The Big Bad Tree (Part II) WHO: Mateo & Eli; Faihan & Juliet; Mateo, Santi, Nati, & Brisa WHEN: May 14 (~1 A.M. / ~2 A.M.) WHERE: UML; Akane's Residence; Central Park SUMMARY: Eli and Mateo set off to see if Akane or the brothers (or the kill switch) can be found at UML, while Juliet and Faihan head to Akane's mansion. Upon their return, Santi gets an idea for how to keep the tree from growing further... CW: N/A
UML
Due to the previous incursion, there were more security guards around than before, but otherwise, the university seemed normal. Nyx was able to escort them via shadow to where they needed to go...which was a big help.
The cats sensed strange vibes coming from underground, so Mateo and Eli agreed that they should try to find access to the basement-that-should-not-exist through the storage room the restricted area.
Using a well-placed window, the managed to get inside the area, where they found a strange stake stuck into the ground within a magical circle.
"That's not suspicious at all," Mateo noted (very sarcastically).
Eli thought about grabbing the stake, but thought they should be careful and asked Mateo if he had any ideas. Mateo asked Nyx, who said he didn't recognize the magic, but it is unquestionably the shady kind of magic that Joaco's acquaintance uses. He suggested making sure there were no traps, and so the two humans went on a trap hunt.
Eli triggered a trap, but managed to get away and disarm it. Mateo managed to find a few more and quickly disarmed them. They decided that they'd gotten enough out of the way that at least they could field anything else, and so Eli asked if Mateo wanted to pull the stake out, or if he should. Mateo readied his scythe and told Eli to go ahead.
Eli took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and yanked out the stake. A strange, quiet cry echoed in the back of their minds eerily.
"I hope that wasn't someone we cared about," said Mateo.
"Yeah, now I think we probably should have done more research," Eli agreed.
"Nyx, can you notice if anything changed?"
"That seems to have disrupted the flow of a spell...I'm not sure what type, or what it was for," the cat replied.
"So that's done. Time to go...or should we see if there's anything else?" Eli asked.
"Let's go. Nyx, are Joaco and Alejo still not on this plane?"
"I can't sense either of them yet."
Eli swore as he gripped the stake.
"Well, let's hope that takes care of the tree. Nyx, is there any other spells going on nearby?"
"Not from here that I can feel at least...we should bring that thing with us to study it, though."
"And maybe take a picture of the circle? I can do that," Mateo offered.
"Feel free to try, but it may not show up on your phone if it's all magic."
"Don't know if it'll work until you try it." And it seemed that taking the shot was worth it, because an image did show up on the phone this time.
There didn't seem to be anything else of note around, so they decided to go back to the park and meet back up with the others.
AKANE'S RESIDENCE
Akane Araki lived in a three-storey mansion, surrounded by a fence, guarded by two security personnel and cameras, and fully staffed with servants.
Faihan and Juliet decided to approach the mansion from the side, sending Elpis to scout ahead first. The bird spotted the guards, the building, and a few nice trees, but nothing else, so Faihan and Juliet decided to climb the fence and use the trees for cover. They made it to the mansion, but Faihan's attempts to prise open a door ended in laughable failure...
A guard started their way, so Juliet sent Slappy to distract him, and the squirrel managed to draw the guard well away. The two humans decided they might have better luck on the second floor, and so Juliet did a gunbreaker powered flip onto a second floor balcony, while Faihan awkwardly scaled a drain pipe and had to be pulled onto the balcony.
Once again, Faihan's attempts to tug the door open met failure, but Juliet noticed there was an electric security mechanism on the door.
"I got this," she said with a feral smirk and tried a small, concentrated lightning attack on the lock. The door came open. They asked the two guardians to scout the room, but the guardians found nothing and left obvious signs of their presence. Faihan just hoped that that meant there wasn't anything bad inside. They decided to just go in and do a search of the second room to see if they could find either Akane's bedroom or anything useful. Faihan listened carefully at the doors, but only heard what might have been WAP played from afar. Juliet knocked over a table, but found nothing.
Faihan decided to start using magic then and put out his feelers, discovering there was magic going on in several places within the building, but most notably, a source from underground seemed to be connected to something far away. The two went in search of an elevator, but the basement was locked. They managed to use a joined lightning attack to override the security mechanism and found themselves in a space reminiscent of the hallways of the cathedral back in Serenitas.
"This will be...a cinch," Faihan muttered and began to cast his searching spell again. There were multiple rooms which he could sense were sealed by a dangerous and intricate magic unfamiliar to him. One of the doors, however, led to the magic he'd sensed earlier, and it seemed to be less guarded. Juliet tried the handle was was nearly stabbed when the knob turned into a spear.
Faihan tried to discern the nature of the magic on the door using Song and noticed there were multiple traps—and that it would only open with a spell. He decided to use a spell known to him as "Chatter of Mice," which summoned many tiny magical mice to chew through the magic's bindings. With an assist from Juliet, they managed to unlock the door. Inside, there was a magical circle with a stake in the middle.
Juliet set to looking around the space for clues, and Faihan cast another spell to discern the magic of the room. He managed to notice the traps and warned Juliet before she triggered them. He also noticed that the stake was flowing energy to two different places away from one another...and just then, one of those spots disappeared.
He thought maybe one had been the tree and the other the brothers and thought it might be helpful to try to trace the remaining line to see if he could contact the brothers. Elpis told him that was a terrible idea, but he tried anyway and was hit with a mental attack—creepy whispers, crying, and other upsetting, spooky sounds filled his head.
They decided to go ahead and pull the stake, and Juliet yanked it out of the ground. They could both hear a scream in their heads. Juliet also decided to scream just for fun, and Faihan was not amused. He turned his attention to Elpis, asking if she could sense the brothers now, but she couldn't. She suggested they get out and regroup at the park. The two humans agreed, feeling they'd already been stupendously lucky and not wanting that luck to run out.
They managed to escape without incident, but left all too many clues that they'd been there...
Regrouping at the park, Faihan reported on the stake they'd found (and was disappointed that the tree had grown up to twelve storeys at that point and the brothers were nowhere to be found). Mateo was relieved that they, too, had found a stake and pulled it. Faihan suggested Eli and Juliet take a break and go to Tabago Town to get some sleep. Nyx suggested he do the same, but he would not, so the cat salted at him and left.
Meanwhile, the Tech Squad began their efforts...
Mateo brought a truckload of materials—which he said everyone assembled was free to share. He began to work on a couple of elemental fighters (spending extra time to be able to adjust the elements to attack as needed—more for research than to continue trying to remove the barrier). Brisa began building additional medical bots in case they wanted to try continuously using healing magic on the tree.
The stakes gave Santi an idea to create a disruptive pulse that would create its own barrier based on something he'd previously worked on. The group set themselves to the task, and thanks to Mateo and Santi, managed to create a gadget that was able to, for the time being, stop the growth of the tree.
Faihan wanted to know if they could repurpose the Jar of Soul to potentially draw magic back from the tree, but Santi said their WIP would not work in that way. That said, there was a possibility they could repurpose the concept to create something like that...