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As the small paper scroll sits on his shoulder, M'baba pats its would-be head gently with a smile and says "Hello little guy!"
Later, when Ikto answers him, M'baba says "Oh, this opens up so many doors! We can craft so many things!" He needs a moment to realize that he's maybe crossing some boundaries, so he says "Sorry, we can talk later."
He moves on to check the door to the south.
Ikto clambers along, "Well, just tell me when you want to rush through if we see more silverfish in a room and I'll charge in gnashing my mandibles and acting like a predator. Not that I am one. I actually love fruit mostly."
Za Minyahil rolls their eyes and makes an annoyed noise at the last statement.
"So long as you don't try to take a bite out of me!"
Heaps of dormitory furniture have been pushed into this room, including several frayed wicker chairs, a jumble of coatracks, and two broken beds. The room is unpleasantly moist, and thin sheets of mold cover the chairs and the bed.
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Ikto realizes he IS talking to a friend who is plant like and well, "Ah, good point, and no."
He follows behind M'Baba, "If you see any silverfish in here let me know I'll try to hiss."
"THANK you!" Za Minyahil replies melodramatically. They then get serious again, looking about the room for signs of silverfish.
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M'baba looks at Ikto and says "Well, you're a spider aren't you? Can't you, like... sense vibrations on the floor to feel if anyone's in here? Last time we got in a room like this, it exploded with tiny insects, so... maybe your... predator senses can detect anything?" Clearly Ikto's revelation messed with M'baba's intelligence.
"Preda..." He starts to say, then mutters "Fruit juice. I like fruit juice." but he makes something like a soft cough and he speaks up "Not one of my gifts in this form, not any more than yours but... in the interest of trying." If allowed he moves past M'Baba and tries to use his 'Spider Sense' (What a silly term!) and see if anything is in the room.
Ruined books, half-consumed pages, and other signs of silverfish habitation fill this room, but you don't see any live creatures here. Ikto does recall that at least two of the giant silverfish came out of this room in the initial combat in the main chamber but none seem to be present now.
The folded papers on your shoulder seem way more interested in leaving the library altogether than in exploring this room. They pantomime a "hurry up" gesture, and flit and flutter towards the exit door any chance they get.
The flying creatures (they are called spellskeins btw) seem to want to leave this place and perhaps the library in general, not so much warning you of anything at present.
Nothing else of note is found or seen in this room.
After poking a few things, Ikto looks over to the others "Another room or follow the flying creatures out?"
You have looked in all the rooms, and are still one book short of you task list. The one room you did not explore much is the one that seemed to have a nest of buzzing insects in it.
"Ah, this one. Ready?" He looks at the others "It will probably get rough."
The room on the west side of the Stump Library is the one with the buzzing. A large mass of matted paper hangs from the ceiling in this room, and the air is filled with the sounds of ceaseless buzzing as if from thousands of stinging insects. If you look closer, you can see a handful of normal-sized wasps flitting about the room, but nothing more sinister is readily apparent.
M'Baba knows enough about wasps to recall that they are not naturally aggressive unless stirred to defense of their hive or queen. The dampness and the available paper for nest making are the likely reason the wasps make this room home, along with the general way insects have been acting around the Magaambya perhaps.
Carefully perceiving the room, M'Baba does hear a soft moan over the incessant buzzing. It seems to come from just below the actual nest itself, where the only visible thing is a pile of papers, perhaps left over from the scrits' ransacking of the space.
"No wonder the cranes are agitated: wasps chew on paper as readily as silverfish do, to get material to make nests like this one," Za Minyahil comments as they follow M'Baba to the room.
Then they stiffen a bit.
"They're going to start trying to pollinate my face aren't they?!"
Ikto looks over at Za Minyahil, "Ah.. my good friend. I do not suppose you would mind ..enticing the wasps and guiding them away from their nest?" A spider asking this probably is comical on some level.
"That is a big nest...I don't think I could attract the entire colony away all by myself. We'd need to move the nest itself and...that'd be risky to say the least..."
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M'baba says "Can't we move the nest safely?" He starts to think of ways to build a safe net attached to a long pole to be able to move the nest carefully, or at least whatever it is attached to.
Then he says "Oh, I almost forgot, I do hear something like a moan just below the papers where the nest is."
"A moan? If someone is under there we may have no choice but to try..." A thought "I wonder if we can safely SMOKE the wasps out?"
"Difficult with the damp environs and the size of the nest, but definitely possible," Za Minyahil says. "Let's see if we can find some dry material to use for producing the smoke."
The moan sounds like someone in pain or at the very least quite uncomfortable. And while there is a pile of loose papers under the nest, it does not seem to be nearly big enough to cover the form of a humanoid. The sound does not appear to be coming from the hive or from the few wasps seen flitting around.
A few of the wasps are attracted to the scent and color of Za Minyahil, but as they move around a bit, the insects zip away to safer environs. There are never really more than a dozen normal-sized wasps outside the next at any given point, though there are clearly more inside the paper structure.
M'Baba believes he could craft a net and pole situation that would allow for the movement of the nest, if such a pole and net could be located -- maybe from the Powderile if nothing else.
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M'baba says "I think it would take too long to make a pole for this. But I like your idea more Ikto. I guess you know best what bothers insects?" He still feels he doesn't know how to interact with Ikto properly yet.
He says "Wet wood can create smoke when burned." He looks to the others looking for signs that they're thinking what he is. He completes his thought "We can magically create water and fire!"
Between the fiery spells and the watery spells you generate enough steam/smoke that the wasps begin to flee their nest, but they are greatly disturbed as a result. For lack of a better place to go, the stinging insects fly to the ceiling and doorway and swarm menacingly. It does give you time to check out the nest, if you wish.
Ikto leaps onto the nest, a giant spider, and looks down "We're here to help!" the giant spider assures whoever it is!
and is ready to get them to safety!
Za Minyahil, meanwhile, begins searching to see if there's anything else, like missing texts, that the nest might inadvertently be guarding.
As the group closes on the next, the moaning - whatever it is -- gets louder and seems to be coming from the floor below the papier-mache hive. However through the smoke/steam and the mess of papers, you don't see exactly what is making that sound.
Ikto chitters, "yes yes, I'll try."
Za Minyahil draws their sword and tries to stick it through the floorboards to crack it open.
Working quickly and keeping a sharp eye on the stinging insects, the group tries to pry below the floor of the stump library to no avail. The floor here does nto seem to give or to open up in any way that makes sense or is easily accessible or even visible.
You do note that as you scatter the pages below the nest to access the floor, the sounds moves along with the loose papers. It seems to be coming from the scattered pages, not below the floor itself.
The outlier wasps slowly start braving trips to the nest, only a few at first but you can see the cloud is soon to follow.
Unable to carry much in his natural form, Itko changes back to a humanoid form (One action), grabs as many papers he can in one scoop (one action) and runs out (Last action) going "Right, talking pages. Amazing. I thought they died when the trees did. Isn't this amazing?"
The initiates grab as many papers as they can and duck under the swarm back towards the central library area as the wasps return angrily to their nest. The team makes it out without further incident, stopping in the center area to look at what they recovered.
Among many pages that are eaten by insects, or smeared and blurred by the gremlins who used to reside here, are just a few intact pages of the last book on Master Ot's list, A Treatise on the Various Communicative Methods of Non-Vocally Projecting Entities. It appears much of the work has been damaged or destroyed but you have the parts of it that can be salvaged.
Ikto is almost gentle with the 'talking pages' and looks to the others, "We should return to Teacher Ot with what we have I think."
"Let us make haste," Za Minyahil agrees with a nod. Then they look at the origami birds following them. "Would anyone spare their cloak to add to mine to make a kind of "umbrella" for them? It might still be raining outside, and that would surely hurt them."
"Gladly," Ikto offers his, "I've never minded the rain that much." A smile as he helps Za Minyahil provide cover for the oragami birds.
The small spell skeins quickly zoom around you once you are out of the wasp room, and they seem excited to exit the library, rain or no. Once outside they wave and zoom around you once more as if to say "thank you" then zip off together over the rooftops and out of sight.
"They were cute, and I guess they'll be fine," He nods to M'Baba, "Let's be off to see Teacher Ot."
Za Minyahil waves after the spell skeins as they go.
"I can feel as small sense of kinship with them: creatures created through magic fully aware of how fragile they are in a dangerous world. I wish them well."
Teacher Ot is impressed with your effort at recovery in the old Stump Library. "These books will further different segments of a well-rounded education. You have my gratitude for retrieving them from the old library. Did you find anything particularly interesting there?"
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M'baba starts telling Teacher Ot "Well, we did find some interesting things in there. Unfortunately most material had too much water damage. Also there were many infestations. The most annoying were scrits. But after they were cleared out, it got a bit easier."
He then continues "One thing we didn't clear out was a swarm of wasps that nested there. But the most interesting thing we found was a couple of self folding and flying pieces of paper. They were communicating with us but in the end flew away as we got out."
"It does seem that there are a lot of gremlins in the area, and on top of that, bugs of various sorts being quite invasive even by jungle standards," Ikto voices his concerns "I do not know if there is a connection or not, but the gremlins seem almost at war with the school, Master Ot. I don't what we've done to so anger them all but the school may want more wards."