Rex, you are currently holding Quinn up. She is accessing a panel that is 12 feet up on the straight wall directly under the emperor's balcony. If you let go of her, she falls.
Nobody else but Jibril can climb that wall. But the rest of you can climb into the stands if you want. Rex only triggered a trap once he reached the 2nd row of seats.
Jibril came over to the top of the wall, "Toss me up a rope and I'll tie it off."
Dizzy grabbed her rope ad tossed it up to the half-elf. "What do ye see up there, lad? Is tha emperor protected from aught?"
To Quinn she asked, "Should ye maybe cut one first, and see wha' happens, before cuttin' all three?"
Quinn began by tugging slightly on the different cables with the assumption that the cable connected to the floor that had already fallen would have a different tension than the others.
Quinn readied her dagger. "Alright, cutting one at a time. Avie, any suggestions based on what you've seen and heard throughout your time in the arena? Black, tan, or white?"
Quinn doesn't notice any change in tension between the three cables. At the question, Avie opens one eye to stare down at the rogue (Jibril now being above her, and tying the rope to the balcony edge), and shakes her head. "I never saw anybody find that thing before," she said, pointing to the panel. A little sob escaped her, "I don't think they needed to, cuz I was already....they had already...." Unable to finish her sentence, she popped her thumb back in her mouth and shut her eyes again.
As Jibril tied up the rope, he got a good look at the straw emperor. He really did appear to be a simple straw dummy - there was no sign of motion, no reaction to the ranger's appearance. The expression on his face seemed to be painted on, and didn't change while Jibril was looking at him.
Directly in front of the emperor, (a few feet away from Jibril's position at the balcony edge) was a large stone table or dais. On the stone top were six large, cylindrical buttons. Two had been depressed, four remained up. A hourglass stood to one side, sand rapidly draining through it. Jibril could see that the top of the hourglass would be empty in a few seconds.
Below, the others felt the rumbling in the floor intensify.
"Alright, cutting one at a time. Avie, any suggestions based on what you've seen and heard throughout your time in the arena? Black, tan, or white?"
As the rumbling intensified Vilhelm made an effort to jump up and grap the edge of the stand, but his sweat-slicked fingers kept slipping.
"Instead of cutting them, could you jam them so the cables can’t move?” Vilhelm hollered, hurrying over where he saw a rope being prepared. Perhaps that would be just the thing to help him up and off this dangerous terrain. ”That is, unless the collapse once in motion can’t even be stopped that easily.”
Rex readjusted under Quinn wait. "Jamming sounds good. Cutting sounds like whatever its holding will drop." He looked at the ground beneath him. "Not sure if dropping is what we want..."
As soon as the rope was tied off Jibril again started to climb towards the Emperor - it both seemed the safest place in the arena and the locations of the buttons. As he looked for the best way up he tried to remember a song, any song from his childhood.
He gave up nearly immediately
"What am I supposed to jam? Cables connect one thing to another. If I jam something here, it won't affect what it's connected to. It'll just push the cable a little to the side."
I need a decision....
LOLOL
Dizzy cried out, "Better cut one quick! When in doubt, pick tha middle one!" She tried to climb up into the stands, but her legs were too short and her armour too clumsy. She ended up in a heap on the ground.
As she picked herself up, the dwarf looked at the dust patterns on the floor, trying to figure out which section would fall away next.
Sure. She can climb up.
Quinn directed Rex to walk her closer to the rope, then she clambered up it. As she threw her leg over the balcony rail and caught her first glimpse of the buttons, the last few grains of sand fell from the top half of the hourglass timer.
One of the buttons smoothly sank down into the depressed position, and the hourglass flipped over by itself.
Dizzy tried to determine which section would disappear, but the rumbling and dust were too generalized. A second later, and the north-most section of the arena crumbled down into nothing, widening the gap between the remaining floor and the still-shut exit.
Vilhelm helped Dizzy up after her less than stellar attempt with the rope. 'Not that I did any better, and she's at least wearing a blacksmith's workshop's worth of steel on her,' he thought ruefully. But with the floor going down in bits and pieces, there was no time to waste for self-doubt.
"Up you go," he said, cheering the dwarven cleric on. "I'll be right behind you."
You can be right up to it if you want. I described it assuming you were there already.
Rex hoisted Quinn to the rope before jumping up after her. Your going to pay now emperor! He thought to himself as he rushed towards his goal.
Quinn stared at the contraption with grim determination. It was precisely what she needed to find to try and stop the entire arena floor from caving in. Learning from the card machine, she was very aware that whoever made this button machine wouldn't want it being tampered with either; therefore, she was expecting it to be trapped. She looked it over carefully, being painfully aware of the sand passing through the hour glass.
Fairly certain that it was safe to tinker with, Quinn began the process of disengaging the buttons so that they couldn't be depressed.
Jibril stood out of the way and marvelled as Quinn did her work with the machinery, the magic of the modern world. He opened up the backpack a little, "Avie. We are above the arena and Dizzy is coming.Is it too stuffy in there?" Come on sister, get out of the arena he thought wishfully.
Accepting the boost from Vilhelm, Dizzy tried to get herself up the rope.
lol!
She got a few feet up the rope, then slid hopelessly back down again. "Get yerself up, lad, and if there be time, you can haul me up after."
Dizzy waited until the invoker was on the rope, then she tied the end on to her belt, so that if the floor vanished beneath her, at least she wouldn't go with it.
Quinn grounded the side of the device with a length of copper wire, then didn't need to worry about the electrical traps. She popped the side off, and saw that the depressed buttons knocked a series of heavy iron balls into a trough, which rolled away out of sight. It was a simple manner to jam the works, so that the buttons couldn't work any more. However, it was clear that this device was not connected to the cables she'd found in the wall below.
Avie cowered in Jibril's pack, keeping her face away from the emperor. "Don't go near him! He hates me!"
"Quinn? Before we look further into the cables, could you take a look at the emperor? I think it would do Avie some good to see him tossed into the arena but I'm afraid abusing him might set something off."
"Gladly. The pit down below definitely has his name on it. I'll make sure it's safe to touch him."
Again, Quinn has her suspicions that traps abound to protect the straw emperor and so she studies him cautiously.
"Allow me!" Rex said, after waiting just long enough for confirmation from Quinn, as he moved to rip the emperor from his stand.
Quinn doesn't find any traps on the emperor, so go ahead and do your worst. He's firmly attached to the throne, but Rex is more than strong enough to tear him off.
Jibril turned a bit to one side so that Avie had a sightline if she chose, "Littleone? Do not shut your eyes to it. This emperor is made of straw. We tare him from his throne. Not because he is powerful. Please, if you dare, look upon the straw puppet. He has no power over you Watch his smile fade. We do not do this to fight his power but to spit on the force that has done this to you. This is your strength. You have roused us to tare him down. Only you could have done this. You gave us the will to ruin his throne and I implore you to watch as my friends throw him into the void, oh Avie, the powerful."
Quinn stood and backed away from the emperor in order to make room for Rex. "I can't find any traps. I guess they figured no one would bother with the emperor. He's all yours Rex. Smash away."
Rex lifted up the emperor, as his eyes gleamed unsettlingly. He then proceeded to repeatedly smash him into the ground.
One eye peeped open, Avie watched as the brawler bodily hefted the straw emperor into the air, then smashed him into straw smithereens. Soon the little girl was cheering, and pointing out larger bits that needed destroying. Within a minute or two, there was nothing but empty clothes, straw and chaff dust in the air, and a gold circlet rolling on the ground.
The rumbling in the ground had stopped, and the stadium was silent.
With a great amount of sweating and swearing, Dizzy finally managed to haul herself up the rope and over the balcony.
As Rex went crazy on the emperor, Dizzy grew concerned by the seeming madness in his eyes. Stepping over the bits of the destroyed straw emperor, she laid a hand on his arm and said, "Peace, lad. Ye got him, e's dead."
Staring at the wreckage of the arena, she said, "I hope no other teams be waitin' to enter - it'll be a long minute before this place be fit for challenge again."
She then looked around the balcony, to see if a token had been released, now that the emperor was dead.
Quinn got down to business, "Right, now that the immediate danger is over, let's find our token. It has to be somewhere and I have a hard time believing that whether or not we find it relies on us killing a child."
The rogue began to systematically search the arena starting with her immediate area.
"There is an awfully lot of ground to cover to find something so small," Vilhelm murmured as he began looking. "If it wasn't in the emperor and it wasn't in any of the cages... one of the spectators, perhaps? I wonder if it'd be faster to just pile them all in what's left of the arena, set them on fire and shift though the ashes?"
Of course, there was one more place they hadn't looked, but Vilhelm would rather leave without their prize than start cutting open the one "enemy" they had decided not to harm...
Quinn looked back over the wall into the arena below. Her eyes caught site of the panel again. "Those cables I found had nothing to do with this button machine. Maybe if I follow the cables and find out where they go, it'll lead us to the tokens..." Her voice didn't sound confident but it was the only thing she could think to do, aside of hurting Avie.
She began tying off the rope around her waist and checked to make sure it was still tied securely up top. To the others she said, "Someone may want to be close to manually haul me up in case I run into trouble." She then threw her leg back over the edge and began lowering her self down.
When Dizzy pulled him off, Rex swung around for a moment, almost as if he was going to take a swing at her. However, he quickly regains his senses and stepped away from the destroyed remains. He took several deep breaths. "Right. The tokens." He said, shrugging as if nothing just happened, but undoubtedly looking a bit rattled.
Jibril's heart lifted to hear Avie taking some of her optimism back it the destruction of the emperor but he didn't drop his guard. While she was in his charge he tried to remain alert to danger ... and prayed that Quinn new which lines to pull.
There is nothing to find up on the balcony, and nothing obvious that you've missed from your vantage point. You can start searching through the arena seating if you want, but that would be a big job - there are 12 rows of seating, and it goes all the way around the venue.
The three cables that were exposed behind the panel - there's no way to "follow" them up or down. The cables run through a hollow space in a solid stone wall. You can maybe stick your arm up or down a little way, but you can't get in there, and you can't dismantle the stone wall to see where they go.
Quinn was frustrated that she couldn't break through the wall to get a better look at the cables. She pulled out her extenders which included a mirror and took a better look up and down before sticking her hand in.
She quickly realized that she would need a better source of light than her ioun stone. Holding up one of her tools, she shouted up at the others, "Can someone cast light on the end of this?"
Jibril yelled down to Quinn, "Um, NO!", then craned his neck over his shoulder, "Ah, littleone, can you make things light up? ... I DON'T THINK AVIE CAN EITHER!"
Dizzy reached down and called upon the goddess to place a little light on the end of Quinn's tool. "Mind yer eyes, lass, it's bright," she called as she handed it back down.
"I'll start searching the rafters, I guess." Rex declared, not sure how else to help, but feeling far to antsy to stand still.
Using her light, mirror and other sundry tools, Quinn was able to peer a fair way up and down the hollow space that housed the cables. She was able to see that the black cable went down almost to the arena floor, then disappeared off the left. Giving the cable the gentlest of tugs, Quinn found it to be quite taught, and decided that the cable ended shortly after it turned the corner.
The tan cable turned right where the other one turned left, and seemed slightly slacker. Quinn decided it was a much longer cable, but couldn't tell where it went.
The white cable went straight down, out of sight into blackness.
Quinn thought that the black cable connected to the card machine. But when she couldn't match up one of the other two cables to the button machine, she was at a loss.
Unable to keep the frustration out of her voice she groused, "I can't tell what these cables are for and there's nothing that can be done with them other than pull them or cut them. Considering we're at a loss as to where the tokens may be, I'm ready to just start destroying the place. I'm going to cut the black cable and see what happens as well as to see what's inside it."
Jibril called down from the Emperor's box, "We have to try something and what must be done is alway wise. I trust you Quinn. Do what you think is best."
"Do what you gotta do." Rex said, his frustration clear. "You'd think this challenge would be good old fashioned fighting. Not engineering and child murder...
Quinn's knife easily cut through the black cable. As she examined the cut cable, she saw that it seemed to be a simple leather cord, though a thick one.
A slight grating sound could be heard below her. She looked down and saw a hidden panel beside the card-and-timer device. The cover of the hidden panel detached and fell to the floor. Then, a long tray slid out of the hidden panel, and they saw three tokens resting on it.
"Do what you gotta do." Rex said, his frustration clear. "You'd think this challenge would be good old fashioned fighting. Not engineering and child murder...
"I doubt we would have to do any of the former if we didn't mind the later. But it does prove one thing ... our Quinn is brilliant."
Quinn snorted, "I think you mean Quinn is lucky, not brilliant."