Dressed in the blues and grays of your special program's uniforms, your team sets out into the night at approximately 8:00 PM. Those capable of sensing or seeing magical energies naturally take the lead, charting a course into the deep ink of a pitch-black dark. While a few sparse streetlights cast fractured, sickly pools of illumination onto the wet ground, the shadows here remain profoundly deep, swallowed up by frequent blind turns and the heavy, overhanging architecture of the old structures. Some of the structures remain warehouses, other old warehouses have been converted into other purposes.
What should have been a miserable trek through plunging temperatures and a blinding, dense fog is held comfortably at bay by Harper’s temperature control power. The fog is entirely gone, vaporized by the localized warmth, leaving only a steady, soaking rain. Thanks to the insulated fabric of your uniforms and the modified climate bubble, the constant downpour remains a manageable, completely comfortable backdrop rather than a chilly miserable night.
Progress is slow but steady, a deliberate pace necessitated by the need to keep the group contained within the moving radius of Harper’s environmental shield. Navigating the warehouse district feels like traversing a literal labyrinth, as you trace the meandering paths of what had been 17th and 18th-century streets. Time and again, a wide, promising alleyway curves organically through the stone facades, only to terminate abruptly against the massive, unyielding brick wall of a modern warehouse, forcing the team to backtrack and try the next path. Despite the constant dead ends, Ethan and Yiva can both feel the steady pull of their arcane senses. Their abilities signal with mounting clarity that you are drawing closer to a remarkably potent, concentrated source of magic.
Then, cutting through the steady, rhythmic patter of the rain, a sudden chorus of sound echoes wildly down the narrow corridors. It cascades through the stone brick channels like a chaotic medley of human screaming, animalistic yowling, manic laughing, and desperate crying. The noise is heavily distorted, twisted by the ancient walls into an unnatural, multi-layered screech that sounds less like any living creature and more like a chorus of something unholy agonizing in the dark. The acoustic distortion rips through the alleys, making the hairs on your arms stand up as the deeply unsettling, demonic resonance bounces from every direction at once, completely masking where the entity is hiding.
At this point Alice can attempt a mind scan with the assistance of Yiva and/or Ethan.
OOC:
earlier success was not possible due to distance and number of people in the area, most in their apartments, converted from the old warehouses.
