Field Mission 6: A Day in Thay, Part 1

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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

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Sans zips on in quite easily! And what he finds is ... not a fellow skeleton missing an arm, but Rainer herself. She has something in her hands — something that almost looks like.


An hourglass? No, wait. A lava lamp.

She quickly tucks it in a pocket in her robes, startled to see Sans.

"Oh," she says. "Oh, boar's toes, this is awkward. Um. Hello! Can I help you with something?"

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Sans was using Blink--can Rainer see him on the ethereal plane or did it turn off once he went inside? Just since Sans would make sure to remember which it was.

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Sorry for the confusion! Blink would have deactivated once he entered the room — as a powerful archmage, Rainer likely has several ways of protecting her quarters from intruders.

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Got it, thanks!

Sans definitely makes a note of this weird lava lamp hourglass thing. He's mostly focused on Rainer, though, since this is potentially a dangerous situation and all.

"Sorry for burstin' in on you, but I was definitely seeing double out in the hall." Sans's tone is casual, but he's definitely watching Rainer closely. "What was that about?"

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"You ... were?"

Rainer furrows her brow in thought, before seemingly settling on something. She's been watching you, Sans, and maybe it's her natural inclination toward fascinating skeletons, or maybe it's something a lot more straightforward then that, but if he says that he was seeing double, then.

Well, she trusts him.

"I might have an answer for you there. Do you think you could help me with something first?"

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Sans really wasn't expecting this kind of response, but also he wasn't entirely sure what was going to happen when he came in here. His own response, then, is a bit wary, but willing to entertain this idea. "What do you need help with?"

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"Nothing too imposing, I hope! You see, I've been made aware of, um. Something really quite disastrous that is likely going to happen later this evening, and I have the means to stop it — I just haven't exactly found the right hook, the right solution, you know what I mean?

"And you're perfect — you aren't going to raise any suspicion, except for yourself, which would perpetuate this to begin with ... but would you be willing to do some recon work for me?"

And then, Rainer just goes ahead and drops her cards on the table.

"Some recon work about ... a few hours ago, that is. Technically."

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"And before you were tellin' me you didn't know what I was talking about with the déjà vu thing." Sans doesn't sound surprised, obviously. He's also pretty sure that, the way she's referring to the mysterious second Sans, he either already agreed to this in another timeline or is going to be intentionally leading himself into here later for a past him to be this current him.

So, Sans hates time loops. But anyway.

"If it's going to get us out of this whole situation faster, I'll give it a shot."

Especially since he was basically already wandering around pretending to be one of the other skeletons to gather info until this whole thing happened.

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Rainer looks absolutely relieved at this — and for a moment, she lets her guard down, her expression shifting to one of absolute exhaustion. She doesn't think she deserves any sympathy, and she hates how many people have become trapped in all of. This. Including these new visitors who wandered in, most of all the skeleton in front of her, easily the most fascinating person she's met in a long while.

But there's no stopping now.

"I need you to go to the shrines for me — or rather, I will send you there! There's a shrine that's sort of run down, hidden by a bunch of foliage. I think something happened there at around noon today."

This request might seem simple enough. Rainer intends to send him back to noon for a stakeout at the shrines.

"Just make sure you're walking through this door when the clocks hit about ... 2:30. You can tell me what you saw whenever you get a chance. Sound good?"

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If there's anything Sans can recognize right away, it's exhaustion. Maybe he can relate, except for the part where she's the one manipulating time. At least he knows it's going to happen.

"Sounds easy enough." Even if it's not and he dies or something, that doesn't matter here. Alright, he's ready. Hopefully he doesn't have to lie about what he sees or anything.

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Rainer smiles — she doesn't know if she's making the right move here, but in the end ... she does trust Sans. And she is going to rely on his help here.

She pulls the lamp out of her robes again, and it seems to resonate in her hands. It's instantaneous — like flipping through the world's scene selection and selecting an earlier moment to watch again. To relive again.

And suddenly, Sans is by himself in Rainer's quarters. Nearby, a clock strikes 12.

If he decides to heed Rainer's request and head to the shrines, he'll find someone there, all right — someone who curiously keeps showing up in awfully suspicions situations, doing ... awfully suspicious things.

It's Casariel.

Standing next to a shrine that's seen better days, one that's slowly being reclaimed by the elements, she doesn't pay Sans much heed, if she notices him at all. She likely thinks he's simply one of the cleaning crew, and not much for talking anyway. And after a few moments, she pauses.

And with a casual snap of her fingers, Casariel commits the crime of blasphemy against Istus, and her shrine crumbles to rubble. Wordlessly, she turns, and leaves, her ... whatever point she was trying to make with that maneuver completed.

This is likely what Rainer wanted him to see — to tell her about. And she'll reward him if he follows through.

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Sans will return as promised! He's kind of expecting to maybe see another him following him, but once he gets back to Rainer, Sans will let her know Casariel destroyed a shrine! He will describe the shrine specifically so she knows which one.