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Author Topic: Thob Goes to the Surface  (Read 57452 times)

King Zultan

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #75 on: August 04, 2020, 05:55:19 am »

And suddenly another epic quest appears, how will we overcome this challenge, maybe it'll require booze...   Oh wait we don't have any.
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The Lawyer opens a briefcase. It's full of lemons, the justice fruit only lawyers may touch.
Make sure not to step on any errant blood stains before we find our LIFE EXTINGUSHER.
but anyway, if you'll excuse me, I need to commit sebbaku.
Quote from: Leodanny
Can I have the sword when you’re done?

Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #76 on: August 10, 2020, 07:10:15 pm »

Death and Blisters

They sheltered for the night in a reasonable sound house. When Thob awoke he heard the patter of rain on the roof overhead. That was never a good sign.
   “I was thinking last night,” he said to Strodno when she got up, “I should have a better image—a persona of sorts.”
   “Pardon?”
   “Well, if I’m going to be a big-time undead hunter I need a properly undead-hunter-y name. Something that sounds intriguing and just a little dangerous, so folks know I mean business. Something like…”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “…sure. Sure, Thob. Makes sense. You’re a mystery to me.”

They stepped out into the rainy morning, and the smell of death rolled toward them on the breeze.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
There were awful sounds coming from the west, also, not far off: clanging, banging, and every so often the squelch of tearing flesh.
   “Alright, Mr. Mysterious the Undead Hunter,” said Strodno, “sound like a job for you?”
   Thob led the way, creeping down the hillside. As the dale below came into clear view he spotted a green-skinned figure clutching a crossbow: another goblin! Though, not a very lively one…
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Another bleak slayer,” whispered Strodno. “If we’re lucky it won’t see us, and…”
   They weren’t lucky. It turned to face them and aimed the crossbow.
   Strodno and he drew weapons and rushed in, but almost immediately Thob regretted it. He saw where the smell of death was coming from: a pile of rotting bodies lay heaped at a crossroads. Amongst the carnage stood four other undead figures, armed and armored in bronze and iron.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
One was an experiment: a black-feathered beast with a curved iron scimitar, covered in awful wounds:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Thob figured they were doomed against so many undead, and bleak slayers at that. But as he looked he saw that the monsters were fighting… with each other. They dealt powerful blows, hammering at each other’s armor and shields with all their unnatural strength—and they seemed unaware of Thob and Strodno.
   But there was no more time to watch—they were upon the ex-goblin marksman, whose bolts had whizzed by inches from Thob’s head. Strodno and he laid stroke upon stroke on the monster, but as usual their strikes seemed to do too little; the zombie dealt kicks and punches, and Strodno took a few bad hits. But at last Thob saw his opportunity and swung for the head.
   The zombie collapsed—but before they had time to think, one of the other bleak slayers spotted Thob, turned and… pointed at him:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
His skin all over felt like it had been rubbed on a rough rock at high speeds, and red blisters formed on his flesh:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Aaaaaaargh!” he cried. “What’s going on?!”
   “It cast a spell!” said Strodno.
   “You didn’t tell me they had magic powers, too!”
   “Come on!” she yelled, “let’s get out of here!”
   He certainly wasn’t sticking around. They left the slayers to fight by themselves.

*   *   *

   “Oh, come on Thob. It’s just blisters. It could have been much worse, believe me.”
   Thob had been moaning and groaning the whole time as they walked north, away from the tower. “But what if they’re infected? What if they mutate into some zombifying cancer? What if…?”
   “Trust me, you’ll be fine. I used to be a doctor, remember?”
   The land to the north was a flat region of plains, surrounding a marshy area in the center. From here they could see a number of settlements and structures—towers, mostly—but what stood out the most were two enormous buildings very nearby.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
They looked a lot like the barrows that surrounded the necromancer towers, only much, much bigger. The larger of the two structures here covered a wide area and stood ten stories tall:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “What is it?”
   “A human tomb,” said Strodno. “They built them for their leaders. From the size, this must have belonged to a really important person.”
   Thob went over to the door and tested the handle. It wasn’t fastened too tightly. He fished a bit of wire from his pack and began bending it.
   “What are you doing?” asked Strodno.
   “Picking the lock.”
   “Wait, Thob, don’t—!” But he had already gotten the door open. Peering within he made out a long hallway, empty except for a slab in the middle. He crept inside.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   The ‘Boss’? Thob recalled Boss Nish from back home—he doubted if the dwarves of Lawmined would have built anything so grand for Nish!
   “Thob, we should leave,” said Strodno.
   “We haven’t even looked around! There might be treasures in here.”
   He climbed the nearby steps. Sure enough, a pile of grave goods lay in the center. Of course, the armor was too big for him, the weapons he didn’t know how to use, and the crafts and tools he had no use for. He took a step forward to look more closely—but caught sight of something amid the pile:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
No thanks. He’d been battered enough for one day—no need to get himself whipped in the chest again. Strodno seemed pleased to leave, anyway.
   On the way out they heard a rustling in the brush nearby. One of those “experiments,” the gray-feathered ones with antennae, spotted them. It seemed to want to run away, but before Thob knew it Strodno had drawn her weapons and charged the creature, laying into it for all she was worth:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The thing fought back, though it pleaded with the goblin to leave it alone, but Strodno kept the blows coming until—
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “What was that for?” said Thob in bewilderment. He recalled when he had first killed one of these creatures.
   Strodno didn’t seem at all bothered by the death of a sentient. “They were made by the necromancers,” she said. “You never know which ones still work for them.”
   “But… it wasn’t bothering you. It wasn’t a zombie: it was a thinking, speaking being!”
   “We can’t afford to take chances, Thob. There’s no room for mercy in this world.”
   Thob eyed the goblin askance, but said nothing. He guessed he should remember: this was a much different world than the caverns where he was raised, a harder and harsher world. He should expect a little more cruelty from its inhabitants—it might even help them survive.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #77 on: August 24, 2020, 09:28:13 am »

Sorry for the break there; I haven't been feeling very creative the past couple weeks.



The wanderers wended westward, walking by a wide river that wound through the wilderness.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Dusk began to close in, and with it came a chill in the air. Up till now the temperature had been, on average, warmer than the caverns; now it was distinctly colder. When they stopped at an abandoned village to camp, Thob noticed the river was a bit more solid than it should be:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Strodno assured him this was normal. Normal for the surface, maybe, which wasn’t saying much.
   In the morning the water in Thob’s waterskin was also hard as a rock. He was momentarily distressed by the sudden change, until Strodno pointed out he could just warm it up.

There was another castle built by the riverside—abandoned, of course, but there were plenty of books inside:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Among them were a few books by “Mosus Presentracks”—a name Thob remembered as the author of several works he had found on his very first journey! By now he knew Mosus had been a necromancer; but one essay told about him working with the Sandaled Key to fight an undead invasion:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Defeating an undead horde seemed like a good reason to bubble with cheerfulness.

As they continued on, Strodno was getting more and more insistent about Puresuns:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “I told you, not until we’ve found some beer!”
   “Just remember—you promised. It wouldn’t be smart to disappoint Egesh.”
   “If she’s so keen to get it done, she could make it rain good dwarven rum instead of water.”
   “That’s not how gods work.”
   “Hmph.” This whole “faith” thing seemed pretty one-sided.

The river passed through many small ruined hamlets. Most were uninteresting—but while they passed by one village Thob had the strange urge to knock on all the doors and check the huts for sweet pods:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He shook it off, though, and they moved on.

Late in the afternoon they caught sight of another large town, flanked by two towers:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
There wasn’t enough sunlight to reach it today, so they found a nearby village and settled into the mead hall. They were just making their way there when tiny, cold flakes began to drift around them, dusting Thob’s beard:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Okay, Strodno,” he said, “I suppose this is normal, too?”
   “Yes. It’s water.”
   “Water is not flaky.”
   “It’s frozen water.”
   “You said frozen water was that hard slippery stuff—‘ice’ you called it.”
   “This is… frozen drops of water. It’s called ‘snow’.”
   Water had too many names. Sure, with booze you had beer, wine, spirits, etc., but those were distinct kinds of booze. Water was just water, tasteless as ever even if it was cold. It didn’t need all these names—it wasn’t parsimonious.
   “Would you mind if we got inside?” said Strodno. “I don’t want to stand around in this blizzard.”
   “You think you have it tough? Let me tell you about me and the Sun…”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

King Zultan

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #78 on: August 25, 2020, 05:17:24 am »

The surface is like a whole new world, covered in hostile alien creatures and strange people that are all dead.
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The Lawyer opens a briefcase. It's full of lemons, the justice fruit only lawyers may touch.
Make sure not to step on any errant blood stains before we find our LIFE EXTINGUSHER.
but anyway, if you'll excuse me, I need to commit sebbaku.
Quote from: Leodanny
Can I have the sword when you’re done?

Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #79 on: September 04, 2020, 06:34:11 pm »

It was even colder at dawn; what was more, the grass had disappeared.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Piles of the cold damp “snow” stuff covered everything to a depth over Thob’s ankles. It clung to his boots and trousers as he trudged through it. This was like walking through a pond, only it was also freezing.

The new town was not as big as the first Thob had seen, but it was still sizeable. They entered the empty streets of the outskirts under a sky that was uniformly dark and gray; the water falling from the clouds seemed unsure whether to be snow or rain.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The rain had soaked the bare dirt between the houses into mud, which was now mixed with the partly-melted snow into a soiled brown mush. It seemed a fitting complement to the dreary weather and the ruins all around.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Elsewhere, though, the streets were clear of both mud and snow; here in the outskirts some old fields bordered the rows of houses. There were small shrines in between the ruins as well, old statues and altars to human gods no one had worshipped in centuries. They passed one ominously inscribed “To the Doctrines of Death.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Cheery thing to worship,” said Thob.
   “You’d be surprised how many mortals did, though,” said Strodno. “It’s partly the reason we’re in this mess to begin with. Guess if you can’t avoid it, might as well try to make friends with it.”
   “I’d just as soon put it off long as I could. That’s one good reason to worship Egesh, I guess—as goddess of healing maybe she’ll keep things running a bit longer.”
   Strodno looked at him with a half-grin. “Why Thob,” she said, “that was almost pious. Sounds like your starting to have some faith.”
   Thob shrugged. “Well I’m not going to make a religion out of it, but… can’t hurt to be on her good side, right?”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Much of the town had been built on the face of a steep hill. Houses often stretched out over the precipice, hanging on for dear life.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   As they scoured the streets they came across one building larger and more sound than the others. Thob pushed at the door; it swung open with difficulty, as if something behind it was in the way. And so it was—a lot of somethings:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
It was an old warehouse, said Strodno, where the humans kept their trade goods. They took a good look around, but most of the stuff was worthless: the clothes and armor were too big, and the rest was mainly trinkets. They might have had value a few hundred years ago, but now they were just bits of shiny scrap. Or… was that what they always were?
   Nearby, in an alley between two houses, Thob spotted a set of stairs descending into the earth.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He and Strodno took a peek inside: it was just a short tunnel, ending in a sudden drop into darkness. There were a few ancient skeletons—two humans, and olm man, and some large vaguely human-shaped thing—but nothing else.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Didn’t know the humans could dig,” he said. “Why’d they live on the surface, if they were perfectly capable of cutting streets in the stone?”
   “This looks like a sewer. Wasn’t exactly made for living in.”
   “Sewer? What’s that?”
   “…dwarves don’t build sewers? How do you… well, never mind. I don’t want to know.”

In the inner city, behind the walls, they found an old temple half-buried in the dirt:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
It was dedicated to the “Superior Faith.” Thob didn’t know what was so superior about it: most of the statues depicted the same event, some poor sod named Tor getting turned by this superior god into a pangolin:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   They made their way to the castle. It was still sound, more or less, but there was little inside, except for one book Thob found: a short poem called “Couples and the Woman”:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Back in the outer town, near an intersection of two streets, Thob heard a strange noise. It sounded like running water, but was mixed with something almost like voices, and it seemed to come from below…
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
As they drew closer he could tell it was really voices, speaking in words he understood—and quite politely, actually.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The voices were drifting up from a grate in the road. Peering down, Thob saw a narrow stream of water flowing through a stone pipe, absolutely alive with and assortment of aquatic animal anthropomorphs: amphibian, serpent, reptile, and olm men and women. There seemed to be a human down there as well, but he wasn’t looking too lively.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Looks like there’s some folk still here, after all!” Thob said to Strodno. “I told you the sewers would make a good place to live.”
   The goblin just lifted an eyebrow; Thob turned to the grate and shouted down into the dark tunnel. “H’lo down there,” he said.
   The animal folk greeted them pleasantly, though they seemed surprised to see them. “Don’t ssssssee many dwarvesss thesse daysssss,” lisped a serpent woman. “Thought they were all long gone. What are you about sssso far from the mountainssss?”
   “Actually,” he said, “I’m looking for other dwarves—preferably of the beer-brewing persuasion.”
   “Asssssk the chieftesss,” she replied, “she’ll know if there’ssss dwarvesss to be found in thesssse partsss.”
   It took a bit of searching and asking to find the chieftess, a frail reptile woman—the sewer was so clogged with cold-blooded bodies it was hard to tell one from another, but eventually they found her.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Thob introduced himself. “Hi there,” he said. “I hear you’re the chieftess in this town. I’m Thob the Mysterious.”
   “Call me Uru,” replied the chieftess. “What makesss you sssso… mysssterioussss?”
   “Well… it’s just a name, really. But I do a little undead hunting, from time to time, you know.”
   “Don’t have to hunt for long, I bet,” said Uru, with a sort of guttural burble that Thob guessed was chuckling. “What do you need?”
   He asked about the local area, and whether there might be anyone else still around. Uru was a wealth of information. She knew all about the surrounding countryside, although mostly it seemed from hearsay. “All the humanssss are gone from thessse landsssss, as far as I know,” she said. “I’ve heard that ssssome still wander the ssssssouthern hillsss, but I’ve never been there.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
In fact, sometimes her knowledge seemed just a little too complete. When discussing the local regions she would include what she knew of their history—which sometimes went back a thousand years!
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “I was mostly wondering,” said Thob, “if there’s any dwarves around anywhere?”
   “Dwarvessss? Hmmmm… only dwarvessss I remember lately are the couple over in Pepperdell. Odd ssssortsss, but that’s ssssurface folk for you.”
   “Pepperdell? Where’s that?”
   “A wayssss up to the north-eassst. It’ssss an old fort.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   Thob thanked Uru for her help, and bid goodbye to the amphibian colony. Dusk was drawing near, so they would stay in town for the night—but in the morning they’d set out for Pepperdell. Chances were, Thob reasoned, that even if the dwarves there didn’t know how to brew they’d know someone who would.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

King Zultan

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #80 on: September 05, 2020, 05:18:20 am »

Reptile people are a strange bunch hiding in cramped and wet tunnels when they could be living in one of the town's many empty buildings.
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The Lawyer opens a briefcase. It's full of lemons, the justice fruit only lawyers may touch.
Make sure not to step on any errant blood stains before we find our LIFE EXTINGUSHER.
but anyway, if you'll excuse me, I need to commit sebbaku.
Quote from: Leodanny
Can I have the sword when you’re done?

Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #81 on: September 21, 2020, 02:19:56 pm »

Thob and Strodno set out from the town of the amphibian-folk, following a spur of the big river northward through the hills. By nightfall they were close to Pepperdell; from the heights they could see across the flat fields below to another line of hills in the distance, and Thob made out the shapes of hamlets and another large town.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “That’s Trampledlearned,” said Strodno, “once the greatest human city around—and the place where this whole mess started.”
   “Reckon there’s anyone left?”
   “I don’t know. It was pretty ruined when I was captured there, six centuries ago. But there may be some survivors.”

The next morning they came to the gates of Pepperdell. The fort sat beside a deep stream, its high walls of ancient oak logs towering over the prairie.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The gates creaked open and Thob went in, hoping to see some friendly bearded faces. But there seemed to be no one around.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Just then, however, he heard a creaking and shuffling sound from an old bunkhouse. When he looked inside he did see some faces, though not bearded and not exactly friendly. Two dwarf women with long white hair stood in the house. They gave off a distinctly eerie aura:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Despite their spookiness Thob hailed them, meaning to ask for a drink, or at least for directions to one. The hags turned glassy, far-off eyes towards him, but made no reply.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Maybe they were deaf? But they seemed to notice him—at least they looked frustrated at his continued attempts to greet them. Strodno couldn’t get a word out of them either. She turned to Thob. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this place. These dwarves don’t seem quite… here.”
   “Maybe we should take another look around,” said Thob.
   They did so; Thob inspected the rampart surrounding the fort, and found, surprisingly, that it was scattered with books and scrolls of all kinds.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
They were all written by the local residents, Thob guessed: Edzul Slingpuzzle and Kumil Figureboat. Some were records of the fort itself, but others were autobiographies. And when Thob read these, he learned the shocking truth.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Memoirs of their marriages six hundred years ago? Touchingly sentimental for the undead. He knew he had recognized that vacant look in their faces from somewhere. “Those dwarves,” he said to Strodno, “they’re bleak slayers. Must be.”
   She corroborated his guess. “But why didn’t they attack us?” asked Thob.
   “Maybe the necromancers who revived them are dead,” she said, “so they don’t have to do their will anymore. Even so, I’m not eager to hang around here anymore.”
   “Me neither. Let’s get out before they change their minds!”

Leaving the haunted fort behind, they crossed the plains to Trampledlearned. The ruins of the city sprawled before them, shining in the evening twilight under a coat of snow. A paved road left the city on the opposite side, leading up to the north.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The town was as silent and dead as the others. They wandered the streets—Thob was, of course, looking for taverns—until nightfall, when they settled into one of the ruined houses to sleep.
   As Thob rose with the dawn and stepped outside, he thought he saw something, a figure of some sort, off in the distance, but he couldn’t make it out:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
After he had eaten and unfrozen the water in his waterskin, though, the shape was gone.
   They approached the town keep in the early morning cold. Thob was expecting at most to find a few more books for the library. But as they drew near he heard noises inside:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He hoped it wouldn’t be more zombies. Unconsciously he directed a prayer to that effect to Egesh—and opened the door.
   It wasn’t zombies. Nor, as best he could tell, necromancers. It was four living, breathing beings—although the oddest assortment of beings he had yet seen.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
There was a Curledbolted’s demon, frail-looking and apparently friendly; a pale elf with green hair and a hook nose; a short, muscular goblin, with features like Strodno’s, and wearing some sort of cloth armor; and a plump but strong serpent man, carrying a spear and dressed in armor, including, for some reason, a boot on his tail:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Goodness,” said the Curledbolted’s demon, “visitors? We don’t get many around here these days.” He squinted at Thob. “And a dwarf, no less? It’s been ages since I last met a living dwarf. I’m glad some have survived these hard times! What’s your name?”
   “My name’s Thob. But you can call me ‘Thob the Mysterious’. I’m an undead hunter, you see.”
   “Uh… of course. My name’s Fafire, and I am a holy sparkle of the Lady of Light, Islas Shimmerglimmer.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Islas? Who’s she?”
   “You’ve never heard of the goddess of the day?”
   “Until a few weeks ago I didn’t know what ‘day’ was… but that’s a long story.”
   “Oh, please tell! Visitors are so rare, we hardly hear of things in the world these days… oh, excuse me. I believe some introductions are in order.”
   The four creatures were all priests, of one kind or another. Fafire and the serpent man, named Cetha, were from the Coven of Light, once a prominent religion in the area. The goblin was named Ngokang; he was, by contrast, a “high umbra” of Kulur, the goddess of night. The elf was called Nemen, and he said he was the abbot of a distant monastery, the house of an order devoted to the True Honor of Palisades, goddess of forgiveness and mercy. Thob asked why he was so far from his home; Nemen, with sidelong glances at Ngokang and Strodno, said he had been forced out when goblins overran the region centuries ago. Thob then asked if he had left any family behind; the elf said he knew only a little of the fates of his children:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Fourth eldest daughter? That’s a lot of kids.”
   “Well, I’ve had a lot of wives.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “It sounds like a pretty violent place, back where you’re from,” said Thob.
   “The influence of the goblin conquest,” said Nemen. “They are… not exactly known for moral behavior—present company excepted, of course.”
    Thob and Strodno gave the priests a brief summary of their adventures, and their goals. “Hmm,” said Fafire, “I don’t know of any brewers, sadly. But if you’re in the business of finding artifacts, you might keep a lookout for some relics the Coven has lost.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Oh? And where might this ‘fallen zombie’ be now?”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Well of course he’s dead, that’s why he’s a zombie!” said Thob. “But where is he?”
   “I can’t say, unfortunately.”
   “You should talk to Estrur,” said Ngokang. “He’s another priest of Islas. He’s been looking for some relic—a bit of a robe or something—and he might know where to look. Last I heard he was holed up in the catacombs here.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “And where’s Doordark?”
   “Under the temple,” said Ngokang. “Outside the walls to the north. You can’t miss it.”
   Thob thanked the priests for their hospitality, and went out with Strodno to see if they could find Estrur—though not especially to help him find his relics. Thob guessed anyone who knew where lost artifacts were ought to know where the nearest pub was as well.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

Luckyowl

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #82 on: September 21, 2020, 03:06:52 pm »

I really love that drawing  :D especially that boot at the end of the serpent man's tail. I laughed so hard when I saw it. What a strange serpent man.
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TheFlame52

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #83 on: September 21, 2020, 03:13:46 pm »

I know, I love the boot. You don't often see serpent men wearing clothes!

King Zultan

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #84 on: September 22, 2020, 06:16:47 am »

I really like the art, I also like how this went from a small search for booze to an epic quest around the world filled with fights, books, and random artifacts.
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The Lawyer opens a briefcase. It's full of lemons, the justice fruit only lawyers may touch.
Make sure not to step on any errant blood stains before we find our LIFE EXTINGUSHER.
but anyway, if you'll excuse me, I need to commit sebbaku.
Quote from: Leodanny
Can I have the sword when you’re done?

mightymushroom

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #85 on: September 22, 2020, 12:57:56 pm »

That boot cracks me up!
It's always the little details.
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Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #86 on: September 22, 2020, 06:54:22 pm »

I really love that drawing  :D especially that boot at the end of the serpent man's tail. I laughed so hard when I saw it. What a strange serpent man.
The boot is the wonderful kind of characterization only DF can deliver. Finding strange people in strange places is a big reason I play Adventure Mode.

I really like the art, I also like how this went from a small search for booze to an epic quest around the world filled with fights, books, and random artifacts.
That was my hope from the start. I love stories of people who bumble their way into greatness, and I think Thob's turning out that way.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

MadMonkey

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #87 on: September 27, 2020, 07:16:02 pm »

Delightful! PTW
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Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #88 on: October 05, 2020, 08:13:19 am »

Delightful! PTW
Thanks! I've enjoyed reading your comic as well.



The temple of Islas Shimmerglimmer, the Radiant Sanctuary, was just where Ngokang said it would be: a large, open structure of white stone, its sanctum at the bottom of a deep recess.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
But before descending to the bottom, Thob noticed another, smaller temple just nearby. It was mostly in ruins, but he could still make out the name: “The Heroic Sanctum.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   Many of the statues were time-worn to the point of being unrecognizable, but at one end of the temple he found a startling one: what looked like a desiccated corpse, but arrayed in symbols of divinity and holding some kind of stone tablet:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “It’s… it’s Vispol,” said Strodno.
   “The dark god?” asked Thob.
   “Yes. This must be his temple.”
   “Why would they build a temple to an evil god?”
   “It’s not that simple. The dark gods aren’t necessarily ‘evil’; sometimes they can actually help people. But they don’t care about people, and whatever boons they give may just as well hurt as help. That’s why you shouldn’t worship them—but that’s never stopped anyone from doing so, humans especially. Look at these statues: you can see how popular Vispol was.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “In fact… it was probably right here that Álat Bookbridges first learned the secret of life and death—in this very temple, over a thousand years ago. Makes you think.”
   “Makes me think about getting out of here,” said Thob. “Let’s find this Estrur fellow and get going.”

They returned to the Radiant Sanctuary and descended into the pit-like shrine. Doors led from the lowest level into the dark catacombs (perhaps, thought Thob, that’s why they called the catacombs “Doordark”?). Narrow passages twisted through the earth, lined with niches where the ancient dead lay sleeping—and Thob hoped they stayed that way. Occasionally they found the remains of more exotic creatures, such as the shells of a tribe of ant folk:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Sometimes the passages opened into great crypts, several stories high, filled with sarcophagi:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Gravestones told the names and lives of those buried nearby. Some deaths were peaceful, mostly those from the very distant past. But the later coffins were filled with those slain in the thousands of battle against the undead—those fortunate enough to be buried, and not have their bodies stolen for the necromancers’ nefarious armies.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Thob was a little taken aback by the “Slayer of Dwarves” on some of the memorials, but Strodno assured him they meant undead dwarves.
   Sometimes the identities of the deceased seemed uncertain: a few were only listed with nicknames, apparently gained in battle.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
And some gave only the race of the coffin’s occupant, all other details being lost.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Not all the violent deaths were from battle, either. It seemed that, in addition to their other cruelties, the necromancers decided to make examples of the civilian populace after their conquests:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   A hole in the northern wall of the crypt led them unexpectedly into another “sewer.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Thob still thought the tunnels would make a fine place to live, but he guessed humans, being surface dwellers, didn’t have the eyes for it.
   In the deepest reaches of the necropolis they descended into a large, wide-open chamber, with only a single sarcophagus in the center—made, to Thob’s amazement, of solid shining aluminum!
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
On the nearby slab was written the name of the entombed: “Lon Irneedin, born in 38, Field Marshal of the Equal Kingdom, 79-103.”
   “Died peacefully at sixty-five?” said Thob. “Is that old for humans?”
   “Old enough,” said Strodno. “Most don’t live past ninety.”
   “Goodness—that’s just the far side of middle-age for a dwarf. I’m beginning to see why this immortality deal was so attractive.”

They scoured Doordark for hours, searching for any sign of the supposed priest, but there was no one in the crypt—not alive, anyway. At last Strodno said, “I don’t think this Estrur is still here; he must have moved on somewhere else without telling anyone. And in any case, I doubt he’d know where to find any booze. I doubt there’s any left in this part of the world at all.”
   Thob sighed. “You’re probably right. But we’ve got to keep looking. Are there any other towns nearby?”
   “Some to the north. Let’s get out of here and see what we can find.”
   They ascended from the catacombs and made their way out of town, following a wide paved road to the north. Afternoon wound on to dusk, and they looked for a place to shelter; hopefully the next few days would bring them more luck.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

TheFlame52

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #89 on: October 05, 2020, 09:32:18 am »

I noticed the two slabs you examined, the one killed by an echidna man and the one who killed that echidna man. It's very interesting to learn about a world's legends like this.
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