My apologies to all for the lack of replies on my part of late. :(

Dealing with family member unexpectedly in hospital and the resulting chaos from that, including going out to feed their cat daily has left me a bit short of time and wits to spare for game posting.

Am gathering wits and hope to have a bit of time soon to post IC, provided life doesn't throw any further surprises at me today.

Gentlemen, I am finding it increasingly difficult to follow Play by Forum games at the moment, and I am taking a break from the format, leaving the few current games I am in.
Perhaps the game pacing makes it hard for me to follow the story with real focus. It is not an issue with the game itself, more with the format of playing.
Thanks for the game so far, I enjoyed it greatly, and wish you a successful continuation!

No worries.

Totes on me.....a lot more distractions at the moment than I thought there would be.

Looks like things will be back to normal for me some way through December if anyone knows of any other potential players that would like to join.

I can ask a couple of people who might be interested in playing.
Not promising anything will come of it, but I can ask.

As a player I am in agreement with Nafu's suspicious assessment of Wayan's account, but let's see what state Wayan's head is in and what his next answers are before Hanako even considers poking any holes in either his story or his head.

However, "Speak softly but carry a big stick." is why Hanako carries a quarterstaff as a weapon.

Nobody bite any monkeys either, just in case whatever the local macaques may have contracted is contagious.

There's a lot of different sorts of macaques, so Hanako is making generalized statements based on the most common variety I know of IRL, and may not be true of the ones ingame.

In reply to Hanako (msg # 109):

Long tailed Macaques are the ones I had in mind. :)

In reply to Damian May (msg # 110):

That's good to know, and thank you for the knowing of it. :)

I apologize for not responding to this earlier, and am sorry to see you go. :(
I also hope you may one day return to the game, but I understand if you cannot.

If anyone in the party has any tracking skills, now would probably be the most useful time to mention it, or the lack of them, as the case may be.

If there's no trail to follow, then climbing a tree for a longer look around may be possible. As it seems increasingly likely that these are not the usual jungle inhabitants, I am hoping they are not as stealthy whilst carrying off their loot as is usual either.

If this is all a tall tale covering for a more mundane sort of banditry, then someone went to the bother of providing a bit of physical evidence in the form of rotten flesh to back up their story.

Sorry for slow posting. Just got struck w Covid ytd... will try my best wehn I feel awake. V tired and still gotta do work from home.
GM Please feel free to npc me...

Hanako is trying to work out just how many of these dead monkeys are potential foes, on the grounds that is a lot of dead monkeys, and the easiest way to hide a dead-but-still-dangerous-monkey is in a big group of dead monkeys.

That would be Datuk's task, to play the roaring tiger warrior so to speak, and draw down trouble to sweep it out the way with a weapon with long reach, but that's a risky one, so if Datuk's player would prefer another plan, I'm open to suggestions.

Lot of little opponents can be damn nasty in a fight, so it's a dangerous plan, given he's got to keep the woman distracted from her captive and keep a potentially large number of undead macaques off his back at the same time.

Which is where Nafu either freeing the captive, or playing stone throwing monkey at the woman from behind is handy, given he's also got to dodge dead monkeys if they go after him. Probably faster than they are, so climbing and running away to get back up are both options if brute force doesn't work.

Hanako can make the woman weaker in a fight with WEAKEN, assuming she fails the MA vs MD test, and she can heal Nafu and Datuk if she gets close enough, and provide some rock throwing support as well.

Does that make sense as a group plan?

Great! Killing here we go!!!!!! I love killing... even though I am a datuk

In reply to Datuk Tan Cheng Leng (msg # 116):

If I have understood the term correctly, in Tan's case, that would make him a Sir, the equivalent of a knight, not a ruler of a domain?

Hanako would prefer a live and captive old woman as well as a live and free Kodok, if that's who she has tied up there.

It is very difficult to ask questions of the dead, and get answers the questioner can rely on the veracity of in Dragon Warriors, so in this case, two witnesses to ask questions of is better than one, even if one witness could fairly be called a hostile one.

I guess more of his step father is the governor of the land of temasek and he somehow got a title from his dad?

Cuturally datukships have several levels and the lower level ones can be easily purchased. hehe

In reply to Datuk Tan Cheng Leng (msg # 118):

That's a fair reason for Tan's possession of the title Datuk, and Hanako is polite enough to use it in a formal situation.

Argh, it's that eyebleed inducing site colour scheme again!
*Checks date...*

Happy International Day of Fact Checking On The Internet to you all, and I shall attempt to choose the least foolish plan for Hanako regardless.

Damn, but it seems the PCs are now in Phase Two: Find Out.

As I said before that's a lot of monkeys, so cut and run maybe the best option, as in cut the captive free, and run. Uphill and through think undergrowth, but at least there's a trail marked by Hanako earlier, and the smoke of a campfire above the tree line.

Not betting that taking the old lady captive or if need be, killing her dead will stop the macaques, but that's the best alternate plan I can think of right now.

If anyone has any suggestions to make, please feel free to make them.

Then I shall charge in and engage the spawn of the devil!

Small technical correction: She's probably not 'the spawn of the devil'. Wrong theology for that, if I am right in my theory as a player.

The woman in question is probably possessed by a demon of some sort, given she's wearing the appropriate outfit for being a follower of the local Queen Of Demons.

So if anything, she'd be the minion of a demon, not a devil.

The darkened eyes may a symptom of an eye disease unknown to Hanako, but given the number of folktales told of encounters with strange black eyed people met in the wilder places of the world, that seems unlikely in this case.

It might also explain why the woman with the dagger is apparently not paying much attention to the pain of the wound she has been dealt, or the weakening effects of the spell Hanako threw at her before.

However, it doesn't mean that Hanako wants her dead. Possession by demonic forces is said to be more often a temporary state than a permanent one.

Kill her body and the demon may not stop possessing it. After all, there'd be nothing human in spirit left in a corpse to fight it off from fully controlling dead flesh.

Need to get that dagger off her, as it could possibly be the demon's focus to control her. Killing her is a last resort, and may make even make things worse if the party does so.

I could be utterly mistaken about all of this, and making a bunch of false assumptions about what's going on in game, but that's the information that Hanako would be going on IC.

Nafu, you still with us?
If so, then do you have any plans for next move?

Ooops sorry!

In reply to Nafu (msg # 125):

No worries, I'm just glad to see you. :)

I'll be back tomorrow to post IC, trying to figure out a workable plan from far too many options.

Player opinion: It is possible that the woman with the bronze knife is both possessed and on drugs, or possessed by an unknown entity, or as Datuk contends, simply drugged and impervious to pain.

Hanako is inclined towards the supernatural explanation partly due to her training as a Sorceress.

It does not mean she is correct in her assumption about what is going on, or that she is being particularly gracious to Datuk Tan Cheng Leng about his own theory of the woman's lack of reaction to physical harm.

Could be they're both right?
Could be they're both wrong, and there's an entirely different cause to the woman's seeming indifference to her wounds?

I eagerly await further developments as a player, despite Hanako's state of annoyance IC.

To be honest, it's probably better that she's more annoyed than afraid in the middle of an attempted rescue mission that has become more complicated than she had anticipated by the second. :)

In reply to Hanako (msg # 128):

Mea Culpa. I'll get on it. :)