[ We find Our Heros in the same room they've been in for two sessions, more or less. They're still there, and now it's time to keep exploring! ] [ Session Start! ] ... okay. So we come back for the various metals after we deal with whatever the hell undead freakish affront to nature is lurking around here? Yup. ^_^ That seems the best course. Continue your explorations of this... workshop. * HKenji nods to Seylin to do her thiefy thing. * Ariake nods. Okay. * Seylin heads off to scout! And, as a side note... clerics and mage, d'ya have something in mind to keep those nasty undeath-causing bugs off us? I'm still thinking about what to do... [ There is a door in the middle of the north wall, and a hallway leading east along the same wall. ] The doorway first, Seylin, if you please. * Seylin checks the doorway. [ Seylin finds no evidence of a trap. The door is locked, but she can probably fix that. ] * Alcinoe folds her arms and thinks. "Too bad Ah don't have a bugspray prayer." No trap. Door's locked, but I can handle that. I can try turning them, but I won't be able to keep it up continuously. * Istvan hoists his war pick onto his shoulder with a grunt, and moves to a coupla yards behind Sey, near the door. * Seylin pulls out her lockpicks and gets to work. If in doubt, and I'm getting swarmed, feel free to fireball me. Red dragon skin helps with that. *pauses* Not that this is one of the rare circumstances I am okay with being fireballed. There are NOT MANY OTHERS. * Patrick snickers. * HKenji shrugs. "I trust the spellcasters. Though sometimes that trust is misplaced." He turns his gaze on Will. -_- Why are you looking at me like that, Kenji? * HKenji frowns and looks away, watching Seylin take care of business. * Seylin fiddles a bit with the lock, then gets it open. "There!" She tucks her lockpicks away. * Ariake grins. "I'll keep that in mind, Istvan." Let's keep treking. ^_^ Who wants to take a peek inside? Guess one of us armored folks should, in case there're more 'bots with bows. [ The door, once opened, reveals a room sixty feet by twenty feet. It is full of more crates, these all labeled in Undercommon, and another doorway to the west. ] That'd be a good idea. * Istvan pokes his head in. What do the boxes say? * Ariake peers in, cautiously. [ Different crates have different labels; wires, cables, and other part names you can only guess at. ] * Ariake beams. "Jackpot!" * Patrick grins. "I think you should start worrying now." Seylin, scout inside for defenses. * Alcinoe peeks in. "Jackpot?" Lots of fun components! * Istvan steps in, clearing the doorway for others. "Looks like boxes of parts. Wires'n such." * Seylin heads in and starts looking for defenses. She's pretty much uninterested in the wires and boxes and what not. Could be kinda-valuable to the folks that work with electric stuff. Or just as spare parts for Ariake. * Will takes a peek over Alcinoe's shoulders. "No wonder Ari's happy." * Ariake follows a respectful distance behind Seylin, eagerly opening boxes as she goes! * Patrick walks in and looks around, glancing at the components and stuff with mild interest. He stays near Seylin, trying his best to, um... help Seylin find traps! Yeah. I'll try not to hold us up too much, since we can come back later... * Ariake says this as she lifts small handfuls of stuff into her sack from some of the more interesting boxes. * Alcinoe shakes her head. Wires and stuff? O-kay. I will never understand the ways of spellcasters. * Ariake starts to slow down after just a couple of minutes, and is soon done. "Thanks for waiting!" Way I understand it, all this technology stuff is less magic and more like forging, except with little parts instead of molten metal. Seylin? The door? Ain't the ways of spellcasters so much as the ways of Ariake. * Alcinoe grins a little. Yeah, Ariake likes the wonders of technology. The 'magic' that everyone can use. ^_^ * Seylin looks back at the group. "No traps so far." * Ariake grins. * Seylin heads for the door and looks it over. * Istvan follows Sey, staying his customary few yards back. * Alcinoe does, too. Clank clank clank. * Patrick does NOT inspect Seylin's cleavage for traps, although it would be wrong to say he wasn't tempted. * Ariake follows. * Will clanks along next to Alci. ^^ * Patrick doesn't clank. He's much too coo' for that. Door is neither trapped nor locked. Shall I open it? If you like. * Seylin slowly and carefully opens the door. [ Through the doorway is a room full of very fascinating machinery. Dozens of molds stand open around the room, with tubes feeding into them from a caultrdon up above. Also up above is a collection of mechanical arms of various sizes. All sit along a conveyor belt running through the great length of the room. ] * Istvan takes a few steps in, and looks around. "I think we've found the source of our robots." * Ariake nods. "Definitely. This is quite some setup!" * Patrick whistles. "Wow, this is quite a system here." What should we do with it? ... some dwarves got together with some humans and tried to open up a forge that made swords like this, instead of by hand. They literally got chased off with axes and torches. * Ariake nods. * Will shuddders. "So this thing can churn out more of those sphere bots?" * Patrick chuckles. "It may work someday. But I don't think you'll get quite the crafsmanship if they were mass produced." * Alcinoe wrinkles her nose a little. "Ah suggest we shut it down." Shut it down...or modify the robots to protect us. It'd be great if you just need a whole lotta, say, swords or arrows in a short amount of time, and don't really care about quality. But nothin'll ever replace forgin' a sword or a suit'a armor by hand. * Patrick nods. An army of those robots on our side would be... useful. * Ariake looks around the room. I don't think we should really be messing with this sort of thing, though... Clay soldiers are no use against a skilled general. * Patrick chuckles. "What if they were also used by a skilled general? Still, we should shut it down. We don't need the risk." * Alcinoe shakes her head. "Ah dunno what we'd do with 'em." Shock troops for the castle. The same way you use ronin, really. Maybe shut it down, then look for a way to control them later? * Alcinoe blinks at Kenji. "Ronin?" Sounds good to me. And what are Ronin? * HKenji nods at Ariake. "It's up to you, Ariake." * Ariake nods, and looks around at a bunch of the panels. What's a... yeah. Ronin are masterless samurai. They have no clan, no family, and work for whoever will hire them. I believe you would call them... "mercenaries"? Ahhh. Sounds right. ^^ * Alcinoe nods. * Ariake snaps her fingers, disappointedly. "It looks like these robots can't see undead, the way their sensors work. I'll just disable this, then..." Many are bandits and worse, but they die just the same. So they are thrown where the fighting is heaviest, to absorb losses, and those that survive are granted fealty. If they survive the heaviest fighting in a war without resorting to cowardice, they obviously deserve to be granted fealty. * Will nods. "So that's why all these robots left the undeads alone." So now all the constructs will attack the undead? * Patrick chuckles. Unfortunately not, Kenji. I'm just going to disable the manufacturing for now. It looks like they don't have the capability to see undead. * HKenji shrugs. "More work for us." * Ariake hmms, after doing some more tinkering. "And it looks like this place hasn't been used for a while, anyway. Ah well." * Ariake spots a box at the south end of the room, and goes over to look at it! [ The box is labeled 'rare parts'. ] * Patrick puts his hands in his pockets and, yes, whistles. Mmm... makes sense. These are the wizard's bots, and the wizard's supposed to be dead. * Ariake efficiently transfers most of the box into her haversack. XD * Alcinoe keeps on the lookout for undead or bots or bugs or any combination thereof. * Seylin keeps going, as she has found no traps! * Ariake closes her haversack, and nods. "All set, I think." She's quieter again, but is humming happily. It's somewhat worrying. * Istvan looks around. "I don't see any doors in this room... head back to the hallway?" [ Alcinoe finds no enemies, and Seylin finds no traps. Unless they leave this room. Then things could change. ] * Patrick keeps following Seylin! No traps! So we should head back to the room with all the metal blocks now? Yes. There was a hallway there not yet explored. * Will nods. * Ariake nods. Okay, then let's go explore it! I agree. ^_^ * Seylin leads the group back that way. * Istvan heads back out the door, following Sey back to the hallway. * Patrick goes THAT WAY! * Ariake follows! * Alcinoe clanks! Back into formation, people. * Istvan is already in formation! HA! * Alcinoe is, too. Go her. * Ariake is as well! * Will sighs and walks along side of Kenji. He was just about to go clanking happily next to Alci. [ Down the hallway a short way is a large empty room twenty feet wide and 50 feet deep. What it was used for is anyone's guess. ] * HKenji whispers softly to Will, "Keep your eyes on your environment, not your heart's desire." * Patrick goes back into formation... * Seylin continues checking for traps! [ Futher along the hallway turns to the south leading on forty feet before reaching a staircase leading down. ] * Seylin checks the stairway very thoroughly, considering how past stairways have been. Aha! Here's one. * Seylin gets out her tools and works at disarming it. * Istvan takes that as his cue to STOP. He holds up a hand to signal for everyone else to stop to, in case they were deaf or something. * Ariake has stopped! * Alcinoe gives Seylin a respectful distance. * Will gives Kenji a slight nod after pondering the meaning of Kenji's words for a bit. * Patrick stops. Kinda. * HKenji has stopped. * Seylin puts her tools away. "All clear!" * HKenji nods slightly. "Good." * Seylin heads down the stairs. [ Down the stairs - careful to watch for broken pieces of trap - is a four way intersection. Your road continues south to the ziggurat room, but there's also branches to the east and west. ] * Istvan follows. "What kinda trap?" [ The east passasge has a door. ] I know that you are eager to get to the ziggurat, Seylin, but... the door, please? * Alcinoe steps over the trap, even if it's disarmed. * Seylin checks the door! ...that was a pretty nasty one. They really did mean it when they said tresspassers will be wilted. (back there on the stairs, I mean) ... more wilting? Eesh. * Ariake winces. This one's trapped, too. * Seylin gets to work again. That are more wilting traps? o.O Yep. Can't have too much of a good thing, right? ^_^ Wilting traps ain't good things. * Will shakes his head. "Yeesh. How many times do they wanna wilt a person..." If you survive to the second, you obviously deserve it. * Seylin finishes untrapping this door. "Got it!" * HKenji nods to Istvan. "If you would do the honors?" [ Through the door is a small room with a desk and a bed. To the north is a set of stairs leading up. Past the stairs is a large sitting room, with a door leading to the east. ] * Seylin heads in and checks. "Two on the stairs, one on the door. Which one shall I do first?" * Istvan steps through after Seylin. "Door? Should probably explore this floor before heading up." Okay! * Seylin heads for the door and starts working on that. * Istvan looks back. "Nobody go near the stairs." * Ariake nods. * Will takes a seat on the floor while Seylin is working. "Roger, Istvan." Who is Roger? Nobody Kenji. It just means that I got his message. I see. * Seylin goes ahead and does the stairs once she finishes the door. * Patrick glances around. [ It looks like someone lived here. A loooooong time ago. ] (Hey guys, I think someone lived here. A looooooong time ago.) (You're so observant, Patrick! Hold still while I punch you in the face!) Patrick, search the desk, please. * Patrick shrugs and, yes, searches the desk! He does a good job too, I think. * Patrick finds two wands in the desk. He balances them on finger before throwing them up and grabbing them. "Got some wands." What kind? * Ariake looks over. "Hmm." * Alcinoe glances over, but she doesn't look horribly interested. Wanna check the rest of the room, Patrick? In case the guy hides, say, suits of armor under his bed? * Will grins. "You want another suit of armor, Istvan? You already have that dragon hide thingy!" * Patrick laughs. "I always can. It wouldn't hurt." * Patrick starts searching the rest of the room! * Ariake looks around a bit, too. Gotta have a backup, in case this one gets damaged. Right now, my backup is my banded mail. Nice and reliable, but nowhere near as good as this. [ Patrick finds nothing else of value in the room. ] * Will nods. "Good call. Doesn't hurt to have a backup." That's it guys. No armor under the bed, Isty. ~_^ Figures. Who'd put armor under their bed? Dwarves. Someone with no closet space? Me? * Patrick grins. * Alcinoe rolls her eyes. Just kidding. Someone with no respect for their armor? For when you want to keep it close, but out of the way so you don't trip over it, and have limited space. Anyway. Upstairs? Or through that door? [ Up the stairs - all five of them, two of which bear the telltale signs of a Seylin trap dismantling - is the sitting room I mentioned earlier. Around the bend is a door leading out of the room, to the west. It, too, has been taken apart for the disarming of it's trap. ] Patrick, search the sitting room. Seylin, check behind the door. * Patrick searches! Under the couch cusions, too! Com'on, he's gotta have some loose change in there. I'll follow Sey, in case there's something unfriendly behind the door. * Seylin looks behind the door! What does she find? [ Patrick finds eight copper pieces and four silver pieces. ] * Patrick yoinks! * Patrick checks the rest of the room, too. [ Patrick finds nothing of any value to anyone who isn't on Antique Roadshow. ] * Istvan is about a yars behind Sey for this door opening. * Patrick grins. "Man, someone else's gotten through this place before. They missed out on the 1/10000th replica of an airship though. Even radio controlled." ^_^ * Ariake raises an eyebrow. "That's pretty nice." Oooh! Can we keep it? If you like, Seylin. I don't see why not. ^_^ Yay! [ Through the door is a room, thirty feet by thirty feet. It has stairs leading up to what looks like a large magical workshop. ] * Patrick has the remote in hand. He puts remote and ship into his backpack. Interdimensional space does wonders for keeping things intact. Seylin, the stairs. Patrick, your usual bang-up job of searching, please? * Patrick chuckles and SEARCHES! "I'm glad you have so much faith in my ability to pillage." [ The thirty foot^2 room is bare and unremarkable. It holds cleanup facilities and nothing more. ] * Seylin checks these stairs. * Istvan follows behind Sey, a few yards back, trying to keep out of Patrick's way. [ The mages' workshop... is a mages' workshop. It's gonna have some nice stuff. ] (Considering pocketing a bottle of windex...) Nothin' here. [ And then they went and looted the lab! Session end. ]