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faderift2023-05-21 01:46 pm
faderifting) wrote in faderift2023-05-21 01:46 pm
Entry tags:
MOD PLOT ↠ STILL RISING, STILL DEVOURING
WHO: Everyone
WHAT: Sea beasts!
WHEN: Justinian 9:49 (now)
WHERE: Ostwick, Kirkwall, and the Amaranthine Ocean
NOTES: OOC post here! CW for some cruelty/violence toward mythological monsters/animals and also one ferryman. Use other CWs in your subject lines as appropriate.
WHAT: Sea beasts!
WHEN: Justinian 9:49 (now)
WHERE: Ostwick, Kirkwall, and the Amaranthine Ocean
NOTES: OOC post here! CW for some cruelty/violence toward mythological monsters/animals and also one ferryman. Use other CWs in your subject lines as appropriate.
I. INTERVENTION AT OSTWICK
The earliest reports from Riftwatch's contacts among the coastal Free Marches arrive in a confusing tangle in hours before dawn. The Venatori have taken Hercinia—no, a dragon has only destroyed a little piece of it—no, wait, yes, a dragon, but a dragon from the sea—wait, no, maybe pirates? Scratch that. Sea dragon, Venatori involvement, and ships and something massive moving west into the Waking Sea.
That is all the information Riftwatch has when it begins loading hastily woken people and griffons onto ships at sunrise to set out to intercept whatever it is, doing whatever it is trying to do, before it does more of it wherever it is trying to go.
Fortunately/unfortunately, those questions quickly answer themselves.
Scouts on griffons flying ahead of Riftwatch's ships spot the disturbance in Ostwick's harbor before they reach the city. Churning water, crunching wood, shouts of terror, and most of all an enormous shell, encrusted with stripes of spiky red crystals, housing something with an over-abundance of mandibles that it's using to funnel whatever it can reach toward its even more overabundant spiky teeth and a long spike of a tail lashing dangerously behind it. The huge tentacles of a giant octopus, encrusted with red barnacles, flatten boats with a slap, and sweep the length of the quay to fling soldiers and fleeing citizens into the water. The sinuous length of a sea serpent darts in and out of sight, its writhing revealing patches of scales replaced by crystalline growth. Occasionally it rises out of the water to snatch someone off a deck with a snap of triangular jaws, or twines around the center of a small merchant vessel and squeezes, dragging it down beneath the water with a tremendous creak of wood strained to breaking and the screams of its crew, all quickly silenced.
These enormous beasts are the largest and most obvious problem, but not the only one. Outside the harbor are a half-dozen small Tevinter vessels, Venatori colors unfurled, keeping their distance from the scorpion-crab's spiky tail, and something else red and silver and massive lurking beneath the surface of the deeper water nearby. On the decks of several are pillared structures that look like lantern posts but are topped by large crystals of red lyrium. Between each set of these beacons are stood two figures: a mage with a lyrium-crusted staff and a strange helm of red lyrium, chains of the crystal strung like armor down chest and arms, and a Templar in an identical helm, armor studded with lyrium and cut to accommodate the crystals that grow out of arms and shoulders. If someone chances a close inspection, their eyes glow red and lips seem to move in unison.
Ostwick is putting up the best defense it could muster with little warning, but its first order of business was evacuating the naval ships in the harbor before any more could be destroyed and only after first scattering to safety are a few of those undermanned vessels circling back around behind the harbor-devouring monsters and engaging the Venatori ships. The city guard on ground evacuate civilians and those on the walls of the inner city send forth volleys of arrows that bounce uselessly off of scales and shells.
As soon as Riftwatch's ships arrive they will find themselves bombarded by small missiles too—a veritable school of flying fish, flinging themselves out of the water and over the deck of the Walrus and the Fancy. With razor-sharp wingfins and needle teeth, they are unpleasant to have at face-height in any circumstance, and like their larger comrades these too are encrusted with red lyrium, the crystals adding weight and cutting edge and the threat of madness and blight to any blow they manage to strike—so it would be very wise to avoid that.
The teeming waters become even more cramped and chaotic when the beast hiding beneath the water near the Tevinter ships, its nose terminating in a sword-like spike meters long, appears from the depths to skewer a small naval vessel attempting to make an escape. The spear punches clean through the ship's hull but becomes stuck, and the ship is tossed from side to side, slapped against the water, flinging debris and passengers and shockwaves as the beast thrashes wildly in an attempt to remove it, its plight blocking the harbor mouth.
Riftwatch's captains keep their ships back at a relatively safe distance just outside the harbor, launching all the griffon-riders they've been able to muster on short notice, and bringing to bear what ranged attacks they have: large deck-mounted crossbows require aiming and winding, and though their heavy bolts can punch through armor and even decking, the time it takes to prepare each shot makes catching the fast-moving sea monsters difficult. Flinging rocks and alchemical grenades in the stone-throwers is faster, but less accurate. Most of the work will fall to those on griffon-back or brave enough to take a launch through the chaos to the quayside or what remains of the piers, to attack the beasts from above or in even closer quarters.
For a time the battle is largely contained to the harbor, the sea monsters seemingly driven to do as much damage in the harbor as they can, dragging people into the water, the scorpion crab's barbed missiles punching holes in waterside buildings, and thrashing tentacles fling wreckage onto shore. Some of the trapped ships fight on, and welcome aid from Riftwatch reinforcements ferried by griffon to help them escape or evacuate their crews to shore.
When the swordnose and its wooden nose ring stop blocking the harbor a small pack of ships make a run for it, and at the same time Ostwick's navy attempts to re-engage, the battle spilling out into the sea before the harbor. The sea snake appears suddenly alongside the Walrus, water pouring from it as its angular head rises over the ship's middle and darts across, flinging its scaly bulk amidships. It lands with a thunderous crash and slides through the trough it has made in the rail, scales gliding and crystals scraping the hull as it coils around the vessel, preparing to crush and it drag it down into the deep unless Riftwatch hacks and magically blasts it free in time.
As Riftwatch finds ways to put down the great beasts, Ostwick succeeds in sinking two of the Venatori ships and the others flee east back into the Amaranthine. The sword-nosed monster flees after them, once again stuck to a boat, this time via a harpoon lodged in its side dragging along the small craft on the other end of the line like a flag signaling its position. Riftwatch at least briefly gives chase, and after a few miles it becomes clear that this is not blind escape—the beast is traveling constantly in a straight line, as if drawn by a magnet. Scouting ahead along that trajectory, Riftwatch will discover that there is indeed somewhere in particular it is heading.
II. CHAOS IN KIRKWALL
Meanwhile, in Kirkwall–
It is Gallows ferry rush hour, the time of day when people who live in the city or who just want to get out of the fortress for dinner pack onto the ferry between their little island and the Kirkwall docks. The ferry only has so many seats, and the day's ferryman–Murph–is the energetic and impatient variety of salty old man who waits for no one, so some may have just missed it and be left standing on the Gallows' docks, watching twenty minutes of their lives row away.
But it turns out they're the lucky ones, because when the dinghy and its passengers are midway to shore, there's a swell of water, and for a moment the odd absence of waves, before a massive reptilian head breaks the surface and smoothly snatches Murph off his perch at the back of the ferry and into its maw.
The enormous shell attached to the head follows close behind it, dragging the ferry along on its crest as the creature–an enormous snapping turtle, more or less, with a long neck and spots of red lyrium on its already-jagged shell–proceeds on its way, slowly emerging from the water as the rocky shallows require it to trade swimming for lumbering. For minute it's too busy eating (sorry Murph) to notice or care about the boat and passengers it is dragging along with it toward the city, but once it does it stops where it is and begins turning its serpentine head back in their direction, snapping the sharp ridges of its mouth at anything it can reach.
So that's the situation. Some number of Riftwatchers are trapped on the shell of a giant red lyrium snapping turtle that is only momentarily distracted from its march toward the docks, left with the choices of climbing onto its shell (while carefully avoiding the lyrium) or leaping into the water behind it and hoping it doesn't turn back in their direction. Others, watching back at the Gallows, may have the presence of mind to run for the eyrie, whether they're very good with the griffons or not, or go for one of the emergency boats kept behind the fortress. Those ashore have other options: the Kirkwall guard is quick to organize a defense, and the turtle is coming their way sooner or later, with or without ferry's worth of Riftwatch members stuck on its back.
In the midst of the chaos, it will take a keen eye or two to notice a two figures on the deck of an unmarked ship in the harbor whose ceaseless murmurs and quick, closely-held gestures give away their involvement. It is, specifically, spellcasting that picks up in speed and intensity whenever the turtle seems to be reconsidering the wisdom of its march toward the shore. Someone will have to do something about them, too.
III. COMMOTION IN THE OCEAN
Following the heading of the escaping sword-nosed monster leads Riftwatch to a strange sight. A mile or two off the end of a small chain of uninhabited islands is anchored a flotilla of loosely-connected ships arranged in a semi-circle. They fly no flags but it won't be difficult to guess at their allegiance—red lyrium beacons float on buoys, and on the deck of one ship is a pair wearing red lyrium helms and wielding red lyrium staves, seemingly calling the fleeing sea monster home.
Riftwatch's assault will take them by surprise. The place is guarded and manned by mages and Templars, several of them lyrium-augmented and capable of inhuman strength and stamina, the crystals growing from their bodies serving as both armor and weapon. Most of its denizens are at least somewhat combat trained, and nearly all will put up some sort of fight. But the majority don't seem to be soldiers and it isn't a big facility. It won't take nearly as long to kill or subdue its workforce as it did the monsters that it now appears may be their creations, or at least under their control.
At first, the semi-circle configuration of the vessels appears random, arranged around nothing but an unremarkable patch of ocean. But every so often something causes the surface at that point to roil, and at one point during the battle a wave races out from that point to rock the ships on their anchor chains sharply enough to send the unwary toppling to the deck before settling again.
When the assault ends, investigation of the site will find a curious combination of equipment, some appropriate to a fishing village, some familiar from Venatori research operations, and some strange apparatus of metal and glass and tubing. Cleansing runes inscribed into the exteriors of most of the ships, save one that appears to've been a barracks, bunks reinforced to accommodate the weight of bones studded by crystal growths, storage chest including a stock of red lyrium potions. Other chests contain armor and equipment corrupted with the same.
Eventually, someone will spot a strange vertical length of pipe near the rail on the central ship, at the point nearest the center of the semi-circle. One end travels through the deck, the other up to head height for a man, an angle just before the open top end inviting passers to step up and try looking in. Doing so will find it is a primitive periscope, its other end reflecting a scene beneath the water: a hill of dark rock broken open and glowing with magma along its fissures, flows of lava bubbling up from the spout and spreading slowly outward, occasionally heaved upwards with greater force. At first it may seem a trick of the light, dim and shifting with the waves above, but soon they will realize it is not just the orange-red of molten rock heated to boiling, but a brighter, deeper shade they've seen everywhere today: the red of tainted lyrium.
The good news is that this discovery means Riftwatch has minimal worries about tainting an untainted environment by burning, sinking, and otherwise dismantling the floating base and its red lyrium adornments. It's still a slow, careful undertaking, to avoid destroying any useful information or exposing anyone to the red lyrium in the process. Examining notes and underwater evidence will confirm that the Venatori were luring sea monsters to the volcano by drawing them in with food or distress calls, then casting spells to paralyze them. Wounding the animals while keeping them in close proximity to the underwater magma resulted in the wounds healing over with red lyrium crystals.
In the meantime those with any skill in cartography do their best to chart the location of the facility so they'll be able to find the volcano again without any sign of it above the water. And Riftwatch also takes time to check out each of the nearby islands—unpopulated and unaffected by the lyrium so far, on investigation, with some abandoned campsites that indicate the Venatori were using them to replenish food and fresh water for the operation but no lingering dangers. Once that's confirmed, Riftwatch is able to set up a camp on the beach of one of the islands and give anyone who needs it a break from sleeping on the ships for the remaining days of their demolition project.
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