Becoming a Praetorian

[Thom]

After a lengthy discussion with Jin and Shar'lee Laurana was given her first task on the road to becoming a Praetorian. She needed to escort Marcarious to the end of the dungeon of Destard. Marcarious was unarmored and depended solely on Laurana to protect him throughout the journey.

There was little problem at the beginning of the journey, and they made it to the ankh.

However, getting back out was a bit more complicated than getting in had been. There were several encounters with the inhabitants of the dungeon.

Happily, the journey ended succesfully.

Edited January 9, 2007 by Thom

[Eisaac]

Very nice! and if this is the first task.... good luck on the following tasks!

Thank you, Thom, for the screenshots and update

[Marcarious]

After a fun night at a winter festival I was allowed to sit through a meeting between Jin, Sharlee. and Laurana. After listening to the idea of Laurana becoming a Praetorian, I must say I was very excited. Then, I became a little worried when Jin, asked if I would accompany Laurana to the dungeon of Destard as she would be escorting me through the dungeon. I did not mind at all, until I was told that no armor shall be worn, and I could not summon any of my animal friends. Nervrously I agreed. I put full trust in Laurana and from there we left for the Dragon home.

As we began we entered the dungeon and found very little resistance in the begining

As we ventured through the dungeon we seemed to be making great strides. We finally made it to the ankah in the first level as that was our first goal.

Our second goal was to make it out in the same fashion. As we headed back we encounted a little more resistance than when we entered, but Laurana did an extrordiary job of keeping me out of harms way and slaying those foul beasts.

We then made our exit. Both of us alive and well. And to be honest a little exhausted.

Was a hard ordeal for me as I am used to calling my animal friends, but we did not need them. I put my trust and my life in the capable hands of Laurana and she did not let me down one bit. Twas a great honor to be apart of her first task in becoming a Praetorian. I hope everyone will support her like I do.

[kodoz]

Jin looked over the reports that he had recieved both from Marcarious and Laurana. It appeared she was up to her first task, and performed it admirably. Jin wondered though if she would make it past all of her tasks. She seemed to have the fire in her, but Jin had seen several candidates falter in the later stages, and most quit outright. Jin checked some of the tasks he'd given other potential candidates, and tried to select one for Laurana. She'd done well with a novice task, now it was time for something a bit more serious. He'd already figured out her final task, but she would have to earn the right to even attempt that. Jin found it a bit hard to concentrate on his duty with thinking about what Shar'lee had brought up. Although he'd already made his decision, he still kept thinking about it. Well, He would give Laurana her next task the next time he was able to speak with her. She'd quickly learn to work with the unexpected, or they may be short a dragoon knight...

[Guest Charlie]

*Shar'Lee cleans her face*

[Thom]

After the festival Laurana was informed that Jin was looking for her. She found him in the dueling pit of Jhelom, and was given her next task. She was to kill several creatures using only the axe that Jin had given her. This task worried her, because she would not be allowed to use her shield and she was not used to fighting without it. She hefted the axe and repeated Jin's words to herself, "You must be adaptable"... she would prove that she was able to handle this challenge, and all the others he could come up with. She was not familiar with one of the creatures that Jin had specified, a Betrayer, so he took her to find one. After a lengthy battle she finally defeated it.

She set off in search of her next creature, a blood elemental. She had killed many before, but never without a shield and wondered how well she would fare without it now. It did not prove too difficult.

The next opponent was to be an Evil Mage Lord. "This should be easy" she said to herself as she set off for the island.

Next was a Dragon, which was also rather easy for her to defeat once she managed to find one amongst the dead from other hunters.

The White Wyrm managed to put up a fight before she managed to kill it.

The Ogre Lord fell quickly to the axe.

With these rather minor creatures out of the way, she could concentrate on the difficult ones. She started with the Lich Lord. After a long, and close, battle she managed to defeat him.

Next she decided to go after the Devourer of Souls, since she was in the area where they were known to spawn anyway. This proved to be an even harder fight then she would have thought. Without the shield she was forced to lead him to a less populated area of the dungeon to kill him, and even then it proved a very difficult fight.

(umm, insert picture here, I seem to have lost it somehow... probably while running for my life I forgot to take it :/)

Next on the list was a Chaos Dragoon Elite, another creature she had never fought before. By now she was growing more confident in her ability to handle the axe, and barely missed her shield. She managed to find one of the Chaos Dragoon Elites near the city of Mistas, but he had a friend nearby, a paragon Juka Warrior. Luckily the Dragoon did not prove too difficult, and she was able to kill both with relative ease.

Now for the true test, the last creature of the night she would face. A Skeletal Dragon. This proved to be the most challenging test she had encountered. She had to get it alone, without leaving any corpses nearby for the creature to animate. She finally managed to get him near the entrance to the cave he lived in, and slowly beat him down.

[Thom]

Laurana met with Jin in Lord British's throne room and received her third task on the way to becoming a Praetorian. This time Jin handed her a bag while explaining that the Praetorians of old used to wear grandmaster crafted leather armor and a skullcap. That and a halberd were what was in the bag. Her task this time would be to use this equipment and again kill a list of different creatures. All but one of these creatures could be found in the land of Ilshenar. And the last could only be found in the lost lands of Felucca. With her new equipment in hand she set off for home to change and begin on the task. She set off for Compassion in Ilshenar in search of her first target, a paragon savage shamaness.

With the Shamaness dead she could turn her attention to finding the paragon savage rider. After fighting many of the normal warriors a paragon finally showed up.

With both of the paragon savages dispatched, it was time to find a Blackthorn Juggernaut. This task had proved fairly easy so far, but it was about to get harder. She fought her way up several floors and managed to find one, and guarantee that he would be alone.

After the fall of the Juggernaut she went in search of the efreet. Unfortunatly, the first she found was a paragon. After attempting to avoid the fight, she was forced into it, but managed to defeat the efreet after a hard fought battle.

After the efreet, the sand vortex seemed like a walk in the park. It was quickly dispatched.

The next three creatures on the list; a gargoyle destroyer, exodus minion, and exodus overseer, could all be found in one place. She quickle set off in search of them. The first that she found was the gargoyle destroyer.

Next she found the exodus overseer and exodus minion. She lured them out one at a time and defeated both quickly.

The last creature on the list was the most powerful of the group, an ancient lich. The ancient lich could only be found in the far corner of Khaldun in Felucca's lost lands. After passing many of the inhabitants she found the ancient lich and slowly lured him back towards the entrance. After working her way back to the entrance with the angry lich following, she managed to engage him in combat. It was a difficult battle, and she came close to falling many times during the course of it, but finally emerged victorious.

[Marcarious]

Wow....*shakes head* That is a a great accomplishment...Congrats. Well deserved Congrats to say the least. Seems like an extremely tough task and you met it head on. Once again I salute you.

[kodoz]

Jin suppressed a pleasant grin after reading Laurana's report. It seemed that handicapping her didn't faze her in the least, or stop her from completing any tasks. He picked up his cup and sipped some more of his sake as he flipped through the various pages of her report. All in all, she seemed to be exceeding his expectations, and even better than that, she wasn't getting cocky about it either. He already had another task ready for her if she needed it, but he would have to figure that out. He really just had to judge whether or not she was truly ready for her final test to become a praetorian or not. He looked up and smiled as he saw Shar'lee come in and he set aside the report for now. It could wait a while, he thought. He was off duty, after all...

[Guest Charlie]

*sharlee jumps up on jin lap and looks to the report and purrs, then nuzzles to jins cheek and gives it a small lick*

[Thom]

As she entered the castle in search of Jin she could not help thinking of what the task could be this time. She wondered what else he could think to take from her to make the task more difficult. She stopped outside the doors to the main area and muttered to herself “only thing left to do is send me out naked to tackle an ancient wyrm.” She shook her head and opened the door. Jin was sitting in one of the thrones, and as she approached he stood and started talking. He told her of the banner of the Praetorians, and how the Praetorian Prefect would sit in that spot if there were such a person today. Quite suddenly he came to the task that would need to be performed. She was a bit confused when he told her she could use any equipment she desired for this task… that is until he started listing off the foes she would need to defeat this time. As she walked back out of the castle she started muttering again, and did not stop until she was back at home looking over the equipment she would need to take with her. Shield, sword, proper armor… she stopped suddenly realizing the only thing she had meant as a demon slayer was a skinning knife… She cursed, and packed extra bandages, and set off to the fan dancer dojo to begin the task.

Immediately on entering she was confronted by one of the enemies on her list, a fan dancer.

She shrugged off the blows inflicted by the fan dancers and set off in search of something else on the list. She rounded a corner and came face to face with a Ronin.

She checked the list again, and sighed. Succubus… should be right down this hallway.

With the succubus dead, she decided to leave the area. “There’s got to be a Balron somewhere other than here” she muttered to herself, as she headed for the Citadel to begin on a different set of enemies. The Lesser Hiryu was quite easy, she had fought them many times before and knew what to expect. It managed to dismount her, but fell soon after.

So far so good she thought to herself as she went searching for more of her targets. She found the rune beetles next, and managed to lure one out alone.

Next was the Hiryu.

Then a Bake Kitsune.

While she was in the area she decided to go ahead and get the Oni, and Elite Ninja.

Now for the two final enemies, the hardest of the bunch. The first of these was the Lady of the Snow. She was rather difficult, and no time was wasted leaving the area after she fell.

And the final enemy was a Balron. She hunted him down with the help of Senator Piper.