"Or gain *knowledge*!" that worthy added from the side.

They can see Detlun visibly soften with Zijan's words. The Aeon Priest thoughtfully looks over Xeno and Irinus, taking his time to absorb them visually.

"If you availed yourselves to them to help collect this wood, I suppose that's saying something. I know the qualseth is nothing to be trifled with, and you took great risk in assisting them. Welcome to the Beanstalk. I give you the benefit of the doubt you will be an asset to our community during what may be a trying time."

The crowd that had been nervously eyeing Irinus listened curiously as she introduced herself, but still seemed slightly wary. Upon Detlun's welcoming of the strange being the nearby townsfolk seemed to relax even more, then they continued to go about their business, not paying them any further notice.

"So where are you in the construction of your device, Old Man?" Detlun inquires. "You'd better get that aneen back to Vols soon though. He's been fussing about it being away from him, grousing about how long it's been gone though you've only been gone a day."

"Welp, best you can hope for on short notice," consoled the old man, pating ranger-girl on the shoulder. "Curiosity doesn't burn as bright in some people as you and I might like."

Eh, what are you going to do?

"Let's find out!" he answered Deltun, clacking the reins and heading towards his and Limen's improvised work space (plas-fabric stretched over thin frames, episodically billowing like sails whenever the plain-winds gently gusted). "Lym? Limem-pup? You guys in there?" he called.


Are they? And have they made progress on the construction of the Chatton of Inquiry in our absence, or is everything as it was before?

The color of the inner light around the skeleton had been yellow. It changes back to blue and you hear whirs and beeps and a voice not of Xenos.

"Primary unit online. Cognitive structure reinstated. Autonomous action granted."

The hulk that had been following shifts and 'looks' around. And Xenos machine like voice comes through once more.

"Hm the treck here seems to have made my systems go into an auto mode. interesting. from my back logs i seem to register you needing something built. shall I accomplish this task? do you habe the materials? what is our objective now?"

again sorry for the delay. alot to deal with lately.

"We call it 'stage-fright'," the nano deadpaned his way.


Waiting to see what's what before answering the rest if that's alright?
And congratulations on Xeno Junior! <Thumbs way up!>

The installation which Fraksel had dubbed "Chatton's Slingshot of Inquiry" remained in the exact same state it was in when they left for the qualseth.

"No one dared work on it," Detlun said, looking over the piece. "No one had any idea what needed to be done to it, nor was there any wood to apply to it had anyone known what was the plan for it." He shrugs, slaps Fraksel on the back, then heads off back to his place.

"Where in the Maker's Spark are those two?" grumbled the nano interrogatively, walking in and setting a fallen pulley back out of the way. Limen certainly had all the parts save for the wood. AND the plan to assemble it all: *she* had helped design half of it!

"I'm... actually a little worried," he admitted, gazing about at the complete lack of any *other* work as well -- you would usually have to *drag* Limen away from experimenting with stuff... "You don't think anything happened to them while we were gone, do you Zijan?"




"Ah yes." Fraksel shook himself back to the matter(s) at hand! "Well we've already built the Ascender Mk 0 over there," he proudly gestured to neatly-arranged coils of strong cabling next to a professional-looking, elegantly-designed pulley system, "our Highway to the Sky! To be fixed on the boulder using our one flying cypher, you know," he explained, miming the rough outline of the operation. "Before that though, we wanted to investigate the area around the boulder itself, see if there's any gravity or tidal - or dimensional, or space-timey - hasards up there before risking one of us to untested wings. Hence the Chatton of Inquiry!" And he dramatically pulled out the plan for such from under dust, sand and a few random small parts that clinked to the ground!

Ta daa!

The Chatton is a crossbow-slingshot able to lob projectiles/grappling hooks 200m away. The version on the plan is the size of a dinner table and mounted on wheels, but you remember Fraksel mentioning this morning dreaming up a modified version incorporating a quantium box to potentially make it man-portable/crossbow-sized.

Irinus listened intently as Fraksel spoke about the plans, the bounce in her step restored from the....suprisingly mild reception. She half-expected to greet torches and pitchforks, but it seems Fraksel's word, as well as her efforts, did carry some merit.

She approached the workspace with intrigue, looking over the mess of parts and other things.

"Have you not tried simple rope and claw? No one has climbe atop one? Surely, some brave soul must have to warrant such a device to....correct it's path? Is that right?"

She thinks on it for a moment.

"At least in this regard I can still be of service: I was trained in archery, so if this...contraption can target it, I should be able to hit it. Would it be fine for me to survey the town? Being familiar with the area has its benefits."

If I have an hour or so to kill, I would like to Familiarize myself with the Beanstalk.

The hulk takes its lumbering steps and seems to 'bend' abd peer at the plans. A beam of light plays over it slowly both up and down and across.

"Blue print scanned. analyzing. processing. organizing. complete." the voice that isn't Xenos hurts.

"Yes. I believe I can build this. it seems simple and mundane enough for a quick job. lever. fulcrum. significant force from stretched rope or sinew. not hard. I shall get to it at once."

The hulk turns to the materials needed for the project and starts its methodical construction.

so what exactly do i need at this point? ive never played a wright. and idk what difficulty it is to make this xbow.

“Ah. Well. About that...” and Fraksel, hands behind back, led them merrily to a little hill overlooking the base of the Beanstalk (or the absence thereof, since the entire thing - the entire, gigantic thing - was floating 10 stories above its ellipsoid base). He pointed up, eyebrows raised.

The Boulder was 30m across.

And 200m up.


The Chatton is a L5 task, each task takin 1/2 a day (OOC post #45). That I recall, Ninth World didn't say if the addition of the quantium box would do what Fraksel wants it too though... Ninth World?

"I certainly hope not.  I shall leave you three to the construction of fantastic things while I try to discover what happened with the twins," Zijan says.  She gives a faint bow before leaving the Conclave of Creativity.

She would like to ask the others in the town council about how things are going regarding moving what structures they can away from the Fall Zone.

"I know I have only been gone a day, so expect only some of the contents of the buildings have been moved, but it would be good to know who is doing what so far.  Also, has anyone seen the twins since we left to visit the Qualseth?"

Irinus whistles, or rather, gurgles, an odd noise Fraksel and the others could only guess was either shock or disbelief.

“Well, that does present a challenge, then! Let’s say you can successfully tag the small mountain—how will we pull it off track? Aneen and cable? Or is this artifact designed to do just that? Send it off track to clear the shelter below? Hmm...”

She started to muse again, rant, even. Distortion fields and void matter and so on until...

“X.E.N.O., if I offer you a cypher, could you...translate it to another? Maybe one of our cyphers still retains a different use?”

If needed, I can offer up the Plant Transformation Detonation to see if XENO can Always Tinkering it Into a different, more relevant cypher?

Etra smiles and nods. "I see you made it back safely, with a couple of strange beings in tow. Yes, some of the contents have been cleared from the buildings near the collector, but we have put most of our efforts into gathering water reserves... just in case we don't find a solution to stopping the boulder's descent. The smiths and repair folks have been focusing on moving items from the buildings while families have been responsible for gathering their own reserves that they believe they'll need.

"As far as those two young ones you're referring to... they were getting a bit rambunctious and in people's way while we're trying to prepare for this impending disaster. We asked them to play somewhere where they would not be under foot. I haven't seen them since so I don't know where they're off to."

“Water collector,” corrected the old man in a distracted, who-would-care-about-that tone. “And no. What we aim to do is get up there, find out how the Boulder moves, and take control of it. It’ll make a glorious floating base for our exploration of the Beanstalk!”

Of course!

Irinus resolutely clamped on tendril onto another, and seemed eager. Yes, to tame a mountain!

“Sound plan—a forward base is a good base. I suppose I should leave you to your work; I would be little other use than a pair of extra hands....or a decent shot.” She admits, somewhat sheepishly. It’s the first time she’s been unbalanced since the crash, like being unused is some great anathema to her being.

So she does just that, and makes herself useful.

“Holler if you require my aid, wise one. The beanfolk look like they could use a strong hand in carrying and securing their resources. I can help there.”

And off she starts, hoping her able body might surpass her odd appearance if she’s a helpful sort.

Xeno listens and then thinks. Poking and prodding a few nodules upon its self it says.

"I have a device that will transmit to one I choose should my lifesigns cease that I am down. I also have one that will cause damage to any who strike me for a period of time. and I have one that can project a large hand at a far range and grab upon my target. are these useful or do you wish me to build something?"

In reply to Irinus (msg # 233):

“What are you prattling on about? *Everybody*’s needed if we want to finish the Chatton by tomorrow, girl! Come along now,” and he waved them back towards the projects shed.

So, to build the Chatton of Inquiry (Mk I), we need to succeed at 5 crafting tasks of difficulty 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Each attempt uses up half-a-day -- of which I figure 2 are left today if we finish a bit late.

Let’s each pick one of the five tasks for the first round and see what that gives us? We do have a plan, so each task is Eased.

Fraksel looked about and then started on... the most challenging/interesting bit, of course: welding the complex frame that would tame and then focus the quantium boxe’s energies into the desired time-dimensions!

Round 1: Taking on the L5 task
20:29, Today: Fraksel M'ba rolled 17 using 1d20.  Quantium shmantium with Plan and Effort.

Zijan sighed internally.  The twins would have been a good help in figuring out how to maximize the water reserves or getting everyone's goods and even structures out of the way.  For certain they would have had some interesting ideas.  Hopefully she might be able to find where they had wandered off to a little bit later.

"Then please show me where we are putting the water reserves for now.  Perhaps we can come up with a more capacious way of storage or better way of getting the water to a storage place.  We should also ask around if anyone has any cyphers stored that could be of use.  There are some that make walls or hole or transmute substances that could be useful, but we won't know if anyone has such things unless we ask!" Zijan says.

In reply to Zijan (msg # 236):

“Ah! And here I thought Master Fraksel M’ba needed no aid!” she chortles. But of course, it made sense; many of her brethren that crafted hosted workshops with helping hands to finish their projects. It all seemed so obvious in hindsight.


She picks up some of that hard-worked-for wood, and begins shaping it to form, her hands moving with purpose.

Crafting task 4— 11:48, Today: Irinus rolled 20 using 1d20.  Aid from plan.

She is confident in her work as she goes about it, the wood seeming to sing to her as she worked it.

Major Effect! How about the wood used for the project picks up some of Irinus’ Void energy, and is made more supple, light, yet hard as steel, and grants an easement when firing?

“Even data Gods need help... sometimes,” grumbled back the grumpy one...

I'll allow that. Nice roll!

Xeno wanders over to the materials and starts tinkering and following the diagram of the item that fraksel wanted created. As he works blurbs and worbles sound from his carapace as if he were humming to him self.

02:09, Today: Xeno Bio-EX rolled 17 using 1d20 ((17)) crafting task level 3

Fraksel began work on the elastic core of their slingshot, melting, evaporating and then coating a string with multiple layers of steaming plas vapours...

Round 2! Fraser takes on the L2 task, with Plan and effort = auto-success

One L1 task left to go!

Following Fraksel’s lead, Irinus takes the finished polymer string, the void-strengthened wood, the quantium applicator, and the steel bow and crank, and begins the final assembly.

11:42, Today: Irinus rolled 2 using 1d20.  Plan and Effort cancels Inability—Crafting.

But somehow, she manages to turn the torque winch backwards, and the string limply flubs forward, the tension obviously not set in the slightest.

“Ah, the the prior worlds with you!” She screeches in frustration. “X.3.N.0., Fraksel, how might this actually go together? She thought she followed the plans.....”