Field Mission 6: A Day in Thay, Part 1

[balancemod]

oh man best of luck out there dudes NAVIGATION Click here for the RNG thread! Ready or not, rested or not, it's time to get moving, Reclaimers. You've got a very, very long day ahead of you. And another one. And another one. And, you get the joke. Early Friday morning, with the Director there to see them off, the Reclaimers load up into the Bureau's transportation orbs for the sixth time since this whole ordeal began, and make their way to about a mile or two outside of Thay. It's important to try to stick to the story, at least — that you're all visitors from a faraway school, here to spend some time with the students and faculty of Boarbumps. As much as Lucretia would have liked to join you, she can't. None of the other leading members of the Bureau of Balance can. Whoever enters Thay, after all, is entering a bubble, after all. A time trap. Nobody will be able to leave until the Relic, the Lamp of Undoing, is either retrieved or destroyed. Someone needs to be able to continue if you all can't. 1. SEVEN O'CLOCK ALREADY As we noted in the OOC post, prompts on this log will be a quick few sentences of specific things happening during each hour. It's expected that Reclaimers will be seeing all of these events multiple times! So feel free to play with them as you see fit. If you're not sure if something you want to do would warrant a roll, please ask us in the RNG thread. ○ The Reclaimers have arrived in Thay, much to the curiosity of the highly intelligent, occasionally highly ... suspicious ... residents. Nevertheless, they recognize you as visiting, esteemed students, and, though perhaps still suspicious, welcome you into their fold. Also, as a note: Every time the relic is used, time is reset to this moment. ○ Boarbumps Academy for the Magically Inclined opens its doors to the Reclaimers. This is your first opening to explore the school — afternoon classes begin in an hour. ○ Rainer Arunsun, The Regent of Thay and Highest of the Hermetic Order of Red Wizards, can be seen watching the new arrivals by the entrance to the Red Keep. It's difficult to discern any emotion on her face. Shortly before 1 p.m., she retreats back inside. ○ Afternoon classes at Boarbumps begin, starting with a lecture on the magical circuits of the common toad. If you happen to sit in on this one, as a visitor from another school, you may be asked to assist in the dissection. You will be heckled by the rest of the class as deemed fit. ○ Erinne and Adriel can be seen within the hallways of Boarbumps arguing in a very heated manner. Some... less than choice words are exchanged between the two before one, or both of them take their wands out and begin throwing magic missiles at each other. No one knows why the fight starts, but the two have had bad blood before, and this isn't the first quarrel to happen at Boarbumps between them. A staff member arrives on the scene and is accidentally paralyzed by a misfire. ○ The town proper, surrounding the Red Keep, is open for a farmer's market. A bountiful harvest of goods are on display, but in particular, Thay is known for its amazing quality of medicinal herbs and magical reagants, many of which are rare without travel to the area. The merchants typically shoo students off, unless they have a hall pass provided to them by the faculty to retrieve something of import for class. ○ The second afternoon class at Boarbumps begins. Are you three or four time loops in and in desperate need of a nap? This class, The History of Boarbumps, is for you. You will be treated to a long and droning lecture about how the students attending during Boarbumps' very first semester banded together to stop a particularly plucky troll. Which you'd think would be an interesting tale. It is not. ○ Someone's enchanted several books at the library to begin rattling and shaking from the shelves themselves. All over the racks, spines pop out from their homes and fall to the ground, magically lift up and return to some other, non-Dewey decimal approved locale. Other books begin dancing — yes, you've read this correctly — dancing on the tables. Leon would be going into cardiac arrest at the moment, but it looks like someone's playing a prank in here. Again. This librarian looks far less tilted by this. It must be a somewhat normal afternoon for her. ○ Over in the center of town, music, a single violin playing a mournful tune, begins to play. It's unclear where exactly it's coming from. ○ The third and final afternoon class at Boarbumps — Fighting with Fire — begins. The professor, known to be slightly more unorthodox in her teaching methods, will recruit any Reclaimer who happens to be there to defend themselves from the students' incoming fireball spells. The potency of the fireballs themselves range from the tickle of a candle, to that one time you ate a ghost pepper, to one particularly fiery spell that might actually hurt you. ○ There's a scream in the girls' bathroom on the 3rd floor of Boarbumps. Anyone who enters realizes, very quickly, that no one is actually in there. Apparently, this particular lavatory is haunted. ○ Szass Astrosz dips class to go visit the local shrines within the town of Thay. He's been known to skip class before, so his departure from the halls of Boarbumps is rather nondescript. He spends time there praying quietly to his god. ○ There's a slight catastrophe over in the Town Square. That is to say, a giant spider seems to have escaped from Boarbumps and is terrorizing the vendors, to everyone's surprise. Subdue or dispatch it, it's up to you. ○ There's a scheduled council meeting to take place within the Red Keep, a usual weekly affair where Rainer, Casariel, Onerion, Gromph, and the rest meet to discuss matters of the town. Today's is canceled, as Gromph is called out to take care of the arachnid chaos currently convening around the Town Square. ○ Someone places a standing mirror around the corner of Boarbumps. If you happen to stand in front of it, it doesn't show your reflection — rather, it shows the person that you desire most. The mirror is gone by 5 p.m. ○ Cleanup of whatever damage the spider did is underway. In the meantime, the faculty of Boarbumps and the Hermetic Order of Red Wizards invite the Reclaimers to a small dinner in one of the public meeting rooms at the Red Keep. Every member of the Red Wizards are present, aside from Onerion Wyvernspur and Brian Darling. ○ The shops around the town of Thay begin to close for the evening. People are somewhere between annoyed and blase — the spider escaping was new enough, but weird Magic Things are, as you can imagine, pretty commonplace. ○ Over at The Sleepy Willow, cozy, fluffy pillows are arranged on the floor around a large fireplace. The owners will also serve you dinner, if you decide to skip the meal at The Red Keep. This may be one of the only peaceful moments you have to study everything that you've learned thus far. ○ No matter where you are in Thay, you'll feel the ground rumble underneath your feet. The residents largely pass it off as an earthquake, but will note that they have become much more frequent lately. ○ Towards the latter half of the hour, the rumbling within the school grounds causes several of the animal cages used in Onerion's Wondrous Beasts class to come unfastened as they begin to escape. Shortly thereafter, various beasts of all shapes and sizes are set free and begin running for freedom. None of them seem intent on hurting students, but they look to make an exit out of town in the quickest way possible. ○ Droves of the skeletal undead that are used around town seem to freeze in place, no longer retaining their animation. Whatever they're holding currently falls to the floor. Whatever task they're working on comes to a halt. No one understands why that is, but even the best necromancers around town can't seem to wake them back up. ○ With a sudden loud roar, the ground of the town square suddenly begins to split. People, shops, and everything else begin to drop into the chasm, despite the Red Wizards, and everyone else's, attempts to save them. ○ In the last split second you remember, if you happen to look down in the chasm, you'll notice a pair of bright, glowing eyes. Whatever exactly is down there begins to claw its way to the surface. ○ And then, just as suddenly, your vision turns white, and you're briefly overtaken by dizziness. When the haze clears, you are standing at the entrance to Thay. The sun hangs directly overhead in the sky. You have returned to 12 p.m. 2. OOC: A SPECIAL SHOUTOUT You are welcome to keep track of how your character experiences these time loops as much or as little as you're comfortable with — we'll also be tracking what you all are doing! Our Minato player Kel came up with some extremely snazzy coding if you would like to track how each loop plays out for your character more closely. Thank you, Kel! Of course, this is completely optional. Keep up with as much as you'd like, have fun as you see fit, and we hope you enjoy this mission! blurb code by photosynthesis

Comments

SEEKER SEEKING MASTER POST

[wrightingwrongs]

Gonna break this up into a few parts!

ICly, at some point, Wash would have put out a call to arms to get people who are willing to investigate the possibility of the missing Seekers that have gone dark! A fair number of people answered the call, and as such, the investigation will be broken up into three groups!

• Team Red Keep (Phoenix, Maya, Church): Phoenix is going to be trying to talk to the Council specifically and mentioning some 'missing staff' that came to Thay earlier that they haven't been able to contact since they've arrived. As the most powerful people in Thay, the Council members would have to know something, right? While he's doing that, Maya and Church will be exploring the Red Keep for any clues that might be pertinent to finding the missing Seekers. Phoenix will have Insight (as well as Nick Junior serving as an assistant distraction, thanks to Maya) to try and get some leads through conversation, while Maya and Church both have Misty Step for snooping as well as Maya's Dimension Door.
  
  Church will be rolling for Team Red Keep.
  
  
• Team Boarbumps (Minato, Shinjiro, Spike): Shinjiro will be using his Rustic Hospitality alongside Minato's charisma-based focus (and some Bardic Inspiration) to get in with the more delinquent elements of Boarbumps, possibly through putting themselves into intentional detention, with having a convenient out to explore through Spike's cover as a janitor through Quick Employment. The three of them will be doing some general snooping while blending in with and trying to pry possible info about people who showed up earlier from the subversive school elements.
  
  Spike will be rolling for Team Boarbumps.
  
  
• Team Thay(Shuichi, Kokichi, Natsuki, Wash): With two groups doing smaller scopes of the two major buildings in Thay, the final group will be trying to get in good with the general citizens of Thay and scout out the general nooks and crannies that the Seekers might have been using as temporary refuge. Either through Wash's Rustic Hospitality, Kokichi's Silver Tongue to lie/sweet-talk, Shuichi's +1 to Investigations and Int-based path (with Friends as a nuclear option), or Natsuki's Intimidate.
  
  Natsuki will be rolling for Team Thay.

THANK YOU MODS AND WE'RE ALL VERY SORRY.

[balancemod]

Interesting approach!

1. Team Red Keep

-DC 16 for convincing someone to meet with you to begin with. While you may be professors of the Bureau Academy, the Red Wizards of Thay are a governing body and are concerned more with the affairs of their own city. If you have an idea on how to bring this DC down, let us know.

-If successful, DC 13 on finding anything out.

2. Team Boarbumps

-We're so happy to use some of these NPC's you all came up with! Pretty simple task, we'll give you a DC 12 for it. +1 to the outcome for bardic inspiration, nothing for the rustic hospitality since finding delinquents in a school filled with haughty magic scholars and being kind of a folk hero don't go hand in hand.

-For Spike specifically, DC 12 for putting his ear to the ground.

3. Team Thay

-This is a more acceptable use of rustic hospitality, since you're bumping elbows with the run-of-the-mill common folk. We'll say it's a DC 12 to get something useful out of it, but we'll offer a +3 to the outcome because of the method of action here.


Sound good?

[wrightingwrongs]

LET'S CRAFT AN ELABORATE STORY, THEN.

The story Phoenix will be running with for team Red Keep is that they had sent some ancillary staff from Bureau Academy to Thay to prep for their arrival. As this is, after all, their city, they were supposed to make sure the Red Wizards that they had checked in and that the professors and student body were on their way. Given Bureau Academy's penchant for paperwork (and their considerable sticklerness to said paperwork), if said staff never showed, not only does Phoenix need someone to fill out some quick paperwork that they should have brought to the Red Wizards' attention (it'll only take a moment or two, it's just acknowledgements of their presence here at the town and at the school, extremely boring but necessary!) then he would like to know if the Red Wizards saw anyone come into Thay who might've been a bit different, as a few members of staff going AWOL is, as you might expect, a bureaucratic nightmare.

If they need actual paperwork to believe this ruse, Phoenix is a lawyer, he's quite technically the most qualified to handle this jargon. If asked why Phoenix specifically is doing it, he'd give the answer of, well, he's a rather recent addition to the teaching faculty, and as such he commonly gets saddled with doing the legwork on things like this. Seniority is as seniority does, right?

Aside from that: All the other teams are good with their DC, and if that doesn't budge the needle on getting someone to meet Phoenix, we'll just roll it as-is.

[balancemod]

1. So, we'll lift the veil a little bit here and say that, even with a successful roll here, the High Council isn't exactly the most helpful with supplying you much information regarding the Seekers. Phoenix is, for the most part, apt and able to talk his way into meeting with the remaining members who are around, and with a little bit of convincing, you get access to the town's census. It lists out all the currently known citizens within town, and has a list of the Reclaimers that's been populated and dated as of this morning. Among those, you see prominent names like the members of the council, professors and students of Boarbumps, and everyone that's been with you upon entry. No additional names appear to be listed under the student roster of the Bureau. You've rolled a 14 on this, and oddly enough, your story lowered the DC to a 14 on getting your way in. Subsequently, you blew through and rolled another exactly-on-par roll of 13 to receive this information.

2. Team Boarbumps is about as successful as team Red Keep. They rolled a 13 total, putting them just at the mark for success, but not too far north of it. While scouring the halls of Boarbumps, they catch wind that there are some additional people that've been in the town lately that doesn't seem like the usual merchants visiting Thay. This probably sends siren wailing sounds to Team Thay---

3. Who roll an 18. Someone on the team starts being really, really obvious about it (we're going with Wash since he's being rustically hospitable, perhaps in a tavern), and Shuichi starts asking the right questions at the right time to the wrong people. We'll say most of this takes place out in the open, and on the way back out of town and towards Boarbumps, 2 of you (whom you can choose from), are grabbed and pulled into an alleyway forcefully.

You're greeted by 3 seekers of the Bureau of Balance. They're incredibly irate, as you could imagine. The leader of which, Jeremy Fangbattle (the brother of Carey), asks them point blank: "What the hell are you guys doing!? Don't you know that we're the spies? You could get our cover blown, you idiots!"

Mostly, though? They're just pissed off that they've been living the same span of 7 hours over and over and over and over again. You can tell because of the deep, dark circles under their eyes.

[parfaitgirl]

Natsuki and Kokichi are the ones dragged into the alley, and they are going to attempt to bully the Seekers.

Once the Seekers introduce themselves, Natsuki will get angry that they have yet to show themselves/help them and lecture them for not being any help. "So were you guys sitting around making fun of us as we messed up or something?" She will try to Intimidate them into giving any additional information that has not already been given to/shared by the group.

Kokichi will back Natsuki up, because what the hell, how were they supposed to know you guys were undercover? Maybe if you’d said something, this wouldn’t have happened! He’s willing to throw in a good round of crocodile tears too, crying about how “Director-chan said you’d all been missing, and there’s a big dragon who’s trying to eat everyone, and we were worried something happened to you!!” He’ll use Silver Tongue with everything he says to try and help persuade them into helping them from here on out, including backing up Natsuki and all that.

[balancemod]

DC's: 14 on the intimidation (they're trained spies, to be honest), but a 12 on the silver tongue take-back.

Sound good?

[parfaitgirl]

Works for us!!

[balancemod]

I'm so sorry.

Jeremy raises an eyebrow at the attempt.

"Look, we've got our directives and our ways. The entire code of conduct here is to make sure that no one- and I mean no one figures out who we are or what we're doing in a mission. Just like how you guys got your own set of rules you have to follow about magic items, not using the Grand Relics, et cetera, et cetera. We would've contacted base if we could get messages to appear outside of this gods-damned time bubble, but that's impossible at the moment. Lucretia ain't got a damn clue what's going on in this town, but you guys probably already know that it's called 'The Lamp of Unwinding'.

We've been in this same damn day for months on end, alright? We just wanna go home. Our job here's done, we figured out the relic and we got family to get back to."

He's not intimidated in the slightest, sorry Natsuki.

Kokichi tries to mend the relationship between the branches of their employer, but that goes pretty sour as well.

"It's whatever, kid. Just do your guys' job so we can all go home."

He absolutely doesn't believe that the Director necessarily cares about him or the rest of his crew- even if she deeply does. He's in a pretty bad mental state, as anyone would be if they relived the same 7 hours over 100 times.