Dungeon Life Quest (DLQ) 92 - Rushed As Fuck OP Edition

Did we ever figure out what the charms we made from Silence's bones did?

I'm betting that they'll become very, very handy later.

I'm hoping they make snide comments.

>one of them deflects blows
> "C'mon, stop trying to hit me and hit me"

Home at last. Will call and write Shortly(tm)

> Take the Wyrm's scale with you
I wonder if there is an enchantment that allows him to track us or something.

> Talk to River
What do you think we should do going forward?

Look, I'm not saying we SHOULD strike at him through the scale.

Just that we should look into it.

we should take the scaleb ut leave it somewhere boring, like in a closet, instead of with us for now

the wyrm may not scry on us through it but i bet one of the other chain holders might also have a scale

Called, tallying, writing.

Sorry about that, Real Life got me.

S'all cool.

The villainous cad!!

Conversing with dragons.

You give Lora a hug. "Try to be well, yeah?" you suggest. "Get some rest if you can talk Richard into it."

"The old bastard's a harsh taskmaster, but I'll try," Lora promises.

You pocket the scale, before you awaken to Amy gently shaking your shoulder.

"What's the plan?" she murmurs.

"You and Nate get some shut-eye. River and I can take watch. I need to talk to her anyway."

Amy chirps softly and gives your forehead a kiss. "I hope you have fun," she murmurs, with a little grin.

"That's actually the idea."

"...Okay."

You give Amy a hug and get up to go find your sister. She isn't too hard to find; you find River resting up against one of the zombified lizards. She's chewing a piece of jerky with a distant, thoughtful expression. You take a seat next to her and get out a strip of your own to chew on.

"You do know that you're also allowed to tell me when I'm going crazy with power, right?" you open up, after a moment.

"I do. I appreciate the thought, though. Robert's been running me through commanding these things as a unit. Lessons he learned with his own army, you know?"

"That's...depressing in a handy way," you admit. "Sis, I need to say something and I'm gonna say it straight - if shit is funny, laugh. If it's sad, cry. Sometimes you have to be strong for other people, but when you don't need to...well, don't be. Or you'll go as crazy as I was going before Nate and Amy helped me realize where that was heading."

"I laughed at Broken Tooth!" your sister protests.

"And then you felt guilty as shit the moment the conversation went somewhere else," you point out.

"...Yeah," River admits, with a sigh. "I dunno, it was kinda a gut shot. How do you handle the whiplash of it all, sis?"

You gesture with your jerky. "Now you know why so many la Croix kinda don't give a fuck about a lot of things. It's self-defense. But, for a more helpful answer.../life/ is whiplash, River. So you take your laughs when they're on the table."

"You give lots of fucks," River points out, her ears twitching curiously.

"Depends. I care about things that seem important to me. The health and happiness of people around me, f'rinstance. The respectful treatment of the dead and the living. My duties, the family name, my loved ones. But things like how I increasingly suspect we're going to meet a minotaur named Flank Steak later on? Nah. Things I can't change? Not worth the time to worry about. You can drive yourself insane, trying to uphold the family name and the weight of the world at the same time. 's part of why we don't really do the whole 'temporal power' thing. We rode that horse, it sucked."

"Went mad with power?" River asks.

"From what I hear, we got so sick of /having/ power that going mad with it sounded like effort and we pawned it off, but that was ages ago. Another time, another branch of the family, back in the transition period between us being massive assholes and...well, today."

"...Can you tell me more about our family?" River asks.

PICK A STORY

> Coming to the Blind Marsh
> The Late Lich
> The Rose Hunters
> Let River pick the story
> No story; move things along

And now I'm going the fuck to bed because real life and writer's block both suck. Votes remain open.

Questions, comments, discussion, feedback, and criticisms remain welcome and appreciated.

Thank you all for reading and participating!

>> Let River pick the story

>> Let River pick the story

Let's give her some agency to pick what she wants to hear about.

> Let River pick the story
You wanna make a decision, here's one.

>Let River pick the story
you want to stroke the lore boner huh, we ant you to stroke it all over our faces. Blow a hot lode of lore on us.

>Let River pick the story
Just fuck me up Vox.

>Let River pick the story.
Oh yeah, it's Storytime motherfuckers! Also, I would /love/ to meet a minotaur named Huge McBeefslab.

That's super lewd, but I like it.

>Let River pick.
It will be interestign to see what she is interested in most.

>> Coming to the Blind Marsh
they are sound interesting

>> Let River pick the story

I'm alive. Will call and write soon.

Called, writing.

You nod, pleasantly. "What would you like to know?" you ask.

"Well...I suppose I'd like to know why we come off as an organization instead of just blood relations. Like - and I'm not trying to be cheeky - but, like, with the relaxed attitude on adoption and everything there's tons of la Croix that aren't of the blood, as it were, and..."

"You're trying really hard not to get slapped the way Aria was," you say with a grin. "Don't worry, a lot of la Croix end up asking about this. And in a sense you're completely right - we /are/ essentially an organization which teaches and practices certain ideals and skill sets, many of them related to death. Healing, embalming, vampire hunting, that kind of thing. Necromancy, obviously, which is our pride and joy and also why we tend to drink."

River snorts.

"And the thing is," you begin, gesturing vaguely. "We have a lot of necromancers, right? And we used to have even more back in the old days. In point of fact, it used to be that you kinda got disowned if you didn't get into the family business."

"/Why/?" River asks, confused.

"Because we were /assholes/," you reiterate. "There was a big concern, back in the day, about the family itself. Some of that remains, like how folks take our name, always, if they marry in. A couple of folks with really creepy ideas about blood purity but we maaaaay or may not have thrown them down a flight of stairs before they started doing weird incest shit."

River /stares/. "Are you fucking kidding me?"

"I wish," you sigh. "I really do. Do you have coffee?"

"No," River sighs.

"We're stopping at the next place we attack and making some fucking coffee. Anyway, before we spread out all over this place we were mostly settled down south, in and around the Thread. The moment we escaped the kingdom that'd started to nail us to sticks we sorta...stopped, you know? We needed to take stock, figure out who'd survived, who'd fallen, and take time to mourn and plan our next move."

River nods. "Sounds like a good idea, even if that was back in the Age of Assholes."

"I'm going to call it that from now on," you say with a snort. "That name's /perfect/. Anyway, that was the time in which we really started adopting in significant numbers. A lot of us had lost children, or siblings, or parents, to those crosses. And while we were big on the idea of getting revenge, we'd just been, y'know, thoroughly informed that we couldn't win that fight. So we tried to pick up and move on with our lives, and in a lot of cases that led to new parents being adopted into the family, or grieving people picking up other unfortunates in an effort to make everyone involved feel less miserable. And we taught necromancy to those folks, but a lot of the family - most of the family - treated them like they weren't 'real' la Croix. And lo and behold, a bunch of them went full zombie army and quite a few even turned against the family."

Your sister winces.

"This persisted for /years/," you tell her. "And was used to justify looking down on our adopted kids and the spouses that married into the family, until we finally lost an entire branch of the family - the Jagged Shore la Croix - when one of their adopted kids had enough of being beaten and pushed around and unleashed a pack of demons on their village in the middle of the night before killing himself. A council was called to settle the matter. The matriarch of the family at the time was Catherine la Croix, who opened up the council with the following words: 'You idiotic little shits are going to kill us all'."

River sputters and laughs, and you give her a big grin.

"What became known as the Bloodline Council debated the matter for four days," you continue. "At first a proposal was made to cease adopting, but this ran into the whole marriage issue and no one wanted to have to kick more people down flights of stairs, especially considering the tragedy that had just befallen us. Eventually it was Jacques la Croix that proposed the radical idea of just treating our adopted sons and daughters like they were our own, loving them just the same, and generally not being pointlessly evil pieces of shit to them for no reason."

"...That was radical?" River asks.

"It was a darker time," you mutter. "...And we were assholes. But the council decided to try his proposal. The word was spread through the family, along with grim penalties for those found discriminating against adopted la Croix. And after a good ten years, a new council convened to discuss the fallout, and it was decided that the solution had worked, and would be continued from then on."

"Family politics sound a bit scary," River admits.

"It's less like that these days," you admit. "We spread out, you know? There's a lot of la Croix and in some cases we're pretty dissimilar to one another. The name will get you places, but...y'know." You shrug. "We stick together because it's better than being alone, but the day and age when we stuck together because there was literally no one else? That's over, and I'm pretty glad about that."

"You looking forward to founding the Dungeon la Croix?" River teases.

> Definitely
> I still don't know if I want to live here
> Oh gods. You just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing.
> Write-in?

And now I must go be Gainfully Employed until about 7 PM or so, plus or minus time to grab some dinner. Votes remain open.

Questions, comments, discussion, feedback, and criticisms remain welcome and appreciated.

Thank you all for reading and participating!

>> Definitely

>> Write-in?
"I've already started, haven't I?"

>>"I've already started, haven't I? Oh gods. That just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing. "

>> Oh gods. You just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing.

We kind of did okay that

>What about the Rose Cultists?
> Oh gods. You just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing.

>We're stopping at the next place we attack and making some fucking coffee.
Glorious. So very much a woman after my own heart. Amy is a lucky girl.

>Oh gods. You just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing.

>>"I've already started, haven't I? Oh gods. That just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing. "

D'aaw.

> I still don't know if I want to live here
> Oh gods. You just reminded me of Henrietta's magic school thing.

Approximately two hours and change to call.

On my way home, will call and write after dinner. Still open for questions and discussion.

Why is the Sunless Sea filled with water? What keeps it from soaking into the ground? If the Sunless Sea is above or in the water table, why aren't the lower levels flooded?

The way lower into the dungeon might be higher than the surface level of SS, also it and the Mire are part of a large rock cavern most likely.

Harpy magic.

>> Write-in?
I was kind of hoping I could stop being a La Croix. Theres enough of us, now.

this

I have a question

Why did the giant champion agree to a fight where he would discard his arms and armor? Yeah he was physically stronger then his opponent, but just because I have more upperbody strength then a gator doesn't mean I'm volunteering to go into the swamp on it's terms

He was fighting naked against a beast with claws and fangs and thick scales I presume. The fact that Red Troth created a bunch of giants and they developed culture and technology before the champion ventured forth to fight indicates that he intended for them to be more then just brute strength fighters anyhow, or else he would have just made one REALLY BIG giant and hedged his bets that thumbs would be the key factor

The Sunless Sea is primarily stone and could be thought of, in a sense, as a massive pair of rivers. Saltwater wells in on one side and drains out on that same side, forming the 'near' half towards Port Atrium. Past the bar, underground rivers feed the 'far' side, which drains out through the Drowned Stair and into the Mire and the Delta that surrounds it.

Eeenteresting. Can you elaborate?

> Serpent
> Claws

In any event, Troth chose the contest. He wanted to prove his understanding of strength, which he, well, didn't.

I don't know what kind of serpent

What exactly did Troth think was strength, exactly?

Opposable thumbs?

You may want to recall that Kratos means 'force'. Troth felt that raw force, raw brute strength, could overwhelm any problem it applied to. At the time he was rather focused on the idea of war and had not yet gained the nuance he shows today in the idea of conflict and strife. The Forgemaster, as a smith, had a better idea of what raw might was and was not good for.

Humans aren't really the best exemplification of raw force in the natural world. We're good for endurance and clever thinking but we kind of lack the giant teeth, tough hides, or sharp horns of many other animals who might better examplify 'raw force'

why did Troth think what is basically a sacaled up human examplified 'raw force' better then say, a giant tiger?

From the sounds of it the serpent should have been Troth's pick, and the clever giant with his capability to create being the forgemasters

But stone absorbs water.
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permeability_(earth_sciences)

Well at least in part because I ripped the details of the fight from the story of Kratos and Canopus in Greek myth but also, y'know, /because/. There was an argument, this is how they resolved it, much like the Anvil Oath between Troth and the Lady of Ravens.

canopus the pilot of king menalaus ship during the trojan war?

Welcome to ancient mythology, where the names get reused and the stories often conflict. Blame England.

how long till update?

Fuck, right, I need to actually do that. Sorry - called, writing.

Well, there's a whole bunch of offshooot la croix, now.
Bri needs to be the Heritor, but nothing says she needs to be La Croix anymore. She started that way; but I suspect that ... given the real, actual, honest to god and not a trap or giving up, _retirement_, and putting down the necromancers mantle, she wouldn't wait more than a single heartbeat to not have to be that anymore.

I disagree, she has pride and joy in her name, despite the hardship that comes with it.

Removing herself from it isn't IC

Wow.

Get fucked.

You groan. "Don't remind me."

"What?" River asks, blinking.

"Henrietta's school thing. It. She. I still haven't really made up my mind about it," you admit, sighing. "It sounds like a really good idea. It /sounds/ like something that could make necromancy...y'know, /good/. Teach people to use it in service to the public good, to respect the living and the dead. But I have some reservations, only one of which is 'I'm pretty sure the rest of the family will disown me'."

"Oh?" River asks.

"We're hedge mages, River. We don't get along well with the idea of schools."

"...Okay, what are you other reasons?" River asks.

"Well, it's like this. When you start making a formal study of various forms of magic you have to experiment, record your experiments, get them peer-reviewed, that sort of thing, yes?"

River nods.

"I blind people, rot them alive, raise cannibalistic undead slaves, and generally give people bad fucking days."

You see the descent of River's expression from 'oh' to 'ohhhh' to 'Gods fuck where are we going to get all the corpses for that I did not think this through' and nod.

"The directly beneficial uses of necromancy aren't as hard to practice," you point out. "Even the darkness thing is pretty easy to practice in a safe and ethical fashion but the other stuff gets a bit...well, sick. And it's one thing if folks donate their bodies to the betterment of our understanding but hellfire, I am /not/ digging up graves for it. I've read some tomes of what Grandmother called 'wizard necromancy' and that shit...I mean, yes, a lot of necromancers are or go insane, but that shit was just fucking sick."

"I can imagine," River says, tapping her temple.

"So I need some time to think, and to bring up these logistical concerns with Henrietta, and maybe consult the ancestors on the matter," you conclude. "I /like/ the idea, I just have, y'know. /Concerns/."

"What would it mean, if the rest of the family disowned you?" River asks.

"Welll....there's basically two kinds of doing that," you admit. "In the first kind, I and my descendants end up a lot like the Rose Cult la Croix, where we keep the name and uphold the duty but are seen as separate. There'd be bad blood for a few generations, definitely some scorn, but ultimately we're still /family/, with all that entails."

"What's the second version?" your sister asks.

"Someone, but probably the vampire hunters, murders us all in our beds and buries us in boxes to seal our ghosts away. I don't think that's likely, though. That's for branches that go bad. Or...well, people. Like Aunt Carol, rest her soul." You sigh. "At least she's had the chance to move on. I hope I can see her again, in the Sunless Lands."

River shifts her position, moving her legs to stretch them, and lets out a deep breath. "Whatever we hit next, the Lush is gonna know we're here. These grasses won't hide us forever or even for much longer. They're only around the very borders of the place."

"So once we go loud, we're in for it?" you ask.

"Pretty much. What do we hit next?"

> Hit the farms; you need to liberate the citizens
> Attack the Seedhouse; it's vital to the future of the Cornucopia
> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies
> Attack the entrenched position at the river; it's tough, but you could take out a lot of the Lush's forces by surprise

>> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies

> Hit the farms; you need to liberate the citizens

> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies
We need to capitalise on what we did with Piercing Cry. Any opinions on that River?

>> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies

Isn't this what we made the charms for? To hide us from the Lush?

We did think to wreck the corpses at the Lizard pens so the necromancer can't raise them to ask questions right?

>>> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies

>You see the descent of River's expression from 'oh' to 'ohhhh' to 'Gods fuck where are we going to get all the corpses for that I did not think this through'
Illustrated

PRETTY MUCH

A surprise attack would be nice but....

> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies

Which can still be a surprise attack if we have Sir Fetch await our orders with the lizombies.

>49176110
> Try to sneak into the Quickling Grove; you can leave the lizards in the grass while you do diplomacy with the harpies

IS.
BRI.
FULL.
OF.
E G G S
G
G
S

Not yet, but give her a week after the BBEG bites the dust, she and Amy will be full of them. Nathan will be with Brook recovering from a broken hip.

That reminds me.

We don't make enough boner puns with Nate.
>I'm a necromancer, watch me raise this bone!
>hurr durr spongy tissue
>*argument about baculums*

You know, we need to make some boner puns with Nate, after we gut the Lush. Rape kinda makes dick jokes distasteful.

Remember that deck of cards that Brianna gave to Nathan? You would not /believe/ the cute, funny, and naughty promises contained within.

One of those is the 'Spread those Hero Genes' card, with prerequisites of 'Ring on Finger' and 'Death to the Dick'.

Kek, family fun night is just a chance to fuck each others brains out.

You know something we haven't checked but should: the evidence that the Librarian sent us. I want to know if its real, Diviner bullshit or a picture of dickbutt. Its too bad we have out hands full with the Lush to find out,

I expect it to be legitimate.

But I also give fifty percent to it being just the guys that built the dam cutting corners on it so it caved in on its own eventually.

>Not introducing the kids to the rest of the family, living and otherwise. Except for Mark. Fuck him.
>Not playing games in the graveyard with ghosts and undead farm animals.
>Not trying to hold back tears and failing as Mom's spirit sings a lullaby to put the kids to bed.

For shame user, for shame. You lack imagination.

That comes later, and we got a motherfucking lullaby choir.

I don't think we should allow Brianna to pursue vengeance in any direct fashion. I mean, remember Aunt Carol? She became the cliche necromancer villain to punish the thieves that desecrated her sisters grave, and it was all in vain.

I think, once this is finished and we have said evidence in hand, we should give it to that General Thorn (who also seems to have come from the Blind Marshes, and was immediately positively-disposed towards Brianna), or to Henrietta herself. They can see to it that those responsible are brought to justice, and restitution delivered to the surviving kin of those who died in the flood.

These people killed an entire village, user.

Just saying, Vengeance is something they deserve, but more importantly Justice is something the villagers deserve.

We turned down the librarians offer because we don't accept revenge at any cost, not because we don't accept it.

Passed out at my desk. Awake long enough to mention this. Will call and write when I wake back up; votes remain open.

Thank you for your patience.

... We kind of did accept the offer though?

Bri got very very angry, and told him that even if he hadn't tried to 'bribe' her, she'd have probably taken the geargrinders to safety, since they were effectively unborn children at that point.

We're not interested in vengeance too much. The biggest thing Bri probably wants to know is just the /why/. After that, she'll pass along the info like has already been said. The offer of the information is a double-sided blade in a lot of ways. It creates a distraction for us, along with an incentive, and might buy time in the form of having us leave the dungeon to resolve it.

We can't go back to the marshes until we're done.

The La Croix, the entire Marsh, deserve justice. Justice at the expense of those still living, they'd object to.

Good night Vox.

>We can't go back to the marshes until we're done.
Yeah, but it's an easy matter to just pass the package along to authorities in-between floor takeovers. Hell we can straight up ask them to only act on it if we lose.

Pretty much this.

We don't actually have to carry anything up either. Just have a Harpy deliver it to someone of authority on the surface, like Henrietta.

If we lose, the world ends. So, yeah.