|
While still in the glass hallway, Lannior acknowledges that the panels are wanting to know about the group.
I'm Lannior Llarm. He says outloud or in his head whichever works. He then draws his bow and demonstrates firing it.
-------
Before entering the next room.
------
As the mist begins to coalesce, Lannior draws his bow once more and notches an arrow ready to fire at whatever appears.
|
Why did I know there was going to be demons involved.
Apollyanna backs up against Meredith and readies her sword and shield.
"Hey everyone I think that this is a representation of a temple dedicated to the Great Gazoo Prince of the Lower Paleolithic Age or something like that."
|
Apollyanna backs up against Meredith and readies her sword and shield.
"Hey everyone I think that this is a representation of a temple dedicated to the Great Gazoo Prince of the Lower Paleolithic Age or something like that."
"The...what?" Meredith shakes her head as she watches the clouds take shape. Thinking quickly, she takes the potion of bless weapon and applies it to Apollyanna's Longsword. "Time to let off some steam, kid. Even if they are virtual demons."
The first shadow coalesces from the mist, and rises to attack. Before it can do so, Prisim conjures a blob of acid, burning the mist creature. Lannior also looses an arrow. It partially passes through the creature, but doesn't do as much damage as he expected. Apollyanna gets a swing in as well, and although she hits, her swing isn't seemingly as effective either.
These creatures are almost illusory. They are memories and shadows of their true forms, and thus much less dangerous to you now that you've realized they are only partly real.
Gailen detects the presence of evil in the room.
Recoiling from being attacked, the mist creature flies up at Gailen in the form of mist, enveloping her and trying to force her to breath it in. Miniature claws of mist pull at her notrils and mouth trying to force their way into her lungs.
Showing great fortitude, Gailen manages to hold her breath long enough to force the creature away.
ac20/14
1b:-9
2r:-5
Meredith swings her scimitar ineffectually.
Pau swings his magic fist. It's difficult punching mist, and despite his skill, the punches land softer than he'd expect. Still, his effort is enough to cause the mist creature to dissipate.
Lannior moves and shifts his target, but misses in his haste.
Prisim tries to conjure acid acid at the remaining mist creature, but misses. The acid sizzles in the mindscape, and then disappears.
Apollyanna moves toward the final creature, and swings her blessed longsword. Despite the blessing, it too does less damage than she'd expect, even knowing it's an imagined creature. However, much like with Pau, her efforts are sufficient, and the creature disolves into nothingness.
As the last creature dies, a hidden panel in the altar falls open. Inside is the icon much like the one Wulessa spoke of. However, this version is glass.
The rope that Wulessa conjured from the ceiling remains on the floor.
There is nothing else of interest in the room.
The vents are too small for any but Prisim, and even then it would be a tight fit.
Even if you were able to get down to the floor 20' below, you find that the vents, much like the doors are smooth against the wall, with no substance to suggest they actually exist.
|
|
The statue remains motionless until Meredith approaches. As she does so, the face of Wulessa animates and speaks.
"Um, the demon lady?" Apollyanna indicates the face of the Great Gazoo with her thumb.
She tries the door to no effect and then remembers how she got out of the last couple of rooms--by waiting for someone else to do something she didn't notice and does so, going so far as to close her eyes this time. She waits a couple of heart beats and then opens her eyes again.
Where are we?
|
|
"Haha! We got those demons good!" Meredith is too caught up in victory to notice anything important.
Meredith walks towards the door before realizing "Wait, it's gone now, isn't it?" She runs her hands on the painted wall to confirm it.
Returning to the statue, she picks up the glass icon. "Why is it glass? She said it was golden."
"Well, we have this rope, and the icon...Do we go up or down?"
Meredith focuses on the icon, recalling that Wulessa said it should be gold and not glass.
The discrepancy shakes apart the reality you are in, and Wulessa’s memories fade into a different reality as the stone walls again become glass. The room’s dimensions seem to remain the same, but the altar, catwalks, and vents all vanish. The statue remains, but its form distorts into that of a featureless humanoid, all signs of either demonic figures or Wulessa’s likeness melting away. Beneath the statue, a glass portcullis blocks off another passageway. On the wall where you entered, the wall once again crumbles away into a fathomless void.
You are staring into the void and mist of crystals, much as you did previously.
The lights pulse, and the thing at the center of the void seems to shift, although it's only in your mind. This time, the walls come to life, with multiple panes of animated pictures.
You see images of Wulessa throughout her life, interspersed with a montage of her next to piles of treasure. As the images and moving pictures of her progress through her life, the treasure next to her in the montage images grows.
You see a series of images where Wulessa's face is drawn on a scroll, and reverently rolled by unseen hand before being stored in a vast collection of scrolls, which are then somehow compressed to fit inside the chest you recognize as the Monadistic Archive.
At the end of this visual display, the walls fade to black again, before lighting quickly with your faces. These images are followed by a moving picture of a beautiful house being overrun by rats, bugs, and swarms of vermin that slowly corrupt the furnishings and destroy the structure of the beautiful building.
|
|
"That's true, Lady Wulessa, might be old and arrogant and foolish and stupid and greedy and uncaring and presumptuous and pompous and criminal and self-aggrandizing and negligent and bullying and monstrous and unladylike and belligerent and horrible and snide and a knee slapping ham-handed git and a glory hound and murderhobo and doesn't bother with the consequences of her own actions and is quite simply a terrible person but she's also a Pathfinder! And that has to stand for something! Waitaminute Pau, did you say this thing just called us a bunch of bugs?"
As you stand discussing the fate of Wulessa, and the temperament of the Archive, the scene shifts to an exterminator clearing the beautiful house of rats.
The statue on the wall above you starts moving. It steps down and raises its arms to swat at Prisim.
The statue raises its stoney arm, bringing it down hard on Prisim's gnomish head.
As with the other creatures, this statue is almost illusory. It doesn't have the full strength of a typical construct this size, and your confidence grows as you recognize its nature as a mental construct.
Pau demonstrates to the party how one properly attacks. His bludgeoning fist seems properly effective, and he leave an imprint of his hand in the center of the statue's chest.
Prisim moves back and goes defensive.
Apollyanna attacks with her longsword. She hits, but finds the sharp edge less effective against the hard clay crust of the statue.
Gailen swings her glaive, and doesn't even manage to scratch the surface of the statue.
Lannior fires an arrow that sinks deep into the head of the statue. The arrow remains lodged, almost up to the fletchings. The statue hesitates, then crumbles around the wedge created by the arrow.
It falls face first to the floor, shatters in to thousands of tiny pieces, and then fades from view.
You examine the room and the glass porticulus. You see no simple was out other than smashing through it.
The bars are indeed glass, and easily shatter when Apollyanna throws her armored shoulder against it. You travel down the passage beyond, and again have the odd sensation of your surroundings moving whilst you have not. As you peek behind, the passage is blocked, and the walls ahead are carved stone.
A door in front of you opens as you approach. As the door opens, a familiar bell tinkles overhead, letting Palhuna Murqual know that his shop has visitors once more. The setting has changed subtly since earlier; while the shop’s layout remains the same, the wares previously displayed in cases and on the walls are missing. In their places are keys of all shapes, sizes, and construction.
Twenty or thirty seconds later, the servant you dealt with previously emerges from the curtains separating the back room, smiling unctuously. Those who watch the man see that he is not quite right. His form flickers almost imperceptibly, and he tends to “jump” from one location to another when not observed directly. He doesn't speak, but makes his intentions clear through pantomime.
The image of the servant produces a golden key and gestures to a door that wasn’t there a moment ago. He gestures to Gailen, who is now inexplicably holding a scroll with Wulessa Yuul's face on it. He holds the key out, making a haughty “give me” gesture with his other hand, as if proffering an exchange.
The "archive" has the ability to let you peacefully exit the mindscape. In return, he wants you to give up on rescuing Wulessa Yuul.
|
|
Lannior knows it's a good shot the second it leaves his bow. As the arrow crumbles the construct, he leaps into the air in victory.
WHOOO!
He runs over and picks Prisim up off her feet in a celebratory hug, before realizing what he is doing, then quickly sets her back down in embarrassment over his zeal. The elf sheepishly grins, checks flush with red.
------
Opening his mouth in a gape. The conundrum is clear, safety for sacrifice. Still buzzing from his defeat of the construct and confident that he can handle whatever the Archive throws there way and before the others can respond he shouts.
NO!
He's not about to leave the Venture Captains fate to one bad decision.
|
|
Appollyanna shakes her head and repeats her words from earlier except the last part about the archive calling them bugs.
"That's true, Lady Wulessa, might be old and arrogant and foolish and stupid and greedy and uncaring and presumptuous and pompous and criminal and self-aggrandizing and negligent and bullying and monstrous and unladylike and belligerent and horrible and snide and a knee slapping ham-handed git and a glory hound and murderhobo and doesn't bother with the consequences of her own actions and is quite simply a terrible person but she's also a Pathfinder! And that has to stand for something!Waitaminute Pau, did you say this thing just called us a bunch of bugs?"
"Sorry, but she's coming with us even if that means we have to fight on a stupid condemned building's roof for no reason at all." She doesn't seem anymore happy about it than the archive does.
The image of Murqual's servant exasperatedly throws his hands up, and both he and the door disappear. As the servant vanishes, the entire shop shimmers for one round before fading from view.
The facsimile of Murqual’s shop shimmers like a heat mirage, transforming into the familiar meeting room in Farseer Tower. Familiar, at least, in shape. The furnishings are different, more resembling a grandmother’s cozy tea room than the stark, studious place where this journey began. Intricately brocaded settees and poufs clutter the room, while elaborate tapestries cover almost every inch of the walls. One of these, a floor-length cerulean silk curtain, is embroidered with a portrait of Wulessa Yuul. Her arms are folded across her chest, and a look of distaste resides upon her face.
Wulessa's image in the silk curtain turns to you and speaks.
“When I first became Venture-Captain and took charge of Farseer Tower, this was how the place looked. The whole tower. My predecessor was more concerned with frippery and luxuries than with hard-won knowledge and diligence. If this becomes my final view of the tower, it might be the greatest indignity of all.”
She shakes her head and addresses you directly.
“I think you are close to the end. I can feel the archivist pausing its work with me to face you directly. The shadows you fought before now were a reflexive response, like sweeping cobwebs from one’s face. Now I think you have its full attention. I don’t think it can appear directly. Its essence is split across all the archive’s scrolls, but whatever form it takes will have considerably more power than the things you’ve fought before now.”
"Is there anything I can help you with before you face it? I can provide one more spell for you, I think, before my energy is exhausted. Would you like blur, cure moderate wounds, enlarge person, or magic weapon? "
|
|
She shakes her head and addresses you directly.
"Is there anything I can help you with before you face it? I can provide one more spell for you, I think, before my energy is exhausted. Would you like blur, cure moderate wounds, enlarge person, or magic weapon? "
"Can you make a horse? I've always loved horses." Apollyanna imagines her dream horse.