The Chronicles of Steambandia

[buzzkill]

The Chronicles of Steambandia: Adventures of Wonderland

PROLOGUE

Abrupt consciousness. This is my lame attempt to document my life as a Seelie Fae Naturalist. Yep, that's what I thought too, so I looked it up. I'm some sort of a faerie. I can fly, apparently. I am unimaginative, as you'll soon discover. I have blue eyes and long blond hair. Some would say I am very pretty. If I weren't a boy, my girlish good looks would probably be a valuable asset. For some reason my creator has seen it fit not only to bless me with the horrendous title of O'Blomie, but has also cursed me with the unnatural abomination that is disconnected stairs. I guess he doesn't like me very much. None the less, I shall willingly sacrifice my life for the greater glory of his highness in his meaningless quest to defeat the dreadful Fu Manchu. And so, after doing a little window shopping downtown, I ascend my very first staircase into the dungeon.

You may be interested to know that, prior to my ascension, I sold my heirloom quarterstaff, since I was too weak to wield it, and not being able to afford a firearm, purchased some throwing knives instead. These will serve as both my melee and missile weapons. To my dismay, I quickly discover that I can only throw the knives 20'. I also took the occasion to don my stylish feathered (fur) cloak and equipped a torch so as to provide the proper ambiance. I briefly toy with the idea of a whip, as a fashion accessory, but ultimately decide against it. I am beautiful. After a long moment I manage to tear my gaze away from the mirror and see what the rest of the town has to offer. At the machine shop I purchase a mechanism of returning and several of phase door. The librarian burdens me with what he considers to be an easy quest to kill 10 alien plasomorphs. I think that it's quite impossible, and that I'll surely die. Anyhow, it's about time I was on my way. I certainly hope that I don't die immediately. It would make everything I've recorded up to this point seem very, very meaningless.

Chapter 50. Maximum Verbosity.

Darn. I forgot my cursed situation. First I must find a stairway. I spy some pheasants, and a mysterious potion, a long way down the corridor dead north of me. I'll seek to avoid them for now. I head south, hoping to also avoid the other nasties I've detected. The passage zig-zags, then splits. I choose the path of least resistance and head east. After a time I realize that it is a dead end. Searching for a secret door reveals nothing. It looks as though there may be a fight in my future. However, before I can convince myself to turn back, my pacifist nature compels me to search further and eventually I discover a hidden doorway. The door opens into a room where I find my very first treasure, a small handful of tin nuggets. I am not amused. Only one way to go from here, so I head north, leaving my innocence behind. A zig, a zag, and another dead end. This time I quickly find the hidden mechanism and open the once secret door. I now appear to be surrounded, with enemies to north, east, and west. I decide to avoid the central portion of the dungeon and head east, toward the rock lizard, hoping for a zag in the tunnel and avoidance of the confrontation. After just a step or two my enemy to the north, an alien spore awakes. Somehow, drawing on the memories of my ancestors, I learn of the aliens slow motion breeding habits. I suddenly surprise myself by deciding that now is the time to test my skills in mortal combat. I charge down the corridor, screeching my faerie battle hymn, that I make up as I go along. 40' later I'm half way there. It's then that I witness my first alien reproduction, and then there were two. I quickly close the remaining distance and let my first knife fly. It strikes the alien squarely, and kills it in a single blow. The second dies just as easily. I gather my spent knives from the floor and proceed to explore the chamber they were guarding only to find it empty. Still smarting from the lack of treasure thus far, I wander out of the room and through a nearby tunnel when I spot what appears to be a treasure laden vein of quartz. Letting my greed get the better of me, I pathetically try to chip away at the quartz with my tiny knives. It's not long before a rock lizard sneaks up behind me. At the last moment, I try to run but only manage a step before its upon me. Having no choice, I stab wildly at the lizard, luckily striking it, and sending it fleeing. Then the chase begins. I immediately head off in the wrong direction. A tricky beast, this one is. We decide to pillar dance for a turn or two before it trips itself up and I land the fatal blow. A short distance away I come across some silver nuggets just lying on the floor. A nearby room yields a ray gun and an unknown mechanism. A test firing reveals the ray gun to be full of photic beams. The examination of the scroll will have to wait until later. I smell chickens nearby. After proceeding east for a while, the corridor I'm following splits to the north and south. The chicken smell is definitely coming from the south, along with the familiar scent of alien spore. Not wanting masses of little aliens, should I decide to return later, I decide to take it out now. I head southward but the tunnel suddenly doubles back and I find myself heading north. I find another handful of tin nuggets. The passage ends in a columned chamber. I'm lured in by some copper nuggets and also discover a stairway leading up and a passage to the south. I head south in search of chicken, and also since it's well known that proceeding while CL<DL, especially as a faerie, is considered quite suicidal. Just my (poor) luck, the passage once again turns back on itself and I soon found myself back in the columned room. I exit the room heading east. Surely there must be a way to the chickens. The tunnel quickly turns south, but just as I think that fortune may be on my side I notice a small dog man, waking before my very eyes. I also spot two treasures, so I commit to killing this man dog. We close on each other. Once he's in range, I throw my knife, killing him instantly. As I enter the room, I collect some tin nuggets and retrieve my blade. It's then that I spy yet another dog man asleep in the corner. He awakes before I can reach him, and dies shortly thereafter. Thus far, my knives have been perfect, never failing me, never missing. I believe myself to be both stylish and invincible. Along the southern wall I find another handful of tin, but no passageways. I'm beginning to think that I may never find my way to those dastardly chickens when, upon examining my map, I find an unexplored tunnel that appears to lead in the proper direction. While back tracking, I pass the stairway again, and this time I take the occasion to rig my previously found mechanism. It produces a bright light. Totally useless in this situation, but I feel somewhat wiser and more experienced from the experimentation. I finally arrive at the doorway to chickens. It's locked, but I quickly pick it. The passage twist and turns and simply ends, once again. A quick search reveals the anticipated secret door. Ahem, the anticipated locked secret door. After what seems like what could be best described as 56 turns, I manage to unlock it. Finally, stepping into the room, I spy 8 sleeping chickens and 3 wriggling alien spores, an unknown mechanism and few bauxite nuggets (and a pheasant in a red weed). Also, there's another an upward stairway. Though I'd like to kill the aliens first, the chickens stand between I and them, so off with their heads, the chickens, that is. About 8 seconds later, 8 chickens lie headless. I feel an immense burst of power as I achieve CL2 and the title Acolyte. I quickly gather a few of my knives and move onto slaughtering the aliens. By the time I draw near there are already 4 of them. I confidently let loose my knife, and miss. Holy crap. My first miss. The next four throws are better, and soon enough the aliens are dead, and I'm collecting my loot. Standing upon the stairway once again, I rig the unknown mechanism and it identifies itself as one of identification. Since I have nothing to identify at this time, I save it for later use.

To be continued... or maybe not... this inane tale is beginning to annoy even myself.
There's really no need to check the dump.

[buzzkill]

The continuation... and the ending.

After quite a bit of wandering about, I find myself centrally located in the dungeon and also find a few tin nuggets and a stairway back to town. I've set my goal at achieving CL3 before leaving this place. Heading further north, I come upon a room of chickens. Knives fly, 8 of them. All the cluckers are soon dead. I collect their heads as souvenirs, gather my knives and pack away an unknown mechanism I found on the floor. Given a choice of direction of travel from here, I try to detect nearby creatures, and do. A strange terminal, in an alcove, just outside the room, and some filthy cave mice, breeding, nearby. The terminal died easily, but gave no treasure. I exited the alcove intent on killing the rodents before their numbers became insurmountable. As I rounded the corner, suddenly, one of them was upon me. It bit me. Twas only a flesh would, but a wound none the less, my first. It drew first blood, but victory would be mine. As the first died, I could see five more behind it, lined up like dominoes, and so they fell. Two more died, and then there were six that I could see. Beyond that a chamber with who knows how many more. 7 more died, and I was almost at the chamber now, only 3 remaining that I knew of. 5 more died and yet there were still 3 remaining. Worse yet, in my haste to enter the chamber I had charged ahead recklessly, engaging in much hand to sharp pointy tooth combat, and had sustained both light and serious wounds. I can see clearly now, for the first time, that there are only 5 of the vermin remaining. I, with some effort, conquer the last 5 and recover my knives. I fear that some may have escaped so I try to detect creatures and find no mice, but instead a room full of chickens, maybe 20 of them, and their leader, Chicken Little. It was a trying battle. I must rest before eradicating the fowl horde. I perform a bit of light exploration while waiting for my less serious cuts to heal and come across some haddocks that I had previously over looked. I now have enough food to feed a small faerie army. My photic ray gun, packed away, keeps slipping my mind. I must remember to put it to good use. Feeling better, I head for the chicken coop. As I pass through an empty room the first of the cluckers comes into sight, packed into a hallway like sleeping sardines. 3 die and as I turn the corner, 3 more come into view, and beyond them I spot a ray gun lying in the dirt that will soon be mine. The 3 die and upon grasping the ray gun, I find it to be identical to the one that I already posses. I'm at the main chamber now, their lair. As I peek around the corner, I can see that the chicks are all packed into the western portion of the lair, sleeping like babies. In addition, there's also a creepy daddy long-legs and a shoddily constructed maintenance robot. The breeders will have to die first, and luckily they are both easily accessible, alone and asleep. 2 knives later and the interlopers are dead. The chickens still sleep. On to the main course. About half way through the battle, ahem, the merciless slaughter the sleeping chicks, I achieve CL3 which heals my more serious wounds and fulfills my personal ambition for the level. Once Chicken Little lies dead, I'll leave this place. Little Chicken put up no more of a fight than his brethren, dying instantly in his sleep. He also produced no more loot than the rest, leaving me with nothing of value. Although I had planned on leaving, a light in a nearby chamber caught my eye, so I approached and took a peek inside. I marveled, at first glance, at the variety of creatures and at the festively adorned robe hung neatly on a peg behind them. As I strained my eyes to take a closer look, I accidental (pressed the wrong key) ran into the center of the room. This unpredictable action awoke and drew the attention of the rock lizard who quickly attacked and seriously wounded me. I struck back with a vengeance, sending it fleeing. It fell to a knife in the back just as the cave mouse awoke. It died instantly, unable to reproduce. My next targets would be 8 sleeping chickens. As I drew closer I noticed that the pheasants that I thought were asleep in the corner were in fact, just blissfully unaware of my presence. Some began to move toward me, and it was at this point that I realized that nothing in this room was asleep. Everything was simply ignoring me. This revelation made me just a little nervous, as I was a long way from the nearest staircase. 3 pheasants, 3 chickens, died easily. The remaining chickens still unmoving, despite being splashed by the blood of their kin. 2 more chickens and a pheasant down and I found myself out of knives, save for the one I was wielding and would not sacrifice. I scrambled for a bit, recovering a knife and reusing it. Eventually all the fowl in the room was deceased and I recovered all of my knives. That left only the 2 hadrosarous, still unaware of what was happening around them. I was content to let them be, but the robe must have belonged to one of them, because as I made a move toward it, they charged at me. The first one's attempted attack was futile, and it died before it reached me. I quickly recovered my knife and strode confidently toward the second, no longer in the mood for mercy, wanting to clear this chamber before gathering my loot. It was then that something unexpected happened. It moved toward me, quickly, more quickly than I had ever seen anything move in my short life. And before I could do anything, it butted me... and clawed me. I was seriously injured, and seriously scared. Had I been thinking clearly, I would have quickly rigged a mechanism of phase door and then quaffed a potion to heal myself. Instead, swelling with both fear and over-confidence, I took a stab at the hideous beast. I missed. Well, that's pretty much the last thing that I remember, other than the clawing and the biting and the excruciating pain that followed. So much for the short pathetic life of a Saeelie Fae named O'Blowmie.

[Rizwan]

Nice name for a fairy