"Welcome to the peaceful town of Alamar." Her familiar voice called from seemingly the sky. "It has luscious green grass and beautiful flowers, being a rather small place. You were summoned, however, by the King, in urgent need. Arriving in the throne room, you are dazed by the lack of elegant golden statues or elaborate decoration. "As you can see," the King, a rather short man with a large, white beard, begins. "we are not the extravagant sort. Our resources are plentiful and our air is clean. Our need for gold and extremities is next to none." The King smiled proudly. "However, we have an infestation of Goblins in the sewers. I regret to tell you that our weapon and gold reserves are dwindling, so we have nothing to spare you. Now go, you will be rewarded somehow." The King smiled and waved you goodbye as you left.

So, Captain Tong, what is your first course of action?" The Dungeon Master's voice was robotic, as if she wasn't even in control.

John was having what would politely be called 'a strange day'. That kind of tactful phrasing was not usually in his nature, that was more his brother's department, but at the moment utilizing the terminology that he felt like would probably get them kicked out of the kingdom, after some mind-reading wizard decided to tell the king what he was thinking. Regardless, none of this semantical pondering had any bearing on the situation. The two things that were of issue were, firstly, that they apparently been transported by unknown means into the realm of the roleplaying game, and him becoming a robot, and, secondly, that they had seemingly lost the rest of their party.

Oh, and the fact that the king was talking to them. The fact that he had completely forgotten about that probably said something about their situation.

Speaking of which, so caught up in his own thoughts was the captain, that he hadn't heard a word the old man had said. Oops.

So, Captain Tong, what is your first course of action?" While Tong did briefly wonder why so much emphasis was put on his name, he was more occupied with questions. "Er, not to be rude or break the immersion unnecessarily, Joleen, but shouldn't our priority be to find the others and figure out how to get home?" His voice came out slightly mechanical, and strangely warped by an abominable blend of dialects, all the same, he was certain that she'd understand him. That is, at least to the extent he was certain of anything anymore.

Joleen sighed, grumbling. "How do you think I feel? I don't even have a body. It's just you guys and I'm telling some sort of bullshit story!? Could you just find a way to get us all out of here?" The humanity had returned to her voice and everything she had said was true. As the last words uttered from her mouth, her screams followed. Somehow jolts of electricity coursed through her "spine" and all over other painful parts of her "body". She panted and tried to figure out what had happened, but she was in far too much pain to concentrate.

"Captain Tong, what is your first course of action?" She repeated mechanically. It seemed as if talking normally or at least commanding the others wouldn't be a very good option.

Captain Tong winced at his friend's screams of pain. Even though he'd no idea that would happen, nor any reason to come to the conclusion that it was even a possibility, he also couldn't help but feel guilty. "Ah, sorry ma'am. Don't ye worry, me and the wunderkind here'll have things sorted out shortly."

These words of assurance sounded flimsy even to the former captain's mechanical hearing apparatuses, though how much of that was due to how badly his two accents had mangled the German word he wasn't sure, and he looked to the person beside him for confirmation.

It was hard to believe, well all of this was really, but this was especially so, that this young girl in commoner's clothing, shuffling along next to him and looking down at her feet, had only this very morning been his little brother, again shuffling along and looking at his feet, but presumably for a different reason. Noticing that she (he? it? they? Ugh, pronouns were going to be a pain in the hindquarters) was expected to add something to this, the smallish blonde, well, those aspects were at least unchanged, looked up. "Well, I suppose that, for the moment at least, following the king's request would be the best course of action. His offer of a reward was just vague enough that it might be a prompt for a way to get ourselves out of here."

What she deliberately failed to mention for the moment was that there was absolutely no in-universe reason to explain why the king would even think that they would want that sort of thing as payment, let alone actually somehow possess that kind of ability. That probably wasn't the most helpful thing to bring up at the moment.

"Alright then, that sounds like a plan."

After a little while of walking, Tong again turned to Aria. "So... where exactly are the sewers." The two stopped abruptly. "I was following you." "I thought you'd have figured out by now that that isn't commonly a good idea." The Magical Girl gave an exasperated sigh, at which Tong was barely able to suppress a laugh, and replied with "Fine then. Stay here, I'll ask someone."

And she was off before he could even ask why he shouldn't be the one asking. Probably for the better anyway, considering that there were just too many answers to give in reply, some of them being, but not limited to, he was sort of dressed like a pompous rogue, which he sort of was, he didn't have as high of an in-character charisma, and finally, he was a freaking robot made of gold.

Looking around, Aria attempted to find someone who'd likely be both willing to listen to what she had to ask, and be as helpful as possible.

The Dungeon Master found herself, again, unable to control her speech. "Perception + d20." She seemed to talk to herself, though everyone could still hear. It appeared that her mind was rolling a d20 to see if Aria actually found anyone - who could help at least. "Seventeen." The Dungeon Master smiled.
"Aria stumbled upon a man - rather frail in appearance - running towards them. "M-M-M-MONSTER!" He screeched, pointing from the way he came. "IN THE SEWERS!"." The Dungeon Master tried to talk to them again normally, but it seemed to be taking a lot of strength to do it. She figured if she didn't hint too much, she might get away with it. "Aria, Tong, the way to ... um... finish this quest... is to go to the sewers and.. look arou--" She stopped talking suddenly.

"Charisma+d6. Twenty-Five. Critical." The Dungeon Master had rolled to see if Aria would manage any more information from the bumbling man in front of her. "The man told you his name was Darvis, and he was a budding adventurer. In an attempt to help the King he had found his way into the sewers. "This way!" He called, grabbing Aria's hand. Captain Tong, Aria and Darvis headed into a dark alley between two buildings. There wasn't too much space, not enough for it to be an ambush. "You can get in through here." He pointed down at an odd looking grate in the floor."

Surprised at Aria's level of success, Tong followed quickly behind as she was dragged along by the hand. When they arrived at the alley, both Aria and Tong eyed the grate warily. Not that they didn't trust Darvis, though John thought he reminded him a bit to much of Professor Quirrell for his liking, but because it was unlikely that whatever monsters had chased him off would be particularly pleasant.

Aria however reasoned that, since they didn't seem to have hurt him, perhaps they were just defending what the perceived as their territory. Perhaps they could be reasoned with.

But, for the moment, there were more immediate concerns to be dealt with. Turning to Darvis and giving a reassuring smile, she first tugged lightly on his hand to get his attention, and then spoke in a tone of kindness and friendship. "Don't worry, we'll take it from here. It would really help us a lot though if we knew what to expect. Can you do me a really big favor and try to tell me what happened, starting from the beginning, please?"

Meanwhile, Tong, both knowing that Aria had things under control over there, at least for the moment, and sort of wanting to disassociate himself from the conversation, was examining the grate, looking into it and nudging it with his foot.

"d6 + Charisma + Trait = 24. Aria managed to get the worked up Darvis talking calmly and sensibly. "I-I don't know, ma'am." He started. "T-There was a rusted chest, and I was going to open it, but it turned into.. s-s-ome giant beast with sharp teeth. I-I tried to run but I bumped into a goblin and tripped, then more goblins came and I only got out just in time!" He blabbered, shaking."

"d20 + Perception." The Dungeon Master was pretty sure Captain Tong had not wanted to initiate a roll for looking at the grate, but he did. "Four. Critical fail. Captain Tong saw nothing at all, for a moment. Until a small glint had come into view. Before Captain Tong could make out what this thing or creature was, he slipped on some wet mud and fell on the grate. The grate was so rusted that it creaked a moment before breaking and Captain Tong became stuck in the grate." Even The Dungeon Master stiffled a laugh at the critical fail. I mean, four's a bad score enough but now he's holding up their quest until Aria gets him out.

Aria had been about to ask Darvis to elaborate a bit as to why he was there, the king wouldn't have sent him if he were summoning her and Tong unless he expected him to fail, but heard the sound of first sliding metal, then a crash, then the sounds of some other kind of metal, older, or at least less well taken care of, groaning and giving way.

With the GMs description, and perhaps even without it, she didn't need to turn around to figure out what had happened. After a moment's pause to allow the sounds to stop, she spoke again to Darvis. "Okay, thank you. You've been very helpful. Now a few things: if we find your adventuring gear, we'll be sure to bring it back to you." This earned a groan of disappointment from the Warforged now sticking out of the ground, something which the girl very pointedly ignored. "Also, if the king sent you on this quest, especially if you've had altercations with him before, I'd recommend laying low for a little while. If you decided to do this on your own, please disregard what I just said." Now Aria did look over, her attention caught by some scraping sounds, that turned out to be the captain trying to wriggle his way out.

"Alright then, I'm going to go take care of him and then see what we can do about this whole sewer monster business." The Magical Girl then proceeded over to her elder brother, or at least what he was now. Halfway there though, she stopped and turned back to Darvis with a cheery little wave. "Take care of yourself, okay?."

With this done, she walked over to the torso and head which protruded from the narrow vertical canal leading to the sewers. For a moment, the two just stood there, Aria with a completely blank expression that let one interpret for oneself what she might be trying to convey, and Tong with as much of an expression of annoyance as his face, being primarily composed of gold plates, could form.

"Not a word." This was Tong, the first to speak. In reply Aria said nothing, though there was the slightest hint of a grin. Still though, as requested, she said nothing. She did however begin humming something that sounded suspiciously like Pop Goes The Weasel as she circled him.

After a minute or two, Aria stopped behind him, and a little away. This frustrated Captain a bit, since this meant that he couldn't see her no matter how he turned, though he supposed it was preferable, for both parties involved, that she were not directly behind him. Even the commoner clothing she currently wore was still a dress. Speaking of which, how on earth was Alex comfortable with that?

Then again, given that he (she/whatever) had been completely silent during the meeting with the king, parts which Alex as a player usually thrived on, he probably wasn't.

"So, are you going to get me out of here, or-" "Get ready to brace against the walls." John was rather surprised at this, interrupting was not usually a habit of his younger sibling's either, then again, he was a robot magically given a soul, who was now stuck in what was basically a medieval manhole, so not much about the current situation could really be said to be normal. "Yeah, I don't think that'll be necessary. If it was we wouldn't have this problem."

It was then that Tong realized what Aria had meant. Hearing light footsteps running towards him, Tong fixed his gaze on where his chest met the side of the opening, and braced for impact, as Aria landed feet-first on his shoulders.

"Darvis scrambled away quickly and turned the corner, almost falling." At the sight of this, even The Dungeon Master laughed. "Anyway, Captain Tong may be hurt if this roll is far too high or far too low, as less power he will remain stuck, and more power he will fall too quickly to do an acrobatics roll to save himself."

The game didn't seem to mind the DM telling them this information. "Either one of these will make him lose one hit point. Aria, for dealing with Darvis so well, you get 20EXP. Level 1 is at 100EXP."

Finally, the DM could get onto rolling. "d6 + strength. Twelve. Critical. Oh dear." She sighed "Aria managed to push Tong free, but only too strong as he fell very quickly down a hole which seemed to go on forever. As he hit the bottom, even if he didn't have any bones to break, he could hear something crack. Tong has lost 2 Hit points because of the critical, and now has only 10."
(You started with 12, I'm not sure I mentioned that. I'll keep track of it if you want, but you can put it on your character sheets.)

Captain Tong attempted to brace himself against the walls as his young companion had suggested, but unfortunately found no purchase, his metal limbs only scraping painfully against the damp brick. It was a blessing, quite frankly, that he was far too concerned with how painful the impact with the ground might be, to consider what exactly it was the walls were slick with.

After he finally hit the ground, with painful crash that made Aria flinch from the sound, Tong made a sound of pain, pain that didn't make any biological sense, but then again magic, and looked around.

"Are you alright?" A concerned voice called from the overworld. "Aye, I just dandy. Like a colonial rebel." In his annoyance with the situation, as well as the pain recently inflicted, he didn't do as well at holding back his character's usual manner of speech. "Then move, I'm coming down." The voice was noticeably less concerned now.

Thinking on why he was asked to move, the obvious reason being of course that she didn't want to step on him, John asked his younger sibling a question that had been on his mind since shortly after this whole business about being in the game had started, and had actually occurred to him even before that, when he first heard the character Alex would be playing. "So," he began, stepping aside and consciously attempting to maintain more of his real speech pattern. "why a Magical Girl? Also, why have her wear a dress?"

Aria stopped descending the ladder, so that they were both at about eye-level with one another, and looked at the Warforged evenly. "Firstly: This, " she used the hand not holding on to tug on the shoulder of her clothing, "is not a dress. It is a tunic. An oversized one perhaps, but I actually am wearing pants underneath the tunic and the cloak, which was actually not uncommon for most of Europe at the time that D&D is supposed to be based off of, but-" John rotated his hand in a 'move along' way, finding much to his amusement that it went all the way around. "Anyway, the second thing is, Magical Girls almost always wear a dress while in costume, it's just an intrinsic part of what they are. Finally, I have my reasons for choosing the class, but the middle of a sewer is really not the place to discus them."

Speaking of which, looking around, Tong could see how oddly large the sewer was, big enough that he could stand comfortably for one thing. "Hey, does this sewer seem a bit... absurdly spacious to you?"

Aria, who had just reached the ground and looked around as well, answered with "Not really. I mean it is large, but it makes sense." "It makes sense? What city of this size could possibly produce enough sh-" "Actually," Aria quickly countered before the golden pirate could finish, "A lot of cities around the world have sewer systems this large. The London sewer system constructed during the Victorian period is positively massive by most standards."

For the moment, Tong found this answer to be satisfactory, and the pair began considering their options in moving forward, looking carefully at all exits, and being sure to listen for any noises. Aria also checked the floor, gross as it might have been to do so, for any sign of Darvis' travel through the area.

"Perception + d20." The DM rolled to see if Tong saw anything at all. "16. Tong couldn't see much, as the sewers became darker, but before the darkness blocked his vision, he saw what would have looked like a swimming pool in any other place. This was the only way visible in the dark, apart from a hole in the left wall where the goblins must have made their shelter."

"Perception + d20." The Dungeon Master rolled to see if Aria saw anything on the floor. "One. Critical failure." The DM couldn't help but burst into laughter, barely composing herself enough to say;
"Aria examined the ground, but saw nothing of interest. Bending slightly, her feet gave way and she-" The DM started to laugh. "-She fell face first. Splodge." The DM lost her composure and continued to laugh. "Splodge!!" She giggled non-stop.

"Hm," Tong began. "There seems to be a hole of some sort. According to the GM the goblins must have used it for-"

He was interrupted by a slick, squelching sound, accompanied by a mix between a soft thud and a splat. Looking over revealed Aria to be facedown on the ground. Grabbing the girl by the hood of her cloak, Tong lifted her up out of the muck. "Ye really ought to be more careful there. We're in a sewer you know."

What came next was not the extremely eloquent speech that he had expected, the one that basically amounted to a suggestion that he preform some very questionable actions involving his rapier and his backside. Instead it was a pitifully woeful wail that perfectly combined without words pain, despair, abject horror, and maddening disgust. Honestly, the former pirate captain couldn't think of how he would even begin to spell it if for some reason it needed writing down.

After what had to be at least five good seconds of this cry, Aria, still being held above the ground, grabbed the golden Warforged's cape and began vigorously scrubbing at her face, desperately trying to remove all of the... residue. For a moment, he almost pulled it away from her, this was a good cape darn it! Even after its trip down the grate it had only suffered minor tearing. He didn't though, thinking of the, the sound, that she had made. It would just be too cruel.

Once the Magical Girl was finished addressing that matter, Tong attempted to put her down, at which she merely scrambled onto his back, and then refused to move.

John gave a dramatic sigh, perhaps, no definitely, more so than necessary, and just tore off the part of the cape that she had utilized, throwing it aside. This was, of course, to prevent another incident like that one by her bumping into it. Quite frankly, John now though, he should have expected this from his younger sibling. Even in the real world Alex had been squeamish, and even he had to admit that the idea was a little gross.

That didn't mean that he didn't see the humor in it, he probably would have laughed along with the GM, had he noticed a little earlier, but that wail... There wasn't much a way to laugh at that.

Walking over to the hole in the left wall, he began to examine it with extreme caution. Calling Aria to do the same, he spoke to the weight on his back. "Hey, kiddo. Looks like they made camp here? Where do you wager they went? Think they'll be coming back?" Stirring slightly, Ms. Hawklight began peering over one large metal shoulder at the place the goblins had taken shelter.