(Skyseas of Gensokyo) Nazrin Quest (Part 4)

[Hanzo K.]

>Let's get a look at what we found then.

[Hello Purvis]

>Or rather, since it's probably not a light source, give it a good palpating, avoiding the edge.
>Do we sense any anything else around. Like a sheathe?

[DracoOmega]

>Let's get a look at what we found then.

>Given that your surroundings are still pitch black, this remains rather difficult. You have very good night vision, but still require some light.

>Or rather, since it's probably not a light source, give it a good palpating, avoiding the edge.
>Do we sense any anything else around. Like a sheathe?

>You carefully feel along the length of the object, keeping clear of the edge. The blade is moderately curved and seems to be a couple feet long, tapering slightly in one direction, while in the other, it ends in an oval piece of metal followed by a ridged grip. This is almost certainly a sword.
>You have another feel around the area you retrieved this from, but don't find anything else of note.

[Hello Purvis]

>Get out of the river.
>Then...give the sword a few slashes in the air. Hee hee hee...

[DracoOmega]

>Get out of the river.
>Then...give the sword a few slashes in the air. Hee hee hee...

>You carefully wade back to where you left your pack.
>Then you give the sword a few experimental slashes. It feels surprisingly lightweight, but well balanced. The air parts before it with a satisfying whistle.

[Hello Purvis]

>Grab our stuff, and head downriver. Use our new sword as a poking stick.
>Keep the non-visual senses peeled.

[DracoOmega]

>Grab our stuff, and head downriver. Use our new sword as a poking stick.
>Keep the non-visual senses peeled.

>You grab your pack and then follow along beside the river, using your ears to steer your course and the sword as a sort of walking stick to check for obstacles. After a short distance, you find yourself poking the blade at a wall. The river itself sounds like it continues on for some distance to your left, but  continuing to follow it from this position would seem to require walking in the river. Unless, of course, there is some path to your right that eventually leads back around to the river, but the wall feels like it extends for at least a couple dozen feet in that direction, and you can't easily appraise the geography past that without light.
>The ambient scent of the area remains unchanged, nor do you hear anything but the river and the sound of your own travel.

[Hello Purvis]

>Check alongside the river, are the banks shallow enough we could wade onwards?

[DracoOmega]

>Check alongside the river, are the banks shallow enough we could wade onwards?

>Feeling with the sword, they seem about ankle deep for a couple feet, and then swiftly descend at least halfway to knee depth. You're not sure how deep it would be further along than that.

[Hello Purvis]

>Let's find out. Follow it.

[DracoOmega]

>Let's find out. Follow it.

>You wade back into the water, trying to stay close to the cavern walls while you carefully navigate your feet along the uneven riverbed. It doesn't take long before the water reaches almost to your knees. The wall beside you continues unbroken, as best your sense of touch can determine, without any relatively dry ground to stand on. A little further and you are up to your hips once more, feeling thoroughly chilled and uncomfortable.
>With your sword, you feel a pronounced drop-off ahead of you, sloping quickly beyond reach. You expect you're going to have to resort to swimming if you want to go further in this direction.

[Hanzo K.]

>Pull up the sword for a moment to stare at it, despite there not being any light.
>"If you got any tricks in you, like making light or something, that'd be real helpful right about now."
>"...Look at me, I haven't even been down here for very long, and I'm already talking to a sword I just found...and myself. Hello me!"
>Chuckle a bit at our current state of affairs before moving back along.


(Yeah, the dialogue's kinda inspired by the ps2 version of The Bard's Tale, it works better if you read it in the Bard's voice, with all the snark that entails.)

[DracoOmega]

>Pull up the sword for a moment to stare at it, despite there not being any light.
>"If you got any tricks in you, like making light or something, that'd be real helpful right about now."
>"...Look at me, I haven't even been down here for very long, and I'm already talking to a sword I just found...and myself. Hello me!"
>Chuckle a bit at our current state of affairs before moving back along.

>You hold up the sword and stare at the darkness where you assume its blade must be.
>You try asking your new weapon if it can provide some navigational assistance beyond serving as an improvised walking stick. It is regrettably silent (and dark).
>You try to give a wry chuckle at your situation. You're not sure it helps your spirits all that much. Then you step over the slope and swim forward.

>Swimming proves to be a rather awkward thing to do with a sword in your hand, particularly when you cannot see where its blade is. Given that only one of your arms is mobile enough to swim with, you transfer the sword to the other hand and try to hold it in such a way that your legs aren't likely to bump into it. This still doesn't quite alleviate your nervousness, and it is a cautious swim forward.
>After a short distance, your right hand catches on something sticky mid-stroke, a foot or two above the water's surface. It... feels like a thick web.

[Hello Purvis]

>Gently try to pull our hand back.

[DracoOmega]

>Gently try to pull our hand back.

>You gently pull your hand back, but the strands clinging to it pull back with it.

[Hello Purvis]

>Is our other arm even a little bit unparalyzed at this point?
>Regardless, tug harder.

[DracoOmega]

>Is our other arm even a little bit unparalyzed at this point?
>Regardless, tug harder.

>You have full use of your left hand, and you think you would have most of the movement of your lower arm if it wasn't still bound to your side by the youkai's webbing.
>You pull harder at the web, feeling the rest of the structure vibrate against the strands still stuck to your hand.
>You hear sounds of movement from above, descending towards you.

[Hello Purvis]

>Is there a wall nearby? Try to kick off of it.

[DracoOmega]

>Is there a wall nearby? Try to kick off of it.

>You aren't certain how close you are to one at this point. Your legs aren't immediately brushing against it, in any case, though you could try shifting your body about in the water and trying to feel for one with your feet. You were relatively close to one on your right a short while ago, but you suspect that the current combined with swimming one-handed means you aren't keeping an entirely straight course.

[Hello Purvis]

>Shift and feel for one.

[DracoOmega]

>Shift and feel for one.

>You rotate your body and reach your legs out to the right, feeling about for the wall. As you paw at the water, you hear what is presumably the web's owner quickly descending closer towards your hand.
>One of your feet brushes against rock and you scrabble to get enough purchase to propel yourself off it.

[Hello Purvis]

>Coil our legs under us as much as possible and kick off the wall. Prepare for it to feel unpleasant.

[DracoOmega]

>Coil our legs under it as much as possible and kick off the wall. Prepare for it to feel unpleasant.

>You bend your knees into the jump as much as you can, then push off the wall! As you start to spring, you feel two thin needles drive into the top of your hand, barely painful among all the other injuries you've sustained today. Your momentum pays it no heed. There is a moment's resistance as the webbing stretches with your hand, and then rips free. You feel the back of your hand bat against something as it pulls away from the web, followed shortly thereafter by a splash and thrashing in the water beside you. You have no idea how much of the web you took with you, but you can still feel strands stuck to your palm.
>Thin tendrils of pain, almost electric, start to lance away from the bite. You find yourself already starting to cringe.

[Hello Purvis]

>Get some distance from the web; keep our stung hand in the water and hope it does something for any venom that may have gotten involved.

[DracoOmega]

>Get some distance from the web; keep our stung hand in the water and hope it does something for any venom that may have gotten involved.

>You quickly paddle back away from the web, keeping your bit hand submerged. You don't know whether the water is providing some small amelioration or not, but it's clearly not enough to stem off the rapidly intensifying pain. Sharp and vivid jolts shoot down your fingers and across the surface of your hand, seizing it in their crushing grip. You fingers start to stiffen, and you bite down hard on your lip, breathing forcefully. The bite itself may have been a minor hurt, but this is something else entirely.

[Hello Purvis]

>If we feel we're sufficiently far away from the web, seek out the wall again. It'll be something to brace against if needs be.
>Use our feet to get us back to the shallow places so we can ride this out.

[DracoOmega]

>If we feel we're sufficiently far away from the web, seek out the wall again. It'll be something to brace against if needs be.
>Use our feet to get us back to the shallow places so we can ride this out.

>You're a couple feet away from the spot you bumped into it, but you have no way of knowing what angle the web was spun along, or whether it might be closer or further away, close to the wall. The spider itself is fairly clearly several feet away from you. It sounds like it's losing its battle with the water.
>The water here is too deep for your feet to reach the bottom, at least without swimming a moderate ways back.

[Hello Purvis]

>Swim back. Let our legs do the work to take the pressure off our arm.

[DracoOmega]

>Swim back. Let our legs do the work to take the pressure off our arm.

>You turn and swim back, following your original course as best you can approximate. The seeping chill of the water seems a distant irrelevancy at the moment, barely perceivable beneath the storm raging within your hand. You wonder, briefly, if this is what it feels like to be electrocuted. It is a small mercy that pain seems highly localized, barely radiating past your wrist, but this does little to mute its intensity. You take deep, forced breaths, as steady as you can manage, and try to focus on something, anything other than that. This is only passingly successful. Eventually you stumble back onto land again, feeling only half-aware of how you got there.

[Hello Purvis]

>Sit in the water and let our hand soak. Whether or not it may eventually numb, it's got to help.
>Try to ride things out without screaming too much. She's not going to get the pleasure of hearing it.