Hey there, here we are again, so on and so forth. Unless something's gone horribly wrong, the last thing I posted before this should have been an Alchemical character build, and I have another almost ready, as my little way of celebrating the Alchemicals: Forged by the Machine God crowdfunding campaign on Backerkit! As I post this, the campaign's about half-over, and so far a big chunk of the manuscript has been previewed, including one of the sections I worked on.
Also, as a reminder, the Trinity Continuum Player's Guide is available in print and PoD. In fact, between backing it on Kickstarter and working on it, I have an extra 'free PDF' code for DriveThruRPG. I'll put a time limit on this of, say, until the Alchemicals campaign wraps up (so about two weeks), and the first person within that time who tells me they saw this can get that code.
And now, on with the show!
We begin with the Circle on the deck of an airship that crashed centuries ago hard enough to punch into the Underworld. A monstrosity of machinery has just climbed up onto the side -- something that looks like a mechanical buzzard the size of a T-rex, walking on unsteady legs and the scaffolding that used to make it up its now-featherless wings. It breathes, waves of heat sweeping across the deck carrying grit like from a furnace as it lumbers forward with a sickening blue glow.
Stray Dog revs upon his telekinesis Charm and starts to float off the ground, as Lecht begins gathering Will for magic. They weave their hands in the air as they gather Essence, truly in their element for once as they draw in the power of the Underworld. But soon enough they're ducking behind Wandering Dawn when the creature lurches forward and lets out a sonic shriek.
The Solar holds up the Piercing Gaze of Hesiesh like he's trying to 'split' the sound with the tip, and after that clears he climbs up onto Mollie and summons his Glorious Solar Arsenal with armor and a flame piece. His muscles tighten as the Essence flows through and strengthens them, as he channels his growing anima into the crystalline head of the spear. That spear leads the way as Mollie gallops forward and they rush in together, and the direlance is suddenly wreathed in flame as he calls out "Raging Talon!" (the name of the Evocation) as he tries to drive it right into the monster's chest, sinking deep.
It then swings at him with its misshapen wing-arm, and he braces himself with the spear to catch the attack at the thickest part of the lance-head and push back against it. After he weathers the blows, his iconic anima flares as he calls upon Behemoth-Slaying Attitude to gain the strength of a creature the same size as the monster as he pushes it back.
Lecht, having scuttled into an alcove, cuts their hand and sheds blood as part of their efforts to gather Will and prepare the spell -- while Stray Dog goes another direction and uses his telekinesis to send a plane of invisible force at it.
Wandering Dawn keeps jabbing at its weak points to keep it off-balance and build up momentum, and fueled by his sunlight-anima, he brings the flame piece up to give it a blast. It lets out an unholy, uncomfortable shriek -- though whether it's from pain or because of the metal warping from the heat, it's tough to say. His blast is followed up by Stray Dog chucking another plane of force at it, which does indeed take a chunk off the thing's structure.
Lecht finally comes out of their hiding spot and rush underneath it, flinging their hand out at the right spot to cast Flying Guillotine at it. The bone-chain rips through what's left of it, and it collapses with a roar that brings down part of the cavern ceiling in chunks. Stray Dog dodges it with graceful gazelle-like leaps, his years of dancing experience coming to the fore and getting him clear. Mollie carries Wandering Dawn in a sprint out from under the rocks, while the Solar deflects any chunks that get too close. Meanwhile, Lecht's fist is still glowing with raw power that they expend in blasts to keep the dangerous rocks off of themselves as the group gets clear of the sudden collapse.
"Is everyone alright?" Wandering Dawn asks once the dust settles.
"I'm alive," Stray Dog confirms.
"I wasn't expecting it to bring the whole house down," Lecht comments.
"That thing was big; what do you think it was?" the Solar asks.
Lecht had been working that out in the back of their head over the course of the fight and determined that the creature was an especially rare sort of ghost -- the ghost of a living construct. Few were 'complete' enough to leave any sort of Underworld presence, so when it did happen they tended to be bizarre, powerful monstrosities.
The group goes back belowdecks, pretty fearless in the wake of their victory, with Stray Dog leading the way. They pick up their search and go down to the lowest level, where a woman is calling out asking if anyone's there. Lecht senses a ghost nearby, and figures there's a trap involved, so they follow the voice and find a woman trapped in a cargo cage, surrounded by bodies. The door is closed on one of the bodies in a way that the latch is jammed shut. The Exigent goes ahead and warns the group that she's possessed before anyone does or says anything.
"Well, ya got me," the 'woman' says, in a voice that's distinctly at least a full octave deeper and with a different accent. "It's a fair cop; there's two of us in here."
"Are you the 'Hook Lady?'" Lecht asks.
"Well, that's complicated. Do you mean am I the Hook Lady, or is she the Hook Lady? Because Thalia is a lady, but I am not."
(For the sake of argument, I'm going to use the ghost's proper name of Marble Mantle [they/them], since they're in full control of the body. They introduce themselves later, but there's only so many times I can vaguely refer to a character when I know their name and it's not supposed to be a secret.)
Lecht immediately uses a Charm to question one of the corpses to confirm whether the person in the cage is 'the bad one.'
"Yes, she came out of nowhere with hooks, and started slaughtering us."
Lecht lets the corpse go back to sleep and turns to the Marble Mantle. "So now that that's out of the way and you see I have my own methods, can we skip the bullshit?"
"Sure, not a problem, we can skip the bullshit."
Stray Dog asks if they can vacate the body.
"That's complicated, because Thalia is a willing host; she and I are partners in this little adventure. I could leave the body and leave her here, but that'd be rude!"
Lecht isn't sure how to handle this now. "Why did you slaughter all these people?"
"We all came up here for the same thing. The plan was to follow them in here, and take it from them."
"What assurance do we have that you're not going to take out hooks and gut us?"
The ghost points out that the hooks are buried in a body half-way across the room, and says that one of the Guildies already escaped with the 'bauble.' Lecht assumes that's Gillian, but the ghost clarifies that it was a guy. Lecht says that if it's Rhion, they're going to scream.
"Oh, you know Rhion!" Marble Mantle says, their face lighting up. "No, he wasn't down here, but the guy they worked for was working for Rhion."
Lecht, with frustration, blasts a hole in the wall and asks how one man manages to make them so angry. Wandering Dawn says that everything seems to come back to Rhion. The ghost explains he's just a major player out this way; there's a bit of a power vacuum between Whitewall and Gethamane, plenty of room for would-be warlords and merchant princes.
Lecht finds it troubling that one man can do so much, when he's just a mortal. Marble Mantle points out that a mortal man started the Guild in the first place. He stared down the Empress herself, and she backed down. Lecht's blank about all this because they slept through it. They ask the others what they want to do. Stray Dog suggests that killing a bunch of Guild flunkies is hardly a crime, and Marble Mantle chimes in for the record that they're not extremely dangerous -- they don't have much in the way of combat powers, just well-honed skills and surprise, unlike the glowy folks.
Lecht agrees and has Stray Dog move the body, and then goes to check in the nearby room to confirm that the Tear of Autochthon was taken. They lament that Rhion has both their sarcophagus and the Tear, and apologize for dragging everyone into their business with Rhion. The ghost helpfully points out that Rhion is probably responsible for things affecting the others, too. But at this point they formally introduce themselves -- they are the Marble Mantle, a ghost of decent age and skill who forms partnerships with athletic humans through which they can express those skills (humans who 'don the mantle' as it were). Their current partner, the young lady they're inhabiting, is named Thalia.
Lecht asks if they know something about Rhion and what he's up to, and Marble Mantle says that Rhion's in Larkim, not too far from there (confirming that he's still there). Stray Dog and Wandering Dawn both make it clear to Lecht that they're along for this journey -- after all, Stray Dog says, Rhion's got something that belongs to a friend of his so he's going after it. Wandering Dawn emphasizes that he's going to stick with Lecht for as long as they can stand him, and they indicate they're far past that point.
Marble Mantle, as a good faith gesture, offers to head up the tunnel first so the others know that they're not behind the group, and if anything's waiting for them the ghost will engage it first. So they just start casually strolling up the tunnel, leaving the hooks behind (since they aren't magical or valuable, really). They do warn the group to stick around in Echo Gorge until sunrise, it's the safest way to make sure they remain within the shadowland and not get stuck in the Underworld.
The trio waits a few minutes and then they climb up. And Marble Mantle is waiting in Echo Gorge, where they settle in to wait for sunrise after Stray Dog uses his telekinesis to seal the tunnel again. So they pass the time in the ghost town, watching as the sky eventually lightens and the Unconquered Sun's warmth reaches out to Creation, indicating they can now leave the shadowland for the daylight world.
And we leave it there.
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