quest log | following rumors

[moustre]

Who: Those signed up for the the High-Risk Quest "Following Rumors".
When: 06/10 to 06/13
Where: A cave deep within the Wilde.
What: From the quest information itself: "A few of our divination experts have spoken of a cave untouched by the corruption in their scrying, which is right exciting! We'll be sending in our Witches as well, but I'd like to offer this opportunity to those who've come in through The Looking-Glass House, too. It should be safe enough for just about anyone to visit, so find a friend or two and come on! Stuff like this is a rare find, dearests - it might give us a good hint about how to combat our corruption problem, too."
Warnings: In various prompts: spiders and other insects, corpses, risk of injury or death, magical corruption, physical sickness, hallucinogenics, and other imagery that may be disturbing. Each prompt header will be labeled with the appropriate warnings, so make sure you choose what you're comfortable dealing with, either ICly or OOCly! Additionally, sign ups aren't closed - if, after reading through the log, you'd like to sign up, you can still do so and play on here at your leisure.



The Way There

Most journeys into the Wilde don't actually go too far; those that do travel outside of the city end up somewhere in the land between, with its smaller patches of growth that feel as if they should be part of a forest, or at the very edge of the massive forest that seems to be ever expanding. Even now, new sprouts push through the dirt, some even as tall as a man despite being obviously new - they're still green and flexible, without any noticeable bark. The quests the Wilders take - and have put out at the Coven, as far as last month went - go a little deeper, to where the trees become far more autumnal, colored in golds and browns and oranges.

The cave spoken of is deeper still.

As the group marches in pairs, the trees turn from vibrant summer green and lushly decorated in flowers and fruits to the tell-tale colors of fall and winter, their bark gradually becoming more and more marred by an inky blackness that's sticky to the touch - sap, bleeding from the cracks between the bark. What animal life had been at the edge of the forest fades into a hollow quiet, the air becoming more oppressive - not unlike a certain shared dream experienced not too long ago. The silence is unnerving even to those with iron-clad hearts, giving off the feeling that something is about to happen -

and then suddenly, the feeling disappears, even as the quiet remains.

The area around the cave is lush with foliage; the trees look healthier than their counterparts outside of it, their bark free of any leakage and their branches hardly out of control. Closer inspection shows this is due to scraping and trimming, and after some discussion, the Wilders and Witches set up camp outside of the cave and gather together the group. Everyone is given the same basic necessities and instructions on how to use them, in a bag containing:

• A grappling hook enchanted to return to them with a tug
• Around twenty-feet of rope
• Three spell scrolls (a light spell, which will conjure a small ball of light that shows about a radius of twenty feet around the caster and lasts as long as the scroll remains in one piece; a minor healing spell with three charges; and a single-use flare spell that can be used as a distraction or to call for help, should the need arise)
• A tinder kit
• One day of rations
• A ring that glows when danger is nearby; it's enchanted to fit on anyone's finger, regardless of size

For characters unsuited footwear-wise to spelunking, they'll also receive a pair of sturdy boots.

The mission is simple: explore the cave and report back with their findings. It isn't just those who signed up going in; other Witches are suiting up to head in as well, talking in low voices about the probability of something like this even existing, especially with how deep they are in the Wilde. It isn't as if they're anywhere close to the center, but it's still in Wilder territory - they're far enough out that a few of them are nervous about encountering one of the bigger variety of Shades. Despite the reassurances that this cave is clean, and the fresh feeling it gives off, the murmurs continue until the mission officially begins.

Smugha Cave

The cave itself feels refreshing compared to the oppressive air felt on the way here, not unlike an oasis in a desert. Cool in temperature and a little damp, it's mostly dark aside from the sunlight coming in the front and the bio-luminescent cave flora that climb the walls - though those are still too dim to really see by. Heading further in reveals sharp cliffs with stair-like structures carved into them, inviting an easy way down into the depths, and landing at the bottom of these is a wide, dark room, even colder than the last.

It's time to start exploring.

I. The Water (cw: magical corruption, physical sickness)


For a cave located in the middle of the continent and in the depths of the ever-reaching forest, there certainly is a lot of water. Damp to the point that it might be considered humid if the cave was any warmer, puddles form beneath long stalactites, and shallow pools of water pour into each other from landing to landing; they populate the floor too, making walking a little treacherous. A few of them glow and glimmer with a faint, pale blue light from the magic runes found around them - these ones, at least, can be read. They're not so different from the script used in Aefenglom itself, though the way they've been carved into the stone makes them a little sharper in shape - for those in study at the Coven, or in spells in general, it's evidently a cooling spell. That isn't so hard to figure out though, as the pools of water surrounded by them have a pleasingly cold temperature, while those without them are near scalding. A few of the latter have runes around them, but they're not glowing like the rest - feeding a little magic into them changes this immediately, and steam rises in a sudden blast as the water cools rapidly. The opposite can be done for the colder pools too - taking their magic somehow or ruining the runes will make them bubble and boil as they surge in temperature. It'd be best to mind oneself around these, as unlike in a dream, any injury sustained in the waking world is a little more permanent and painful.

Three pools in particular have to them a translucent green shimmer, made a little more blue-green by the cooling spell carved and activated around them; they're deep enough to wade into, or even just sit by and rest one's feet in - both of which feel like very attractive ideas to anyone who looks at them a moment too long. The water is pleasantly cool, and those who take a quick rest in them will feel more refreshed than they have in years. Their worries will fade, the anxieties they've held in the back of their mind seeming to slide off into the water, but in place of it something new occurs: within fifteen minutes of resting in the pool, they'll begin to feel sick, and grey spots begin to appear on any wet skin. Longer than that, and those residing in the water will find their spots turning black instead, and a lot harder, too. This affects Witches quicker than it does Monsters, curiously enough - for Monsters, it takes almost double the time. Getting out and getting dry will temper the effects back down, though the feeling of being not quite refreshed lingers.

That isn't all the water the cave has to offer - the large cavern has a sudden, massive drop in the form of a sinkhole on about halfway across the room; it leads to a similarly massive underground lake. Traveling around the rim of the sinkhole shows there's multiple waterfalls pouring into it soundlessly, pooled together from the pools of water running into one another. Thankfully, there's another way down other than just diving headfirst into the darkness - twin tunnels on each side of of the sinkhole, not quite natural in nature, lead down to the lake in a gently winding slope.

Starting shallow before getting much deeper in the middle, the lake also has an inviting feeling to it, stronger in its suggestion to simply take a load off, to let anxieties and worries simply soak and sink away in its pleasantly tempered waters - but it also has a stronger reaction in those who enter its depths. Within five minutes, those within it begin to feel sick, the grey spots showing up on their wet skin, and the rate of their blackening and hardening is quicker as well. This, once more, affects Witches quicker - and, just like before, getting dry will make alleviate the sickness and the spotting both, with the discomfort lingering long after.

In both the upper and lower caverns, there are tunnels leading to other parts of the cave - they might just be worth checking out...
II. The Upper Tunnels (cw: risk of injury, spiders and other insects, hallucinogenics)


The tunnels leading from the upper cavern stay relatively horizontal, with small hills and valleys among their turns and a lower ceiling that might have people higher than five-and-a-half-feet ducking a little; they're more like a labyrinth than anything else, with empty metal sconces beginning to appear further within them. Sharp, thick nails have been hammered into the stone as well, with leather pouches rotted and torn hanging from them - whatever were in these hasn't remained, either due to wildlife or decay. Small rooms and caverns shooting off from the tunnels hold much of the same, albeit with a few other items: jackets and other clothing, Coven robes, specially-tailored Monster wear, instruments with snapped strings or clogged holes, candles burnt to the wick. One room in particular holds a few bookshelves, though the wood is also in poor condition due to the dampness of the cave, and the books suffer for this as well. What ones can be made out seem to be standard fare: the type of books one might expect to find in the fiction section, ranging from romance to horror to fantasy, and a few Coven textbooks on spellwork, specifically basic transfiguration. Not all of this is so old, however - some of it seems newer the closer explorers get to the "end" of the tunnels, either landing them in a room or at an ordinary dead-end.

Unfortunately, the tunnels aren't as safe as they seem: giant spiders make their homes among the caverns and tunnels, made obvious by the webbing that appears before their funnel-like traps. They range from the size of large dogs to horses, but all of them have the same venomous bite that causes hallucinations, deliriousness, and fatigue. Among giant mushrooms whose spores paralyze those who breathe them in live similarly large millipedes, incredibly long and vicious; they attack in pairs, but thankfully just have very, very painful bites. Last but not least are bats - regular sized, plentiful as they might be in any cave, and just as annoying, too.
III. The Lower Tunnels (cw: risk of injury or death, imagery that may be disturbing, corpses, physical sickness)


Meanwhile, the tunnels leading from the lower cavern have higher ceilings and are mostly flooded (about waist-high) due to the nearby lake; water permeates through the rock in rivulets, darker than the lake above, and give a similar effect to the water in the lake itself. Thankfully, they're also mostly iced over - walking on them takes practice and a careful eye, considering the ice is thin in places. The air becomes more frigid as the tunnel dips down, with smaller caverns sharing the same fate: covered in ice and icicles, their entrances sometimes a little too squished to get through without breaking the ice or being particularly small in stature. Those traveling might notice a trend if they look a little too closely at the clearer parts of the ice as well: scratch marks gouging into it, as if something'd been trying desperately to get out. The longest tunnel opens up into a frozen room, as tall as the lower cavern itself, sconces lit with pale blue fire - magic, and obviously so. The walls glitter beautifully with the light, but looking down into the depths below, past the sheet of ice that allows travel, reveals something horrifying: dozens of thin husks and corpses of animals and adventurers both, held in place by the ice as it stretches down like spikes into the water. Witches, Monsters, Shades, other creatures - not a single one spared, with a mix of infected and non-infected among them.

These tunnels aren't exactly safe either: ice-breathing salamanders the size of elephants can be found resting in some of the caverns - though they might be hard to see, given their pale white and blue scales. While not infected (curious), they're incredibly aggressive and attack those who wake them or get too close. Their bites can inflict frostbite the same as their breath can, so caution is advised in dealing with these. When killed they remain intact, their blood creating an extra layer of ice on whatever it touches due to its chilly temperature, not unlike liquid nitrogen.

Unfortunately, they're not the only things those adventuring in the depths have to worry about. To be precise, Shades of Monsters and Witches also roam some of the tunnels shooting off from the larger, main one; the latter pulses brightly with white veins of magic on their blackened skin. Both types of Shades are sluggish, likely due to the cold and the lack-of pure magic, but are experts on dealing with walking on ice. The Witches in particular are ticking time-bombs, every spell they cast - primarily of snaring-type spells, desiring the magic and flesh of whom they capture - risking an explosion, but when they do supernova... It's fairly localized to somewhere between five to seven feet of the Shade in question. Those within that radius, however, will feel physically sick and find their skin or fur-scale-feathers-so-on turning into sharp, black shards of ice and infection due to the corrupted magic exploding from the Shade.

Either way, once killed the Shades fall apart and turn into thin, brittle corpses of what they used to be; they're old enough that when touched, they simply crumble as if made of ash.
IV. Outside The Cave (cw: nothing)


For those seeking a little relaxation or recovery can make their way back outside - or be helped that way, given their flares. There, Witches can take care of them, food can be shared, and in general, people can take a breather. As the first day closes, and the cave proves itself to be bigger than expected, Witches will also offer to teleport people back to the city should they wish to go - staying would be nice, but they aren't going to force anyone to stay who doesn't want to. They'll also be collecting information from those who've ventured inside, encouraging each person to share with each other their findings as well.

(Note: Essentially, this is more of an open/breather prompt, considering the heavier nature of some of the prompts above; any injuries or infection sustained can be healed here, extra supplies can be gotten, as well as anything that might need specialized storage - such as bottles, cages for small animals, and so on. Characters can be teleported back to Aefenglom in small batches occurring every hour should they choose, but they cannot be teleported back; it's a one-way trip. Otherwise, at the end of the three day stay, the same trek will be made back to the city, and the quest will be considered "completed"... Until further notice. Any questions can be asked here.)

Comments

[divineconfetti]

( wolf nods, and the matter is settled. the man certainly seems confident, so he will assume that that confidence is well-founded in the weapon.

as for magic, he thinks that they would be useful — if they did, indeed, work. he has noticed that many of the fledgling "witches" of the coven struggle for consistent results. it's not as though he could pass any judgment, as he couldn't manage any of it. but even if he could create defenses or heal wounds half of the time, it is already far more useful than wolf himself might be for the same things. usually, he would have the aid of his healing gourd and not worry so much about such things, but with the gourd seeds no longer producing medicine... he has to be more cautious. )

I have been told I have no aptitude for magic. ( his prosthetic hand comes to rest on the hilt of his own sword; he certainly doesn't make any attempts to hide it, as the sleeve of his coat cuts off above where it is attached to his upper arm. though he hadn't picked up any of the rope, there does seem to be some twined around a spindle as part of the forearm, right beside what appears to be a human bone. an odd contraption indeed. ) But I am capable in a fight, and I am able to travel throughout the caverns without issue.

( their first trial seems to arrive just in time to test him on that statement. the cavern before them opens up, but the floor also drops away, broken up along a rough rocky cliff-face before evening out into a floor some fifteen or twenty feet below.

wolf looks towards aymeric, seemingly interested in how he would deal with the situation. )

[civicbooty]

[ That tells him nothing about the arm, which — Aymeric thinks, scrutinizing it for a moment more — looks like exposed bone, now that they're closer, with twine and metal imitating muscle. How can that be possible? How, more pressingly, can he wield a sword with it?

The cavern interrupts his wonder with a steep drop.

Aymeric frowns at it, peering over the ledge. The light of the spell doesn't reach the bottom as well as he'd like; the floor of the tunnel is dark. He turns to survey the rock around them: the jutting stalagmites could take a rope, and the grappling hooks are enchanted. He shrugs his own off his shoulder, wraps it around a stalagmite as securely as he can manage, takes a step back, and tugs sharply, leaning away, letting it bear his weight.

The rope creaks, but the hook and the knot hold. ]

This seems a strange formation, does it not? [ He drops his bag at Wolf's feet— ] Pray cast this to me when I reach the base, if you would— [ —and he wraps the rope around one of his gloved hands, backing toward the edge. ] How does a ledge so high come to be in a cavern so otherwise small?

[ He pauses, glancing skeptically behind him as he starts to descend, one foot balanced on the edge of the rock. ]

If I land in a lake, I suppose this will be a foolish question.

[divineconfetti]

( there is much about the prosthetic wolf would struggle to explain. he did not invent it, and he wasn't even the one it was invented for — it had been something handed down to him. he knows how to maintain it now, and he could affix a new tool to it if given time, but there was much more about it that was shrouded in mystery.

fortunately enough, however, it's his left arm, and wolf wields a sword with his right. not that he doesn't use the prosthetic in combat, but this allows him to do both at once.

wolf's eyes scan the grappling hook, where it is secured to the stalagmite. it looks steady enough, so he leaves it as-is. he takes the bag from the taller man, holding it carefully as he began to make his way down the sheer cliff-face. wolf is thoughtful; it's not usually in his wheelhouse to wonder the why and how of things. he merely assesses the situation and deals with it. ) I am not certain. Parts of this cavern were lived in, and there are also signs of something having happened. Either might provide answers natural law does not.

( he checks on aymeric's progress as he steadily makes his way down towards the cavern floor. or what he hopes is the cavern floor. more water here would prove problematic.

he squints through the darkness. even with his keen vision in low light, he can't quite see to the bottom. ) Have you reached the ground?

[civicbooty]

[ Cautious footsteps answer him. For a moment Aymeric says nothing, turning in a circle, and then—

Oh. ]

The ground is ice, I fear.

[ He peers off deeper into the tunnel, but it's useless with the bag and the scroll still above. He steps away from the rope and kneels, examining the surface. ]

I cannot say how deep the water is, but it appears to be frozen well enough.

[ Or it hasn't produced any suspicious sounds under his weight, at least — yet. ]

[divineconfetti]

...I see.

( ice... so it would be a lake, if the temperature was warmer. this is not something wolf really has too much familiarity with. the ashina mountains could be very frigid, but caverns of ice and whatnot were not really a part of that. he will have to be cautious, then. it would be very unbecoming of a shinobi to lose his footing.

he glances over and peers with faintly luminescent yellow eyes into the darkness. he can make out where aymeric stands now, and so he calls out, ) Ready yourself.

( once he figures the other man is ready, he gently tosses it down. his aim feels true, so hopefully it all goes well. after that, wolf largely imitates what aymeric had just done, though he instead fires the grappling hook from his prosthetic arm and makes sure that the hook is secure in a crack in the wall before descending. it doesn't take him very much time; he seems to be very adept at scaling up and down such things. when he's at the bottom, he pulls the hook free and retracts it back into the prosthetic, the rope twining around a spool alongside the bone in the forearm and the hook clicking into place next to it.

he glances to aymeric, judging to see if the man is prepared to continue. )

It seems solid, but we should be cautious, regardless.

[civicbooty]

[ Aymeric squints up through the darkness, though with the bag and its light spell hanging off his shoulder again, he can't see how Wolf secures the grappling hook. He watches his descent with interest, openly impressed when his feet touch the ice. ]

Your skill is admirable.

[ This is one part a plain attempt to be friendly, three or four parts an automatic association with the kind of adventurer he most esteems — but it's genuine, either way, and audibly earnest.

He leaves his own rope where it is and starts further down the tunnel, steps a little more cautious, listening for the ice to creak.

Ahead of them, the cave wall opens up into a dark, yawning mouth of a tunnel that branches off somewhere unseen. Aymeric gestures to it, glancing at Wolf. ]

Shall we look? One turn ought not be a danger.

[divineconfetti]

( wolf seems a little awkward in accepting the praise. he dips his head a moment, silence thick and conspicuous in the air as he sifts through a way to respond with whatever dignity and honor he can muster. he ends up nodding. ) ...Thank you. It is something I had to become familiar with.

( ashina was a vertical land, built into harsh and foreboding mountains. the grappling hook, therefore, had been vital to learn how to become proficient with. otherwise his journey to save kuro would have ended very soon.

wolf's eyes scan the ice, looking for faults or imperfections, any sort of peculiarity that might make him think it wasn't safe to walk across. but it seems sturdy enough; the water must be very cold to permit a layer of ice this thick. eventually his gaze finds the same thing that aymeric's does: the dark cavern that continues to stretch off, deeper into the underground network.

he looks (up) to the much taller man. he gives a stoic nod. ) We must. Otherwise, coming this far will have been for nothing.

( he begins to cross the room, toward the tunnel. even with what light they have and his ability to see in the gloom, the illumination only seems to go so far. the tunnel itself is not very noteworthy — just more ice and rock that they have become familiar with until this point — but eventually the sounds begin to shift, footsteps threatening to begin echoing again, as they did in the larger cavern.

a larger space. and it's not just the footsteps... there seems to be something else, shifting in the darkness. something that sounds a good deal larger.

wolf's voice is so low, it is nearly inaudible: ) Be wary. There is something ahead. ( his right hand slowly drifts, coming to rest on the hilt of his sword. )

[civicbooty]

[ Aymeric's hand shifts to his own sword — but he draws it, softly.

They're not well positioned. The walls are too close, and the ground uncertain, and the light of the spell doesn't reach far enough ahead of them. Whatever made that sound, that shuffle of mass, will be hidden until it's close enough to strike at them.

It moves again, quickly, and then pauses — silence. Aymeric tilts his head, relying vainly on his ears, brow furrowed in the spell's light.

It's listening, just as certainly as they are. It almost sounded like—

The shuffling comes fast and frantic, barreling toward them. The snout that appears at the edge of the light is blunted and round, but Aymeric sees what he's been long conditioned to. ]

Dragon—!

[ He reels back, flattening himself against the rock wall as the salamander opens its too-wide maw. An icy mist bursts through the center of the tunnel, close enough that the freezing cold of it is palpable even outside the spray. ]

[divineconfetti]

( their approach had been somewhat foolish, though entirely unavoidable. the smaller cavern gradually opening up into a larger space was something like a funnel that forced them into the face of something dangerous. the only way to go was to escape where they had come from. but wolf is not so quick to retreat, edging forward with his hand on kusabimaru, his eyes glinting yellow and seeing a large shape of darker gray shifting in the gloom.

suddenly, it moves faster, moves closer. wolf tenses, drawing his sword with a sibilant hiss of steel scraping through the scabbard. then, stillness. silence. wolf is the same, watching and listening, aware that aymeric was a short distance away, doing the same.

then it lunges forward to strike.

it looks nothing like any dragon wolf had ever seen, though the divine dragon and the odd entities that had preceded it in the divine realm were perhaps poor things to judge from, being utterly removed from the world's reality. this creature is oddly smooth and round, body bulbous and heavy. the jaws open, and instinct causes wolf to do much the same that aymeric does, ducking and dodging down towards the wall so he can avoid the frigid spray of the creature as it breathes into the cavern. he begins to move forward as the breath slackens, its lungs emptying, and there is a click as he rotates the tools on his prosthetic arm's wheel. if the beast relies on cold, he thinks it will not very much like this tool...

when the salamander pauses to take another breath, wolf leaps out of hiding, raising his left arm. a sizable gout of flame springs forth from a vent attached to a small, metal barrel embedded into the arm; he continues to step forward, the tool like a miniature flamethrower as he does so. the salamander bellows, the flames licking at its muzzle and causing them to burn terribly. it stumbles back a few paces, flinching away, though it also turns to swing a huge, pendulous tail in their direction. )

Watch out! ( wolf says as he deactivates the flame vent, diving once more out of the way. )

[civicbooty]

[ Ayemric's nerves have fallen back to instinct and experience, and it dulls them, detaches them, turns everything to the flow of a fight — but for a sharp moment when he sees the flames he doesn't connect them to Wolf, and all he thinks is the man's not wearing armor, and he's about to watch someone utterly crumble—

—and then Wolf shouts, and Aymeric springs away. The motion is not graceful; he's no dragoon, and he grunts as his shoulder smashes into the tunnel wall. The salamander's thick tail sweeps harmlessly across the floor.

Aymeric seizes the opportunity: he brings his sword down hard.

The severed end of the tail slaps across the tunnel floor. The salamander itself lurches away as fast as it can with a screeching hiss, waving its truncated tail back and forth, spewing dark blood across the ice, flinging drops of it at their legs.

Aymeric sags against the wall, catching his breath. ]

Are you unhurt? [ And then, on the heels of a sudden realization: ] How did you summon those flames?

[divineconfetti]

( oh, wolf has been set on fire plenty of times, no worries. he has a powder medicine for that. he usually has a red gourd filled with medicine for it, too, but none of those are working for him right now... video game mechanics are a hell of a thing.

but fortunately enough for both of them, the flames were something he had summoned on his own accord, and they prove very effective against the icy monstrosity. the flesh burns and sloughs where the flame had come into contact with it. this only seems to enrage it, though, and the tail swings towards them. wolf rolls quickly out of the way, looking up quickly to ascertain that aymeric had done the same. not quite as quick-footed, but he appears to be safe, and he slashes out with his sword at the creature's tail.

it cuts clean through it, causing the end to fall to the cavern floor, hissing with an icy smoke. the beast seems to reassess its attack after the burns and the loss of its tail, scrambling away into the depths of the cavern and watching them with burning eyes, cautious and perhaps afraid of the insurgents.

wolf looks to his companion as he hears the questions. ) I am well. ( at the second question, he bares the prosthetic, indicating a small, metal tube installed into the metal framework. ) With this barrel. It can spit flames through this vent, though not for very long.

( he lowers his arm, holding kusabimaru out to his side. he stalks into the open cave, eyes on the beast, which continues to stare them down in the same way. )

I can draw its ire, so that you might harry it where it is blind.