Under a Dark Sun(2nd Ed. AD&D)

[Kazilan]

Bas nodded at the shaman's response.

"Thank you."

Bas paused to consider the ramifications of off-worlders flooding through the portal as he thought of his next words.

"I am willing to return to the camp and investigate what sorts of people are coming through and what their plans are. It will help in determining the level of danger to your tribe. While there is little I can do to stop those of hostile intent, information can aid you in your preparations."

[Man Who Fights Like Woman]

Lorath replied to Evon, "Let's just get out of here. Even if he is still alive, he's lost his supply of symbiotes, and he's not getting his hands on this sword." He looked back into the room anyways though, just to make sure Ulik was faring all right in incinerating the symbiotes. "You doing okay in there?" he shouted, then beckoned with a waving arm. "Let's get the hell out of here and let it burn."

[dplax]

Anne

Anne mulled over the shaman's words...his thoughts, she corrected herself. The lizardmen feared being overrun by the newly come outsiders. Outsiders like herself, and her companions.

"I do not know whether they shall come this way, neither whether they shall mean harm to you and your people, but I know that if they see you armed and prepared for battle, they might take that as a danger and attack you merely for that."

She paused, wondering how the shaman would react to this.

[PurpleXVI]

Lorath, Evon, Ulik

(OOC: Briefly taking control of Ulik since I kinda need SOME sort of action from him to continue.)

Another sphere exploded and crystal shrapnel lacerated Ulik's robe, while failing to hit the man himself, as the black remains of one of the gooey symbiotes were splattered across the ceiling, drying up almost instantly as they hit the warm rock.

More of the containers were making little strained noises and cracks were appearing in their surfaces, unless Ulik got out of there fast, he was likely to get some interesting piercings. Considering his options very, very briefly, Ulik let go of the ashes in his hands, all that remained of the pedestal, and leapt over the steps down into the water below, missing Lorath and Evon by inches.

Unfortunately the flames around him extended more than a few inches. While the two other adventurers were technically unhurt, they did lose their eyebrows.

When he surfaced a split-second later, it was to a chaotic cacophany of noise. Above in the chamber, there was the sound of roaring flames devouring the remainder of the wooden pedestals and the sound of spheres shattering as they hit the floor or simply exploding from the heat. Down below, right next to him, Lorath's new bone sword was continuing it's incessant howling, almost drowning out their conversation.

"Can't you shut that thing up?" Complained Evon, clamping his hands over his ears while he followed the elf's recommendation and started to wade away through the deep water, "Hold it under the water or something."


Bas, Anne, Tamora, Balth

The shaman regarded Anne calmly as it replied, "And if they see us unarmed they might take it as the perfect chance to remove us," it shrugged and then spoke to the group, "Your offers of aid are welcome, but I doubt you can do more than tell your people we seek no war. This is not a situation that can be solved by a few brave heroes, though a handful of fools can ruin it. More interesting to me is this talk of a mission, what brings you all here?"

Before any of them could reply, the shaman interjected a comment, "Oh, and the three men you had with you? The skinny one, the elf and the large one? They have yet to return, I had a few scouts watch the ruins out of curiosity. Earlier in the day, others emerged from the ruins, but not your companions."

[ 04-05-2007, 03:19 PM: Message edited by: PurpleXVI ]

[Man Who Fights Like Woman]

Lorath nodded, and held the sword up so that the hilt was next to his mouth. "Shut up! It is a bloody racket!" he shouted at it, and then stuck it under the water. Hopefully that would do something to dissuade it from making a constant noise, because hey, he really wanted this sword. He began heading towards the shallower water. "After seeing that, I don't think we'll be able to excavate anything of worth out of this place. It's so full of symbiotes!"

[ 04-05-2007, 03:26 PM: Message edited by: Man Who Fights Like Woman ]

[Caleb808]

Ulik's screams join the sword's as he runs past Lorath and jumps in the water. By now, the flames had receded back in to the runes they sprang from, but Ulik didn't seem to notice as he continually submerged himself and tried to pat out the fire that was no longer there. In his desperation, he began to thrash violently and claw at himself. His panic only seemed to grow worse with time as his eyes rolled back and tongue lolled out, only to be bitten off by his gnashing teeth.

(Ulik loses 1 HP, 7 remain)

[dplax]

Anne

An idea was forming, something that hopefully could help the lizardmen.

"Now I am not sure if this would work, so take it all with a large grain of salt, but if your tribe has some secret recipe for a medicine, even an imaginary one, which cures, or supposedly cures a disease which afflicts us humans. If you have something like that and are the only ones who could provide it to the humans, then you'd be able to cut a deal with them. If this medicine works it would just be an added bonus."

She listened to the shaman giving info about their other companions.

"Thank you for telling us about them. I'm not sure whether we shall set out in the same direction, I'm still curious as to what Bas has found out during the last couple of days."

[Kazilan]

"I'm afraid I have not discovered much. There were druids here once in the past, but as far as I can tell they left in a mass exodus."

Bas frowned and glanced down at the ground before continuing.

"I'm not sure how to proceed with my mission. Perhaps we should search for the others. Or we could try to help the lizardmen with the new outsiders. It should not take too long to return to the camp and investigate, and anything we can do to help maintain a degree of balance here would be worthwhile."

[Armen]

Tamora

Tamora nodded at Bas’ suggestion then ‘spoke’ mainly to the lizardman shaman. “I have no wish to make your situation worse and, in truth, my skills are better in the forest than here in civilization.” She glanced over to Anne, she had been surprised at the human’s suggestion and couldn’t see how setting themselves up as fraudulent healers would help the tribes at all but she kept her thoughts about this hopefully to herself. She continued, “unless you wish us to do something else or even nothing at all we will travel to the others of our world and find out what we can about what the others have been doing and return to you.”

Her earlier fears about allowing Balth to learn about the portal had been outweighed in her mind by the potential conflict between the tribes and the off worlders and in any case, the sun runner will have picked up much from this communication already. All she allowed herself to think out loud though was, “I’m sure Balth will find it interesting if nothing else.”

She spread her hands; “I think we will leave you to your council although I would appreciate it if we can rest here tonight. We are still injured from our travels.” Saying this she unwrapped the stone dagger and teeth and claws she carried and presented to the shaman. “Please accept these as a mark of our gratitude for your earlier and for this hospitality.”

[PurpleXVI]

Lorath, Evon, Ulik

Lorath's new sword gurgled and bubbled as it was thrust into the water, which considerably muffled it's yelling.

Evon was still standing around near the stairs when Ulik started frenziedly tearing at himself, "Lorath!" He shouted at the retreating elf, "Get back here, Ulik's gone strange!" He stood still for a moment and considered what he'd just said, "Stranger than usual! We need to drag him out of here before he drowns himself or something."

Scrawny as he was, Evon then proceeded to grab a hold of Ulik's robe and began attempting to pull him towards Lorath. Ulik was considerably stronger, though, so he was making little progress.

Above, in the sphere chamber, they could see the flames dying down and the sound of exploding orbs and ricocheting crystal shards was dying down.


Tamora, Bas, Anne, Balth

The shaman muttered a sibilant, surprised-sounding sentence as Tamora produced the teeth and claws, then picked one of them up and regarded it critically, as though attempting to make sure it was real.

"Without knowing," the lizardman said, "You may have helped the situation. What you slew was one of the most terrible beasts in the jungle, a sloth, a single one can kill an entire hunting party. With your permission I will show this to the tribal leaders gathered here, with luck it will convince them that you are powerful warriors and not to be trifled with unless we are forced to."

Next, the stone dagger was examined, "And a weapon of the halflings, too... I doubt you traded with them for it, and they would probably not give up their weapons unless they were dead. It seems that many of our kind have underestimated you."

Balth again spoke outside of the mind speak, apparently preferring to talk normally, "Why don't we go find your friends before we embark on any missions?" He suggested, "Our one fight with the local wildlife was a close scrape, it would be useful to have just a bit more help, don't you agree?"

While the elf spoke, the shaman responded to Anne, "It would be a good idea, but our only contact with those not of our kind is warlike, we have no medicines that benefit them, only poisons that harm them, and trading them weapons to kill each other with would likely not make us popular with the ones who end up suffering from it."