OOC: I'm assuming dog supplies include dog food.

IC:
Aria entered the basement and, after walking in a bit to let any behind her go by, knelt down and dipped her hands in the water. Undoubtedly the Gerudo looked rather like a small child to her companions, just letting her hands move through the shallow water. After a few moments, she stood back up and dried her hands on the side of her legs.

The ranger began to poke around the materials gathered down here. She stopped at the dog food and scooped a handful out. Not knowing what it was, she brought it to her nose and sniffed. "Urgh," she said, wrinkling her nose and dropping the food back into its container. "Must have went bad down here."

Aria took a look around the basement to see if there was more to it then this small room. [Awareness Check] Surely it would be in the shape of the house above it? She shivered and said, "Does anyone else feel like they're buried alive?" This was the first time she ever entered a basement.

Rosen grinned at the sight of this cryptic scribbles that buried themselves in the lackluster shine of a single pendulum. It had to be said that he was a little disappointed that he could no longer stare in wonderment at the humble glow that glazed its flesh but at least he was getting somewhere as far as sleuthing around. He moved towards the door, eyes hanging on the board game still sitting in a drawer full of others, "Game night, eh?" were the last words as he left the room, recalling the soft echoes of that robed figure Alpha.

It shouldn't have been that peculiar that he decided to back track where Alpha came from. He hadn't seen which room he'd entered but the goron understood that it couldn't have been the other two rooms which had their own detectives respectively.

That left the room farthest to the right, no longer hosting its decor to the shadow of Alpha's scrutinizing gaze. Eyes passed over bookshelves and cabinets and the desk that stood on guard nearby with papers scattered about its chest and mantle.
"36, then left to 39, then right to 14 then left to 26 and circle?" he mumbled, eyes plastered on the safe that stood sitting in the enclave of an open mouthed portrait. There stood the dial that he'd imagine would leave its maw open for the picking.

Rosen already had suspicions that the numbers were for a safe seeing as the letters were obvious in their directions. He assumed his first interpretation of the scribbled password assuming that the circle must've just been a note added to assure him that it was indeed for the safe. If anything, he'd simply try again as he wasn't totally confident in his interpretation.

OOC: OOooooooohhh yeaaaahhh...talk about cool. What's behind safe number 1, RG?!

OOC:

ZV wrote:OOC: No, really, I should have expected something this evil from you

And I suppose you'd say that I should've been expecting you to post a minute before I finished my own post, thus meaning that I would have been anticipating that I'd need to rewrite the last paragraph quite extensively. The first one remained unchanged as punishment for being so terribly rude to me.

IC:
Alpha shrugged as Dogura turned away, walking after both he and Aria as they followed Altair down the newly reveal staircase. He glanced at the samurai from behind, raising an eyebrow at him both while he wasn't looking. 'Why didn't he think to try opening the door himself?' he wondered silently, not sure what to make of it. It didn't seem like Dogura to simply brush past a doorway that had not yet been opened; the man always seemed to be extra observant, especially in matters like this. So for him to have just ignored the doorway seemed a little . . . off.

He saw the Goron walking back into the entrance as he turned towards the new door; expecting Rosen to follow after the group, he was a bit surprised to see the man head into the Study. The Sheikah paused at the top of the stairwell . . . then slowly turned back from it. There were already several people exploring this new basement area; no doubt they would be able to find anything of interest that might be down there. Especially if Dogura started acting like himself in such matters again.

"You find something?" Alpha asked as he strolled back through the Entrance area and back into the Study. Rosen appeared to be moving the dial of the safe; had he found the combination somewhere? Curious, the Sheikah walked over and peered at the metal door from a position at Rosen's side, wondering if whatever the Goron had found would indeed prove to be the way of opening it.

OOC: Alpha's right... I really haven't been at the top of my game lately, I want to apologize for all the little mistakes I've been making. I really do try to give it my best effort here at HA2 (I have to compete with some of you guys ), but lately I seem to be lacking. I've no excuse now, because I get out of school at 1:00PM and I never have homework. I'll sincerely try harder, because there isn't a whole lot that I've got going on right now that means more to me than HA2.

IC: Dogura continued down the stairs, and observed the flooded room. While he was happy that it was flooded (explaining the puddles upstairs), subconsciously, he'd hoped that it would have been dry. The house was a bit of a mystery, much like the disappearance of the people here. Dogura really liked mysteries, especially when they seemed to get deeper and deeper. However, the basement was indeed flooded, and there was only a bit to inspect. He decided to give it his best look anyhow, as he searched through the things that were within his reach on the shelf.

[Awareness Check]

"Quite a bit, friend." He said bluntly, the silence soon blanketing them both as his large and curiously articulate fingers moved the dial backwards and forwards, listening with ears wide open for the shifting of tumblers and locks, "I don't know if it means anything to you but they were playing Time Dungeons."

"The room over there," Rosen's head bobbed slightly to his left shoulder, kneeling in the direction of the previous room, "I found a few board games in a drawer. Last one being put away a little bit in a hurry. I assume it's just how most kids put things away...

"but you never know."

Blocks! Of the cinder variety!

For once in his comparitively short life, the comparatively tall Hylian found fortune to be smiling upon him. Grabbing a block in each hand, he heaved each chunk back to the guarded house, then commenced stroking his chin thoughtfully, as all philosophers do.

I could always...well, I'll leave that as a backup plan. Either way I should try to get some more height first.

Strolling off in the opposite direction this time, the mercenary began to cast his eyes around, making a mental checklist of all the items he was searching for. Any would be helpful at this point, but hitting paydirt would obviously be preferred.

A rope, some other sort of platform, more cinderblocks...maybe a taller ladder. Yes, a ladder with the appropriate height would definitely be preferrable.

[Awareness Check][Nomadic Awareness L2]

Dogura scours the shelves, but comes up with nothing of interest (5+9 vs. 15 Fail). The western wall's shelves seem to be mostly food; this was apparently a Cellar or something. Meanwhile, Aria's thinking takes a rather interesting turn - could there really be more to the basement? What on earth would cause her to think like that, even if she hasn't been in a basement before? Even if there was more to it, there's obviously no other doorways leading there, so it'd be almost impossible to access it. I mean, seriously, there's no freakin' way; the walls are covered in concrete, so really the only way that one could do it would be to find a hole or something in the wall -

Oh, would you look at that. A hole in the wall (19+3 vs. 15 Pass).

Yes, as Aria searches the basement walls for some kind of hint for further chambers, she just so happens to find a tiny hole peeking out above the water level. It rests on the floor of the northeastern corner of the room, probably about a foot and a half tall and maybe two and a half wide. There are metallic bars lining it vertically, making it sort of like prison bars on a window; perhaps this is there to provide ventilation or something to whatever lies beyond it. But yes, if she reaches her hand through the small opening she'll find that it is not a wall of dirt that lies beyond it, but rather another apparently open area. Too bad it's impossible to see through the vent as it is.

Upstairs, Alpha and Rosen can hear the safe clicking with every number that it scrolls past. However, as soon as the Goron begins entering numbers in they notice a new set of sounds occurring every time he hits a number in the combination correctly - a small scraping of metal coming from behind, or maybe within, the door. The locks are being removed, it seems, but it is so old and perhaps rusty that it has become easy to tell when their combination is correct.

36 *scrape* . . .
. . . 39 *scrape* . . .
. . . 14 *scrape* . . .
. . . 26.

No scrape.

If Rosen tried the handle now, he'd find the thing still firmly shut - and moments after the 26 is input, the pair hears a trio of scraping pieces of metal simultaneously moving back into their original positions. The lock has reset itself; apparently that last number was incorrect.

And Saber? Well, he doesn't find anything worth mentioning (3+2+6 vs. 15 Fail). Except for a trail of ink in one of the alleys that looks kinda fresh, but who knows what that could be?

"Hmph," Rosen grunted at the sound of the locks returning to their previous engagements. "Doesn't seem like the owner thought the last number to be important enough to divulge." The goron was peeved, resolving to repeating the same digits forward and backwards only to be greeted by the same bothersome sounds of locks and tumblers returning back and deterring his advance.

A sigh fell from his mouth leaving his head to drop down to retrieve it and perhaps the last digit that apparently ran away with him.

"Twenty six plus?" He murmured, head still in prayer. Rosen tried again, this time spinning the dial once completely before leaving it at 26. Should this fail him, he'd assume that the number could perhaps find itself as a value more than twenty-six.

Never a fan of waiting or being discouraged from an advance, he quickly moved towards setting both thoughts in motion, courted by his fingers as his theories spun wildly on the dial.

"Hey, guys, I found a barred hole in the wall," Aria called out to the others; she didn't have to speak in raised tones in the small room. "There's an open space beyond it, but I can't see far into it. Do you think it might be worth investigating?"

While she waited for a response from her fellow adventurers, she once again stuck her hands into the water that covered the floor, this time letting droplets drip off of her hand and onto her bare arms. The refreshing feel had a rather calming effect on her, but she didn't let it take away her caution; someone had put bars into the wall to keep something out of the rest of the house.

OOC: So, hey, Abel, this now brings up a rather good point. If you pass an Awareness Check or Insight Check or any other such check that gives you information about the current situation, your character ought to share it with everyone else. While we, the RPers, obviously know about it, our characters might still remain ignorant of it, so they should be communciating with each other. It's all part of working as a team, you know?

Alpha felt his facial expression change into an annoyed grimace as the last of the numbers failed to result in a sliding sound, especially when it was followed by the other three locks sliding back into place. It was nice to get some audible clues concerning the code; it meant that what Rosen had found was not inaccurate. More than likely they were just missing something, some tiny detail that would allow them to finally open it up and gaze at what lay within the metal box.

The Sheikah spared a few seconds to glance at the pendulum held in the Goron's large hands, locating the inscription on them without much difficulty. "26+ . . . Circle?" he muttered, shaking his head in confusion. "Maybe the circle's supposed to represent a number, or something that can be translated into a numerical value." He leaned in for a closer look, trying to figure out exactly what the circle was supposed to be; the markings all around its edges hinted that it was something specific, and he had a feeling they just needed to determine what that something was in order to solve this little puzzle. [Awareness Check]

"Gah... This is all worthless garbage..." Dogura was getting frustrated with this place. That's when Aria seemed to make some sort of breakthrough. Dogura trotted over to her, and inspected the hole in the wall. "Looks like it was made as a drainage system... Saria must get floods a lot. Only natural, considering it's surrounded with water."

The samurai thought for a moment, but didn't want to be too quick to dismiss the fact that there may indeed be a secret way into the drainage system. "Anyone feel like getting wet?" He asked sarcastically, leaning against the wall. "Well, we can't sit around here looking around this house forever. I'm actually beginning to hope that Saber is having luck with his ladder idea..." He looked around the room one final time, before he would declare it unworthy to search, and head back upstairs.

[Awareness Check]

Did the people of Saria lead empty lives?

Not even rope was to be found. Who lived without rope? It was the epitome of...well, honestly, it wasn't really that essential to life, yet it always seemed to be around. Why such a rarely useful item was rarely absent from anyone's dwelling was a mystery, but that's a topic for another topic.

Or, no. Perhaps for some reason our lovable mercenary chap found such a topic worth pursuing. Yes, the inner workings of his mind began to work innerly, in a shocking display of thinking; quite a rare hobby these days, it seems.

Could it be that people simply thought of emergency items more obsessively than things of the everyday persuasion? Perhaps humans, tending to take things for granted, overlook the small things when considering necessities of life, and instead jump to such terrible conclusions as "Well a bear may break into my house at any moment, so I should have a rope and flashlight to keep the bears away."

It certainly made sense. The youthful swordsman could not count the times he had left his more routine accessories behind, such as his bomb satchel and rupee bag. While his sword was his most common traveling companion, it shared a special status for obvious reason. Yet he had never once forgotten, unless he had forgotten, to take Dogura's dagger along. He never used it in battle and indeed could not comfortably do so, yet he always thought that perhaps he would run into the samurai. A slim chance, indeed, yet one that he seemed to find more likely than needing his bombs, which was laughable.

Dogura? Oh, yes, Dogura! He, too, had been at the scene! It had completely slipped the mercenary's mind, but now that he had thought of the dagger it all returned, and he found his resolve to get inside the house doubled. With Dogura's natural athleticism, it was likely the samurai had gotten into the building already. There was no time to lose, and he would not lose to time.

What was that strange trail upon the ground? Some black substance. Ink? But why would there be ink in a place such as this? They couldn't find a use for fences or ropes or planks of wood (other than nailing them into their houses), yet cinderblocks and ink were staples of Sarian life? What an odd place. Curious as to how this ink had not dried up during the undoubtedly long time the town had been silent, the mercenary traveled after it, looking for the source.

[Track]

or

[Awareness Check] [Nomadic Awareness]

The study of the Study's safe turns out to be going nowhere. Rosen's thinking of an extra rotation isn't a bad idea, but in the end results in the same conclusion as before: the first three locks opening smoothly, followed by a few seconds of silence before the seals are reset. This would certainly seem to be an annoying effort if not for Alpha's decision to take a closer look at the Pendulum (14+5 vs. 15 Pass). As the Sheikah looks at the numbers carved into the gilded metal, he notes that there are a total of twelve marks on its edges, with three of them appearing to be comprised of a pair of marks rather than a single one. If it was a compass, then the paired markings would appear at approximately north and two positions in between north and west.

In fact, the more one looks at it the more similar it should appear to... a clock.

While Aria plays about in the cool water of the Cellar, Dogura takes another quick look through the shelves. However, all he sees is more mold and forgotten supplies (4+9 vs. 15 Fail); it seems that Aria's discovery of the hole is the most interesting find of the area.

* * *

Back outside, Sabertache continues down the path of ink left behind by some unknown entity. His Tracking abilities come in useful (19+4 vs. 15 Pass), though they probably aren't necessary for following such a well defined trail as this. Of course, it might have been a good idea for the man to think about what might have left behind an ink trail in the first place...then he probably wouldn't have been so surprised to turn a corner only to find a quartet of Octoroks staring at him.

Octorok x4
STR – 4; DEF – 10; AGI – 3; INT – 1; SPI – 8; SPL – 4; HP – 30
Items:
Rock Cannon – long-ranged, high-velocity rock fired out of snout with high precision. 10 base DMG, +5 chance to hit.

And maybe it wasn't that Sarians had none of the stuff Saber had been searching for: two of the Octoroks had been carrying a pair of boards on their backs. Maybe the creatures are scavenging for items or something? Hardly matters, as the four beasts all fire their Rock Cannons, spraying stones at the Tantari Mercenary; none of the attacks hit, probably due to their surprise at seeing a Hyrulean in the thought-to-be deserted city, but some still come a bit too close for comfort.

Octorok #1 - 30/30 HP
Octorok #2 - 30/30 HP
Octorok #3 - 30/30 HP
Octorok #4 - 30/30 HP

Somewhere up there, somebody hates me.

Having expertly followed the obnoxiously dark and clear trail to its source, what was his compensation? A group of big-mouthed, looting monsters. What would Octorok need with wood? Who knew. Well, besides the Octorok and those who worked with them.

Which begged the question, what was it like to work with a group of monsters who had none of the necessary organs required to communicate? Sure, they had a mouth, but all it was good for was firing--

Oh, look at all those rocks.

Snapping out of his waxy philosophy, the mercenary had no time to dodge the incoming projectiles. Luckily, all his enemies seemed to have been trained by Stormtroopers. Having no time to think, Sabertache fell back on his fallback (go figure) strategy; removing a bomb, he jammed it into the most strategical position he could--in this case, the closest Octorok's snout--and lit it, skipping around the corner immediately afterwards to buy some time.

He knew he didn't have long--after all, they were right next to him only seconds ago--but they couldn't fire at him with a wall in the way, and if his attack had the effect he was hoping for--blowing the monster apart from the inside--he didn't want to be in the way.

HP: 44/44
SPL: 14/14
Will: 9/9

"Alright then, I don't see any reason to continue searching here. I'm headed upstairs with the others." He did just that, and ascending the staircase. He came to the top of the steps, and heaved a sigh. I sure wouldn't mind a little action around here... He turned and saw Alpha and the Goron inspecting the safe. "Where is a thief when you need one, eh?" He said approaching the duo. "I don't exactly like aimlessly wandering around in search of something that may or may not be there." He leaned against the wall near the two, and glanced out one of the windows nearby. "What happened to Saber with that ladder? Is he still out there?" Dogura pondered for a moment, wondering if it was safe to leave someone all alone. "Well, if he runs into trouble, he can handle himself."

[Awareness Check (because I can and will)]