Our heroes, the De Facto Explorers, are at the KIA Academy. They are looking for some money making opportunities to keep the Academy's roof over their heads for the winter.
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Sneaky Pete: A mutated weasel scout. Pete's telepathy and night vision take a backseat when he whips out his electrical powers.
Sonny Helianthus: a sentient sunflower artifact examiner with trusted Restorationist ties. Knowledgeable, but not a good one with device repairs or upgrades. Very interested in a "Children's Alchemical Laser" he recently acquired.
Slitheran Wurmtail (aka Squiggles): a mutated earthworm scout, in impromptu power armor, looking for trouble, and finding it often. Previously "gave birth" to a litter of sentient earthworm babies, but recently has been subject to genetic testing and developed super-human strength, a more human body, and a thick coat of shaggy white hair.
Lathar Bracken: A pure-strain human from River Bend. He's got the muscle, the face, and a mount for most encounters. Lathar's trusty beast of burden, No Name, travels wherever he does. No Name has recently been fitted for a artillery device of the Ancients that chucks spears further than any human. Looking for trouble in all the right places. Former jousting champion of Fair-Town and has been awarded... a peacock he has named Chambray. He's recently been struck by a weapon by a strange race of people and transformed into... something else... multiple times.
RHA-9: A lab assistant piece of "Living Metal" that seems to have befriended the group... for now! Currently getting repairs done by the Restorationists. Currently safely in their hotel room on KIA Academy Level Zero.
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Descending down the stairwell, the crew followed the concrete wall on the left. The right side of these deep stairs opened up to row after row of steel columns. Beyond the columns was a considerable amount of darkness, as well as strange noises. No one was particularly interested in investigating the right side and focusing on a lone door situation on the landing of the steps, before it continued to go down.
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| The stairs continue down, into Sub-Level 7, perhaps? |
Staring at the odd cube-shaped depression in the wall where a keycard should be swiped.
Squiggles used his telekinesis to open the door. Lights from the inside spark and flicker inside. A blue liquid sprayed from inside the room, covering Squiggles. Two bodies hang off from the ceiling.
The liquid didn't seem to harm the furry worm, save dying the creatures hair.
One of the bodies was missing a head, yet still hung from the ceiling. Looking at the second body, this human form didn't have legs do much as a set of treads like RHA-9.
Behind the bodies and along the wall, were a number of blue crates.
Sonny investigated the bodies further. It appeared a large hook and chain held the bodies, from small compartments in their backs. This appeared to be living metal with soft, false exterior. He lowered the headless living metal to the ground, and promptly ran through his pack to find the living metal head he had acquired earlier. It fit perfectly, along he was unable to activate the unit.
Lathar was standing watch in the doorway, rummaging through his pack for rations. He pulled out a clear cube, 9"x 9" x 9". Sonny was astonished by this thing magically appearing.
Sonny:
Hey, that thing could open up doors. Squiggles and Pete further investigated the living metal with treads. It appeared it's hands had been removed and replaced with actual mining drills.
Lathar was able to reached the treaded living metal, and after fiddling around, finds a control panel and press a button.
The living metal's eyes light up with a yellow hue. At the same time, both mining drills on the bot's hands began to turn, building up to full speed. The barbarian stepped back, only questioning, "Did I do that?"
The living metal began rotating side to side, still attached to the hook and chains.
It emitted a stuttered voice, "IN-TRU-DDDERR IN-TRU-DDDEERR. UN-AUTH-ORIZED." Somehow it managed to lower itself.
Pete quickly whipped out his blaster pistol and fired.... Shocked by the turn of events, Sonny pulled out his new laser pistol. Nothing seemed to discharge from the weapon when the sunflower pulled the trigger, but portions of the living metal burst into flames,
The living metal was badly damaged and appeared to go through a countdown.
Sonny realized what was happening, "It's gonna blow!!!"
Everyone scurried out the door, Sonny pulling the other, still deactivated living metal. A small explosion occurred in the room, only a small bit of debris flew out the door.
The explosion appeared to have destroyed any interested items that were in the room.
They moved onto the next door, using Lathar's cube again, the panel lit up. The seal to the door opened, release the sounds of screams, grunts, growls, and even a flash of fire or two before the door completed its motion.
A race collection of white furry and armored being are pointing spears at a large creature in the middle of the room. The creature ignored the spears getting stabbed at him, stared at the party and roared.
Sonny quickly walked over to the cube and removed it from it's square console, closing the door... with a five second delay.
"It looks like this thing will resolve itself shortly. Let's wait it out."The large fiery beast raised what appeared to be an arm and shot out a red ooze through the door, hitting Lathar for burning and blistering damage. The ooze ate through Lathar's armor, the studs on his leather falling directly to the floor.
Squiggles called out, "Remember, red ooze bad, blue ooze good!"
The door continued to muffle more noise, but finally everything fell silent. With Squiggles armed in front with rifle, Lathar opened the door again. The large humanoid was all that remained in the room, the bodies of the white furry folks turned to smoldering piles of ash.
Squiggles fired his new rifle, but nothing came out. One second later. the creature explodes. All the equipment in the room had been destroyed by ooze/fire.
The next door opened into a huge open, but definitely open area, similar to the street layout of sub-levels 1 and 2. Most of the buildings were ruined, but a number of small, glowing emerald light were installed on the standing structures. Bones littered the entire area.
They had arrived.
Two of the party member quickly placed bones into the sack they were provided.
There was certainly movement down the streets. Three individuals with robes and points masks came scurrying down the street, a fourth looked the same, but with two antennae sticking out of their head. Sonny waved and Peter used his telepathy to no effect. Spotting the De Facto Explorers, this group shook their hands as they ran across their view to a corner out of the party's view. Sunny yelled at them, to no effect.
The sound of multiple people hitting something with bones, Pete turned the corner to see them destroy a computer terminal, and then they ran back in the opposite direction.
Once that attack on technology occurred, there was a loud hum emanating through this chamber. The Explorers though it was high time to back-track and leave.
They returned to O'Pinnery's with only some opposition by the rabbit-folk they encountered earlier. They finally collected their 1,000 domars.
They finally returned to Level 0 at KIA Academy and found a letter at the front desk for them:
A Letter from Ramsay Kallax
GM Notes: The De Facto Explorers are pretty banged up after their first foray into the the bone-strewn sub-level 7, so it might be a while until they make another attempt, but these sub-levels were heavily modified from A Fallen Star for All, a Mutant Crawl Classics module from Goodman Games. The module definitely helped me flesh out some of the more feral inhabitants, and certain rooms that were untouched can be expanded into whole areas within the sub-level. Not too shabby for a $9.99 module.
Next: We'll take a few weeks off for the holiday and return with a different adventure for a bit. #0 - Beyond the Eastern Barrier.
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