Regina considered for a moment, then raised a hand and sent a steady stream of flame flowing out at the block of ice, fully intending to melt it before it could reanimate into something nastier. Bewitched elements could be weird that way, and she had no intention of taking chances. "Is everyone all right?" she asked as her own wounds visibly filled with etherstuff and, slowly, vanished..
Solomon jogged into the room just in time to answer the question. "I'm... still rather frostbitten I'm afraid." He said, rubbing his aching body. "It's dead then?"
After the creature was defeated, Jennifer fell back against the wall, gasping for breath. She puts her hands on her knees and takes deep breaths as she recovers from her bloodrage, only stopping to offer a low, cruel laugh in answer to Solomon's question.
Stepping aside from Regina's line of fire, Aurora moved back to the floor. "Was that the eldritch horror that drove away the Swallows? Didn't seem that terrible to me."
Nurai walked into the hallway, looking both direction and seeing no one. Muttering to herself, "Yeah... I've read too many books and played too many games for this being by myself to bode well..." before taking a minute to summon her eidolon. A shadow is never truly alone and many other kayals saying came to mind.
Her own shadow faded before being replaced by her shadow eidolon who stretched out on the floor for a moment. Nurai rolled her eyes behind her glasses before listening for anything of interest.
When she was satisfied, Regina let her flames die out. A moment later, she focused her etherstuff inwards, renewing the protection against cold that had really helped her throughout that fight. Best to keep that up from now on, yeah? "Don't raise unlucky flags." she told Aurora. "We just need to keep going and get our job done."
Burai failed to notice anything of significant interest, only that the ice on the body seemed to be growing slowly still.
"It was dead to start with," Valda pointed out, poking the frozen block with the barrel of her gun. "What it is now is...uncertain. That doesn't feel like it was enough to destroy this place, but we might not have the whole story yet." Glancing up the stairs the creature had been attempting to ascend, she added, "There's always up there."
Nodding to Solomon, she added, "Was Nurai's wand enough, or do you need more healing? How about everyone else?"
"I'm still quite miserable, but that was rather helpful Nurai. Thank you." He nodded to the shadow caller. "I've always been jealous of the magical arts of healing. Could I, perhaps, bother you for a bit more...?" Solomon suddenly seemed uncomfortable, as though he wasn't accustomed to asking for help overly much.
"I suspect that's not the end of it, but I would recommend we take this... thing, and put it in one of those stoves in the kitchen. I can lift it so we can avoid someone having to touch it."
.
"Destroying it with fire might work," Valda acknowledged, pocking the corpsicle again. "Plus whatever's upstairs and downstairs, of course."
"I have all the fire if we want to burn it in an oven." Regina noted cheerfully, watching as Valda poked what remained of the thing they'd killed.
"Looks cathartic enough."
Putting on a pair of gloves, Aurora grabs the icy corpse and moves towards the kitchens. Sure, Regina would likely burn it easily to a crisp, but she has some doubts about the destructive girl being able to control her power.
"It's more I've seen enough movies to be concerned that we beat the killer, only we come back down and - gasp - the bodies gone and the sassy character of colour has vanished." Glancing around, Valda added, "Given that's about half of this group, we should probably avoid that fate."
"Yeah, it would be a shame to lose the comic relief." Regina noted. As the corpse was loaded into the oven, she gestured for the others to stand back and then resumed torching it. Until, basically, everyone else was satisfied.
"If we can really kill it now, do it. There's no reason to wait," Jennifer says getting her wind back.
"Let Aurora -- or me -- stuff it in an oven or in the fireplace, and then we'll let pyro finally cut loose." Jennifer hooks her thumb at Regina.
Except she said all of that before Regina posted. Her timing was impeccable and not awkward at all. It was great.
Solomon bothered Nurai for her healing powers as Regina tended the oven with unsettling enthusiasm. "That book had some interesting information. I think we should go back up and discuss it."
Jennifer is for Solomon's suggestion.
"Information is good," Valda agreed.
"Information is right, information works." Aurora quotes, taking scraps of dried fruits from a pocket and feeding them to Reason.
The return to the Library, grabing Nurai on the way past, was a simple enough matter. "OK, Doc, Knowledge us. What's in the books?"
Solomon gathered everyone around and paged through the book to refresh himself on the material. After a few moments he spoke to the others. "It seems our resident secret society was dealing with entities from beyond. The sort of thing that people really ought to know better than to play with." He turned a few more pages, examining studiously, then continued. "So these creatures ran a bit amok, but couldn't escape the house to run about breaking our whole reality. So they tried to fix it with..." His finger traces across the words as he spoke, "An ancient spirit of winter and cold." He looked up and addressed the others directly. "Naturally this spirit turned bad to worse. And I believe what we're currently facing is said spirit. But to make matters more complicated, there's these outsiders somewhere in the house, presumably, hopefully, locked in the basement. Yet we've made at least one invisible friend, so there's really no telling what is free within the house and what is locked away in the basement." He stood, reaching for the rapier found earlier and affixing it to his belt. "Not until we unlock the basement, of course."
Jennifer jerks her chin at the book in Solomon's hands.
"Does it say how many spirits?"
Aurora sighs. "So, we have a Lovecraftian horror in the basement, a spirit of winter running amok, close to no information on how to fix it, and no trace of the guys who made this whole mess to begin with. Buuut we still have a floor left to explore, right?"
"Doctor, do you have any means of trying to communicate with the friendly entity that contacted us in the greenhouse?"
Solomon peered at Jennifer suspiciously. "I'm not aware of any friendly entities, Jennifer, although I did arrive at the greenhouse after the rest of you. Is there something you haven't told me?" He asked, scanning the faces in the room.
"Shit, I don't know. The invisible thing that wrote 'Not us nothing to show' on the glass!"
Nurai smiled and nodded at Valda before following in step without a word. The shadow followed silently as well, blending in and taking in the situation.
Hearing Solomon's summary of the text and the other's question, the first one that came to the kayal woman's mind was, "Does it say which beyond? That could help us narrow things down...if it didn't sound like they used other planes like a grab bag of tricks and toys." said in a mild tone that became more frustrated as she went along. She could hear some of her mothers' remarks about how no amount of warning labels would stop some scratching at the back of her mind.
Shaking her thoughts free, Nurai glanced to Aurora, "One more floor with that weird bloody magicky mold...how that fits in with the rest, I've no clue yet. I think that will be the last of it other than beyond that weird bound up door into the basement. Hopefully, we can find something useful up there, not more of this cryptic nonsense. Maybe something that will help us communicate meaningfully..." said with little optimism in her voice but it was the best plan she could think of at the moment.
It was at times like this Regina missed having her friend's input on matters. ...Although there was always trying to imagine what sort of response Miyu might have to things.
"Um... c-can we fix whatever they did with the cold spirit to make it work the way they wanted it to?" Regina asked. "It seems to have been mostly effective, so it might be possible to change it enough to render both it and the... things in the basement... no longer a problem."
Solomon nodded to Jennifer. "I see... I wasn't aware of that. Well, as it happens, I could try to make contact with this invisible creature, be it friend or foe. It would take some time, but it could be worth it. It has risks, of course, but I'm confident in my abilities."
He turned to Regina and responded, "No, I think one of us misunderstands the situation. I believe it was the others that summoned the winter, in a bid to free themselves from the wards of the house. Completing what they started would be quite the opposite of what we want."
Solomon looked to Nurai a bit inquisitively and with just a hint of an excited smile. "What's this about mold? I'm... somewhat of an expert, you know." He paused to bask in his own expertise.
Nurai raised an eyebrow at the doctor's remark, "You're an expert on moving mold that radiates magic and writes threatening messages in blood-looking fluids? It's in the en-suite of the big bedroom though the main source of the mold's magic, and possibly more of it, was coming from above like the mold had pushed down from upstairs and something in the house was struggling to keep it where it is." as she motions where the mold had been and then up before returning her hands to her pockets with a shrug.
After a moment's thought, she sighs, looking to Valda "Likely way too much overlapping magic and bonds are just making everything worse...sounds like smart people who really should have known better ignoring the basics for high powered options that seemed more fun at the time..." the summoner said shaking her head as she tried to gather her thoughts...
...struggling to come up with much that might help with everything else on her mind. Getting rid of summonings and creatures, particularly ones that seemed unconnected to the shadows, was not something she'd spent much time on yet.
Nurai's shadow eidolon looked around as it relaxed on the floor, taking a slightly longer look at the newer person Regina as they pieced together what Nurai had told them with what was going on now.
Solomon frowned a bit and looked to the side. "Well, an expert in molds and fungus." He rubbed his aching body once more and then fished out a small, glowing vial from his bandolier pouch. He briefly spared a thought for the shaman that had gifted him with it, remembering well-wishes and his last moments in the little secret village. A flicker of a smile passed over his face as he tore off the seal with his teeth and threw back the contents like a shot of cheap whiskey.
The book has only a limited amount of information, sadly. There seems to be only one of the Spirits, and there were a dozen or so of the intruders at the time. One thing that is made clear with a little further reading, however, is that the Spirit itself cannot be easily defeated. Unbinding it to this plane will stop it, but as for how to to do that...
It occurs to anyone with a solid knowledge of the Planes that the simplest way to deal with the problem is to kill the Summoners.
Solomon remembers that it's also possible to co-opt a summoned creature, in the same way that he dealt with the Summoning back at the Vampire Jared's house.
Alternatively, Summoning something in opposition to the spirit will likely work. It would have to be equal and opposite of the monster with which you're fighting, however.
There's no mention of where the Spirit came from.
~~~
"OK, so sarcasm aside, we still have the upper floor and the basement to check out." Valda considered for a moment. "Although I've kinda lost track of time. How long have we been here now?" Pulling out her phone, she sighs. "Looks like it's almost sundown. Eating is probably gonna have to happen at some point, too."
"I say basement for last, call me old-fashioned but opening ancient prisons holding forgotten horrors is not my cup of tea. And hey, as long as you don't ask me to cook, I'm good eating anything."
At the discussion, Regina shrugged slightly. "I only summon ether." she observed. "If you want blasts of electricity to charge something, I've got you covered, but I don't know anything about summoning or banishing creatures." Miyu, YOU know this stuff. Did you send me here on purpose knowing this was gonna happen!? "Anyway, if you're hungry, I'll just stand guard or something. I don't need anything."
Valda looked over a Regina with curiosity in her amber eyes.. "You don't eat? Sweet. That would be a really helpful on occasion. I got trapped in a town swarmed by fire elementals when I was younger. You would not believe how hard it is to find decent grub in that situation."
Considering Auoura's words, Valda added, "Maybe it's more of a playpen of evil and they're just in for a really long time out until they can play nice with humanity and not eat our eyes as delicacies?"
Aurora mimics writing in a notepad. "Dear Diary, today I tried to make friends with a human. I said "Hello", and he screamed in unspeakable horror as his flesh melted into tendrils of darkness.
These humans must always overreact. What should I do?
Sincerely, Gr'bfhgsst'tab."
Regina held up a hand, on which glimmered a ring. "Payment for a job I did with Miyu a few months ago." she explained. She looked over to Aurora a moment later, and her lips twitched in amusement. "Funny, but ya kadishtu f'bthnk, and they don't really... think... like we do. Don't try too hard to understand them. Even if they can be reasoned with, you're better off using rituals and arts to control them. ...Carefully."
"So, um, take out?" Jennifer starts flipping through her phone at local restaurants. "Have we tried the front door since we started having fun in here?"
The summoner nodded at the Doctor in response to his explanation of his expertise, "You'll probably find it more interesting than we did then, the way it moved was odd - like it was in stalemate with the house trying to clean it...the threats read mostly like archaic literature...or old faux medieval fantasy TV. Overly dramatic aggressive mold..." she said with a short chuckle.
Nurai pondered while listening to the rest, then looked to Valda, "All I've got is some trail mix, we could risk what's in the kitchen.... then looking to Jennifer, "If anyone has signal we could try calling in food though I'm not sure how far that snow spread and, as you said, we would need to check the front door first. Maybe check upstairs, then food and preparing for super locked down playpen of doom? Or try the kitchen and front door first? Nurai shrugged, fine with either option, her small neutral smile not hiding the concern on her face as she returned to her thoughts. She hadn't expected a source to mentioned with how the previous inhabitants seemed to have acted but it did make things harder. As a summoner she felt both annoyed at the previous group's actions and lack of care in the practice and a need to figure out a solution, but the more she thought the more Nurai felt more summoning would either not be strong enough for this mess - or just add to it.
"I can fly back to Fever or whatever's near and we can get some Chinese takeaway, but maybe first check the upper floor? Just for completeness' sake, lest there's a horrible curse on whosoever shall bring food through the threshold or somesuch."
Valda snored a laugh at Auoura's comments and fake note. "It's all just a big misunderstanding. Monsters need love too, and they show it via the power of heart." Glancing out the window, she added, "Not sure your average takeaway guy is going to get in, though. Looks like about three feet of snow at the doors." Considering, the gunmage added, "So, yes, checking the next bit and going to a late night restaurant is probably the best idea. Everyone ready?"
"Whenever the rest of you are." Regina said with a shrug. "Lemme go melt a path." she was totally planning to go eat, though. The fact that she didn't have to didn't mean she wanted to avoid it - especially if it was still tasty. Life without food was pretty boring. With that, she headed towards the front door, fully intending to let loose with a stream of fire and clear a path for the group.
Readying her spear, Aurora moved towards the upper floor. "Snow's not a problem, if you want to use me as a courier. Let's just see what's up here, real quick."
Recovered from her earlier bloodrage, Jennifer follows behind Aurora, trying to take point if there's a non-awkward point to do so.
"There's the door right at the top of the stairs," she recommends as they head up.
"I suppose we'd best hurry it up then. I wouldn't want to see most of you desperately hungry." Solomon jested as he followed behind the group, his hand case at the ready and his gun on his hip. He noted the new addition of the rapier and idly mused about how it would feel to use it, in his hand or otherwise. His thoughts caught up to him, however, and he tapped Nurai on the shoulder. "Pardon me, but I think I could benefit still from the magic in that wand of yours. If it isn't too much trouble."