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Kaervek then smugly tells the rest of the party everything he knows about the dark tapestry, which is actually quite a lot. Oria rolls her eyes upon hearing the first bits of information. "If you wanted to know that, you have someone right here who's felt the touch of the dark tapestry." Of course, as the information continues to flow, she realizes that such a trickle is closer to a river. Flowing, abundant, and beyond her disappointingly inadequate ability to swim through. By the end, the best she can do is slouch and shrink away. "It's.... still different... to use."
"We're seeking knowledge, and we need it to contain some dangerous magical items that have connections to the dark tapestry. Please... can we come in?"
Triix's attempt to communicate with the slug reaches a dead end of sorts. Like attempting to pilot a boat across land, or attempting to climb upwards using only fog as footing. Or however her mind conceptualizes a language barrier. "That's a hard one to answer, really..." Oria says before trailing off. The thought balances precariously on the tip of her brain before losing its footing and falling into the abyss. Almost as if something gave it a little push. "Ugh. The details always slip my mind. But I was..." Studying. "Studying." Exploring ruins. "I was out exploring some ruins." The slug squeezes tightly around her arm from the inside of her robes. She ignores it, attempting to grasp at the slippery thoguht. "There were voices, whispers... they..." They promised you. "They promised me something. Was it power....?" No, it was not. Oria barely had the gumption to make use of power that was given to her, nevermind the ambition to seek it out. One last slippery grasp at the memory yielded a glimpse into her past self's actions. A glimpse of utter oblivion. "No." she says to herself as much as anyone, or anything, that may be listening. "My memories may have been part of the deal I made." she says, vaguely enough to not technically be lying to her allies. But certainly not skillfully enough. "We should be looking in the Arcanamirium, right? Let's get ready."
Oh? The Dark Tapestry itself or one of the Old Ones in it? Nyarlathotep for instance. And ... that thing .... what IS it? While this has been going on, Candledark has been trying to engage The Thing, if not in Aklo, then in Undercommon, Senzar, Abyssal, Ancient Osirian, Draconic, Thassilonian, then finally Wayang, while testing its reactions to strange lights and small floating objects. Oria holds the void-corrupted slug in her hands. It gazes at the two, the many sightless eyes on its body blinking out of unison. "This is Xya'Lorash. It serves as my conduit to the dark tapestry." She sighs, extending her arm. It crawls along her hand for a moment, leaving a trail of slime across her palm before vanishing into her sleeve and settling somewhere inside of her robes. "It's funny, really. Without it, I'm nearly powerless." The slug emerges from the collar of her robes and tilts his head towards the shaman. The front of its face parts like some kind of toothless maw and it utters a strange, alien language: The sound of multi-chambered voices twist and turn around one another, discordantly resonating around it. The language bears no resemblance to anything Xanac understands. Oria responds in a similar voice and language, rolling her eyes. "It's harmless." she adds, speaking those words in common as she places her thumb on the slug's head and tucks it back into concealment.
Oh, okay. I'll roll it back on the scrolls. All, please forgive my absence. My mother passed away on January second. There has been a lot of demands for my time and attention these last few days and I am only now getting back to something of a normal routine. I should be able to resume near daily posting today. My condolences for your loss. I had to go through the same thing almost exactly two years ago. However you're feeling now, I can tell you the pain gets more bearable over time.
Oria's horribly disfigured body slowly begins to return to its original form, bit by bit. Kaervik and Shine are certainly helping as well. A shame, really, as being restored by another all but assures she won't learn her lesson. Still, it is enough that she has to draw upon her own reserve of scrolls to keep her body in shape.
Returned to her original, significantly less interesting shape, Oria walks over to the wriggling betentacled slug on the floor and scoops it up in her hands. "It's... connected to the Dark Tapestry? Interesting... that's the same place where I draw my powers from."
Whoa, Excruciating Deformation is a nasty spell! Oria, you need a dispel magic to end that evil spell quickly before it does more damage to you. As far as I can see you are also the only one who can cast the dispel right now (unless Zarta can do it, too?). Nope! Oria's only got one in the chamber, and it's looking like the only tool we have to do anything about this strange sphere. She's just gonna have to endure being folded like amateur origami.
Oria continues to look at the glowing sphere and examines its features. The seconds crawl on by at a pace that would make them feel like weeks, but she shakes it off as some odd and irrelevant feeling. Deciding to take action, she gestures for the party to give her some space. The bottom of her robes flutter, and out crawls a purple slug about a hand's length in size slips out and onto the floor. Its body is covered in lumpy spots, all of which open to reveal sightless eyes across its body. Along its back, a sinuous tendril drags behind it, several times its own body length. It crawls away from her at an agonizing pace, eventually settling behind the rest of the part. With her familiar secure and her allies hopefully out of the way, the shaman decides to put herself to a use. She places her hand on the sphere and gives it the slightest little push to see what happens. As the saying goes, should a lock-picker be unavailable for the job, trap duty falls on the team member with the most resilience and the fewest people who would miss them.
Oria approaches the beacon, standing close to Zarta. The girl's untrained eyes fail to notice any details of importance or insight, and despite this shortcoming she seems determined to contribute to the conversation. "Is it... growing plants? Maybe eating it?" is about the best she can manage. One might swear that even her summoned monstrous wolf had given her a disappointed look in the moment before it dissipates.
More and more the concept of success reintroduces itself to Oria's mind, like the memory of an old stranger's face slowly revealing itself to be the visage of a friend not seen in ages. With this rediscovered confidance, she steps forward to deliver a slightly less cowardly, if similarly soft-handed blow.
Likewise, her wolf begins to lay into its new target with a set of serrated teeth that seem to have worms wriggling just beneath the gums.
Almost to her surprise, the shaman still has her organs exactly where she left them six seconds ago. Not wanting to look a gift goblin in the mouth, she utters the final incantations and makes a wide sweeping gesture with both hands, as if tearing at reality itself. And a tear she does make. From this this temporary wound in reality, a creature steps forth. One might mistake it for a wolf, save for the asymmetrical bulging muscles and forms wriggling beneath its stretched-thin golden hide, as if its trembling body were being piloted by a colony of parasites. The wolf-thing turns its head, the three shimmering eyeballs stuffed into one socket all focusing on one of the enemies. It lets forth a bloodcurdling howl and charges! Satisfied that she has contributed enough to no longer qualify as an embarrassment, Oria turns her attention towards keeping the immediate threat away from her allies.
Oria once again takes an appraisal of the battlefield. It would seem that her backup is mostly a firing line of mages against a fairly lopsided match up. And the piece of spiked steel wrapped around her knuckle certainly isn't up to the task. Her mind flares with two ideas. Each one sillier than the last. She could retreat behind her allies, allow them to be evicerated while she safely conjures, or... "Nooo..." she protests to no one in particular, and yet the foolish notion takes root regardless. She takes a brisk leap backwards over a vine and begins channeling magic, hoping that the sillier of the two ideas is worth it.
As the information of her foes' capabilities is spelled out to her, the shaman's mind races with the likely consequences of her decisions. She can already feel her organs turning into soup. A foot shifts back, bumping into a root, reminding her how deep she's in this. She steels herself and reaches out towards her foe, hand coated in inky blackness and glittering motes of starlight.
Oria gives a tired smile as she nods to the other arrivals. "Everyone's layering up with magic? May as well do the same." Through a slightly clumsy arrangement of her armaments, she puts her shield away long enough to draw a channeling rod that adds extra longevity to her next spell.
Then, makes a fist with her gauntlet, feeling an inner warmth within her palm. "During the seance I sensed a wandering spirit of flame, so I seized it. Its power is mine for the day, so that should make burning the plants away a little bit easier." Then, she looks to Kaidynn. "Don't worry, it wasn't one of yours. I won't let it take them."
A human woman in dark robes with a deep blue inside moves to catch up with the party, pulling a shield off of her back and doing a last-second check of her equipment. Despite her hurried movements, her half-lidded eyes and abysmal posture would suggest she had just fallen out of bed. She regards her kobold companion with a friendly nod, having quite enjoyed their morning seance. Even more so when eerie spiritual tendrils threatened to entrap one of the dragon spirits before dispersing into nothingness. "So something we barely understand became active and now we're being sent in to handle whatever it is and whatever it's doing?" But really, she wouldn't be a Pathfinder if she was sent to deal with the mundane and easily explained. "...not that I'd like that kind of job anyway." she mumbles out loud to no one in particular.
It's pretty great. The hexes are an amalgam of different buff/debuffs with an elder god theming, so you have a lot of means of expression. The way it modifies your familiar is especially delicious. And for any aspect of the list that doesn't work for me there's always Wandering Hex. Easily flavored as the Outer Beings forcibly corrupting and subverting some aspect of reality.
Hello! This is a replay for me, but it's been ages since I've run and the main thing I remember is really wishing I could have played it on my shaman. Speaking of.... Player: Nate Wright aka Rosc
Oira wracks her withered brain to think of something to contribute. She listens well, thinking of gaps in the stories of her allies, hoping to fill some of them in with her own expertise. Of course, this town isn't looking to be set on fire, nor is it aching to be converted into a shanty town filled with pesh addicts, so the task is well above her areas of expertise. "Shut up." She says, to no one in particular, the weight of her loneliness and slowly creeping madness coming into sharp focus. "Grmrg." she mumbles, thinking better of it. Then, she focuses her attention to the matter at hand. "It's clear that Kolvi was trapped in an eternal duel with the linnorm's spirit, keeping it down and away from all of you. Such a dfate is reserved only for people who were dedicated to their task in life, and were willing to carry it on in death. Really, you all should be thankful for her vigilance."
Oh, dear. She should have focused on the job.
Oh, I should probably mention a fun little trick for the end of the scenario. Oria has Heighten Spell and will reach level 7 at the end of this, so If you want a 4th level Continual Flame for all those pesky Deeper Darkness spells in your future she'll happily provide a casting if you spend 50 on the materials.
Oria's spells complete as she gestures in a wide circle in front of her. A tear in space forms as something crawls its way out. It is like a bat, but closer to a horse in size, with hairless pale skin that writhes and bulges as if serpentine tendrils were squirming beneath. Honestly, it's one of her finer works. The creature looks upon the dragon with its many, many eyes and lets forth a furious screech as it charges!
Not wanting to simply sit back and do nothing, Oria begins to chant and gesture again. This time, with a simpler spell. A bit of brutish, uncreative force. At least, by the standards of causing an explosion of magical flame.
One could almost hear the rusted gears grinding against one another as thoughts eventually stumbled their way through Oria's skull and out of her lips."Hey, uhm... ghost lady? You fought the dragon before, what exactly tends to come out of its mouth when it breathes at you?" As she listens, she goes about casting a variety of spells. Despite her ineffectiveness, she can at least provide magical benefits to those who actually have the capacity to get the job done. With an annoyed grumble, she blesses her allies.
Good, good. It's about time Oria really puts her back into this one.
Not wanting to hold back, Oria raises her arms and begins to chant in strange tongues, her eyes rolling back in her head as she calls upon distant, unseen powers.
Oria blinks, arms still raised in a defensive position. It takes her a moment to realize the combat has already settled before she could lift a finger to help. A rather familiar feeling of uselessness settles over her as she lets out a sigh. "Good thing we were able to distract that dragon." She nods to Ridley and nudges the recently toppled corpse with her foot. "Well, I'd guess they weren't exactly Cave Buddies."
"Hmm... their final words. Etched into a rock and a horn." Oria muses at the idea. In the end, she knows where she'll eventually end up. She reflects on her own aspirations and accomplishments, becoming acutely aware of the fact that the best thing she might ever accomplish is to die in a pose that would confuse future archeologists.
Oria narrows her eyes. "On the grounds that your favor doesn't put us directly at odds with the citizens of the town we just came from." But then, she shaman thinks better of herself. "At least not until our mission is done. Then?" She pauses, her voice wavering, but a grim determination restores her resolve in short time. "Who cares what happens to them, really?"
Oh, the witch thinks she's old? That's cute. Oria affords herself a slight smirk, the first thing resembling a smile that she's worn this whole trip. "And I consort with powers that were old when the gods first touched this world." she says, waving a hand dismissively. "Age comparisons aside, we're here to look into Kolvi. You mentioned a Kolvi the Brave?" She steps forward. [b]"I get the feeling your take on the matter is a bit different from what we've heard. Care to trade spooky campfire stories?"[b]
Oria approaches the charred wooden spike, running her bare fingers over the surface. The texture, the temperature, the thickness of the wood. Her imagination inevitably wanders towards the fated witch who suffered at this spot. She wonders, in a stray, dark thought, what it would be like to be in her position. The shaman steps back, flinching at the mental image. Unfortunately, her imagination is most through. "That's just wasting time." she mutters, quite rudely, before chanting to focus her mind and look at the scene with a new perspective.
Oria lets out a sigh, tired and dull, like she didn't just punch herself in the face with a spiked metal glove. So apparently this sort of thing just happens! "How delightful." she says, her voice just dripping with very heavy sarcasm.
With the haunt gone and the scene eerily calm, the shaman pulls out a wand and sets it to her own skin, mending the results of her improvised piercing session. "Alright. Let's go out there and see where the body used to be." Knowing her luck, there would be another haunt, or some snowbound monstrosity ready to tear the rest of her face off. "Or maybe we'll find an angry witch's vengeful ancestor." Or maybe they'll find an angry witch's vengeful ancestor. But there's only one way to find out!
Oria's will, despite tempering and testing throughout her adventures, fails utterly and completely to fight off the effects of the haunt. Surely, it's embarrassing her allies by simple proxy.
"What was that? what's happening?" she asks, unsure of the situation, knowing on some level that something went wrong despite her inability to determine the source.
"Oh. I understand now." she says with an distant stare and a strangely calm tone to her voice. Her hand, covered in a spiked gauntlet, flexes into a fist as she turns it around on herself. "It's all so simple. I've just got to beat it out of my head." You really don't have to do that, Oria. "Yes, I do!"
Oria looks up from her slouched, table-gazing haze after hearing the accusations being shouted at her. Witch? Well, yes, technically. And worse. The shaman has a sudden pang of nostalgia mixed with fear as her mind struggles against... well, whatever it is that's happening.
Of course, she never was one to keep her head on straight in an emergency. At least she hasn't managed to completely botch both the objective and the spirit of the mission. Not yet, anyway. Better that she not get her hopes up.
Oria shuffles in and nods to the man. "Something to drink. Warm. Doesn't matter what." She looks over her companions, then back to Ifan. "So, how are things around here? Looks like, uhm. It's enjoyable. Running an inn. With people in it." The shaman does her best to kick off a well-meaning conversation, doing her best as she reaches for that lofty goal of managing to keep the man's attention for longer than thirty seconds. Still, it might just be enough to leave the door open for someone more competent to use her as a footstool on their way to progress.
Not wanting to be left out, Oria does her best to contribute.
Of course, she ultimately finds herself staring at a product that she clearly has little understanding up, saying only vague and noncommittal things. "You know, I actually thought about buying a new..." But really, her overwhelming ignorance on the topic quite obvious. "...thing. Maybe a new thing. Or maybe... not?" Better she quit while she's only slightly behind.
After considering Zora's offer, Oria graciously accepts the opportunity to save on her own personal resources. "No, really, you don't have to buy a wander for our sake. I can prepare..." Oria graciously accepts the opportunity to save her own resources. "Hmmph. Sure, whatever, if you insist. But if the days drag on, I have my own protection." On the first day of the journey, that previous conversation suddenly snaps back to Oria like a slap to the back of her head. "Oh! My own protection. Right. My familiar." The shaman opens an inner pocket of her robes and allows her familiar to slither free. This violet-tinted gastropod is six inches in length, covered in pale eyes that blindly glance every which way. Tendrils of varying lengths protrude from its back like the petals on a blooming flower, with a finger-length tendril protruding from its back with the estimated length of a man's arm. Before they set out, Oria finds a discreet corner away from the eyes of whatever unnamed servants happen to be with them. In relative privacy, she meditates upon this creature, channeling her magical power as though it were some kind of conduit, eventually channeling some of it back into the mutated slug. While she's at it, she takes her time to envision the element of fire. Of its heat, its warmth, it's radiant glow and the life it can nourish. And of the dark, all-consuming tendrils that encircle the very idea of that element to claim it as her's. Yes, this will do nicely.
At the actual destination, Oria simply introduces herself with a single name and a disinterested shrug, leaving her familiar tucked away firmly within her clothing while her charismatic companions do the majority of the talking.
A young lady with a slouching posture and long, unkempt black hair looks up with a tired expression. Well, less 'tired' and more 'somewhat familiar with the concept of sleep' coloring her drooping eyelids and slow, ponderous movements. "Gmrng." Really? Let's try that again. With less mumbling. "G'morning. Morning." Is it really morning, though? At the very least, it is for her. She barely gave herself time to wash. "Nngh. Effigy. They made an effigy out of her, right? Can we see that? Might be important. Could be pretty fun."
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