Happy to move on.
Search Posts
"Well look, so long as there's adventure to be had, I'm ok with dealing with anyone's smuggling ring." Marine is rather alright with having this new job fobbed onto her. "If we're going by boat to Vyre, will we have a few days to unwind after we're done? I'd rather like to go gambling again in the Gambling Dens. Also, we had better book a boat with animal stables - there's no way I'll fit in the average cabin."
Marine stops waving her sword around angrily and sheathes the blade. A smile is plastered on her lips as she calms down. "Well, why didn't you say so earlier, Fallenta? I'd love to do a bit of fighting - after we had to fight all those terrible, no good ghosts that were immune to my best tricks? No fun at all. Now these smugglers? They sound like good targets to Slam Down." As Callistro considers casting options in Vyre, Marine adds her own two cents. "Ooh...I've been to Vyre before with the Circus! Let me see what I remember..."
She rattles off a bunch of information about Vyre, some of which might be relevant and most of which was about what she found cool.
"What!" The centaur yells, outraged. Marine's hands reach for her sword and she starts waving it in the air. "That is unbelievable! It's our adventure, darn them! Isn't there anything we can do?" She looks furious and seems about to charge off towards Vyre herself.
Oh, and I'll spend 60 GP to buy the Formula for a very cool mutagen - Hydra Mutagen.
Upgrading Marine Masquerade Marinelle to Level 13: Ancestry Feat: Incredible Luck (so-called free thinkers when given access to Halfling feats)
Fighter Features: Weapons -> Master, Swords -> Legendary Downtime (10 days, level 12)
Marine reaches into the oven (with gloves on) and comes out with 4 fresh Phantom Rolls, ready for consumption. She dumps them all onto Callistro's plate. "Eat your veggies, Callie. They're good for you." She tells him. She spends 1 day writing and posting a letter to Sir Albert Canningsworth at the Circus of Wayward Wonders updating him on her progress thus far and inviting him to come to Kintargo to complete her training, if he happens to be in the area.
"Excellent! A toast to new beginnings!" Marine prepares to Quick Alchemy up some Bravo's Brews.
"Aw, thanks Jayma! To tell you the truth this was an impulse purchase. I didn't want Miss Almidia to leave looking so sad. Say, do you think we can get her to design the promotional posters?" Marine both explains herself and spitballs another crazy idea. She does a double take when for once, Callistro turns up on time. "Wow, Callie, I didn't think you were capable of waking up early! Hey, do you want some coffee to go with your cheese? I've got Doctor Lazarus' dose right here!" She somehow manages to both inadvertently insult and make an offer at the same time. She tries her hand at Influencing Zachrin using the Theater Lore that Callistro relentlessly drilled into her. "We want to put on a real good show! It will be as dramatic as Fallenta's best works - you remember the one where the evil merchant was trying to steal a pound of flesh from the protagonist, "The Merchant of Chelliax"? Except this play will be based off the true story of our adventures, so it'll be as authentic as authentic can be!"
Marine is a little sad that Jayma's painting of her didn't sell for as much as the Doctor's, but swallows that emotion for now. She turns to leave the auction, waving goodbye to those she recognises. When she has a quiet moment with the party, she remarks with a bright smile on her face. "I think that went very well. Jayma and Callistro, you guys charmed the pants of the artists. Oh, do you want some coffee with those cakes, Doctor? I'm going to make myself a batch. What flavour do you want yours?" The next day, she goes to pick up Obligation and pay Almidia. If she has time, she will get it properly appraised. After that, she attends Zachrin's estate with the party.
Marine smirks as her extremely obvious ploy to help her friend works. She dangles a deactivated versatile vial in front of Callistro's face. "Wanna have some of this Cognitive Mutagen? Then you can be smart too!" Marine proceeds to bid for the underdog. Feeling bad that she scared Almidia earlier, she decides to bid for her painting - just so she can leave with some coin in her pocket. "300 for Obligation! You got this, lady!"
When it comes time for Jayma's painting to come up for sale, Marine does the exact same pose she performed for the painting and proclaims, "Sorry folks, you can't have me - I'm taken...taken by the spirit of adventure! But you can have the next best thing - me as a collectible one of a kind painting!" She gestures enthusiastically at herself, captured in paint.
Marine yells from her high horse at the party's table. "C'mon, are you all really going to leave a treasure like that sit there at such a bargain? It's worth much more than that - you can trust me, I've travelled all over Golarion and seen all kinds of art." She boldly claims. She slams a huge sack of gold coins on the party's table, the same sack which she nudged over to Doctor Lazarus earlier. Coins spill out of the bulging sack onto the table. "It's all mine, Doc. Unless..." She looks around the room, making gleeful eye contact with the guests and daring them to stop her. bold"...unless anyone here can put their money where their mouth is?"
Marine isn't here to enjoy art - she's here to have a good time and mayyybe make a profit. She whips up a Mercantile Lore flavoured Greater Cognitive Mutagen and downs it with a sip of Chelaxian wine. She's about to bid on Delmonia Crape’s sculpture before she hears the Doctor grumble about not having enough gold. She slides a significant number of gold coins (700 GP) over to her friend. "Here ya go, Doc! Have fun. Think of it as payment for all those times you've been patching up my wounds."
Marine approaches Almidia along with Callistro. Her larger frame looms over the Aiuvarin lady. "Hey there, lady! My friend and I - we're adventurers - just wanted to come up here and say howdy."
She lets Callistro seal the deal.
Marine follows the Azarpal until he leaves the party, then returns with a satisfied smile to enjoy the rest of the proceedings.
"Why I'd love to tell you all about the Circus! Let me tell you about how the Circus of Wayward Wonders saved the Starstone Isles..." Marine recaps the entire tale of the Extinction Curse for Chopperly, talking incessantly about how great the Circus is. She refuses to change the subject even when pressed. Fallenta's warning weighing heavily on her, Marine refuses to divulge anything about the opera or having met Fallenta. She only lets him go after she's done recapping the entire Adventure Path in exacting detail. "...and can you believe it was Aroden's fault the whole time? Unbelievable stuff. Nice talking with you, Chopperly! You are such a good listener!" Marine sees the Doctor going to confront the servant. Wanting to try and tease this easily flustered man, she sneaks along behind the Doctor and watches their conversation. Seeing the Doctor leave to do...strange Doctor things, she sneaks up to the portly servant (again) and claps her hands on his shoulders (again). "Boo! Hey, you should really stop being so easy to sneak up on. What's for dinner tonight - do you do special requests?" Marine attempts to stall the servant so that when the Doctor comes back from having formulated a grand plan, they can mess with him together. After she's had her fun, Marine goes to mingle with Zachrin. "So, High Priest Zachrin - can I call you Zaccy? I've been to Kintargo before and it's quite a beautiful city - how did you get your start here?" She tries to ask an innocuous question to get him to open up about himself.
Before the feast starts, Marine mixes a Greater Silvertongue Mutagen into her goblet of wine. Draining it to the dregs, she looks for her new best friends - Louise and Chopperly Smynne. "To the Smynnes! They're great dancers and even better listeners. Chopperly - you handsome rogue! I hope I gave you a night to remember!" She winks at him in front of his wife. "And you - Louise - you must work hard trying to meet all these people during such a short time. Love your outfit - you really make it work!" She points at the glittering, shining fit that Louise dons.
Marine leans down to reach the shorter man's height. "What was that you just said about glitter?" Just then, an infernal noise comes from the front of the theatre. Wanting to see what it is, Marine drinks a Greater Serene Mutagen. Straining her neck, she tries to get a glimpse of the commotion.
With a strain of heroic effort, she sees...a rich person making a fool of herself. How boring. What actually catches her eye is the portly human servant taking an unusual interest in the event. Using all of her mastery at Stealth, she sneaks up behind the man and claps a hand on his shoulders. "Howdy! What do you find so interesting about rich people making a fool of themselves, huh?" With that nonsense taken care of, she moves back to her original conversation partner. "Y'know, seeing your wife is busy dancing with Callistro..." She jabs a thumb Callistro's way as he's tearing up the dance floor with Louisa, "How 'bout a dance with me? Ever danced with a circus performer? This might be your only chance." Assuming he accepts, she dances with her. Otherwise, she makes the same proposal to another guest - probably Mulberry.
Marine is unlike any dance partner he's ever danced with. Instead of dancing to the tune of the music, she uses her natural acrobatic prowess to perform crazier jumps, pirouettes and stunts. For a few moments, her partner finds himself airborne as Marine leaps through the air gracefully, spinning her partner around like a top. "Now how 'bout that, huh! Hope you enjoyed the dance - I haven't had to perform like that in years!" Marine gently frees her partner from her grasp when he can dance no more. Following her mentor Callistro's example, she joins the competition. Entering the dance floor and now without a smaller partner to hold her back, she performs a whole bevy of flips, stunts and everything in between.
Her first flurry of jumps miss their mark, as her natural bulk sends her swerving into a crowd. She's forced to cut her performance short to prevent an accident. The second attempt? That one steals the show. Marine performs a perfect breakdance, finally perfecting the maneuver she displayed to the Kholo all those weeks ago. No wasted movements, no flailing limbs - just pure acrobatic prowess timed perfectly to the beat. The third performance is quite impressive. Marine starts Moonwalking on the stage. But at this point Marine's tiring out. She fails to reach the same heights of excellence that she managed to achieve just 10 minutes ago - or that Callistro has consistently managed to hit.
"Thank you! But you should praise the painter of the painting, Jayma Thornfiddle. While I'm the woman in the painting, she's the one who brought it into existence. I'm Marine Masquerade Marinelle." Marine replies as she rights herself, trying her best not to damage any of the art on display with her size. Marine holds up a hand for him to shake. "I've heard of you, Chopperly. You and your wife are are art critics, no? Where's she at?"
Marine mills about the refreshments, sampling the little treats while also keenly observing the crowd. After a while, she notices a few interested guests gathering around the painting of her. Seeing her chance, she attempts to bound to the front of the crowd, pointing at the painting of herself and yelling at the top of her lungs; "Look everyone! That's literally me!"
Initially, it seemed like she overestimated her jump and was about to crash headfirst into the painting and a bunch of other artwork but fortunately she was lucky enough to land in the exact same pose she was making in her painting.
Fete preparation 2x Greater Cognitive Mutagens, one for the Doctor and one for myself. Both grant training in Art Lore. 1x Greater Serene Mutagen, in case I need to Sense Motive or discover any social weaknesses 1x Greater Silvertongue Mutagen, in case Marine called upon to actually attempt a social check and cannot get Callistro or Jayma to do it instead.
"Oooh! Callistro! How did you know I was a worshipper of Calistria! Thank you, this is amazing!" She gives him a great big bear hug in gratitude. Seeing that Jayma is about to get up to her old tricks by Influencing Rumours to benefit them at the expense of Fallenta's rival, Marine joins in to Aid her in the process. She helps spread Jayma's chosen story all over town, while also discouraging the stupid sounding rumours that pop-up and distract from the message.
Marine trots alongside the horses, even though she could very easily attempt to outrun them. Wearing her amazing new clothes underneath her armour, the Rainment rune allows her to look her best even though she's wearing plate. It even simulates her cloak flying gaily in the breeze! While she doesn't have flowers to throw at the crowd, she instead waves her sword in the air triumphantly, its gleaming blade reflecting orange light from the retreating Kintargan sunset.
Marine's really eager to help Jayma out! She spends three days plying Jayma with Cooperative Waffles and Aid to give her the best shot at making a great painting of her. She takes periodic breaks from posing dramatically mid-strike to give some critique of the painting. "Yeah! That's more like it. Maybe make my hair a bit longer...have me look at the viewer and not away from them...What if you used a lighter shade of yellow for my hair! That would contrast the battlefield you've put me in." She suggests. The day after she finishes with Jayma, Marine decides to go the extra mile for her debut. Knowing that her full combat capabilities require the donning of heavy armor, yet being unwilling to sacrifice safety for fashion, she spends a significant chunk of gold to apply a Rainment rune to her armor. The magical rune applies a minor glamour to her armor, making her appear as if she's wearing her fine coat, cloak and feathered hat while she dons her plate armour. Happy that she finally looks the part of a dashing duelist, she follows Callistro around to the hair salon hoping to get their hair done...and maybe find out more about Almidia or the Smynnes from the hairdressers. Before doing any mental work, however, she makes with Quick Alchemy one Greater Cognitive Mutagen infused with the pure essence of Art Lore.
Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7
"Ooh! That sounds like loads of fun! I'll get to wear my best clothes and everything..." Marine's practically falling over herself with excitement, but then she remembers the task at hand. "I'm not the gal you go to for masterful performances or arts and craft, but I sure can help out. Would anyone here want a bit of Aid going forward for the rest of the week?" She makes an open invitation of herself to the group. When Fallenta urges them to keep her presence a secret, Marine puts a finger to her lips knowingly. "Mum's the word, as they say in the circus business. Never let the audience know when the star performer's hitting the stage!" She turns to the more excitable and looser-lipped members of the party (they know who they are). "You all got that?" She asks them with a wink.
"Callie here has talked about Swirly the Spiral Summoner's cruelty, but I will praise his lyrical prowess. He (or the GM) had such a way with words! Always able to speak in rhymes and riddles...He really was very charismatic. That's kinda why I was following him in the first place. I thought he was forming a new circus and I wanted to get in on the ground." The centaur thinks for a moment. "Weaknesses? Swirly the Spiral Summoner's overconfidence, for sure! Why, there were many times besides the time in the temple where he had us dead to rights. When we were on the island and on the run from him, we soon found ourselves running out of food and water. Swirly could have let us starve and die and he would have won. But instead, he deliberately chased us using his minions to the Grippli village so that his games with us could continue. How nefarious!"
When Callistro places a comforting hand on her shoulder, Marine looks at him with a sad smile. "Thanks, Callie, but I must confront the reality of it. I did help Swirly the Spiral Summoner with his dastardly plan." Composing herself, she thinks for a second. "I think my role in this play is something like a redeemed villain. I was turned from the Dark Side of this conflict by my friends here - and as their ally I was a Phantom Menace. A sword, sneaking in the dark and stabbing at all who would attempt to hurt them." Marine ponders Fallenta's question before continuing, "My aria should cover the moment which I turned from the side of evil to good...I was bearing down on the party, who were very heavily injured. I walked slowly towards them, sword drawn and ready to run them through...Then they called to me, reminding me of the good times we had adventuring and appealing to my better nature. They reminded me of a time where I wasn't dominated by Swirly the Spiral Summoner...They gave me hope that one day I would break free of his domination. Like a drowning rat, I seized that hope and broke free of the spell over me. I performed a literal heel turn and turned to face Swirly the Spiral Summoner and his minions, tossing the alchemical firebomb that lit the spark which blew up the temple. My aria should start off ominous and authoritarian, then become somewhat, then transition into a hopeful theme after my return to the light." Marine lets her words hang in the air before interrupting, her finger jabbing the air like her sword. "Oh! Important detail. The whole time, I was in a sort of black plate armour that covered my whole body and made me look much more menacing than I actually am..." Marine starts humming a tune, now much more Masterfully than a few months ago. "Could my aria sound a bit like this?"
Marine looks around from her high horse, waiting for the others to start. With everyone else surprisingly tongue tied, she begins. "So I'm not the best person to give you the full story. As you all know, I was originally Swirly the Spiral Summoner's dominated pawn. My thoughts weren't my own and I'm not sure how much of what I remember really happened. The lingering effects of that mental enchantment is that I can't avoid calling Swirly the Spiral Summoner by anything other than his full title, Swirly the Spiral Summoner. Ah dang it! There I go again... Anyways, I found my three friends washed up on the island of Veedeesha. Swirly the Spiral Summoner instructed me to pick them up and gauge if they were a threat, useful pawns, or a funny distraction for Swirly the Spiral Summoner to toy with. I proceeded to lead the three of them on a wild goose chase around the island in search of a way out. Eventually, Swirly the Spiral Summoner got bored of seeing the three of them beat up his werecrocodile goons and made me lead them into an abandoned monastery, where we ambushed them...I'm still quite ashamed of what I did and said. Luckily, the rest of the party managed to break my conditioning and help me escape together with them by the seat of our pants, blowing up the temple in the process." Marine takes a deep breath before consulting her notes. After some frantic flicking through the pages, she continues. "Unfortunately my notes are pretty sparse here too...That's what happens when you've just recovered from mental domination, I suppose. You just don't feel like writing. Anyways, we needed to find a way to avoid detection by Swirly the Spiral Summoner's werecrocodile and fey minions as they canvassed the island to pick us off. After raiding a few of Swirly the Spiral Summoner's outhouses, we figured out a way out - infiltrate and capture the Porcelain Throne - Swirly the Spiral Summoner's supermassive battleship with a portal to the Plane of Water and the only ship off the island." She squints and looks at a circled and bolded note at a corner of a page before reading verbatim from her notes. "Can't quite see this bit...says here that I felt the party didn't trust each other after the reveal that I was dominated...Understandable, given the circumstances...It also says here that there was a reveal of a horrifying truth which I'm not supposed to share unless the others agree...so I'm not going to talk about it." An awkward silence hangs over the room as the others are brought back to that terrible moment. Marine coughs loudly, trying to break the spell. "A-anyways, we knew that we had to risk it all to get off this island or die trying. On the night before Swirly the Spiral Summoner headed out to flood all of Jalmeray, we infiltrated the Porcelain Throne. An epic battle ensues as we fought our way through the massive structure. I don't have too many notes on this part, given that it's quite hard to write and swordfight at the same time. We confronted Swirly the Spiral Summoner and his minions on the seat of his throne, eventually besting him and flushing him down his own portal, never to be seen again. We then sat on the Porcelain Throne, riding it back to Absalom. You should have seen the looks on the Absalom Guard's faces as we came in...We must have been quite the spectacle!" Marine cracks up laughing at the memory.
"Pay?" Marine audibly scoffs. "Please, I'm just happy to be adventuring with my good friends again. I don't really need pay - in fact I'd be happy to stay out with my friends, camping in a nice stable somewhere..." Marine starts to offer but seeing the others visibly grimace at her proposal, hastily changes her tone. "I mean, camping is so last century. Let's enjoy fine living here at the Feathered Fox! You can put my pay towards making sure we live comfortably."
Oh right, forgot to do this. Spending 600 gp to upgrade my Persona Mask to a Greater Persona Mask. Gotta stack those rerolls. I now have 256.88 GP
I have 2939.33 after receiving 2,856.88 from going through the theatre. With that gold, I purchase a Brilliant rune, giving me a lightsaber and my second weapon property rune. I have 856.88 GP which I will leave for myself. Note to self: Callistro now has Darkvision so I can use the freed up Advanced Alchemy slot for something else. Oh and the lightsaber is of course Marine coloured. She's not a secret Sith lord.
"Ooh, I'd like to go get some runes inscribed with the payment! So yeah, back to the Feathered Fox, then I'll hit up the Blacksmith and get my sword upgraded. I have just the rune..."
"Yeah! That will be great. Oh, oh, I do have one request though. Can you get whoever plays me to be a centaur too? I know it'll be hard to find a centaur actor, but you know...It'll be a great sign to centaurs all over that they too can make it big in the city!" Marine shares Callistro's excitement.
"Yeah, I don't really want to deal with the crazy squatter living in the basement. I would just sit on the property until the lady dies of old age. I mean, come on, an apocalypse about to hit Golarion? That happens every 3 months or so." Marine says in a completely flippant manner. She's confident that she could take the Herald but can't be bothered to do so right now.
"Well, pleasure doing business with you and so forth...would you be interested in coming to the opera eventually? We intend on putting on a performance and you seem like the type with a lot of time on their hands." Marine says as she trots carefully towards the male actor and unties his gag. As soon as one of the actors has their gag removed, he immediately starts babbling. He clearly wants to get out of here, but "You need to watch out for the fire ghost!" "Oh, that thing?" Marine idly responds while working on undoing the bonds on the other actor. "I killed it. I stabbed it to death. It was quite embarrassing honestly - for a ghost it sure lacked any confidence in its abilities."
Marine was attempting to slowly sneak towards the prisoners to undo their bonds before the Herald - "which was a weird name to call yourself", Marine thought - made sounds approximating wanting a peaceful conclusion. Trying to seize the opportunity for a non-violent solution, Marine makes herself known to give her opinion. Coming out of the shadows, she makes a show out of sheathing her sword and speaks loudly, in the most nonchalant tone she can manage. "Well Madam Herald, I don't speak for the rest of the party but I don't mind leaving you to your own devices. We don't really need this cracked shack. You can take it for yourself. And if you are concerned about us snitching, as a woman of...formerly some disrepute I can appreciate having a hidden, decrepit lair for one to brood in. Keep on keeping on - I won't snitch on you."
"Well, nothing else for it then? Let's find the mystery man and see if he's reasonable enough to have a chat." Marine opens the door and trots through.
"Aw thanks, Doc! Those Geists sure did a number on me, huh! Hey, can you check if they ripped my cloak or armour? Large sized clothing for centaurs doesn't come cheap." Marine's irregular tossing and turning to check out the damage dealt to her throws the doctor off his game and thus delayed his surgery until the overeager centaur could sit still. Marine draws her sword and reads the message. "Seen who?" She wonders out loud. Having no real survival instincts, she waits (as usual) for the Doctor to tell her what this is all about.
Quick post before I will be afk for a while. "Ow ow ow! O-Okay, I've had enough of you. Go back to forgetting about me - forever!" Marine says with a hint of panic in her voice before unleashing her own storm of sharp strikes.
Reactive Strike:
Dueling Riposte:
Marine attempts to slide through the Green apparition to get into flanking with Jayma. Unfortunately she overestimates the slide and bumps into a wall instead of going through the geist.
Finally making it through the incorporeal green geist, she enters flanking with Jayma and tries to end the Orange creature by setting up a Snagging Strike.
"Did you forget about me?" She asks mockingly as she Strikes Orange.
Reactive Strike, CA:
Dueling Riposte, CA:
Marine staggers under the blow the puppets dealt her and pouts when they leave. "Typical terrible audience member. They throw insults and worse at the performers and refuse to stay for the redemption arc." She grumbles under her breath. Noticing that she is being flanked by two Geists, she first performs a Dueling Dance to boost her armour class. Next she Strides towards the Doctor, who is busy pummeling a Geist into the ground. Lacking space to move into flanking, she decides to Snagging Strike the ghost. She sticks her free hand through the Geist's body and wiggles it around, trying to set it off balance while the Astral Aldori goes for the head, in a textbook Snagging Strike maneuver. With the Doctor's advice, she hits it at the same sensitive spot the Doctor has been bludgeoning with his hammer.
"Laugh on this, you stupid clown!" Marine yells at the one she just hit. The fact that she's currently a clown is lost on the centaur.
Reactive Strike:
Dueling Riposte:
"Oh no...Am I really a hack and a fraud? Is that I left the Circus? Because I couldn't act?" Marine's self doubt gets to her. She turns to the puppets and points her sword at them. "I'll show YOU how great of an actor I am...Check out this funny joke I learnt from Callistro's friends!" Her persona mask switches faces from a bold blue eye mask to a cartoonishly looking clown mask. This mask has great big eyes, a huge honking red nose and a gigantic grin on its face. Marine starts to relay the joke. "I told this joke the other when asked to stand up and introduce yourself to the group, and say something interesting about yourself... So this guy dies and goes to hell. He finds himself in a nice room with a group of other people. Asmodeus himself stands up and says, "Welcome to Hell!" The guy thinks to himself, "well, this doesn't seem so awful." Then Asmodeus says, "I'd like each of you to introduce yourself, and tell us something interesting about yourself. Eh? Eh? How about that, huh?"
The puppets don't seem to appreciate the joke and they give her a vicious lashing for her troubles. While the protective layer of her heavy armour would normally prevent the blow from striking a vital organ, Marine's self doubt means that she's too slow to avoid having the lash strike right at her jaw.
Reactive Strike, CA not accounted for, Sneak attack not accounted for:
Dueling Riposte, CA not accounted for, Sneak attack not accounted for:
"Ooh, magical loot within these creepy lifeless puppets? Gimme." Marine starts searching through these puppets. She pokes the ugliest looking ones with her sword first. "These ain't so scary...They remind me of the puppet shows Callistro took me to watch back in Absalom." Given how enthralled she is by looting, she definitely does not hear him.
Marine at this point has spent the last few minutes digging the skeleton out of the heap it was under in hopes of getting to the sweet loot it has on it. Her manic digging is interrupted by the sounds of the party deciding to split itself - Jayma and Callistro heading to the door while Lazarus preparing to climb (again) over the rubble. Marine puts her head in her hands (not caring that they happen to be grubby with dirt and bone dust) and sighs. "Guys, why do we have to split the party? Can't we just pick one and choose? This is just like the previous adventure when we..." She realises that with lives at stake, now is not the time to reminisce. Not wanting to leave the doctor alone, she follows along behind him and climbs over the rubble with him. Calling back over the wall, she says to the other two "Yell if you get into any trouble, okay?"
"Hey is your climbing kit big enough for me?" Marine barely gets the words out of her mouth before her cape starts fluttering gaily in the tempest that Jayma summons. Rising along with the party, she lets out a excited "Woo-hoo!" as they hurtle down into the not-so-illusory hole. Touching down into the room, Marine immediately draws her blade and looks around, her keen eyes suited to the dark. Remembering that Callistro had refused to disbelieve the illusion, she goes over to him, asking "Callie, are you quite alright? From your perspective we must have just apparated through the floor. Did it feel weird for you?"
"Fake stairwells? Missing actors?" Marine draws her sword dramatically and holds it in the air. "This calls for an adventure into the bowels of Hell!...Or at least, into the hole." Noticing that everyone is at least a little singed, she waits for the Doctor to treat their wounds. In the meantime, she spends a minute glaring at the stage until the illusion gives way. "So, Miss Fallenta..." She says, after the director has had a moment to take a breather, "If you were the one who owns or at least rented this place out, surely you can tell us what's down this conveniently placed hole into the basement?"
, Marine feels a minor tingle of pain from the flaming aura but continues her dance of blades with the Hellshadow. "For a creature who likes to talk big, you sure are distracted by the littlefolk! I'm your opponent here!" She sets up 3 Snagging Strikes before going for a magically hasted Strike.
Reactive Strike:
Dueling Riposte:
Marine retorts back: "I ain't an enemy of Hell - only an enemy of you! Taste my blade, foul rapscallion!" Like a whirling devish, she spins round and round, trying to slash the Hellshadow at least once. After all, more attacks means more damage, right? "I'll try spinning! That's a good trick!" She says as she attempts to stick her hand into the Hellshadow to keep it off-balance, which might be an extraordinarily unwise move on her part.
Her first attack is rather embarrassing as despite her tough talk, she gets her blade stuck on the stage. Her next few strikes, however, find more purchase in the incorporeal being. Somehow her Snagging Strike techniques seem to be having an effect too?
Reactive Strike - I have one free one per round duel to tactical reflexes:
Dueling Riposte:
Marine hisses as the burning aura singes her, even through the Charm of Fire Resistance. She closes the gap, bounding over the heads of the illusory audience and onto the stage to face the smokey creature. With two quick slashes, she tries to wound the creature. Alas, the smoke appears to interfere with Marine's swordplay...
Now a bit uncertain that this foe is within her ability to duel singlehandedly, she enters her dueling stance, ready to defend and counteract in a single blow. "Guys? I don't think these are actors. And I definitely don't think this is a centaur in a fancy dress - we aren't that cloudy!" Marine gulps nervously and states the obvious.
"Are you sure this one's the final challenge? I'll wait till we see them first." Marine holds her blade out but does not use her oil yet.
Marine tries to quell the spirits further. She tries to add to Jayma's lie by singing a lullaby to them, hoping that the soothing ambience will lull the sprites to sleep.
Current Campaign
|