's the sort of thing a legitimately good person like himself would want to do), any rescue will be a quick in and out, no combat involve.
At least, that's the plan.
