"Maybe a bit more than just a talking to," Grogza agreed. "Although that will have to wait until all this gets sorted out. She has a big paper due tomorrow - today now, I guess - so she hasn't been online for the past couple of days. Karma-dodging slut," she finished, though her tone of voice didn't really mean it.<br/><br/>"Anyways, I still have my gold, well almost all of it, I only lost a bit of gold and none of my gear to the death penalty. Funny, how they can take our dignity and our freedom, but not our riches." For herself, the barbarian acquired a composite longbow with incredibly high draw and some arrows, intent on never being caught without a way to shoot back again. The bow's description stated a minimum strength requirement of 24, and when Grogza passed it over to Rayne for her to try to draw it, the slender half-elf had about as much chance of drawing the bow as she had of bending a solid iron rod!<br/><br/><br/><br/>Down at the wharf, Ledude wasn't finished yet. "There's also a second problem. The paddlewheel is powered by an arcane engine. Long story short, it needs a heat source, which is conveniently missing. Here, just take a look and it'll get the quest started..." He showed her the complicated-looking gearbox connected to the paddlewheel's axle, which had a prominent socket that was conspicuously missing an orb-shaped object about the size of a bowling ball. A new quest appeared in Rayne's journal: apparently after speaking to the riverboat's NPC captain, she had been told of the location of a dungeon in the jungle (a few hours in-game travel away, and relatively high-level for the jungle with a recommended party level of 9-10) where an Elemental Fire Orb was rumoured to be found, which could be jury-rigged as a fuel source to get the<em>Crocodile Express</em>up and running again.<br/><br/>"I guess the system wasn't quite ready to handle NPCs being attacked and taken away or killed by monsters," Ledude observed. "But like you said, we're just going downstream, so we can always just let the current carry us. It depends on whether going faster with the paddlewheel fixed can make up for the time spent retrieving the Orb. The dungeon seems to be high-level too, so Moonshadow and I might be of limited help there. Actually, are we in any particular hurry?"<br/><br/><hr/><br/>Rayne - Fighter 4 / Sorcerer 4 / Arcane Archer 1<br/>Grogza - Barbarian 8<br/>Ledude - Alchemist 5<br/>Moonshadow - Monk 5