Session 24

Grabbing Hoff by the collar and dragging him back to the Inn for a recovery nap, the team turn to Siobhan to get to know her.

"So... You're a local girl?"

"Yeah - I grew up with semi-adoptive father figure. It's sad because he's a trainer (who specialises in critical hits) but he never seems to get much business. Still, he taught me everything I know!"

"He ever gets any business? That's a shame. I wonder why that is. It sounds like critical hits would be a really brilliant thing to get trained in..."

"I dunno. Still, if YOU want to give him some business be aware that he's VERY VERY VERY expensive. Oh, and he works in Kounos (the tiny village you can't get to half-way over the impenetrable mountain pass). Oh, and he will only train people between 8 and 9 in the morning. Oh, and he always takes his lunch break and goes to the pub between 8 and 9 in the morning. Oh, and he doesn't like people knowing he's a trainer..."

After hearing about her dad, it sort of makes sense that despite being a 29 year old warrior who's done nothing but train all her life (until the other day when she left her home and sarted hanging around in a house in Beloveno on the off chance someone on an adventure might pass by) she's still only level 7. Even Hoff is level 12 and he's spent almost exactly none of his life training for anything!

I'm also guessing that she's never been to a hair-dresser, since her stat-screen portrait suggests her "do" is about 2.5 meters long. It looks amazing in the picture because she's been drawn standing in a strong wind and it's all flying out to one side behind her - VERY dramatic, windswept and interesting. But has this planet invented tangle-free shampoo? No one in the party has a comb in their inventory...

We stop off for a rest, then return to the basement Hoff had signed us up to clear of monsters.As we're walking through the house to the stairs down, we stop momentarily to chat to a child who lives there.

"I hope I don't get asked to fetch any more wood from the cellar for mummy and daddy. I don't like having to kill the flying creatures that live down there..."

Seriously? That kid must be super hard-core. It's a crazily hardcore series of fights down there and my team of blood-thirsty adults have to pop back for more resting after pretty much every encounter. Siobhan is in fact left poisoned and insane after one fight!) If this boy is swatting them with such ease that he sort of feels bad for the monsters, why did the owners of this place hire Hofstedt to clear the basement out?

Actually, it's quite irritating. Level 7 Siobhan looks like she'll be dead handy when she starts building up some XP. But it's hard to get her to do that since she keeps being killed in every fight. As far as I can see, the XP gets dished out at the end of each encounter and shared equally between everyone who survives. That means that Dirr and Tom (top level characters) tend to get all the levelling up because they're the ones who're tough enough to survive. I guess I'm going to have to buy Siobhan some ace armour so that she has a chance of surviving long enough to benefit from being in a fight at all... To this end, I pinch all the gold out of the chests in this family's basement. There's not all that much really, just 30 or 40 coins - but I reckon that since I'm clearing the place out for them I can get away with clearing them out too. Plus, it's plainly not gold they'll've been relying on since it's been inaccessible in the cellar surrounded by warniaks for who knows how long...

After I've finally got rid of all the problem monsters in the family's basement, I wander back up stairs to gather my thanks from the grateful family.

"*huff puff huff* Phew! We've finally cleared all those monsters out of your basement!"

"Eh? Really? Why did you do that?"

"Y... You asked us to!"

"I don't expect I did! Our son is quite handy enough with the warniaks!"

"But... But we've been coming in and out for days... Every time we've left we've been dragging our un-concious team members... why... why would you just let us do that?!"

"Well I assumd you were some kind of, y'know, contemporary dance troupe..."

The team turn to Hoff who signed them all up for the basement-clearing quest...

"Hoff. Who asked you to clear the basement of monsters?"

"Er... Well... Now you see... The thing is..."

"Excuse me..." (the home owner interjects before a fight can break out in the team) "...You don't have any food do you? We're basically starving for one reason or another..."

Casually, the team thieve the family's remaining food and leave. The whole visit to this house is given up as a bad lot - with the possible exception of the recruitment of Siobhan (who, I noticed, has apparently got nothing at all to do with the family who live there. When I met her she was just standing in the middle of their living room. On talking to her she immediately asked to be allowed to tag along with whatever we were doing, so long as she got to see the world. But at no point do the family there acknowledge her and she certainly never refers to them. Maybe she's another character who, like my own, just shambles round towns blundering into people's homes, killing their pet warniaks and stealing their food and money. Maybe the reason no-one ever says anything about ME nicking their stuff is that there's loads of people on this planet who act in the exact same way and everyone else just takes the imposition for granted...)

On the street we talk briefly to a loony lady who explains:

"I think you should DEFINITELY pester people you know. My mother always told me, pester pester pester, that's how you get the best(er). Oh yes - many times I've spoken to someone and they've told me one thing. Then I talk to them a few more times and they tell me the same thing, but eventually I talk to them enough times and they tell me something different and more in line with what I wanted to hear in the first place! It's true! I can heartily recommend the power of pester power... Pester pester pester I needn't tell you the rest(er)."

Arg. This sounds like the game's designers are telling me to have repeated conversations with characters. This was a variety of "puzzle" that you used to get cropping up in point-and-click adventures back in the day. Lazy designers would decide that if you try the same thing three or four times in a row (e.g. talk to bar man) you get no indication of progress until eventually the victim of your chat-barrage crumbles and gives you the important item (e.g. packet of kettle chips) out of exasperation. This kind of puzzle is 100% no fun and I really hope that I'm reading too much into this woman's obsessively interrogative attitude and that in fact it's not ACTUALLY a clue to an important puzzle later...

Actually, now that I think about it, I wonder if it was a joke character who - if I pester her loads - would give me something ace just to make me go away... I'll have to go back and try pestering the pester suggester...

We stop into a shop to get Dirr's boob-protecting harness mended (did I mention she had one of these? It looks like an incredibly uncomfortable bra made out of one sea-shell and 4 boot laces. There doesn't seem to be much other armour around that Iskai characters can have so there's not much I can do except for making sure the boob-protector is at least not shattered and sticking into her. Also, she's already my toughest character, so I don't feel I should be splashing out on armour for her too much anyway).

While I'm in there, I notice the AWESOME weapons that're available. For 2250 gold coins you can pick up a Danu's Light (some kind of sabre). This is the most expensive weapon in the game so far and there's 4 of them available. Presumably the designers felt that SOMEONE would play the game and have 9000 gold on them when they got this far... Alas, I have only 30 (which I stole from a starving family... did I mention?) so I'm not sure where I've been going wrong... I'm tempted to grind the area until I earn enough for all of my fighters (plus Hoff) to have Danu's Light sabres... But perhaps I'll leave it for now. I'd have to sell a LOT of warniak sphere's to earn that much gold.

I wander into another person's house. It's filled with kids who ask "Have you seen my mummy?" (what is it with this town and a neglectful attitude towards children?!!)

Further into the house (which is large to the point of being probably the most luxuriant private residence I've wandered blithely into so far in the whole game) I meet a man with very bushy eyebrows who is levitating a cup, only to hurriedly un-levitate it as soon as he sees we've seen him doing it. The whole scene stinks to me like he's staged it and DESPERATELY wanted us to know he's a wizard, but also wanted to look like he's mysterious and didn't want us to know he wanted us to know...

Mell - a trained wizard himself - holds up a card with "Nice cup levitation" written on it. But the man says with pretend casualness

"Cup levitation? But there WAS no cup levitation... It must've been a trick" (at this point he waves his hands in front of his eyes theatrically) "of... you miiiiiiiiiiiiind" (this last in a dramatic whispered tone with meaningful eyebrow waggling and winks).

*smack*

*poke*

"Never mind all that. Who're you then?" says Tom, shaking his finger.

"Who am I? Ah ha ha ha ha ha" (the stranger sweeps his cape and releases some doves)

"ooooooh" (this was Dirr, Sira and Siobhan)

"Why I am Khunag!" (a sudden strong wind blows dry-ice smoke up behind the magician who scatters shiny confetti into the breeze to enhance the effect)

"Gosh - you're very impressive!"

"Impressive? But I'm a simple man with nothing remarkable about him" (Khunag sits sharply back down and pretends to be drinking his space-coffee, although he stops this abruptly when he remembers that there's actually nothing in the mug - this having been a precaution against staining his clothes when he did the mug levitation earlier)

"But... ptah fth fth... what about this?" Hoff responds, spitting out glittery confetti and holding it up.

"I don't see anything..." (dramatic turn of the head, pause, and eye-brow twitch) "Unuuuuuuusual! AH HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!" He jumps up and releases a tiger from his pants, then sits back down again as though nothing's happened. A little more eye-brow work and some mysterious pouting of the lips - he seems to be daring... BEGGING someone in the team to mention the tiger so he can pretend not to have noticed anything...

"Uh-huh... Well... We're on a mission to find the enormous planet eating robot space ship that me and Hoff" (indicating the befuddled old man who's looking quite a lot like a magical-item chandelier since I've started using him as my crystal pack-horse recently)

"Oh ho! What an ostentatious outfit your friend has on..." Khunag comments - trying to mask his jealousy of Hoffs splendid magic rings, multiple crystal daggers, pendants and hat. In an attempt to compete with it he jumps up, drops a coloured smoke bomb and whips his clothes inside out, revealing a bejewelled snow-leopard fur cape and silver jump-suit. When the smoke clears he's once again casually sat at the table - again daring anyone to comment...

"Well, it's not really meant to be ostentatious... it's just that I'm not a very good fighter and have no magical abilities so I carry all this stuff to make myself useful when..."

"Ah ha ha ha ha ha!" Khunag cuts Hoff off awkwardly. Embarrassed by Hoff's legitimate reason for wandering round like Liberachi in space he tries to fold his cape around himself and hide the jump-suit - maybe no-one will think he was trying to compete after all...

There's a long awkward silence, then eventually Tom breaks it saying "So... What do you do round here then?"

"Oh, this and that. The odd job here and there. You know how it is" (Khunag makes sure everyone knows this modesty is entirely fake by tapping the side of his nose, winking and flicking his tongue in and out like a conspiratorial lizard).

"Seriously? You're... like... and odd jobs man?"

"Ah yes. I am THESE DAYS..."

"Right. So you just, what, fix people's plumbing and stuff?"

"Indeed. That's the sort of thing I fill my days with NOWERDAYS... not like IN THE OLD DAYS..."

"Hmmm... I guess this makes sense. I've not met any actual labourers on this planet yet so far. Previously I've just met hunters, shop-keepers and politicians. It's nice to find that there ARE handymen around..."

"I DIDN'T USED TO BE A HANDY MAN! I USED TO BE A WIZARD!!! I USED TO BE A MIGHTY POWERFUL WIZARD!!!!!!" he jumps onto the table kicks his shoes off and they turn into doves in the air, does a back flip through a flaming hoop and pulls 15,000 hankies, each of a different colour, out of Sira's ear.

"oh, you used to be a wizard eh?"

"Oh yes. But I gave it all up looooong ago. I'm far too old to be a waizard now..." to demonstrate that he's fibbing and still as fit as ever, he flexes his guns and shoots green sparkles out of his fingers. But then so that it doesn't look like he's posing, he feigns a crooked back and hobbles around the room for a bit winking and going "blblblblblblblblb" with his finger on his lips. Then he does some lunges and pulls a bunch of flowers out of his sleeve, chains himself into a box then steps out of a cupboard on the other side of the room and sits down as though nothing happened.

"Oh, so you don't do any magic any more. Never mind."

"NO! NO! I MIGHT'VE GIVEN IT UP! BUT I'M ACTUALLY WAY MORE POWERFUL THAN I HAVE EVER BEEN IN MY LIFE! I'M NOT TOO OLD AND I CAN MAKE LOVE FOR 10 HOURS STRAIGHT!!!! I'M NOT PAST IT! I GAVE UP MAGIC BECAUSE I WANTED TO SETTLE DOWN AND BECOME A HANDY-MAN / SECRET ADVENTURER!!!" Backflip vancishing into a bucket of water, re-appearing on a crane coming down from the ceiling with several chorus girls who he turns into a eagles playing electric guitars while he whips off his cape, throws it over a table and pulls it away to reveal that it's turned into all the same girls. Then he bangs two solid hoops together until they are linked, pulls a pheasant out of a hat, rips his beard off to reveal that he was a beautiful chorus girl all along then steps out of the cupboard behind the fake him again and makes an elephant disappear.

"WOW!! That was AMAZING!!!" Hoff blurts out.

"Sorry, what was amazing? I didn't notice anything..." (Khunag is sat back at the table with a wry smile and an arched eyebrow... and has he had that eye-liner all along?) "It must've been a trick... Of the mind!!!" (waving his fingers close across his face. More winking).

Dirr taps Tom on his shoulder "this guy's clearly amazing! We should definitely have him on the team!"

"I agree - I'll ask him." Then turning back to the eccentric magician. "Listen, we were wondering if you'd join our quest - we could really do with someone with your skills on board!"

Jumping up, punching the air and celebrating that his pitch had worked, Khunag can hardly contain himself!

"YEAH! AWESOME! I'M TOTALLY THERE! WITH BELLS ON! YOU WON'T REGRET THIS! GO TEAM!! YEAH!!!" he bounds over to the party and a text box pops up saying "your party is full"

"Oh well, never mind..."

In the next room we meet Kariah who's house this is. She's clearly minted to be able to afford such a massive pad in the middle of the worlds biggest trading city. I wonder what she does in the Inn to make this much money...

"Hello Kariah! Aparently you tell a good story!"

"I'm sure you can tell from my clothes where I work" she begins (looking at her she seems to be dressed the same as everyone else, but I guess if we were to see her inventory screen we'd get a better idea... Mind you, we already know she works in the inn) "Although most men are to WEAK to admit they've ever been to a brothel. Anyway - perhaps you could do the city a favour?"

What?! A Brothel? Kariah is a prostitute?!?! She "works" in the inn - the only inn in town - and that inn is a brothel??!! I've staid there several times already and had no idea! I certainly didn't get any of the attention I'd expect if I took a party of 6 into a brothel!!! A BROTHEL??? For real?? This only makes me MORE confused about what this woman was doing to "over excite" the guests! I mean, how "excited" does someone have to get before they're too "excited" to be in a whore house? I thought this woman just told stories!!!

Kariah takes the party's stunned silence to be a pause waiting for her to explain the favour she wants us to perform.

"Would you mind killing Gard and Rick. Y'know - from the Council of the just? I'm a prostitute, so I know for sure that they're bad news."

"Um... how does that work?" Sira asks - since she's probably a murderess she doesn't want to come a-cropper on any psychic prostipowers this woman might have...

"Oh they tell me about how they're cheating the local government to work it in their favour instead of for the good of the populace. Men ALWAYS reveal their secrets in their 'moments of weakness'"

For real? In the throws of bought-passion these men throw their heads back and say things like "I'm funnelling off a percentage of the council tax to buy up private land for my own farrrrrrrrrrms... ahhhhhhh"? I'm expected to believe this with enough certainty to justify double homicide?

Thankfully Tom's a little reticent to jump into action too and suggests "Are you possibly over-simplifying things? Maybe just killing these guys isn't the best thing to do immediately... I tell you what - we'll do some investigating. Don't wanna chop these guys up without making sure they were just lying to impress you..."

As we leave and step back out onto the street the little text box saying "everyone is tired" pops up. "Tired" Eh? Oh yeah - you find out that the inn is actually a den of vice and now all of a sudden you're tired? This team sickens me. None the less, we book in for a good time.

In the morning we set off to the Council house to have it out with Riko and Gard. But neither of them will talk to us (not even about Aurino's land dispute that we found out about before and that seems to fit perfectly with claims of corruption). Eventually we track down Perron (leader of the Council and thus probably the most just person around).

"Yeah. I've sort of been thinking that they might be bad news too" he confides rather over casually. "But I've not really bothered to look into it. Maybe you should go talk to Kontos and Darios in Kounos. They CLAIM not to know Riko and Gard, despite the fact that I KNOW they do. That's pretty suspicious don't you think? They probably know something..."

Sweet - that's two reasons to go to Kounos. Both to track down the conspiracy gang AND to meet up with Siobhan's sort of dad for some training.

We head out of the town and set off north (after a little exploring to grab some more magical-berries so that Sira can keep casting spells) avoiding treading on any of the corn, since that blond guy warned us not to.

We find a sort of valley that has some vines signposted "Climb vines to access pass". Seriously? Someone thought they'd put up a sign, but couldn't be bothered to nail up a rope ladder even? I mean, what about in the winter when the vine dies back? This sign will be meaningless!

For now we ignore the vines but have to come back and climb up them a couple of minutes later because just up the valley from them the only route is blocked by a tiny fence. The fence (that is half as high as a man and not even covered in barbed wire or anything) has a gate in it. But the gate is locked so progress is CLEARLY impossible.

The vines allow the team to walk up the vertical cliff faces and along a winding trail of plateaus and ledges. Soon they come to a very very very small town (three huts and one pig). This must be Kounos. The pass carries on but we stop off to follow up our quest.

First things first, we wait to meet up with Garaad the trainer in the pub.

"Oh for christ's sake. Can't you see I'm on my lunch break here?" he starts when we walk up to him at 8 in the morning. Then he catches a glimpse of Siobhan and says "Oh! Siobhan! I didn't see you there! Well I GUESS I could train you and your chums up a little!"

I wonder if this is a sort of eater egg. Certainly without Siobhan on the team there's little chance I'd've known to look for this guy for training. And I wonder if he just wouldn't give me any if she wasn't in the party...

Actually, he won't give me any now since I've got no money on me.

Balls.

I'll have to come back when I'm packing a little more clout. That was stupid of me to turn up skint. Still, critical hit training seems like it'll be really handy - so it's worth having worked out where to come to get it.

In the same pub we walk over to a flight of stairs. Out of curiosity we go to head down them, but soon discover they relate to the OTHER part of our questing in this town

"STOP!" cries a burly door man "No one gets to see Kontos - the HOLY RULER of our three huts and that pig who won't leave and whose divine residence is the cellar of the pub! No one, unless they have... AN APPOINTMENT!!!!!!!!"

Dan dan daaaaaaaaaa