Gizmo

Giant Krampus' massive cloven hoof crashed down atop the wall surrounding the Academy grounds, leaving a pile of rubble and a crescent shaped ditch. The magically sensitive students felt the subtle wards placed around the school ripple, strain and burst like eggshells under the mystic weight of the towering monster. The central statue in the middle of the large fountain by the gates rotated away to reveal a pair of automated defensive turrets but they had barely begun to fill the evening with the whir of rotating chambers before the bundle of birch trees swept them aside with a magnified baseball bat crack. The statue's head tumbled away to land face down in a snowbank. More than sixty feet tall, Giant Krampus reared back and let loose a roar like an avalanche, throwing back weirdly jointed arms to bare a chest covered in dark, matted fur. It lolled its serpentine tongue and turned its attention to the first specks foolish enough to rush into its grasp.

Knowledge [Arcane Lore] 15+ Knowledge [History] 15+ Knowledge [Pop Culture] 15+ Knowledge [Theology and Philosophy] 15+

GIANT KRAMPUS Initiative: 1d20+2 14 > 32 - White Lioness - Uninjured, 1HP > 25 - Zenith - Uninjured, 2HP 23 - Forever Boy - Uninjured, 1HP 23 - Masque - Uninjured, 5HP 21 - Facsimile - Uninjured, 3HP 15 - Salvo - Uninjured, 2HP 14 - Thunderbird - Uninjured, 2HP 14 - GIANT KRAMPUS - Uninjured 14 - Arcana, 3HP 11 - Ms. Thursday - Uninjured, 2HP 10 - Dio - Uninjured 07 - Sun Dragon - Uninjured, 2HP Okay, so obviously that's a lot of people so here's how we're going to handle initiative for this one: at any given time two of you will be 'up' in the initiative order. Once someone has posted IC and OOC their priority passes to whomever's on deck. So to start us off White Lioness and Zenith are up. If Absurdist posts for Zenith first then priority passes to Rocket and both White Lioness and Forever Boy would be up. Still try to be timely with your posting but that way we're never waiting on just one person to keep the action moving. Skill Check results incoming!

Need Initiative from @Tiffany Korta and @TheAbsurdist, plus any Knowledge rolls you'd like to make, then we'll get this show on the road!

"Blessed Ra!" Sekhmet exclaimed as she looked up to see the horrific, blinking mass. The oath turned into a leonine roar midway as her head shimmered into its fully feline appearance, fangs bared threateningly. The scowl Set wore went well beyond his usual mocking distain or eye-rolling annoyance. Temperance had seen that look only very rarely, in moments when she was reminded that the flamboyant troublemaker was a being who might consider 'smiting' a measured response. "You'll wish to cover your eyes now, vampire," he warned flatly, not taking his eyes from the ceiling. Sekhmet had already torn a baluster free from the railing beside the stairs above the crawlspace with a splintering crack and with her hands ablaze with solar flame, fashioned a sanctified torch. "By the All-Seeing I shall not suffer such depraved abomination!" The sizzle of burning moss and meat followed as the goddess proved her words.

Pick one, Cubismo.

I'd accept an Arcane Lore, History or Theology and Philosophy check.

EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT https://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/10983-giant-krampus-2-krampus-campus/ https://www.freedomplaybypost.com/topic/10984-giant-krampus-2-krampus-campus-ooc/ Claremont Academy is under siege by the dreaded Giant Krampus! The students staying in the dorms for the holidays must defeat this titanic threat or be carried off to assured doom! You have until New Years, January 1st to make an in-character post establishing where your character is around the campus as the Giant Krampus attacks and post initiative in the OOC thread. Combat begins in the new year!

Claremont Academy is under siege by the dreaded Giant Krampus! The students staying in the dorms for the holidays must defeat this titanic threat or be carried off to assured doom! You have until New Years, January 1st to make an in-character post establishing where your character is around the campus as the Giant Krampus attacks and post initiative here in the OOC thread. Combat begins in the new year!

Three Miles Northwest of Claremont Academy 8:56 PM "What do you mean 'no adults'? What kind of Macaulay Culkin nonsense is that?" the ear-splitting hero known as Wail demanded, jabbing a meaty finger toward the shimmering red and green dome that had covered a sizeable portion of Bayview. Neither the destructive power of his superhuman voice nor the impressive array of powers represented among the other assembled heroes had been able to so much as dent the barrier. The hirsute, stocky Canadian he was speaking with shrugged. "Dark holiday magic'll be like that." Daniel Storm had been in town to visit a few of his wards living in Freedom City for the holiday but had somehow known to be one of the first on the scene of the mystical disturbance. "Pretty obvious what the old bastard is after. Once it got close enough to the school it opened the Basket of Ancient Winters and poof. No adults, like I said." Without removing his hand from the pocket of his leather jacket he indicated a group of the Claremont Academy faculty who'd been on site even during the holiday break who'd been unceremoniously teleported to the opposite side of the dome and were currently making hurried phone calls. "I'm not having any luck with my scythe," the translucent blue woman in the cowl-neck sweater sighed, mouth set into an irritated line. "I almost had it, jumping over to Jötunheim and back but it's all..." Kimber storm wiggled her fingers in the air, searching for words and floating above a massive hoof print. "...molasses cookies. Maybe I can get a Ghost of Christmas Past thing going?" Daniel shook his head. "Not gonna work, kid. Only way this barrier is going down is when Giant Krampus goes down. They gotta do that part themselves." "You're seriously suggesting we just hope a bunch of teenagers can deal with that thing?!" Becky Shuster-Martel growled, hair flared out into a mane and teeth razor sharp as the spirit of avarice wrapped around her soul reacted strongly to Giant Krampus' presence. She huffed noticeably, out of breath from trying to claw her way through the dome, the seams on one arm of her puffer coat torn open. The older Canadian patter her elbow reassuringly, unfazed by her appearance. "Abby's a tough nut to crack and she's been talking the rest of the crop up, too. They'll handle it." His grim expression as he turned back in the direction of the school seemed far less confident.

South River December 24, 2018 7:24 PM Henry 'Tug' Stacy whistled a carol to himself as he guided his tugboat back toward the Riverside docks for the night. His daughter was old enough this year to really understand what was going on and had gone ga-ga for Christmas so he'd rented a Santa suit and was eager to get back home by the time she'd be sneaking out of bed. It had been a quiet afternoon and evening, just cold enough for a light snowfall to fill the air but not enough to begin icing over the water. Tug lost the tune as his boat lurched abruptly. The experienced sailor quickly reoriented but frowned; he was far enough from the bay that there shouldn't have been much turbulence. Leaning out through the window of his cab he peered out into the gathering dark, with only his own runners and the distant lights of the docks illuminating shapes. He watched as a piece of driftwood bobbed by, a pile of birch branches clumped together and rising five or six feet above the surface. As Tug scratched idly at his bushy red beard there was another, more violent lurch and he rushed back to the wheel, wrenching to one side against the inexplicable wave. His jaw hung slack as the birch branches rose higher and higher out of the water until he could see whole trees lashed together. They were joined by curving shapes the size of city buses Tug gradually recognized as something like goat horns. His boat went into a spin as a massive form followed, skyscraper tall and covered in dark, matted fur that shed water in great sheets. Great iron chains hung from its wrists, clanging with the timbre of cannonballs and it gripped the birch trees in one clawed hand. The other held the thick strap of some massive thing slung over its back, some sort of great cylinder with an uneven, woven texture. The tugboat gradually slowed its spin as the behemoth strode up and out of the river, heading in the opposite direction: away from Riverside and toward Bayview.

"Eyes eyes, blood blood, blah blah. Learn a new tune," Set groaned, rolling his storm grey eyes while leafing through the documents. "An entire ice cream parlour of deities and pantheons to which a mortal might devote themselves and some sack of diseased hippopotamus phalli ever chooses rum raisin." The godling turned on his heel to find Grimalkin extending a hand to the posturing mystery man in white, flanked by Temperance surrounded in a glittering halo of razor ice shards and Sekhmet with her fists alight with the golden flames of the merciless sun and bared teeth as sharp as Temperance's ice. "Oh, we're doing a thing!" He took a dramatic pose with his fingers splayed, arcs of crimson lightning jumping from fingertip to fingertip, crackling and adding a whiff of ozone to the cornucopia of aromas in the study. "~Just five pals looking cool in a crazy man's bookstore, ooh~!" he singsonged, moving his electrified hands about in something that looked vaguely like a fandango.

"Ha, I mean, that part might be above my pay grade, Yoyo," Erik protested with a grin, raising both hands with his palms outward to ward off the girl's annoyance. Mara and his sister certainly acted like they were married but he had no desire to put himself in the middle of that conversation. Leaning over the jewelry box the swordsman inspected the ring as if he had some expertise to draw upon. Something about cut and colour? "Sounds like you thought things through. Have you and the Miss talked about doing this at all? She kinda makes sure we don't know too much about her - which I can respect, obviously! Hard to get a read, is all."

Set Notice Check: 1d20+15 22 Will Save vs DC 20: 1d20+8 20 Search Check: 1d20+4 7 Sekhmet Notice Check: 1d20+15 22 Will Save: 1d20+5 8 Search Check: 1d20 12

Fingers laced behind his head, Set rocked idly back and forth on his heels until it became clear that no-one was coming to answer the knock. "Shall we stand about for another few hours, then?" he asked the three women with exaggerated cheer. "Nay?" The godling made a show of placing a thumb alongside his chin and audibly cracking his neck then shaking out his hands from the wrists. When they stopped shaking he'd grown a set of vaguely avian talons at the end of each finger, black at the tips with a faint ombré to deep cardinal red. The claws sunk into the brick of the townhouse-style building with satisfying ease and in moments Set had hauled himself up to a second storey window. Balancing there he spayed the fingers of one hand rested them against the glass, pushing carefully while rotating them in a perfect circle and etching a deep groove. He plucked the disk free, held delicately between his talons until he tossed it aside to shatter against the open lid of a dumpster in the adjacent alleyway. Reaching through the new opening Set flipped the interior latch and shoved the window open. Looking over his shoulder down to the street he sweetly called, "Coming?"

Erik placed the remainder of the gingerbread man into his mouth and chewed while matching Steve's stoic expression while Yolanda voiced her approval. After swallowing he cleared his throat into the back of his hand and deadpanned, "Well gosh, big guy, that's super flattering and all but honestly I'm kinda full-up on spouses right now." He managed to hold back any laugh apart from a brief quirk at the corner of his mouth. Catching his niece's eye he mused, "Unless you think he meant he was going to propose to somebody else?"

"Uh." Erik glanced in Yolanda's direction and briefly considered asking her to leave the room but he supposed she'd actually been present for a lot of what Steve was making about anyway. "I mean, I don't know if I'm necessarily the best one to ask, big guy. I kinda did things pretty backwards. Like, Talya and I flirted some then Min and I started living together, then had a kid, then got married, had another kid, then we started dating Talya, more kids..." He shrugged, sending gingerbread crumbs falling to the floor. "It's not like it was a single thing, more like one big, long, continuous 'transition'."

"Chris somehow got Talya going on the American butter thing again and Min is still convinced Raina's not eating enough but I figure having too many cookies to choose from is a pretty good problem to have," Erik updated him, gesturing with a gingerbread man with an icing domino mask and a bite mark where one arm should have been. In broken in jeans and a knit sweater the cost of which Talya had certainly failed to mention he looked much more the contented young father as he looked over the pile of children than the piano wire-taut bundle of training and instinct that Steve knew was only ever the first sign of danger away. "Looks like the troops wore themselves out, sergeant."

For a split second Set looked as though he'd been slapped across the face but in the span of a blink the gosling had schooled his features back into an easy grin. "Selfless as ever, oh strong-willed spiritualist but I could never forgive myself should you be relegated to airborne amenities less than you have rightfully earned. And so needlessly! Sekhmet delights in jesting over the daily trials of mortal existence but obviously Heliopolis' finest need not rely on mundane conveyance for a mere hop, skip and jump across the earthly plane." He wagged a finger at the statuesque goddess with a bright chuckle. Sekhmet for her part furrowed her brow. "Eh? Nay--" "Right indeed, of Lady of Slaughter! There I go again about hashtag just god things, ha! Temperance can certainly tell you, Ms. Epstein, I am positively insufferable at times. We shall leave you to make your arrangements and rendezvous in Bedlam, aye? Adventure and failed city planning await!" Taking Sekhmet by the elbow he hurried them both out the shop's front door with a cheery wave. His taller companion let herself be led away more out of bemused curiosity than anything else. "Liesmith, unless our previous leg-cramping, stomach-churning journeys have been an admittedly characteristically distasteful farce..." "I know! I know! I'm texting Huang," Set muttered irritably, taking out his phone as soon as they were out of direct eyeliner of the storefront. "Thy plan be to beseech thy consort to transport us by mystic means so thee may not loose face before a woman who once spurned thy advances?" Neither her flat tone nor her lidded stare suggested she was impressed. "Mayhap I shan't phrase the situation thusly!"

"Fate? Or the heady-hot winds of chaos?!" Set proposed dramatically, teeth gleaming in a broad grin and one hand held outward with splayed fingers while a single peal of thunder rumbled overhead. The godling relaxed his pose just as suddenly and leaned casually against a shelf of books. "Truly, though, the text in question has a... layered history, so much so that tis no great twist to be found under watch of a seelie - or unseelie, my apologies, thoughtless to assume - guardian or to be spirited away to a city where the spirits be largely away, so to speak" He tilted his head and looked the wax sculpture over head to toe, blasé about Lynn's ability to will it into existence. "Our Mr. Hawthorne has made some terribly naughty bargains and would you believe no one checked with me first? Rude." Sekhmet idly poked the statue in the temple with a finger tipped with an extended feline claw, expression ever more dour. "Rrrrhh. Bedlam. I would have no more to do with the pallid hound's odorous barges, deceiver." It said something of their evolving relationship that she placed more derision on the smell of mass transit than she did on the dubious honorific, if only just.

Set had his phone back in hand after barely a glance at the business card. "Ugh, Tan-Aktor, what a plumb bob. Let us see, 'Hawthorne'..." A few skillful searches began to fill in some blanks. "Elderly fellow operating a bookstore in Bedlam City? Bold choice given the overall literacy of his townsfolk. We've been meaning to pay a visit to some friends in the city good taste forgot anyway. What say you, Lady of Slaughter?" "Tis spit," Sekhmet snarled back, stomping back into view. Her lips were pulled back enough to reveal pronounced canines and her shoulder blades were drawn together as if to minimize her contact with the air around her. Set blinked once, looking to Temperance's expression reflexively. "An apt description of Bedlam, albeit brusque even by your standards...?" "The shop reeks of octopus, brine and mastication." The explanation was a growl while Sekhmet's exposed muscles rippled, shaking off fur she didn't currently have. She met Lynn's eyes gravely. "Thy thief rent thy pumping asunder then placed their mouth on..." Her grimace deepened. "...everything." There was a palpable pause before Set opined, "Well, ick."

THREAD PROMPT November 22 is America's incorrect Thanksgiving, traditionally the first time in the school year that students head back home to spend time with their families and have awkward conversations with their long distance sweethearts! Also turkey, I guess? I'm not really the right person to ask about any of this. Not everyone at Claremont can make it home for the weekend; some don't even have a home to which to return. Partner up to have more fortunate students invite a friend, roommate or squad member to Thanksgiving dinner with their family! That may just mean having a nice meal in the Freedom City suburbs or it may mean heading out of the city for a look at their hometown! It's a great opportunity for some one-on-one character development, introducing supporting characters or revealing backstory! Also turkey, I guess?

Set gave Lynn a dazzling grin of perfect teeth accompanied by a flourish of his hand, delighted as ever to be recognized. "Set be the storm crow on the tumultuous winds of the ever-unknown, oh much mistreated merchant! Set heeds not 'bad days', rather those foreboding events but answer to Set! Now smile." Without further instruction the godling turned on his heel, phone appearing in an outstretched hand while his other draped across Lynn's shoulders. One artificial shutter sound effect he had already removed himself from her personal space and was tapping away with both thumbs. "'Same book, new chapter. Hashtag freedomcitystrong," he read aloud as he typed, not looking up. "Have you a store account I might 'at'...? Aha, found! Bee-ee-ar, no second eye--" The stream of rapid speech was interrupted as the bookstore's door opened again and Set glanced up. Expressive eyebrows lifted high above kohl-outlined eyes in recognition for an instant before the godling casually tucked his phone away and crossed his arms over his sweater, standing a little straighter. "Do you know I was so close to wearing my own peacoat today? Thank benevolent Ra's suggestively large hands we avoid any awkwardness, eh?" Grin still in place he turned back to Lynn. "May I present the spectacular spiritualist, contessa of condensation and cold shoulders: the ever lovely Temperance." Having stalked past Lynn and further into the store, sniffing as she went, Sekhmet poked her head around the side of a bookshelf to size up the situation for a moment before continuing her inspection with an audible grumble.

Jack of all Blades SHADOW of Doubt (1) Flash of the Blade (2) Lou Lubrano The Black Luck Job (1) GM / NPC Assemble! (1) Let's Fall in Like (1) Rollover and Ref Point can go to Reagent, thanks!

Set 1 = Heads, 2 = Tails: 1d2 1