Exile 3: Ruined World Part #20 - Bavner and the Friendly, Happy Spiders

Part 20: Bavner and the Friendly, Happy Spiders

Update 018 – Bavner and the Friendly, Happy Spiders

“If this map is correct, then we have nearly completed a full circle of the island.”

“Wow! So, what does that mean?”

“It means that we've been going in circles.”

“Not quite. More like an oval, assuming you don't count the tail of the island that leads to Southpoint.”

“Islands can have tails? Why did no one ever tell me?!?!”

“I don't know if he's joking or not...”

“I will assume he is.”

“Come on then, maybe we can get some information here.”

“I will take my leave then. I will endeavour to wait for the rest of you here.”

“Don't get lost!”

“This is a small town. How could she?”

“There are more ways to be lost than in direction.”

“And all who wander”

“are not necessarily lost.”

“Last one.”

“Hello, Mother.”

You meet a woman wearing a robe and rings of the Anama Church. She has the air of not suffering fools gladly, and the authority of a born leader. "I am Mother Loomis. Welcome to Bavner."

“I am Delilah, petitioner.”

"I am the guardian of Bavner. A trying job, I am sure you realize, but the faith gives me strength."

“Surely your guardianship is sufficient to help with the spirits of your people!”

She rolls her eyes. "One trial after another! As if the roaches weren't enough, I have to deal with Judith, and with Seela's ravings."

“I do not know this Judith. At least, I don't think I do.”

She frowns. "A carpetbagger! She's a healer who travels from town to town, healing for a hefty price! She's from some religion that values making money or amassing power or some such rot. I, as you can probably tell, despise her. If, for some odd reason, you actually want to meet her, she comes through occasionally."

"As if everything else wasn't enough, Seela says there are spiders in the woods who come and speak with her. She's around town somewhere if you want to ask her about it."

“I think not. Greed is a poison on the souls of good people. The faith I seek to share has no room for such things.”

"The Anama teaches self-reliance above all things. We should rely on our own strength, not the energy from realms we do not understand, and from the summoning of bizarre creatures. I have thought much on my beliefs. Would you like me to share them with you?"

“Of course! The magic of the mages, unlike the priestly spells, come from without, not withing, and the only things worth doing are those achieved with your own hands, toward your own joy!”

And that's that. We've done everything we need to join the Anama Church. I'll save going through that for after we've purged the Filth Factory.

“Talking Spiders... but where is this Seela person?”

“aaaaaaa...............................”

“And why do I hear Art screaming in fear at the mention of spiders? Is she an arachnophobe? That's an odd failing.”

“Hey! What are you doing back here in the trash?”

“Oh, hello. Just hiding out. My name is Judith. I met you and your people back in Shayder.”

“Really? Well, it's nice to meet you again!”

Judith is the same NPC as we would find in Shayder on other days. However, her in Bavner, she likes to hide out in the lower-right corner of the map. With the garbage?

“Huh. Freerange chicken.”

“You know, why aren't people putting up walls, or barricades to deal with the Roaches? It's not like the Slimes that can spit acid. “

“Another series of lodgings for the displaced. But where are the ruined villages that they came from? Why have we seen no such things on our travels?”

“Curious. This house is different from the others.”

“... what ....”

“How did they get in? Why hasn't this building been burnt down yet?”

“Never mind, looks like I'll get to do it for them.”

I didn't close the door behind me, so when I went to rob the dresser of some coins, someone in town saw me do so – you see the notation “Your crime was seen!” in the log window? That means the town has gone hostile. So I simply reload and ignore this building. Funny thing though – I couldn't spot who had seen me, so unless it was the Roaches who sounded the alarm, I'm at a loss. But that's alright, it wasn't a lot anyway.

“On second though, I'm no taffer. I shall leave this be.”

“Ah, this is where the roaches died. Nice to see they came in along the road.”

“Hrm...”

“Yeah, I think we can do that. Hello there!”

A stolid, massive man is slouched behind the counter. He looks rather dull, but is surrounded by books on a wide variety of topics. "I am Voorn."

“I am Art.”

"I am a teacher."

“I am an adventurer, not a teacher.”

"I train adventurers, what adventurers come here anymore. I am schooled in all the adventuring skills from Alchemy to Priest Spells, and everything in between. If you want training, say so, and we'll go out back."

Hold on, the only thing between Alchemy and Priest Spells is Mage Lore.... I'm really glad he's speaking hyperbole here. And if he was going alphabetically, it would have been Alchemy to Thrown Missiles. Anyway, let's do some training!

Gets more SP, and 5 more points in Edged Weapons. She's leaning heavily on the overpowered Alien Blades, and it won't be until the end game when the scale of the enemies catch up to the scale of her weapons. 10 points there is good enough, so for the next few levels, I will be saving for Priest Spells and SP gains.

More SP, more Intelligence. I'm going to have to invest in Priest Spells for her soon – for reasons. She may wind up drinking that Skill Potion Matthias is lugging around for that purpose.

I did not train Sass at this point, once again, for ~reasons~.

15 total points in Mage Lore should cover everything I need for a while – there are a couple things I've missed because I didn't have enough, so I plan to catch them later.

Forgot to grab a 'before' shot, but Bronwyn got 4 points of Edged Weapons, and one more in Dexterity. I should invest in Luck and Assassination soonish. So few Skill Points, so many Skills....

Another 'I forgot the before' picture, Ni'aurrl got 4 Spell Points, and 2 points in Intelligence before I ran out of gold.

“Oh! There you are!”

You meet a young Anama priestess, more than happy to take a break from looking over the fields and picking weeds.

“My name is Delilah, and I've been looking for you.”

"I'm Seela."

“Curious. Why is a priestess like yourself weeding while in town?”

"I look after things. I watch the crops, patrol the woods, that sort of thing. And let me tell you, I see some strange things."

“The crops? Surely there are farmers for that!”

"More interesting work that you could possibly imagine," she says wryly.

“Perhaps. Now, I shall be honest. My group has been tasked with the investigation and eradication of the cockroach plague by the Mayor of Shayder. We have made several advances in our investigation and now we turn to you as we have been informed that you have had strange experiences in the woods.”

"There are intelligent spiders in the woods! And what's more, they're friendly! They come and talk to me, and I give them little bugs in return. They're kind of sweet!"

“aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa”

“What was that?”

“Just the screams of the damned. You get used to it after a while. Tell me more about these spiders. We haven't been receiving any complaints about them, so we're hoping they are predators to the Roaches.”

"I know what you're thinking, but I tell you there are intelligent spiders in the forest. They say they have a big lair somewhere, but haven't told me where. If you went and were nice to them, I'm sure they'd talk to you too."

“Thank you! You were most helpful.”

“You're welcome.”

“No, we are not.”

“We are not finding them.”

“See, we can deal with these things on our own.”

“We don't need to talk to them.”

“This is a waste of our time. No Spiders!”

“There is no reason to go looking for them! At all! Ever!”

“See? They weren't there. We can just pass them on by.”

“Completely irrelevant to our job.”

“There is no need to head south and back into the Webwood to find them.”

“No.”

“No. Nope. Never.”

A giant spider runs up and kisses you in the knee. Then it backs away shyly.

“Oh, aren't you the most adorable little arachnid! What's your name?”

"I'm Spider," it says, pleased you asked.

“Hello Spider! What are you doing here?”

"I'm looking for a mate!" it says exuberantly.

“Really? A mate?”

It shies away, and if it could, you think it would be blushing. "It's good to make baby spiders, and you're cute!"

“Oh, I'm not that cute. I only have two eyes!”

"Yeah! You're cute and tall! I like you!" You sit down and patiently explain that you would make very poor parents for baby spiders. It understands and walks away sadly.

“I am going back to Exile.”

“Why?”

“So I can go grab Peregrine and Kai-Lyss.”

“You know Kai-Lyss? Cool!”

“... Why?”

“And then I'm going to bring the two of them back up here. To this place. And then the three of us are going to BURN THE WHOLE ISLAND DOWN. No more roaches. No more spiders. I can sleep in peace knowing I have done the work of the righteous.”

“Don't you think you're over reacting?”

“How could you hate them?!? You're a monster!”

“You haven't seen the horror...”

“It doesn't matter. We're here to conduct an investigation. They may have further information about the Roaches.”

“So, where should we go? All these spiders look alike.”

“We can ask that one!”

You meet a large spider with big fangs, standing guard. It doesn't seem to want to attack you, however. It's just standing there, watching you with interest. "Hi!" it says, "I'm Spider!" It has a cheery, high pitched voice, coming from somewhere below its pedipalps.

“Hello! What are you doing here?”

“I'm guarding our lair! There's mean things about." It makes little martial leaps in the air, to convince you of its fearsomeness.

“And you're doing an amazing job of protecting the lair. You should be proud.”

"You never know when someone mean and bad will try to break in, like some of those cockroaches, or nasty humans."

“Humans? Like us? That's horrible!”

It shakes its head sadly. "Some humans don't like spiders. Silly, huh? We're so good at killing roaches!"

“Actually, we're trying to find the roaches ourselves. Could you tell us where you find them?”

"Roaches are mostly yummy food, but some are smart and friendly, just like us! They are hiding to the north. You should go meet them! They're swell! Our chief knows exactly where they are. He's way to the north!"

“... Friendly Roaches?”

“... I don't believe it.”

“burneverythingbureverything”

Sorry about the map window getting in the way. I had multiple windows up, and forgot that the screencapture would show what I see, and not what the program would show. It'll go away. Eventually.

An official looking spider marching precisely around. It comes up to your waist, and looks as if it could be a threat, were it not for the unflappable friendliness of these creatures. "I'm called Spider," it says perkily.

“And I'm Bronwyn. What are you doing here?”

"I'm the captain spider." It looks you over. "You're cute!"

“A Captain? That's an important job!”

It looks uninterested in discussing it. "Yep. The chief picked me." It returns to the subject its most interested in. "You're really cute!"

“Oh, I'm not that cute.”

"Yeah!" It says, bouncing up and down a little. "Want to go on a date?"

You decline politely. It looks sad, then brightens up. "OK! But if you change your mind, I'll be right here. Ask for Spider!"

“I feel really bad about that.”

“Hey!” You meet a giant spider, pacing about, lost in thought. The hair on its legs has streaks of white. It must be rather old.

Another reason why I don't like the GIFTS. It's impossible to tell them apart. The 'Captain' is to our south in the previous picture – this new spider is to the left.

"Hello, humans! My name is Spider," it says. Despite its age, it still has the bright, chirpy voice of the younger spiders.

“And what do you do?”

“I'm a sage spider! I record the history of our people!"

“You're a sage? You must be very smart!”

"Yeah! That means I have lots of cool learning and stuff. I record history mainly. When I'm not eating yummy bugs!"

“Tell me more about your history?”

"Yeah! Would you like to hear about the great journey, or what we did otherwise?"

Journey

Otherwise

You have to see it to believe it.

“We should move before Art stands still long enough to melt the rock under her.”

“I don't think we could move these rocks.”

“And the Spiders have ignored them.”

“Except I think I saw something over this way...”

“Careful, there's a sharp turn here.”

I'm stunned here. For the entirety of all the games leading up to now, secret passages have always been two tiles long. That this one is three tiles, and you have to turn while sliding through it to get into this clear space is amazing.

“I got this.”

“And that is a lot of metal.”

“Even if this is merely iron ingots... that's still a lot.”

“But we can't carry them all right now. We should leave them until we can extract them later. There's no forge marks on them either... quite odd.”

“Well, let's get moving then. I don't think Spider or Spider can do anything about this.”

“I agree.”

Each of those bars weighs twenty stone. I'll need a lot more Strength to make coming here and robbing the place worthwhile.

“At least we know where those bars were made now.”

“Ugh.”

“So cute!”

Baby spiders don't say much.

“Let's go north! Maybe the King Spider is in the back!”

“Sounds as good an idea as any.”

“Or we could find more 'free range' roaches.”

“There sure are a lot of them.”

“Nothing a Fireball or six won't fix.”

“I like the way you think.”

“Because there's more of them over here!”

No loot though.

“Where is the King?”

“Not here.”

“North or south?”

“North!”

“Amazing! A temperature controlled larder!”

An officious, bold spider blocks your way. It doesn't want to let you go east.

“Hello there! I'm Bronwyn!”

"My name is Spider," it says sombrely.

“So, you're doing a very good job of standing here. Why?”

"I'm a guardian arachnid!" it says in a proud way, and show its fangs to punctuate the point.

“And who are you guarding?”

"I'm guarding our chief! You can't go east until you prove you're allowed!"

“Your chief must be very proud of you to trust you with this job!”

"He's powerful and good! I will protect him, even until it's not convenient!"

“Well, I think I'm allowed to talk to your chief. I need some information from him.”

It thinks, unsure for the moment how you would prove you can go east. Finally, it says "If you are allowed to see our chief, surely you would know his name! What is it!"

“...”

“It is Spider.”

It jumps up and down happily. "That's it! That's chief spider's name! You can go through." The spider wanders off, looking for bugs.

“That was... I don't know what to say, really.”

And Spider will never get in our way again.

“Spider!”

You meet an older spider, its brown hairs starting to be run through with wisps of gray. It has a gold circlet around its head. "I'm Spider," it says, it's high pitched voice has a tiny hint of authority. "I'm a leader spider!" it says.

“And you're an amazing leader.”

"I guided all the other spiders on a big, nasty journey to the surface! I lead them in catching yummy bugs. And I say what we should do about those nasty cockroaches."

“Tell us about the surface!”

"We used to live down in the weird, dark, chilly caves. Then there was a fire. Then we found a way up here!" It gives a happy little jump up and down. "Now we finds lots more bugs!"

“You must be the bestest Spider to ever Spider if you find bugs so easy!”

It plucks a fist sized cockroach from a nearby web and munches it down. "Yum! Snacks!"

“Chief Spider, Spider told us that you know more about the cockroaches in the area.”

"Cockroaches are good food, but also tough and hard to hunt. But not all are bad! There's some friendly roaches! They live in the north, but are all hidden. Would you like to know where the friendly roaches are?"

“The Friendly ones? Yes please. They may be able to help us find where they are from.”

"Before I tell you, you need to help us. Directly northwest of here, in the middle of a circle of stone, is a big roach lair. Go there and some of my spiders will meet you. Help them kill all the bad roaches, and I'll tell you where the nice ones are!"

“Kill feral roaches to learn the location of the civilized roaches. Understood! We'll be back!”

“But before we do, I want to check out this room.”

“Neat! Yoink! I'll check you out later.”

“Why would you step on that?”

“Because there wasn't enough energy in it to me a problem. See?”

“Easy!”

“Still demons.”

A little bit of everything, but still easy to crush.

And interestingly enough, they 'explode' when they die, leaving behind the 'crater' texture.

“Anyone want Wormgrass?”

“LEAVING!”

“I think this is the spot.”

“Are we ever! SPIDERS! CHARGE!”

“I hate all of you. Forever.”

“Well, we could be over there.”

This isn't much of a fight. But this is the first encounter with the fourth type of Roach – the Guardian.

Nothing to out of the ordinary. Huge chunk of potential damage, but easily taken care of by a Party Blessing. And while I'm here, let's take a look at the GIFTS, shall we?

25 SKILL? And 9 POISON? Good lord, these things will wreck your day when they bite you. But they're something of a glass cannon.

The Spiders also like to web the enemy which reduces their ability to move and act. Honestly, I don't think we're needed for the Spiders to win the fight. But if I did that, I wouldn't get the precious XP for the kills!

“YAY!”

“We've beaten down the bad roaches! Can you tell us where the friendly ones are now?”

Chief Spider bounces happily. "Well done! You helped us get lots of yummy, yummy food! The Roach Lair is directly north of here, hidden in the middle of a bunch of trees. Be nice to them because they are really friendly and good."

“We will!”

“burneverything”