Shorlixa/WPSessionFive
And here be Session Five for this crew of pirates.
Session Five
After each Solar (save for Red) has been given a vision from the Lunar, telling them how close he is, the Solars have gathered to make plans to deal with this looming menace. Red manages to find himself tagging along for this little council since he technically isn't under orders from the ship's Captain and can do what he wants.
Lady Syn says, "Did anyone else get the feeling you're watching yourself?"
Megumi glances at Syn and nods.
Big Red gives Syn an strange look. "Isn't that a little hard to do Miss."
Ryoujal sits serene and opens his eyes at Syn's comment, "Yes I did... it was very... unpleasant. Thankfully after some inward meditation I feel better now."
Big Red waits to hear a little more about these visions
Orillian raises an eyebrow. "Aye. Strange magic our pursuer bears, I imagine. But he'll meet his end soon enough. I've loaded our reserves of firedust into the submersible" - his voice wavers slightly as he points that out - "and I should be able to rig a sling out of the lines and spare sailcloth."
Lady Syn says, "A little hard becomes a common trick in our course of being."
Megumi gestures behind them toward where the vision came from. "The squiddy is hunting us. Toying with us, really. He doesn't see us as a threat, and he's letting us know it."
Megumi pauses and regards Red. "He...doesn't know you're here.."
Ryoujal says, "That means it's about time to show him the error of his ways capitan?"
Big Red says, "If your asking if I've had a vision that’s a no. But I am sure he knows I am here. I did help in that fight we had with him"
Lady Syn says, "Then I'd feel insulted. He obviously doesn't even consider you worth messing with."
Orillian ponders. "Hmm... he knows what we be... ye, on the other hand, have lived through horrors no mortal could bear, but haven't revealed obviously why."
Megumi says, "You helped as much as any crewman. If he really considered you a threat - well, more of a threat than the rest of our crew - he'd have taunted you, as well. It's meant to demoralize, I imagine."
Megumi nods at Orillian. "Exactly.
Big Red says, "Well I'm not saying I am normal. Since my time in the sands I've seen and done some pretty weird stuff. But you guys look to have abilities of your own."
Megumi shrugs. "I am what I am," she replies neutrally.
Big Red says, "Right. And what you are is not normal" He points to the crew. "I've seen none of them shoot energy arrows and such.""
Lady Syn says, "All I know is displaying what I am usually results in an angry mob"
Orillian rolls his eyes at the captain's continued avoidance of the subject. "...Chosen of the Unconquered Sun, Hated of Creation below, I'm afraid."
Ryoujal says, "Well, I've known I wasn't normal for a long time so it's not that much of a surprise to me. I just keep doing what I can to thrive and help out."
Megumi nods to Syn. "I prefer..." Sigh. Orillian. "..To avoid the problem."
Big Red says, "Than we have something in common then. Since my vision in the sands and my abilities that came after I've done a pretty good job of hiding myself."
Megumi nods. "I'd like to keep it that way, insofar as we can. Anyway, we have more pressing problems. Like our hunter over there."
Ryoujal blinks a little odd, "So... what does that mean? I'm not going to be biting the heads off of puppies one of these days am I?"
Orillian nods. "It seems that most of us be incapable of hiding what we are after a... certain level of exertion."
Lady Syn says, "Aye. But if he doesn't think Red is one of us, perhaps we can use that to an advantage?"
Megumi nods to Syn. "That's exactly what I was thinking. Red here, is our secret weapon."
Lady Syn says, "Well, aside from the exploding sub of destruction"
Big Red says, "I don't know what your thinking but I am a ranged fighter" he pats his repeater "No good at fist fights"
Megumi shakes her head. "Didn't say you need to fight with your fists. Just that you can unleash your power when he's not expecting it, and can't easily counter it."
Big Red says, "So what’s the plan then?"
Megumi considers. "Let it approach close. When it's within 20 yards or so, we use our first surprise." She gestures toward the remains of the sub. "Repulse borders as best we can, but their captain will board eventually. When that happens, we need to concentrate all of the strength the five of us can muster into attacking him at once. He can't defend against everything."
Orillian nods. "Aye."
Big Red nods
Ryoujal says, "Okay, I think I can follow that plan pretty well."
Lady Syn says, "Shouldn't we try to get him on land? This way he's got some running to do before he can escape? And he can't sink our ship, er what’s left of it."
Megumi hesitates. "If he lets us get to Storm Isle, he'll be a threat to our people there. I don't want that. We've got to land on the far side of the island. Beyond that...yes, I think we'll have a slight edge on land."
Orillian scratches his chin. "Aye, but that means we'll have to keep his ship from closing before we can get there."
Lady Syn says, "So that makes it a question of time and sailing."
Megumi nods. "If you have a suggestion, this is the time to field it."
Ryoujal says, "Nothing from me unless we can find a way to have some really big grappling hooks about..."
Lady Syn says, "I'll be at the helm."
Orillian shakes his head no, then thinks some more. "Well, I could give us screw propulsion... it'd sorely test hull integrity and we'd have to use the crew and survivors of the other ship for labour."
Orillian turns to Red and Ryoujal. "Remember how fun that was, mates?"
Megumi ponders. "How much of an increase would it be?"
Ryoujal lets out a rather unenthusiastic, "Yay..."
Orillian shrugs. "Well, our present hull shape makes for poor hydromantic efficiency, so... um, some? But we would be able to proceed regardless of wind."
Megumi frowns at Orillian. "I'll take the first watch at it."
Orillian shakes his head. "Nay cap'n. To push a ship this size, the spirits of the water would demand the efforts of many men."
Megumi considers that. "Spirits, you say. Could we...call upon these spirits for aid?"
Orillian shrugs. "Well, that be the province of prayer, not artifice..."
Ryoujal says, "I know a few prayers, but I rarely ask for those kinds of results..."
Megumi shrugs. "I'll speak with Berane about it. Start looking into that screw idea, see if it's viable in the time we have. Other than that, I guess we'll just have to wait and see."
Orillian nods and heads down to check the leftover scrap wood and figure out how much he'll need to take off the upper deck.
Megumi goes to speak with Berane about what can be done to coax the spirits into helpfulness.
Berane is currently with Ulos, using the time to teach the boy a bit more about his duties as one who controls the purse-strings. When they see the captain, they both make a gesture of respect. After she mentions her issue, he ponders slightly before answering. "Well, we'll need to attract the spirits, make the appropriate sacrifices and see if they're willing to deal with us. I'll see what I can do." And he goes off, Ulos trailing behind, to do just that.
After the plans are made, the Solars and the remaining crew of the Hurricane get to work to try and outrun the Lunar, at least long enough to reach the Storm Isle. Berane manages to attract 2 water sprits who are willing to help with the speed of the boat once Orillian hammers in something that'll make it go faster. From then on, it's a tense race to the island. Now and then, the Lunar taunts various members of the Solar, giving them a glimpse of how close he is. But he seems more interested in toying with them rather than attacking immediately, which gives them time to move into position. After three more days of travel, the Storm Isle is finally in sight and the ship beaches herself quickly, away from the main population of the island. They have at most a precious few hours to prepare.
Megumi directs the walking wounded and merchants toward the manse at the centre of the isle, there to take refuge, and begins preparations in the trees and such near shore for an ambush of sorts.
Ryoujal quickly jumps off the raft and helps the mortal crew that's not going to participate in the fight off as quickly as he can.
Lady Syn assists with setting up the bomb then moves to hide amongst the trees.
Big Red helps with the mortals and takes up a spot in the trees
Orillian keeps pace down in the 'engine room', taking the lead on the dozens of cranks needed to drive the screw. "Aright, me hearties, keep pullin! Not much longer 'till we reach nice dry land now! Heave, ho!" He keeps at that with only tiny breaks until they reach land, then oversees setting them up the bomb by making a giant slingshot between two palm trees. If he has time, he'll start tearing the ship apart to make some simple defensive emplacements. At this point it'd almost be easier to build a new one anyway.
And finally the Lunar comes. The Solars wait tensely in their various hiding spots as the rain falls, before finally noticing the enormous beast that rises out of the misty ocean, stepping forward onto the shore. His monstrous crew follow behind him, looking at the island before them. He looks around, then grins. "I see you Solars!" And they all charge in.
Ryoujal is hiding behind a tree that would have been wide enough to obscure him, if he was of normal dimensions. "I am the worst hider in the world. Should have told you guys..."
Orillian shrugs and holds his arm out toward the Lunar, palm up, and then makes the universal "come and get it" hand motion.
Ryoujal steps out from behind the tree and unsheathes his claws, feet spread out, ready to take any blow.
Megumi quietly draws an ethereal arrow back on her bow, waaaaaiting for it..
The Hurrican's crew fire a volley of arrows at the incoming creatures, but are unsuccessful in doing anything more than annoying them, especially the Captain. They continue to charge forward, but since the Solars were already waiting, they have the perfect advantage, for now.
After the annoying arrows though, Orillian fires off the big bomb. His wonderful sub goes flying straight through the air right on top of the Lunar, exploding with a very satisfying boom of loud proportions and big flames. At the end of it though, the creatures just behind the Lunar are dead, while all Orillian seems to have managed is to make the Lunar extremely pissed rather than extremely hurt.
Orillian shrugs. "Well, at least the environment be less target-rich now."
Ryoujal runs soon after the bomb is released heading right for the squid-lips, so that when the smoke clears, the first thing he sees is a couple of blades right into his face.
The Lunar turns to face Ryoujal as he comes charging in, but isn't quite fast enough as Ryoujal's claws rake him over the face.
Lady Syn smiles from her hiding spot in the trees. She gently pats Reefcutter as she eyes the Lunar busy with the giant below and with a feral grin she drops into the fray letting gravity assist her blade in its brutal work. (Hungry Tiger as well, 1M personal)
The Lunar is caught completely by surprise by Syn's attack and doesn't dodge and the Reefcutter sinks deeply into his flesh, drawing from him a scream of pain.
An ethereal, flaming arrow pierces the foliage and plunges toward the tentacled creature, contrails of gold, purple and green essence flowing behind it like streamers. Another flaming projectile follows at the heels of the streamers. There is a brief rustling in the trees before Megumi pops out and lands on a forking branch just below the line of leaf-cover, planting one foot on each branch. "This is my island, and none may enter it without my leave. You may surrender, or you may die." Another glowing arrow materializes, already knocked against her bow. "Your call." There is a resignation in her eyes, as though she already knows what the Lunar's choice will be. It is inevitable that he should die - she's seen fools like him rush in before, heedless of the obvious danger, and she knows just how this must end.
Orillian sizes up the squidheaded foe and exclaims, "Now here be where we stop ye, foul cutthroat!" before rushing down the beach and making an overhead swing at his face.
Megumi's first attack works well, tearing through the silver flesh and giving Ryoujal and Syn the dubious pleasure of seeing a big hole in his silver flesh. They note how even inside, his internal organs just look like liquid silver. As the next arrow comes, the silver flesh shifts and moonsilver flows all over his body, making him look like a monster made from pure moonsilver. And the second arrow...bounces.
Big Red steps off from behind a tree levelling the repeater at the squid man. "Remember me. I'm more of a threat then you think" Sand from all over starts swirling around Red and and infuses its self with his slug. When the trigger pulls a tunnel of plasma heated sand flies out.
Lady Syn says, "It bounced? How in the abyss? You know you are a very sore loser."
Now with his defences up, Red's extremely good shot simply bounces off the moonsilver the creature has coated himself in. And he turns to see Red as well.
Orillian raises an eyebrow at the unsuccessful attacks and hefts his hammer high. "Well then, let's see if ye can bounce this off!" he exclaims, charging the Lunar and sminging it mightily; he lets the hammer fall after it hits or misses and then digs into the beastly man with two flaming hands.
Big Red spits a curse "Damn you."
Orillian is followed in his strike by the giant mechanical man again.
The Lunar stares at each Solar, or rather, they get the feeling he stares at each of them, given how the moonsilver is covering his eyes. Silver light begins to glitter upon his forehead, reflecting the current phase of the moon. He makes no answer to Megumi's offer, although she does feel he stares at her a second longer. Then he shrugs and reaches out with his tentacles to clinch those Solars who have come so close to him, namely Ryoujal, Orillian and Syn.
Lady Syn jumps back and dives into the mess of Squiddy's remaining crew men while swiping at the tentacles to bat them into grabbing someone else.
Ryoujal says, "Oh no, not again..." As he backs up, his arms up and ready to stab any tentacle that comes his way while trying to give himself some moving room. (MA 5)
Orillian recovers himself through the power of his Essence and shoves the gripping tentacle down into the sand, hopefully slowing it down further by melting the sand into gooey glass around it.
The Lunar just manages to grab Ryoujal, tentacle twining around even his large body firmly. And where silver flesh touches skin, it hisses and burns in the painful way of acid. Even his touch can be lethal. Orillian snaps the tentacle to one side, diverting it to the sand before it withdraws. Syn moves into the crowd of creatures and the tentacle grabs his follower by mistake, snapping the creature's neck.
Ryoujal cries as the tentacle burns into him, he says, "Won't be that easy to hang on to me!" as he sticks a claw towards the main body and fires it off to give him a little extra incentive to let him go.
The Lunar doesn't give Ryoujal the time of day, simply squeezing harder until the Solar can barely breathe, breaking several ribs in the process of turning the extremely large man into a jelly.
Lady Syn backflips back into the melee. "Hey, tentacle-fuck. Let the big goof go." She brings her blade around for a cross cut but suddenly angles it for a downwards
The tentacle attempts to squirm out of the way, but Syn does manage to hit it, jarring it slightly. Ryoujal gets a little more space to move and may be able to force his way out...if he's awake enough to comprehend it.
Big Red says, "Okay lets try this" he pours just essence into his repeater as gold and white lights flare up around his body.
The shot strikes true again...only to bounce off again. It seems like as long as the moonsilver protection is up, they're unlikely to be able to do much damage. They have to wait out the monster, or find some other way to hurt him.
Orillian narrows his eyes and thinks. "Well aren't ye a tough nut to crack... let's see how ye swim in this!"
Orillian dives at the Lunar, or actually, beneath the Lunar, and shoves his gloves into the sand, turning their heat to maximum and trying to swirl a molten whirlpool around the Lunar's feet. "Ahoy, there be treacherous waters in these here sands!" he taunts as the sand turns to goo and gives way...
Orillian dives in, dragging his gloves through the sand until it isn't so much sand as molten glass. There's an annoyed shout from the Lunar as he suddenly finds himself chest deep in the rapidly solidifying glass. He thrashes about in rage, and his grip on Ryoujal becomes even lighter.
Megumi shakes her head. "Concentrate all fire on the squid!" She leaps into the air, wind currents enveloping her briefly. She fires another flaming arrow before she touches off another branch, then does a forward somersault over the battlefield and toward the ocean. Two more crispy projectiles float down toward the squid, noodly phantasms merging around one another to spin in an ever-tighter arc toward Squiddy's face. She wants to give her crew all of the chance to get clear of this monster that she can...
The creatures led by the Lunar has in the meantime charged forward to engage Megumi's crew. And they charge forward with such ferocity that many men are wounded. But they rally round and do their best to return the favour.
Megumi leaps forward, shooting off crispy projectiles at the tentacle holding Ryoujal. And the Lunar is so annoyed at that, he throws Ryoujal at Megumi in return.
Around him, his anima flares even brighter.
Megumi attempts to catch Ryo while still flying through the air, perhaps cushioning him with her armoured body upon landing.
At the same time, he seems to be slowly oozing his way out of the hole in the floor while his tentacles slap angrily at those around him.
Megumi then recalls that he's nearly twice her size. Oh, crud, this is gonna hurt, isn't it?
Ryoujal mentions groggily, "Tzihetla, I can fly!!!!!" *THUD!*
Lady Syn plunges her blade into one tentacle to give herself a boost over the flailing limbs then spins the blade around to slice into the second one.
Orillian rolls away and grabs up his hammer while holding his other gauntlet out defensively, still with some slippery glass coating it.
Megumi seems to dematerialize in that brief moment before impact, and then grips Ryo on the way down, so as to catch him without the pain of the initial impact of Exalt upon Exalt.
As Ryoujal flies groggily through the air, he might notice that he passes through something that smells vaguely like Megumi before he lands in the ocean. Happily, the water breaks his fall so he's not terribly injured.
In fact, the saltwater kinda soothes the acid burns from before.
Orillian and Syn both attempt to fend off the tentacles, but the first shot gets in at both of them. The acid stings at their flesh, but each of them feel it very well that if the Lunar wasn't slightly distracted by other things, it could have been a very lethal blow.
Ryoujal glugs a bit, but the water soon wakes him up, and he turns about to keep his nose above water, "Did we get'em yet?" Noticing that the big nasty dude is not down yet, he sighs, "Ah poopie..." He says dragging himself away from the battlefield.
Lady Syn decides to take advantage of the fact this bastard is stuck and if they can't kill him too much now, wait him out and maybe take down a few limbs. She dives back into the melee and aims to sever the limb that once held Ryo since it's injured already.
As the tentacles are flailing around, the Lunar doesn't pay close enough attention as he oozes his way out of the glass hole. This results in Syn viciously severing his weakened tentacle, the one that had thrown Ryo away only moments ago. It drops to the ground, loosing its shape to become a puddle of liquid silver while the Lunar screams again. Not much else in his current vocabulary.
Orillian hefts his hammer high. "Now surrender, or it be time to play whack-a-squid. Can't have ye gettin' at the civvies now."
Red moves to where Ryoujal landed and helps him back to the shore, helping to ensure that no one takes advantage of the fact that he is near death.
Orillian brings the great hammer down overhand towards the Chimera's head.
The Lunar glares at Orillian, and as the hammer comes down, the silvery flesh of his mouth shifts wide open to bite down on the hammer, stopping its blow. As he watches, the Lunar practically streams out of the glass hole, the fluid flesh flowing quickly up his hammer to his arms and makes to swallow Orillian whole.
Orillian holds on for dear life to his precious hammer. "You... are... not... getting... my... hammer!" he exclaims, then realizes when it starts quite happily flowing up his forge-hot gloves, "Or me!" With herculean effort he keeps tugging at the hammer and flesh, attempting to drag it through the sand to slow its progress, leaving rivulets of molten glass in its wake.
The Chimerae flows quickly up the hammer, past even the burning gloves and swallows Orillian whole, absorbing him into its flesh. There, it begins its attempts at digestion while the acidic flesh flows around his body, melting away all mundane materials. His hammer is shoved out of his hands as Orillian attempts not to get digested. He can barely move, pressed in on all sides by the silvery flesh. Hence, he invokes the power of the Sun against the digestion, and manages to keep the acid from doing his body any harm. Now comes the question of...how is he getting out?
Megumi views the swallowing of Orillian with some concern. However, he's a big boy and can take care of himself - and she's afraid of making the situation worse by accidentally skewering him with one of the arrows. So instead, she plunks an arrow at the most dangerous-looking of Squiddy's subordinates.
The crew continue to engage with the creatures and give as good as they've got, pushing the creatures nearer the shore and away from the main part of the island. The Solars don't really pay attention to them since they've got to deal with the Chimerae, save for Megumi who neatly shoots off an arrow to skewer a nasty looking creature. The sudden attack causes the creatures to not fight as well so the crew manages to continue holding their own.
Lady Syn glares at Squidy and walks up to him calmly with her sword at her side. "You have something of mine. Give it back." She pauses for a second. "Wait what am I saying. Pirate." She reaches towards the Lunar. "Mine."
Syn attempts to draw Orillian out again, just like the other time when pulling him from the stomach of the kraken beast. Unfortunately, the Chimerae pulls back on Orillian just as hard, resisting from giving up its new meal so easily. And so the Solars have a standoff. Orillian is still very much inside the Chimerae, and it looks very ready to continue fighting the others even as it slowly digests its meal.
