Lizard and Lunk

The continuing GURPS adventures of eight men who really should find better uses for their time.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

On the Nature of Reality...

26 July 2010-

After recovering from our successful defeat (well, assist, anyway) of the orc slavers, we managed to get back to the caravan, and the rest of the trip passed uneventfully. Our characteres spent the next two weeks getting to know each other better, and still decided to work together, as we had been so successful thus far (so it's a bit contrived- sue us).

Once back at the larger town, however, rumor reached us that there was another job opportunity, this time involving a well-known gnome and his Wall Drug-like business in the middle of nowhere. We traveled to his establishment, only to discover that it was nearly abandoned, with only the owner initially there to greet us. He explained that a local legend had come to life- a demon that haunted the region, and which reappeared every 100 years or so. Now it seems it had returned, and had driven off his customers and taken his pet pig. While we were in the process of accepting the job of solving this problem, a group of four halflings swaggered in and berated the owner for hiring us, while disparaging us as well. That simply wouldn't stand, and several of us stood to explain this to them, but they stalked out, mounted large dogs, and took off before we could get close enough to them to make them even smaller.

This, of course, convinced most of us that the halflings were behind the whole thing, and had somehow created a mechanical device which allowed them to simulate the demon of legend. We decided to stake out the building, then unmask and kill them when they proved to be the real villains. Sadly, that's not exactly how it went down.

Although the critter did come to call, it didn't approach the building, but rather roared and squealed a lot from a ridge about 100 yards away. We shot a couple of arrows at it, and it seemed ready to leave, so some of us went after it. Kevin's giant-kin wizard (long story) teleported right to it while Bruce's samurai cast Haste on himself and ran towards it, and Craig's lizard man and the two dwarf fighters (Jeff and eMichael) pursued as well. Kevin, prepared for a fake or an illusion of some sort, instantly changed his mind when he saw it up close, and he teleported right back to the building while the fighters were about halfway in between the building and the ridge, shouting "It's real!"

Of course, by that time it seemed best to keep after the creature, at least until we could get some clue as to its lair, so our fighters pursued it. This paid off in two contrasting ways: first, we saw the halflings pacing it from the woods, so our suspicions of their involvement were confirmed; second, it heard our metal-clad dwarves, and it turned on us. The samurai and the lizard man braced their naginatas to receive the charge, but it broke the polearms and kept coming, crushing Bruce's samurai and then moving on. The dwarves blasted the thing with musket fire, but it gutted eMichael as well before we could bring it down. Up close, it appears to be a giant boar the size of a VW bus, and covered with spiked and armored plates- but at least it's dead. Next week, our surviving members kill halflings.

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