Mud and Bones - RPLOG
Participants
Date
22/5/478
Log
The entrance to the deep swamp was as muggy as it ever is, swarms of kricks flying around to bother those entering and trying to press far in. There though, in one of the most 'open' clearings, sits a trio of shady looking alligators... Familiar to those whom were hear last time, they are all clad in body concealing cloaks, and face obscuring hoods! Near them though, stands a single male crane, busy pruning his feathers as he looks around for a moment before checking a flier... Seems he was impatient today!
Natska makes her way through the swamp, a slight breeze wrapped around herself and keeping the kricks at bay. The jaguar nods at the familiar looking crane, then the alligators, and takes her spot to wait for the rest of the group to assemble.
Cassidy keeps herself close to Natska, sharing in the breeze to keep the pesky kricks away. "Is uh, everything alright?" She asks the crane, brow raising behind her mask. "You seem flustered. Is it that urgent?"
Cara rushes through the swamp, clad in more suitable attire for the mission. She manages to have little trouble with the kricks this time, no doubt thanks to the jaguar's help. The feline nods to the jaguar upon her arrival and takes out her staff. "Well, it's nice to see you here again, Natska." She shifts her gaze to the masked fennec and grins, "The same goes for you as well, Cassidy." The feline turns to face the crow and waits for further instructions.
With a few muttered curses about the stagnant smell and ugly looking vegetation, and a few more.. choice words in regards to the insects anouncing her arrival, Sara emerges from some thick set foliage just set off the general beaten path and looks expectantly around at the gathering, tired looking crimson eyes looking to the smattering of freeswords that had arrived before and greets each with a nod, "Natska, Cassidy.. good to see you both." she admits with a faint smile before looking to Cara and nodding her greeting. With that out of the way she looks then to the alligators and crane before looking again to the group and asking them, "That guy the client?"
Iorek follows in behind the others, the cloaked wolves red eyes darting around him at every noise he hears. Despite his best efforts to conceal it, he's obviously nervous, clutching a bow tighly in his paw. He nods to the others before looking over to the gators and the crane. "Um... Hi, Iorek... here about the contract."
"Yes, yes I am flustered. I lost two errand boys to attacks by these 'Ground Poppers', and I want them eradicated for waisting my perfectly good manpower. Now, we've found where they seem to originate from, and I want -ALL- of you to go and deal with them." The Crane is certainly snappy today! The Alligators look up at the group, their sharp and rather handsome features showing as they examine the group while the smallest of them speaks. "We can show you the cave, and we can all go in at once. We figure you guys will aid more if things dont kill you before the fight."
Natska inclines her head again to the alligator trio. "Ah! Thank you, that is thoughtful of you. I will do my best to not slow you down once the fighting starts." She smiles, sweetly, and then her shadow stretches out and rises up from the ground, coiling around the jaguar like a light mist as she gets ready to move further into the swamp.
Cassidy nods slowly, reaching up to adjust her top hat as a number of small, fiery orbs flicker into existence to surround her. "Mhmm. I'm not letting something grab me and pull me down again. I'd rather not have to go make an emergency change of clothes this time, if I can help it."
Cara raises her staff and grins, "Sweet! I get to whack the Poppers today." At the advice from the smallest of the alligators, the feline raises an eyebrow, "Why would they kill us this time? After all, there has to be a medic amongst us all. Although." The feline stops for a moment and her stance seems to become more firm as a faint glow emits from her arms. "I think I might be able to handle myself."
"Uhm.. ground poppers?" Sara asks, a little quaver in her voice, removing that earlier bluster from before, "Well.. considering I'd like to not die here, I'll go with your offer of assistance and be led to the cave you spoke of. Still.. before that, do you know what we'll be going up against? Numbers and the like, or is it more or less a mystery?" after giving her equipment a brief look over Sara nods inwardly and says, "Well.. no matter what, I think I'm good to go whenever all of you are."
Iorek nods along with what Sara is saying, something catches in his throat and he coughts "Oh, and um... anything anyone suggests foor tactics... ground poppers, so... burrowers?"
"They burrow under the ground, pop up, stick you with a barbed tongue, and try to pull you under... And as we're in a swamp, it's a little hard to -see- how many would be present." The crane idly fanning himself with a hand before sighing gently. "-Hopefully- you will be facing the queen, or spawner, or whatever it is. -That- should hopefully be too big to just burrow as easily as these things do... And at least none of you are -too- small."
The smallest Alligator shrugs once more, pointing to his accomplices. "We'll lead you to it when you're all ready, and we'll take care of any extras that show up. Just focus on the big guy or... Thing."
Natska looks over at Sara and grins. "Like... swamp toads. With giant, barbed tongues. But they pop easily." She nods. "Goog to have you with us by the way. You too, Cara." She glances around, then nods to Cass. "I'm sure we'll manage."
Cassidy nods at Sara, offering a little smile. "Yes! Nice to see you. It's been a while since I've see you in action," she says, lifting up off the ground with a bit of air magic, the tails of her coat flicking in the breeze as she hovers a foot or so off the groun.
Cara rolls her eyes for a moment and answers the wolf's question as well, "Yep, so long as you dodge the tongue, you should be fine.", The feline turns to the other reptile that isn't an alligator and smiles, "You must be an elemental dragon."
As the general description of the gound popppers comes up Sara nods inwardly and pulls a small blade seeming to be of eastern origin and admits, "Don't think barbed tounges would be that big a problem.. still, as I said I'm quite ready to see what the big toad looks like." followed by ".. and to get out of this damned swamp.." muttered under her breath. As question of her race comes up Sara looks to Cara and scratches at the back of her head, "I guess.. I can become one, but well.. I'm not exactly a dragon per-se. Just.. a strange looking lizard.." the last bit followed with an awkward chuckle at herself before turning her attention away from the feline in question.
Iorek puts his bow over his should and draws his dagger instead "Hmmm... if these things burrow... do they have eyes? ...Just trying to figure out if we can get an edge somehow..." looks around all his comerades, his tail dropping as he feels slightly out oof his depth.
"see for yourself." The smallest alligator says, turning to depart with his two cohorts, as the crane waves the group to follow them. The Alligators themselves have unerring direction as they lead the group through the densest parts of the swamp, where the krick swarms can become rather -huge-... Passing by these swarms takes some careful manauvering, but soon enough the group is standing at the entrance of a large half burried tunnel! The Tunnel itself is pitch black, and smells almost of rancid meat mixed with the delicious smell of vomit... A euphoria for the senses surely. The Alligators don't seem bothered by it, as they glance back at the group for a moment. "Ready?"
"Of course," Natska replies, although she touches Cass' arm for reassurance. Her breeze begins blowing a little faster, and she wrinkles her nose. "Worse than that other one, ugh... I'll try not to breath to deeply."
Cassidy grimaces behind her mask at the scent, tail flicking in agitation as she floats along. "I hate the swamp," she grumbles, keeping close to Natska. "The sooner we solve the issues out here, the better, as far as I'm concerned."
Cara manages to suppress herself from gaging and wonders if there would be a safe way to light a fire. Although, something about this entire set up feels like a trap. She manages to bring up a pleasant, "Yeah, I'm ready. Is it okay if someone brightens up the place though?"
After following close behind the alligators, and making sure to avoid the giant swarms of kriks, of whom her eyes never seem to leave until she's far enough away. With the various wetland creatures passed by and the group relatively unharmed Sara peers into the cave, doing her best to hold back that gag reflex as the smell of rotting foliage reaches her nose. "Bleh.. I"m with you there, Cass. Think the longer we stay, the higher my chance of being sick.." a brief urp of discomfort passing her lips shortly after as if proving that point. "Well.. considering the darkness, I'd rather not go in without a light source.." after pulling a decent sized cloth wrapped torch from her satchel Sara utters a soft "Well.. here goes nothing.." before speaking an even softer prayer to Hephestia in her attempt at safely lighting both it, and protecting her and her group from anything the open flames would most likely agitate.
Iorek audibly breathes out his nose as he stops and gags a little "Man, now is not a good time to have a keen sense of smell" he exhales deeply and shakes it off, muffling another wretch. He looks at all the others and then, looking to the gator he says weakly "as I'll ever be?"
Each of the gators pull out their own torches as well, lighting them silently, before motioning the group forward. "Good, come on then." Into the mouth of the tunnel they go, the damp cave reeking of that unpleasent stench as they press in deeper... Not too far in, they pass the half consumed remains of a male armadillo with a heavy clan badge clutched in his hands, the smallest gator motioning to the corpse as he speaks. "One of the couriers, we're gett--" His words interupted by a loud earsplitting screech filling the tunnel! Seems whatever resident it had, was aware of the intruders! The ground beneath the group begins to shift and disrupt itself, as a larger tongue lashes around the smaller gator's ankle and yanks him right down into the earth! The Two large gators motioning the group forward into the tunnel! "GO! We'll hold them!"
Ears folding at the screech, Natska dodges to the side as the tongue lashes; as it starts to drag the gator down the tunnel, the jaguar breaks into a sprint, determined to reach the creature on the other end of the appendage before the gator does. "Come on!"
Cassidy inclines her head at the gator's words. If they were confident in their chances, she wasn't going to doubt them. She drifts forward, faster now, before finally touching down on the ground as they went further into the cave. "Careful, stay on guard."
Cara cringes as she looks at the gators and frowns, while her ears furl down. "I'm sorry!" At that point, the feline instantly dashes after the jaguar. "Please forgive me!" Her ears hike back up and the feline runs as fast as she possibly can, her legs striding at speeds that anyone who knows her would expect by now. "I really hope we'll be able to save them though."
With both her hands full the screech comes as Sara's own personal hell as she had nothing at all to block the sound with. With a long wincing shudder that had her turning her head with eyes left half-lidded Sara whispered, "Shutupshutupshutup.." as she beared the ear-piercing shriek. As it had finally ended and Sara breathed a short breath of relief she had turned her head to find one of the two gators missing and the group rushing towards the end of the cave, the two felines making the situation quite clear and leaving the lizard-woman rushing down the cave as fast as her feet could take her!
Iorek follow the others along the corridor, remember their objective to go after the queen not the swarm. Instead of running like the others, he decides to try and remain as quiet as possible as he advances, curious on how the enemies can detect his presence. Staring at the ground around his feet, ready to pounce if he sees a tongue come his way, hoping he is quicker.
It seems the swarm is interested in the Gators, the two beings drawing strange sharping looking swords as they begin to cut at emerging tongues while covering the freeswords! Their path is rather simple, as there is only one tunnel, and soon enough they're left on a small ledge that heralds an exit into an even larger dome like room! The Dome itself is far too smooth, and well carved to be natural, and the ledge itself is too sharp and clean before it's three foot drop down... But the true eye catcher of this room, was a twenty foot tall creature, vaguely shaped like a cross between a newt and a frog! It's jaws are massive, and more than large enough to swallow a normal sized being whole, with razor sharp teeth to rip at whatever it's massive barbed tongue cannot shred first!
The Creature turns to the freeswords as they enter, and with another ear splitting shrill faces ready against them! Two beedy eyes trained on them as it readies itself for it's 'snack'... It seems the battle is on!
Cassidy scowls and furrows her brow, slipping back a few steps to position herself behind the others. "Well this will be interesting, certainly." She begins pondering her 'arsenal,' trying to settle on a spell that'll provide effective.
Cara covers her ears from the loud screech and instantly jumps down into the arena. The feline can easily figure out that attacking from the front is a terrible idea. Therefore, she instantly tries to circle around to the back of the creature in the hopes that she might be able to find a blind spot that she can capitalize on the beast.
