as told by the cavalier Olmas Lurecia himself.<\/p>\n
It would be too much to ask, of course, for us to simply board the barge and head back to the mainland.\u00a0 These gods that Kari, Ivan, and Qatana speak of were clearly idle and bored this day.<\/p>\n
It began typically enough.\u00a0 We had rescued the maiden and soundly defeated a dozen enemies.\u00a0 It was time to sail into the harbor, victorious amidst a cheering crowd.\u00a0 We boarded the boat and found, to MY surprise at least, that Dasi knew how to operate a boat!\u00a0 I mean, anyone can take up a pair of oars, but this was a bit more than that.\u00a0 He helped arranged rowers and watchers and flyers (Kali and Qatana do so like floating above the ground) and took the tiller.<\/p>\n
Before we left, Kali announced we were being scried. Of course.\u00a0 She tried doing that thing where she gets a glimpse of the scryer. It worked, sort of. She got an image of what seemed to be a beggar, hunched over.\u00a0 Probably a disguise.<\/p>\n
We were just far enough from shore to be in some of the deeper water, when Zos, He of Small Stature but Sharp Vision and positioned at the front of the boat, pointed at a wake heading for us from the right side.\u00a0 Defensive postures were struck.<\/p>\n
I can now say I have met my first “dragon turtle”.\u00a0 It is not a dragon.\u00a0 It is not a turtle.\u00a0 It’s as if somebody took all the gracefulness of a turtle on land and combined it with all the social graces of a dragon missing 10 copper pieces.\u00a0 They were kind of ugly, and more than a little ornery.\u00a0 They could actually speak (Dragon, I’m told) and they claimed we were going the wrong way. And so we had to die.<\/p>\n
They? Sorry, did I say they?\u00a0 Yeah, two more showed up seconds after the first.\u00a0 All of them tried to tip the boat.\u00a0 All of them could breathe scalding steam.\u00a0 And all of them did this, before all of them died.<\/p>\n
Can we rest now?\u00a0 Zos reminded us there was some distinct advantage to resting right now, because he could do the old ‘make a treasure map out of their skin’ trick which sounds so disgusting but has proven useful more than once.<\/p>\n
So we reached the dock safely, with the added weight of one turtle-dragon corpse. One hour later, Zos was able to announce that there was indeed “something valuable” (at least to a dragon turtle) underwater near one of the islands.\u00a0 Since we would want more spells available to us for that effort, we decided to go visit turtle-uncle Numataro-sama.\u00a0 There was much joy when he and O-sayumi saw each other again.<\/p>\n
This day was dedicated to finding out what is valuable to a dragon turtle.\u00a0 Thankfully, they value (or at least, these valued) the same things we do.\u00a0 In an underwater cave, aided by an air bubble spell, we found 3 piles of mixtures of pearls, precious shells, and gemstones … about 18000 gp worth.<\/p>\n
I need to consider what item(s) might make more effective (or less defective.)<\/p>\n
We will spend another night at the kappa’s place before windwalking back to town.<\/p>\n
There was another happy reunion when O-sayumi returned to the teahouse with us.\u00a0 True to her word, O-kohaku arranged meetings over the next several days with key merchants, nobles, and\u00a0 other contacts from the area.\u00a0 Each would arrive secretive and skeptical, and each needed to leave pleasantly surprised and hopeful.\u00a0 We need to have our presentation well polished.\u00a0 Suishen will undoubtedly be a part of many of these meetings as he offers concrete proof that the Amatatsu line survives.<\/p>\n
In gratitude, O-sayumi offered the magical samisen.\u00a0 We declined it at first, but it seemed to only make her more determined.\u00a0 Both Dasi and Ameiko are able to play it so nit wouldn’t sit idle … in the end we accepted it.\u00a0 But then she gave us an even greater gift. As discussion turned to overthrowing the daimyo, she offered that she had connections to the general of his army .. his brother.\u00a0 She believed she could arrange a meeting with tsuru<\/p>\n
We have the ninjas to get in our corner yet, but things are moving better than we might have expected.<\/p>\n
We were again surprised when O-kohaku asked her servants to bring out a green box.\u00a0 She offered it as a gift, and when we opened it we found an exquisite tea set.\u00a0 (Ivan whispered that it radiated magic.)\u00a0 “It’s been at the tea house since before I was here.\u00a0 Those who perform the tea ceremony using this set, find it easier to recover from illnesses and consummate deals.”<\/p>\n
[669] tea set decorated with willows and flowers<\/p>\n
Although I’ve been in this side of the world for months now, I am still amazed at the culture here.\u00a0 Between her wizardly skills, her musical skills, her social skills, and her attractive person, I find O-sayumi to be a most intriguing representation of that culture, and I asked her if she would like to enjoy a meal with me this evening. She has agreed.<\/p>\n
Before then, though, she arranged the meeting with Itsuru.\u00a0 She believes that Jiro can expect substantial support from him once he understands the situation.<\/p>\n
We were scryed upon again, and this time Kali detected a man in clerical robes within 10 miles of us.<\/p>\n
Das tried a divination using our new samisen.\u00a0 “What can we do to improve our conversations with the ninjas?”\u00a0 The non-specific reply he got was “stop the scrying.”<\/p>\n
We sent a message to Jiro today to arrange for him to meet with Itsuru.\u00a0 He was surprised and agreed, but warned he had intelligence that the fort was soon to be attacked.\u00a0 Consequently, he would come but Hatsui would remain to fortify their position.\u00a0 If it were not that Suishen will play an important role in the meetng, I would go to the fort to assist.\u00a0 Dasi tried a divination again – Does Jiro coming here put the fort at risk?\u00a0 The terse response was: fort will still be there if he’s not there.\u00a0 Cryptic, but we’ll take it as a positive sign.<\/p>\n
So later in the day, the following people met in a large room in s private part of the teahouse:<\/p>\n
Jiro
\nAmeiko
\nQatana
\nDasi
\nItsuru
\nmyself
\nKali
\nRadella
\nand of course O-sayumi<\/p>\n
Itsuru appeared confident and hesitant at the same time.\u00a0 He nodded politely to Jiro.\u00a0 He paled and looked doubtful though when O-sayumi introduced “the Amatatsu heirs”.\u00a0 This is why I was here, and I withdrew Suishen from his scabbard and bathed him in flame.<\/p>\n
From that moment the meetng took on renewed energy.\u00a0 Itsuru offered that there may be a moment soon when the daiymo would be less guarded.\u00a0 He is leaving soon to his vacation retreat with minimal staff.\u00a0 There are nine other ronin who know of this as well, and together we may be able to overcome the staff and bodyguards .. and kill the daiymo.\u00a0 Family honor prevents Itsuru from doing this himself, but it does not prevent him from being conspicuously unsupportive of his brother.<\/p>\n
We have opportunity.<\/p>\n
Another day, another divinaton.\u00a0 Both Dasi and Ameiko used the samisen, and got related responses.<\/p>\n
THERE IS A NINJA OF GREAT RENOWN FOLLWNG AMEIKO.\u00a0 and
\nNEUTRALIZE THE STALKER.<\/p>\n
That’s getting pretty direct.\u00a0 The new Mask Clan of ninjas is rumored to have a superhuman ninja.\u00a0 The puzzle is coming together.<\/p>\n
Itsuru returned briefly.\u00a0 In 10 days his brother will\u00a0 set out for his retreat.\u00a0 The 9 have infiltrated his staff and are ready to provide the necessary distraction which will separate him from most of his retinue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
as told by the cavalier Olmas Lurecia himself. Wealday, 29 Desnus It would be too much to ask, of course, for us to simply board the barge and head back to the mainland.\u00a0 These gods that Kari, Ivan, and Qatana speak of were clearly idle and bored this day. It began typically enough.\u00a0 We had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[34],"class_list":["post-4075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-journal","tag-olmas"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4075"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4076,"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075\/revisions\/4076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dungeonetics.com\/gamediary\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}