From the Ashes... A new king's day?

[Olvelsper]

Jan's golem form shimmered moments before a hazy of mist surrounded him, steam shooting out and obscuring as the massive silhouette of the golem gave way to that of a man.

"Ugh..." From within the cloud, the negotiator reappeared. "Well, it was certainly different. When'd you learn how to do that?"

[Shukuen]

Leets blinked, considering his words thoughtfully. "I'm honestly not sure, since it wasn't on my stat sheet," he replied. "Before I picked up that book, I had only an inkling that this sword was epic after getting it appraised. The Final Battle of Fizban was the major clue stick," he added wryly.
 
"However, after I picked this up-" he tapped his satchel for emphasis, referring to his latest acquisition, "-it's like I got bonus points to my INT stat. Stuff I can't even begin to understand, yet have no trouble popping up as I need... like someone scribbled shorthand on my character sheet and forgot to tell me the translations were on the back."

[Olvelsper]

"...right." Jan replied, with a worried frown. He made a mental note to seperate the boy from that book as soon as this was over. "There's some ladders up here. Let's go up."

[Shukuen]

"All right, don't rush me," hummed Leets, absently picking up the leather satchel before following after Jan... before realizing a certain problem.

"Uh... little help?" he called, making a jump to the ladder. His hands barely gripped the bottom rung, and he struggled to pull himself the rest of the way due to lack of footholds.

[Olvelsper]

Jan helped Leets up, offering him a hand up. "It's just...you just found that thing all of a sudden. Why don't you get rid of it?"

[Shukuen]

"I've been finding loads of useful knick-knacks lying around since I got here," Leets said indifferently, "take Masamune. It was just a rusty hilt when I found it, and look at how useful it's been."

[Dracos]

The leather satchel dropped out a few papers as Leets made his leap, noticibly having some weight inside.

The others gathered around, needing equal help to make it up to the ladder.  Looking up from the inside, they could tell that there was a trap door built into the ceiling, maybe twenty feet up the ladder.

Dracos

[Shukuen]

Hearing papers fall, Leets mentally berated himself for not securing the bag before he started climbing.

"Miss Viki, could you grab those papers I dropped for me?" he asked, while tightening the satchel to prevent anything else from slipping out.

[Dracos]

"Okay," the cheerful white robed mage replied, reaching down and grabbing the papers, stuffing them into her bag.  "that all?" She waited her turn to climb over the giant mech, pretty unsurprised by the whole turn of events, cold air and zombies and all.

Dracos

[Shukuen]

"Yes, thank you," he said gratefully, making note to look over what exactly he picked up when there wasn't a chance of something eating his face for not paying attention. He climbed higher until he reached the trap door, pausing to check it over.

[Dracos]

The door was more of a carved out stone block with a metal ring on the bottom for pulling shut.  A brief brush against it indicated it was fairly heavy to lift.

Dracos

[Olvelsper]

Having scrambled his way up, Jan moved towards the door. "Let us handle it, Leets." He waved for the other men to move with him to shove open the door.

[Dracos]

Pushing hard, Jan found he was able to shift the door open to slam down above, clearing room for a man to slip up into the darkened room above.

Dracos

[Olvelsper]

"Go on ahead, Leets. Your magic sword should be able to handle whatever is up ahead. We'll follow."

[Shukuen]

"Not canceling Big You would probably be a bonus," retorted Leets, quckly climbing onto the next level and scanning for imminent dangers.