Renew the Pact: Time of our Lives, part 21

Log Info

• Title: Renew the Pact: Time of our Lives, part 21
• Emitter: Whirlpool
• Characters: Paenitia, Aryia, Seyardu, Lyme, Fallon
• Place: Goldcoast of Veyshan, Tashraan: Auction Vaults, the choatic streets
• Time: Friday, November 05, 2021, 9:41 PM
• Summary: The Time Eater charges the adventurers who bravely run away. Out, into the streets, down alleys, through stores. They are shouting and waving to drive people out of their way. As they do, they realize others aren't seeing the creature, although the guards did. This is a puzzle they'll have to sort out, including whether they will steal the items or not.

Previously

The time trippers continue to explore the auction vault, hoping to uncover clues of what happened or what they might have done. Seyardu casts an invisibility purge, which reveals several crates and upsets the guards. There's a strange sensation in the air, as if they're being watched, but only the time trippers sense it. Paenita runs around, being a distraction while Seyardu uses some more spells to figure out what has gone wrong. Once again, the Explorer's guild has sent a bunch of fighters and a cleric to deal with an esoteric magic time, their skills are woefully inadequate. Images of themselves appear, some stealing items, another set seemingly being pursued, from what Aryia can make out of her own handsigns. They decide they've caused enough trouble, and leave.

Boy, the guards are glad to see the end of you. So is the officer of the auction house. They did not love bringing you here. As you depart the vault, the officers steal it behind you. You know it only opens twice a day, so if you want to come back and try to break in, it's going to have to be on another day. You're escorted from the building at this point, having made quite a scene at this point.

The guards standing beside you are talking.

"Glad to see the end of this job."

"Yeah, I thought I'd die before--"

His torso suddenly erupts in a spray of viscera as something cleaves through him. The spray is all over you.

Impaled on its large, bony hand, a skeletal, avian creature leans over you. Skeletal, but not flesh-less. Thin and stretched over its gaunt body, the large vulture-like being studies you intently. Sniffs once.

"Messy business," it rattles, "but here we are again. Here I am again, for you. For all of you."

...now you know what's chasing you, yes, or at least one of those things. It reaches for the other guard.

"I'm afraid we can't have any witnesses." The guard, feebly drawing his blade, has his skull immediately crushed.

But at least it gives you a chance to RUN.

Now

So, stick around and face the horrible thing, or run.

The group is not in the vault anymore. They were being escorted out and then this thing came out of nowhere and murdered the guards.

Who could possibly get blamed for that?

"Ah! It is the murder we are blamed for!" The little Red Knight shouts, then tells her companions, "Run! It is not the good time to die!"

She pushes, to get them going, bringing up her shield. She points at the weird, void vulture, "You will fight only me!"

More shoving. "Later."

SHOVE, "A lot later."

Aryia was glad to be out of that vault. The tension was so high, it was probably going to set off an anxiety attack. Especially after seeing another version of herself signing that something was coming. That certainly didn't set any foreboding warnings-

Her face gets covered in blood.

Aryia craaaanes her head back. Blinks a few times. Then, almost catchphrase at this point, a hissed phrase spills from her lips."F-ck."

She starts running the hell away.

GAME: Lyme rolls intimidate: (13)+8: 21 (Lyme will Aid)
GAME: Paenitia rolls intimidate: (5)+13: 18

Lyme looks up and back, and "well, shit." He's fine to start running, but he takes a moment to stand behind Paenitia, arms folded, growling at the void-thing. Then, as the posturing completes, he turns and starting fucking running.

Seyardu blinks, and looks up to find the guards slain, and a horrifying vulture creature there. A number of thoughts cross her mind, namely, had they attempted to run before, if running was the correct thing to do, or if they were just getting themselves played into exactly the same loop that had proven no success so many times.

Then the second guard's skull is crushed, and she decides not to be the Seyardu to test that theory. So she turns and begins running with the others who seemed to have decided the same.

It stands there, staring at Paenitia at her challenge before it simply lets the guards body fall to the ground, headless and spraying blood, as it begins to advance on them.

Seems they have its attention, for the moment, but whether or not that's a good thing for them remains to be seen. Slowly, it begins to pick up its pace.

"No more of this, little ones. This time, your lives end on time."

GAME: Paenitia rolls intimidate-2: (3)+13+-2: 14

The Red Knight dashes ino the streets. Everywhere, people are panicking. Well, they aren't, but the little lucht is working on that. "Flee! The doom is upon you! Clear the streets, the time to die is now!"

She also cackles. So a three foot tall, heavily armoured, red dervish with a grinning face is laughing, screaming, and otherwise raising hell.

GAME: Aryia rolls athletics+4: (12)+14+4: 30

Aryia darts into an alley. There are a number of barrels and crates stacked against a wall. They make it possible for her to vault herself up onto a roof top. The crates could be thrown down to slow down the time-eater once the others are through.

Aryia is considerably much faster than everyone. Doubly so when she's fucking terrified. Her face is pale like a snow elf's and her feet hammer faster against the ground than a dwarvish speed smithing competition. Still, that little spark of camaraderie is in her, which keeps her from blasting off out of reach of her friends. "We didn't fucking DO ANYTHING!" she motions in front of her widely. She barrels through the crowd, darting into an alleyway. Spotting some barrels stacked up, she hops to the top of them, waving her friends through before dismounting and drop kicking the side of the stack, knocking them over. She lands easily with her magic boots, and keeps running

GAME: Lyme rolls intimidate: (17)+8: 25

Lyme looks up and just /bellows/: "ALRIGHT EVERYBODY MOOOVE" letting the full orciness of his long-suppressed orcy accent come through. You can just hear the tusks mangling those words as he says them. He's running, but he aims for the areas of greatest movement -- trying not to bull, but rather, to hit the gaps.

The oruch BLOWS through the crowd and into the alley. Now, he can see what Aryia is doing, lined up beside some barrels and crates that are stacked against one of the walls here, and ready to set them tumbling.

Climb to the roof, or help her hurl them down at the time eater to slow it down.

Or just run on through the alley.

GAME: Paenitia rolls intimidate-2: (11)+13+-2: 22

Reaching the alley, the little lucht darts down it and manages to run the entire length, catching up with the orc. She continues to holler, "Move from the way! This is not the game!"

Seyardu is in the alley because she got hung up on people. Aryia is in the alley for the moment because she is using her remaining actions to slow down the Time-Eater.

GAME: Aryia rolls athletics+4: (18)+14+4: 36

The barrels go tumbling down the alleyway. Very convenient that they were there to ensure you had something to slow down the weird vulture creature with.

It reaches the alleyway only to find it's path impeded by them and it raises a taloned foot and crushes one beneath it, shattering it into splinters. There's a bunch of people shouting on the other end of the alley, calling for help and the guards.

Breaking out of the alleyway, you're now on another busy street full of market stalls. Yes, this is another market, and there's a whole lot of them. Open air cafes with cooling drinks being served with the aid of magic, caged chickens on sale for people, a clothier selling fabrics and textiles, and buildings on either side of the streets that are more brick and mortar shopfronts. There are people everywhere, going about their business, and in this densely packed area it's going to be hard to keep track of each other, let alone navigate it. Trying to blend into the crowd might be possible, but unlikely. That thing seems like it's pretty keyed into you, and there are plenty of shop-fronts you can try to get through and out the back doors on the other side of the street...

... presuming they have one...

GAME: Seyardu rolls perception: (14)+5: 19 (vs DC15)
GAME: Seyardu rolls diplomacy: (19)+13: 32

Seyardu sprints through the alleyway after nearly everyone else, but still thankfully ahead of the creature chasing them. Their back erupts into a pair of wings as they look for a path out of the place. They likely would not listen if she tried to stop and speak to them , and it was better to keep them not involved unless absolutely necessary. She looks for an exit, and finds a door that she shoulders her way through, and she exits the other side into another alleyway.

"Look, this one understands you like spending money due to thinking one has the superior physical form and technique over the other. But I know for certain that the ones watching at the very least are not wishing to perish. If you would like to stay that way, I would suggest moving out of this alleyway as quickly as you can, and staying together if you do not trust those here with you to run off with the money."

...a strange winged dragon person is making very uncomfortable statements that sound very true. They stop. they stare. They start to slink off in the sense that they feel 'busted'.

This leaves Seyardu free, and the others to boot if they can see what shop he went to, to get a move on.

GAME: Aryia rolls perception+4: (17)+22+4: 43
<OOC> Whirlpool says, "...This was a triumph, making a note here, huge success."

Aryia wasted no time, her skidding out of the alleyway and diving in after just barely catching Seyardu through a window. She crashes throb the back, panting, before sliding under Seyardu's wings and taking off to see what's ahead.

GAME: Lyme rolls perception: (5)+4: 9

The oruch barrels on ahead.

GAME: Paenitia rolls bluff-2: (5)+12+-2: 15
GAME: Paenitia rolls perception-2: (6)+5+-2: 9

The Red Knight catches the Mul'niessa's sign, and the shop. Trusting her comrades she follows after her. It's a good route and a good choice, but she is both shorter and more heavily armoured. She also doesn't see as well, because of her mask.

Her efforts aren't completely farcical, but there is some urgent jumping, and pushing, and banging people in knees and running down the aisles of the shop. As a waist high red-hat, she's not easy to spot, but also hard to miss.

Still, she escapes.

Having been delayed by the barrels initially, the Time-Eater lets out a weary-sounding sigh. "Again, you only delay the inevitable."

The shoppers are all looking at them oddly, in their hurry. There's a lot of 'watch where you're going' and yelling at them...

GAME: Seyardu rolls perception: (12)+5: 17
GAME: Paenitia rolls perception: (5)+5: 10
GAME: Aryia rolls perception: (2)+22: 24

"Yes we buying time, we buy enough, the problem go away. Even you." A child-like voice with adult tones and inflections comes randomly out of the crowd.

No screams of fright. Glancing back into the shop as it's entering and ... no one sees it. It's *only visible to you*.

Now people DID see the murders, but they ...definitely just saw *you* there.

There's a good question as to why they saw it and no one else did. I mean, they saw people EXPLODE IN A MESS, and that's *definitely* not the murder you were apparently accused of from the last time loop. But, hey, if there's another, you'll probably be wanted by the guards for killing guards and that;'s so much better, right? ;)

Well, the murder FARLAND was accused of anyway

So far, right now, the adventurers have: run down an alley, knocked over some barrels, passed through a street, ducked through a shop, ducked into another alley, broke up a fighting ring, and then ran out onto the next street over.

Causing chaos everywhere they go.

Fruit stands are next on the list.

So far, they adventurers are trapped in an iterating time loop. The consequences of previous iterations were visible, but not to others who couldn't see them. Changes in the past, such as replaced items, which others couldn't, is the thing. They went to the Temple of Navos, and found it corrupted by Void spawn. Then, they travelled back in time, and are now playing through *another* loop, which was revealed to you by the Navosian you previously killed.

Talking to Akorinil, they got access to the 'unaltered' and original auction list.

And decided to steal the items from the auction and bring them to the future so that you can buy them properly and break the loop.

Or not.

OOC

 ===================== Current Initiative Order - Round 1 =====================
 ---Init--Name------------AOO-Notes--------------------------------------------
     19   Seyardu          1  Flat-footed (0 rnds active)                  
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     13   Aryia            6  Flat-footed (0 rnds active)                  
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     6    Lyme             1  Flat-footed (0 rnds active)                  
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
     5    Paenitia         1  Flat-footed (0 rnds active)                  
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
     4    Time-Eater          
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 ==============================================================================

<OOC> Whirlpool says, "You are all starting on the same 'card'. :)"
<OOC> Whirlpool says, "https://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/other-rules/chases/"
<OOC> Paenitia says, "I'm lower than average speed, so that's a -2 on all rolls, isn't it? I think I'll go with Intimidate"
<OOC> Aryia will bull rush through it, +4 from 20 extra speed over 30
GAME: Aryia rolls athletics+4: (6)+14+4: 24
GAME: Seyardu rolls athletics: (5)+-1: 4
<OOC> Aryia says, "its +-2 per +-10 feet past 30"
<OOC> Paenitia says, "usually 30feet is average, and it's -2/+2 for every 10' different"
<OOC> Whirlpool says, "A character who wants to attempt to move three cards during his turn can do so by taking a full-round action. That character must overcome both obstacles on the card he is leaving. In this case, if a character fails either obstacle check by 5 or less, he only moves one card forward and his turn ends. If a character fails either obstacle check by more than 5, he cannot move at all that turn. A character unfortunate enough to fail two obstacle checks in a turn becomes mired in his current square (he might have fallen from a ledge, gotten a foot stuck amid roots, or got caught in a crowd, for example). A character who is mired must spend another full-round action becoming unmired and effectively loses his next turn in the chase. In some cases, becoming mired might impart additional penalties (such as falling damage)."