Scene Listing || Scene Schedule || Scene Schedule RSS
Owner Pose
Dominic Masoch     Welcome to the ocean. It's fairly uneventful, actually, a calm day with gently rolling waves that occasionally rock the Alexander Academy Expedition Ship, which is a mid-sized vessel that is mostly meant to house analysis and excavacation equipment. Right now, on the planning deck, Dominic is going over some maps and schematics.

    "About a hundred meters below us is the wreck of the old Ramuhan Ship, the HMA Fenrir's Howl. It's particularly signficant because it predates the Al Cid dynasty in terms of age. This means that while there's likely very little of mechanical use, the historical artifacts could be staggering. Unfortunately, that also means it's been down there a long time," He notes, rubbing the back of his head.

    "Parts are collapsing, rusting, and decaying. That was manageable. What's not manageable is that tidal season shifting has made it a den ground now for Anguiforms and Exocites that need to be cleared out before operations can resume," He points at a couple pictures: http://i.imgur.com/PtR154w.png

    "Fairly common enemies, but numbers as well as the aquatic environment have elevated this to a B-Class dungeon equivalent, which means specialists are needed to clear it out."
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason was happy to be home more or less, she enjoyd the feel of the water, the air the sun and was otherwise in a veyr good mood. She listens as Dominic give them the run down about it and today he drones were with her. She thinks for a moment about the idea the ship is older than the Al Cid's rule.

"So look for the things people who work in the history department or at a musesam woudl want to get. I can see the value in treasure like that. Ah I see so clear out the local sea vermin shuld be easy enough."

THe Levitan i woman takes a moment to remove her jacket, and her boots, and one would get the idea her clothing is more or less moduslar and she's down basically to the swim suit like section as she's ready to get ready to go for a swim more or less if needed. She also adjusts her goggles down.

"Ready on my end for this, and I'll let the team know if anything gets odd with the water."
Kyra Hyral     Given that this is a Levanti "dungeon," bathing suits seem pretty mandatory. Kyra's gone one on but right now it's hidden by her usual skirt and shirt. The hoodie is gone for the moment and her super pale skin is exposed to the HORRIBLE HARSH SUNLIGHT. Kyra's taken the necessary precautions for this, however, and has liberally applied sunscreen all over herself. Without the hoodie, it's much easier to see the gear she usually straps herself down with-bandoliers, guns, pouches. The usual heavy boots are replaced by sandals as well.

    "So we get to be specialists today." Kyra grins, wiggling her fingerless-gloved fingers. "Good. I've got a bunch of bolt bombs I can deploy against those monsters."
William Pauwel     After just barely crawling out of a nautical nightmare with life and limb intact, one might excuse a guy like Will for being... hesitant about going right back into the sea. But with a clean bill of health (minus a few electricity burns), Will seems just about as chipper as anyone else to get back to the ocean. After all, he didn't get to swim at all the last time, and he's been promised** that there will definitely be absolutely no ancient electrokinetic ultracorals around here.

(**By another flyer)

    Will is dressed in a simple pair of shorts and a heavy harness festooned with a whole bunch of *things* hanging from it. Various handtools, waterproof containers and a number of other potentially useful doo-dads dangle from easily accessible carabiners. He's... also still pretty well-bandaged, but it'll probably be fine! Probably. "Well, if it's salvage, then you've come to the right guy! Though uh."

He hesitates, "...Never really tested what happens if Solano touches saltwater."
Xiao Li Yu      "Oh boy. Specialists. How quaint." Xiao intoned mildly after the briefings lulled. "In addition to rusting and decaying, I imagine we'll be in generally cramped spaces with hazards all around. Fun, fun~." She chirped, smiling wryly, her golden eyes twinkling. Surely this was going to be the exact opposite of fun, no matter how you looked at it.

     That aside, the scientist seemed to be prepared for the thing anyway. A full body swimsuit adorned her figure from foot to neck. It was black with white segments scattered about the sides. A moderately sized chrome metal pod was affixed to her back, and her usual gauntlets were replaced for a more sleeker pair that seemed to be interfaced with the suit itself. Lines of magic energy occasionally thrummed through the suit, from the gauntlets, and to the pod on the back.

     Of course, she couldn't just put on a simple swimsuit, and use normal diving equipment, could she? Nope. "So, we go down, clear out anything that tries to stop us, and secure any artifacts we find? Will that be all?"
Staren     Staren's on a ship for the second time this week! As usual, he's in his armor. It's... kind of necessary for expeditions like this, after all. Underwater presents its own problems, though... his suit can /do/ it, but his normal weapons and forcefield won't work. He's done the best he can -- including jets that will allow him some level of underwater propulsion for more than walking -- but it's a sub-optimal setting all the same. "Specialists is good. I'm not really... experienced with underwater ops." Staren rubs his helmet. "Geeze, nobody else needs to wear full armor, huh? Just swimsuits?"
Dominic Masoch     "Salvage artifacts if you want, but that's not really your main job," Dominic tells people honestly, "You're being asked to specifically clear out the fauna that has taken up residence in there that is stopping the team that was excavating before from doing their jobs. That's the primary goal today."

    "It's pretty deep under water, so if you're not used to it, even normally easy monsters could prove difficult," He adds as he puts on a headset, "I'll be up here monitering progress and the weather status, particularly since this technically counts as a B-Rank Qualifier for a few people here, so I can't interfere in that," He adds as he drops into a chair.

    "The Academy has provided underwater breathing equipment for those without their own gear or magic that allows them to do so. Feel free to head down when you're ready. There's a beacon at the ship to let people located it from back when other people were excavating."
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason is checking her gear and is getting what seems to be some sort of harpoon rifle out of a weapons crate she's also making sure her cutlass is ready as well. She can sure hold her breath a good bit but she's looking into pulling out rebreather. Shje looks over to Xiaop for a moemtn with a grin.

"Oh come on I'm from Kara'a'Din. The city home to the largest salvage and ship yard on the plate. This is going to be fun, and got it it's a cleaning mission."

With that Lyria is ready to dive on into the depths of her home plate she does look over to make sure everyone else is ready first and she pauses at Staren.

"We need to talk shop about that armor later, Staren."
Staren     Staren nods, giving a thumbs up at the clarification of mission. When warned about the unusual environment, he nods and promises, "I'll be careful." What else can he do?

    Staren shrugs at Lyria. "If I keep having to do underwater ops, I might get special underwater armor..."
Kyra Hyral     At the realization that they'd be 'pretty deep underwater', Kyra suddenly gets very busy rearranging her weapons, knowing that a lot of the whole napalm-based items and the like aren't going to work very well underwater. Certain darts that delivered poisons or chemicals would, on the other hand, functioning like tiny death-dealing harpoons. She hums to herself as she fixes up her gear, soon donning one of the provided underwater breathing equipment-magitech of course that slowly drew on Kyra's own MP to power aero magic. The excess clothing is discarded, Kyra now down to her red and white bikini.

    From there, she makes a thumbs up motion at Dominic. Of course she wishes her fencer was accompanying them personally. With that, she slips into the water and sinks downward towards the ship.
Xiao Li Yu      "Mmhmm. So focus on clearing out the monsters. That's simple~." And with a nod, Xiao proceeded off. Lyria gets a look in the meanwhile. "Well, I'm from a band of wanderers who live in the desert. So this couldn't be further from the norm to me." A shrug followed. "But well, it could be interesting. ...Or a disaster."

     She put her money on disaster.

     Oh well, time to go! With a press of a button by her neck, a visor and compact helmet formed over Xiao's head, also doubling as a breathing unit. She made the dive with Kyra, taking point as the one with the obvious frontline fighter Jobs in the crew. And as she did so, she prepared a spell. "Aspir." A shimmering blue aura surrounded her at that point. What? Her tech ran on MP. If she was going to be down here a while, then she'd be stealing it from their enemies to keep herself topped off.
William Pauwel     Will shrugs on what diving gear the Academy has been able to provide. It's just about the first time he's had to wear anything at all like this- but he knows how rebreathers work, and he knows that goggles go over the eyes and flippers on the feet. "Well, here's hopin' the old handcannon doesn't disagree with the sea. Else this' gonna be a real quick trip!"

    "Best head down now, though. The sooner we go, the sooner we get back." Will pauses shortly before he wanders chest-deep into the sea. "Uhhh. What kind of things SHOULD we expect, anyway? Not... coral, right?"

"I have issues with coral."
Dominic Masoch     "Crabs and snakes," Dominic says in response to will, absently looking at sea charts.

    The dive down is long and, after a point, very dark. Luckily, lights were provided for those who wants to grab one, and there's a beacon on the ship that makes it easy for anyone with navigation equipment to know where they're heading. The deeper they go, the more the water cools down, before slowly starting to heat up again as they approach the floor.

    When the ship is in sight, the reason why becomes apparent. The ship crashed very close to a vent in the floor that's spewing hot water into the area. The vent is close enough to substantially warm the water, but far enough that there's no risk of it scalding anyone with water that's too hot.

    The ship itself is cracked in half, the decayed remnants of an inflated balloon barely visible on the floor of the sea, time and animals having destroyed most evidence of it save a few tatters. The ship looks like a schooner, split down the center and tipped to the ocean floor. It's very old, with the wood starting to rot away and the metal fastenings being the longest surviving parts of it.

    The problem is also immediately visible: The warm water spot amidst all the cold has attracted those monsters mentioned before, and the ship is crawling with them. Dozens, perhaps hundreds, of crab-like creatures about the size of large dogs are wandering around the floor and the crevices, while dozens of several-meter long sea serpents are coiling around in and above the ship.
Lyria Mason Lyria Mason takes a moment to double check her goggles, then she checks the last of her gear she then leaps into the water, and looks at hom there swimming as she is on the depths of a ship. Also it would be flear that her shoulders and upper arms have these long coiling serpent like tatoos, natives might know them as serpents coil a habit of lower to middle class Levitani then agian given Lyria's family is /new money/ this makes a lot of sense.

<<That's a lot of crabs hope you land lubbers are ready for this. Might be a thing or we coul mod yours Staren.>>

She gets the auto harpoon gun off her back redy as she decents but she knows she'll be doing a lot of sword work today.

<<Oh the serpents those make good eating if we're lucky we can feast after this is over>>

She presses on ahead near the lead of the party as they all decend. She keeps note of Kyra, Staren, Xiao and WIlliam as they decend too after all this is the first time of them have been this deep on the plate as far as she knows.
Staren     Down they go! Staren tries not to think about how crushing, unbreathable water is all around him, outside a relatively thin layer of metal and composites... really, is it that different from going out into vacuum?

    His helmet has a head light on it, as well as there being a couple of other lights on his armor. Vision's not a problem as long as there isn't too much sand and mud in the water...

    Staren looks at the ship for a moment, taking it in, mapping the immediate area, checking how well his sensors work underwater... and then suddenly, oh hey, crabs! And... "Oh geeze, those sea serpents are huge..." Staren tries to stay close to the others. He's less mobile, walking rather than swimming, though he's attached some underwater thrusters to his armor that let him jump somewhat gracefully. He does not feel confident in just wading in and fighting, here... so he'll let the more experienced underwater warriors start the fight however they do, and then pitch in on their chosen targets.
Kyra Hyral     Ah, an ancient airship. Kyra expected this and can see the very outline of the balloon that the older airships were well known for. Older airships that Kyra has only seen displayed in museums, meaning that this was an old wreck indeed. She descends further, slipping into the darkness, seeing the glow of the nearby vent, feeling the warmth on her skin.

    Then she sees the absolutely enormous amounts of hostile sea life down below, killer crabs and, more concerning, giant serpents. She stares, stopping to tread water far above the teeming masses. It was /dangerous/, but...

    No, she wouldn't run from danger. Kyra holds her hands together and murmurs into the lower mask covering her mouth and nose. White magic stirs inside of her, her entire form glowing like a star.

    This is the only warning the creatures get before Kyra drops a holy down on them like an orbital laser.
William Pauwel Crabs and snakes! That sounds significantly less horrifying than the last awful thing that he had to deal with. Will throws up an A-OK sign and trudges off into the sea. He shudders a bit as the water soaks into his bandages and the salt stings at his wounds.

That's how he knows they're healing, right?

Right.

    Will takes a few moments on the long journey down to make sure his gun still works. Fortunately, it looks like not even the sea's corrosive touch can befoul the technology of the Ancients. The Solano blazes with arcs of coruscating energy as Will half-depresses the trigger. It serves as good of a torch as anything else, but he elects to make use of one of the lights he was provided instead.

No need to tempt fate. Or overtax the power cells.

    Soon enough though, they do eventually find their way to the venerable vessel. It's definitely exactly as was promised: a nicely sized, well-crafted ship that is almost certainly either home to some kind of awful boss-type monster, if his luck is any indication. More importantly though, the monsters are just about as promised as well.

Crabs. Lots and lots and lots of crabs. And serpents!

    His compatriots are wasting no time in unleashing HOLY LASERS and other similarly ridiculous implements of destruction. Will glances left, glances right, then shrugs and takes aim with his oversized handgun. Bolts of crackling energy discharge from the weapon, boiling water to steam as they streak down towards the larger crabs. The shots rupture upon impact, unleashing a burst of cavitating bubbles and a sudden cloud of roiling electricity!
Xiao Li Yu      "Well, this is something." Xiao murmured to herself, peering at the wreckage. Absolutely ancient, without a doubt. ...And also teeming with monsters. Oh dear.

     But this is what they were here for! Time to start things off safe and simple. She directed both arms downward, the cores in the palms of her gauntlets thrumming to life. Well, Lightning would be a bad idea in water. As would blizzard and fire. So what could she actually do? Holy, or course. Following Kyra's lead, she began firing beams of Holy down at the crabs that she could see, aiming to either take them out, or scatter them.

     And also drain their MP. She needed that. Yes.
Staren     CRAB BATTLE

    Kyra initiates combat with a crustacean. Staren joins in, firing his beam cannons down at the crabs his compatriots are attacking. Range and damage are reduced underwater, but that still means he can pack a fairly mean punch at a couple hundred feet, instead of ridiculous blasts at a few hundred.