"About seven feet more rope, or something to stand on."Cynthia replies.
She describes what she can see and then drops to the tunnel floor, trusting in her lightness to mitigate any heavy landing. Taking care not to bump her head on the low ceiling, she takes a look around, paying particular attention to the glittering band, whilst trying to pinpoint the bubbling sound.
Spot hidden 50% fail,[dice]0[/dice]
Listen 50% fail,[dice]1[/dice]
Last edited by jp1885 on Sun Jan 27, 2019 1:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Atauchi maintained close proximity to the shaft with his ear tilted toward the space below. If the others called out for help, he wanted to immediately be aware of it. Further, the tracker periodically glanced about the surrounding area with the aid of his binoculars to ensure that no man or beast could get the drop on them.
Listen (50%),[dice]0[/dice]
Spot Hidden (67%),[dice]1[/dice]
OOC: Sweet. Extreme Success on the Listen roll, Hard Success on the Spot Hidden.
Jackson Elias clambers down the rope, following the others down - including Anderson. He has enough extra rope from Larkin's supplies to bridge the final section of the ramp, so that an escape rope is in place from the bottom all the way back up to the surface.
He calls back up to Atauchi and Marcus, nearly 100 feet above, Jackson's voice echoes up the ramp and chimney "We're all down now!"
The low tunnel at the bottom of the ramp heads straight on to the left and the right. Like the steep ramp, it is only about four feet high, and so the explorers will need to crawl, but it is about three yards wide, so there is room to pass each other, or to move two abreast.
The tunnel clearly runs along the outside of a buried step of the pyramid - the floor ceiling and "outer" wall match the small blocks used to construct the chimney and the ramp, but the "inner wall" is constructed of larger blocks like those of the exposed part of the pyramid. Midway up that wall is a narrow, ornately decorated band of gold that matches the ward the investigators brought here.
The band is undamaged for as far as can be seen in the flashlight beams. The oozing, bubbling sound is audible to everyone down in the tunnel - it seems to be coming through the warded wall, but Cynthia is sure that it is louder to the left.
OOC,Giving the benefit of the earlier exceptional listening success, rather than the later roll.
"The bubbling sound seems to be coming from the other side of this wall, but it's louder to the left. Maybe there's a gap in the wall there that it's emanating from. It could be where we need to place the ward!"
jp1885 wrote:
Cynthia presses her ear against the warded wall.
"The bubbling sound seems to be coming from the other side of this wall, but it's louder to the left. Maybe there's a gap in the wall there that it's emanating from. It could be where we need to place the ward!"
Dr.Sánchez will follow Cynthia gun drawn and ready for anything.
With her friends beside or behind her, Cynthia slowly edges along the wall to the left, torch in one hand, pistol in the other, looking out for any gaps in the gold band.
Atauchi maintained his position near the top of the chimney. While generally brave and willing to take on challenges, the Quechua man was glad it wasn't him who was delving into the depths of this ancient structure. Besides, the real danger was atop the temple rather than within its depths.
"What you think of all this? Is real evil spirit at work here?" he asked Marcus.
At the Ancient Ruins 6:00pm - Thurday 24th March, 1921
Above ground, the sky is darkening and the stars already appearing through the thin mountain air as the sun vanishes behind the western peaks.
It would be a beautiful place to be, if not for the stench of decay, the incessant buzzing of the flies and the worries about vampiric kharisiri and imprisoned gods.
The Underground Tunnels - Beneath the Ancient Ruins 6:00pm - Thurday 24th March, 1921
A hundred feet below ground it is slow going. The floor of the low tunnel is covered with dust and fragments of broken stone - anyone who rushes risks injuring themelves as the sharp fragments lacerate their hands and knees. There are also occasional clusters of small stalactites hanging from the ceiling, where dripping water has left limestone deposits.
To make things even less pleasant, the smell of decay down in the tunnels is absolutely overpowering, and the air is filled with the buzzing flies. Jackson ties a cloth across his mouth and nose to try and lessen the nauseating stench, and suggests that the other explorers do the same.
After what seems an eternity of crawling - during which the explorers pass underneath another of the steep ramps - the section of the golden band damaged by Luis de Mendoza and his companions finally comes into view.
Both the pyramid wall, and the tunnel are badly damaged here: There is a two inch wide crack in the wall, running through the recess where the missing inlay used to rest, and down to the floor of the tunnel. The floor is especially damaged; a hole has been opened that covers a twenty feet long section of the tunnel. The hole is filled with a pool of rancid white fat that has dribbled from the crack over the years. The stench of decay is almost unbearable now and as the explorers try not to retch, they can see that the surface of the pool moves constantly, as though something living writhes around below the surface.
Due to the width of the pool, it appears to be impossible to access the section of wall where the inlay is missing without wading through the accumulated filth.
SUCCESSFUL SPOT HIDDEN,You spot something briefly breaking the surface of the pool of fat. It is a writhing thing nearly a foot long, that blends almost perfectly with the fat of the pool. A maggot thing like the one left inside the victim at the haulage yard in Lima. Although this looked larger.
Make a SAN roll. Lose 1d3 if you fail.
SUCCESSFUL LISTEN,The oozing sound is definitely coming from the other side of the crack in the wall.
DOCTOR SANCHEZ,You feel an urge to wade straight through the rancid pool and stare through the crack in the wall, so that you can behold it's majesty...
Make a POW check to resist.
If you pass the above Spot Hidden check, then you stop short of the pool, even if you failed the POW roll.
Dice rolls,Listen 50% success [dice]0[/dice]Spot hidden 50% success [dice]1[/dice] SAN currently 46 success[dice]2[/dice]
Carefully putting her stuff down, Cynthia follows Jackson's lead and covers her mouth and nose with a cloth, knotting it round the back of her head bandit-style. She is now convinced that the sound is coming from the other side of the wall. Something is there...
Picking her pistol and flashlight back up, she casts light from the latter over the gap and the pool. Her eyes widen as something writhes in the fat. She backs up by instinct, but holds her nerve (not to mentin her stomach).
She frantically signals to the others to be careful, before making a writhing motion with her hand and pointing to the pool. Pocketing her pistol, she fishes out her fuel pump and looks enquiringly at Jackson.
Marcus considers. "You know, i never believed in all this magic mumbo jumbo. I was in the war; you see the things I've seen, your realize man doesn't need gods or witchcraft to do horrible things. But the things I've seen... I can't really come up for an explanation for them. There's an evil at work here, and I don't know if it's a god,a demon,a spaceman. Whatever it is though, I know we need to make sure it doesn't get released out there." He points to empathize the remark.
"You ever seen anything like this?" He asks the native.
Amy shudders at the sight of the creature and aims her shotgun at it. "While I can swim," she says, "I can't say I like the idea of doing it in that stuff, especially with that thing in there."
OOC,Spot Hidden roll (64% skill) in the tunnel:
[dice]0[/dice]
Listen roll (45% skill) in the tunnel:
[dice]1[/dice]
Sanity roll (current level 70) for seeing the maggot:
[dice]2[/dice]
Sanity loss:
[dice]3[/dice]
"Whats is that?" Dr.Sánchez says raising his arm to point on the pool. Without completing his movement to point, he take a few steps ahead towards the pool of white fat stopping at the very edge of it ''hes calling on me" he murmurs while passing Cynthia where she stands "its glorious"
Atauchi listened as the other man spoke on his perspectives on the natural world as well as the supernatural. The Quechua man was also reevaluating his system of beliefs. Until now, gods and demons were merely story, he never expected to encounter them in the flesh.
"Si. My people have some belief in other place, uhm, spirit world... but I never see any proof before until recent. I not sure what to think." he replied and then popped a fresh coca leaf into his mouth.
