Airships Over Aranor [Prose] :: 5--Furious Red

[deificAnuran]

The coloring worked out well; I think we're familiar enough with these characters that we know the colors well. Only trouble is the olive green next to Charlotte's, but I just had to squint is all.

> Seems like she's hinting that the great-grandson is someone we're supposed to know. Who is it?
> Charlotte: MYYYYY TURRRRRNNN!

[Ellume]

I would say that I would have been lost without the colours. Like when Charlotte counters with "Bandit Busters?" and then Khazu counters. or likewise this section:

"Oh, yeah yeah, you're right. Hate to be unoriginal. Flame Throwers?"
"That only describes the two of us. Unless you use fire magic, Leona?"
"I know a little. It isn't my focus, though."
"You seem to have accepted that the group will have a name at all," says Shazak.
"Sometimes you have to pick your battles."

I probably would have got lost in without the color. But with the extra expressions added like:

"..Among numerous other rules Aurica made up so she could keep on telling you stories without interruption." says Conall dryly.

and

Leona shrugs. "Works for me."

and

"<Wait..what does that mean?>" Terminus interrupts.

I feel stuff like this really adds another level to the conversation. We aren't just getting the words they are saying, but also expressions that give a greater sense of context and attitude.

On the side of losing work. Someone I know had a glitch happen during a save for his work that corrupted the file. He had to revert to the old version from the day before. Lost about 8 hours worth of work he had to redo. At least your incident wasn't THAT bad.

> I second Charlotte's story telling.
Conall > *grown in response*

[Xindaris]

The path the group is following now comes to the leading edge of a forest. They continue into the woods without a pause, some grateful for the shade. After a good several seconds or so of walking in silence, Charlotte says, "Well, I think it's my turn then. Unless one of you others has a good story to tell?"
"I almost wish Terminus did," says Conall. "It would be more comprehensible."
"If he did, I think I might be able to use my newfound magic to translate for you..but it would tire me out pretty fast," says Leona.
"Don't worry about that," says Charlotte. "You've got to save your energy for whatever monsters we meet on the way--and telling the rest of your story tonight."
"<I...did not have a tale anyway,>" says Terminus, looking a little confused.
"I believe the end result is nobody being disappointed," says Khazu.

Charlotte takes a deep breath, getting ready to launch into something. "So! I'm going to tell you about Choneiji Irys--Ichoneiji about a century or two after this story takes place, but if I call every one of them Ichoneiji it'll just get confusing. Anyway, do you know that sometimes one Choneiji actually doesn't get the name for a person, and has to go consult another about it? Well this story, recorded by the Green Bard himself, is proof that actually happens."

"There was a poor little girl, half Blue Tail and half Red Claw, that Irys couldn't name. He was a nearsighted, part-human Choneiji living comfortably in the Blue Tail Camp at the time. The girl was five years old before it occurred to him that maybe he should ask someone why he hadn't gotten a name for her yet. And just at that time there was a worm infestation that made things too busy for him to just send a messenger to the Shadow Fang Camp about it, so he was gonna have to go himself."

"I don't remember anything about a worm infestation," says Khazu when Charlotte pauses to breathe again.
"And he was specifically told by The Spirits to wait those five years, and then to consult Ichoneiji in person," adds Conall.

Charlotte unloads a barrel of retorts, rapid-fire. "Hey, who's telling this story anyway? Does Kalzen's journal specifically say there wasn't a worm infestation? And why else would they tell him to go himself if there wasn't some reason a messenger couldn't be sent? Huh? And I bet they made up that excuse to make an Ichoneiji look better, instead of allowing for the possibility that he might have been a bit absentminded.

"Anyway, as I was saying, he had to leave Camp because of the worm infestation. But the Blue Tail were notoriously possessive of their Choneiji at the time, so they weren't about to just let him walk off on a month-long journey. So he had to hire a body double to do his job for him. Too bad you can't just temporarily give someone else your Choneiji powers, or that plan would've gone a whole lot smoother. He held tryouts for who could act the most mystical, make up names, and looked the most like him--all in secret of course. The only problem with the person he eventually settled on is that it was a woman. But Choneiji wear loose robes anyway, so she just had to keep her voice deep and not move around too much."

"Really," says Conall, disbelief dripping off his words. "What was her name, then?"
"Well that obviously isn't important because she was disguised as Irys the whole time. At least, for the first few days, until she found a big wolf in Irys' house who turned out to be the Doppleganger. He apologized for being so late, thinking he was still talking to Irys himself, but when he copied her form he found out that she wasn't really Irys, or a Choneiji. But it's a well-known fact the Doppleganger can't copy someone she hasn't met--"
"No it isn't," interrupts Leona.
"I concur. That isn't a fact at all," says Khazu.
Charlotte just points at them, with kind of a mock-glare. "Well. Known. Fact.

"In order to properly fill Irys' duties the Doppleganger had to take on the shape of a Choneiji she'd actually met before, and ended up picking one who looked a lot like Irys except for happening to be female. Same problem, same solution, except now the mysticness and the prophecies were totally legitimate from The Spirits. They don't usually listen or talk to the Doppleganger, regardless of what Choneiji's form he or she takes, but this was a special exception. Are you going to object to that, too?" she says, looking at Conall.
"No, I am pretty sure that last part is actually true," he answers.
"...Right. But we're getting off track here.

"So, Irys left. And then he lost his glasses the very first time he got attacked by monsters--a few Dog Heads, in particular.And guess who had to save him and his fragile, expensive eyewear? Kalzen himself, of course! Which is how he was able to write down the story at all. Irys was able to fight okay without his glasses, as he was pretty strong thanks to being mostly Shadow Fang. And The Spirits told him where to throw his punches anyway. But Kalzen came in and bashed the monster's head in with his stone-enchanted lute. Once the monsters were dead he said, 'Hey, aren't you going to greet the Green Bard?' To which Irys replied, 'Hello, green blur.'"
The next interruption is Terminus'.
"He would like to know what a dog head is," says Khazu, translating.

"Wow, you've never seen one? It looks like a big grizzly bear with a dog's head. And their bite is...slightly poisonous. They're called what they are because it's that bite that makes them so much more dangerous than an equal amount of angry bears."
"So they look like that then," says Leona, pointing a few yards ahead of Khazu, who happens to be at the front of the group presently.

"Yes. Exactly! Thank you for the demonstration," says Charlotte, leaning forward a bit and putting a hand on the hilt of her sword. Everyone else is getting ready for a fight, too: Conall draws one of his metal crossbows; Terminus teleports to the top of a nearby tree; Leona puts on a pair of leather gloves with claws built in between the knuckles; Shazak draws her soul-weapon. Khazu doesn't do much of anything--he's strong enough to fight with his fists.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

I once read an article for fiction writers on some blog or something entitled "don't dread 'said'". The basic point was, don't be so afraid to use the word 'said' that you make up a bunch of unnecessary, clunky, conversation-interrupting other verbs to replace it. Here I'm not dreading the "says". Hope it reads alright.

This required 3 layers of writing to make it work. Layer 1 is the original story. Layer 2 is the 'modified' version to fit Charlotte's characterization in this story so far, peppered with entertainingly ludicrous alterations. Layer 3 is everyone reacting to both the story and the alterations in it. I was lucky to think of a scrap of a tale I had written for some English class and archived somewhere that I could use for this, or it might have taken me up to a week just to do layer 1.

I forgot to answer a question last time, about Karua's color changing. All I will say is yes, it did change going from past to present, and that was intentional, and there is a reason I'm doing that.

I added into the end of chapter 3 a natural question you guys totally missed, mostly because it was a story I had worked out already and had really meant to put somewhere in that chapter. CTRL+F the word "father" and you'll find it.

This is a monster I knew about before now. And I will definitely use the swarming enemies sooner or later, but I wanted to demonstrate this group's skills against some somewhat humanoid enemies before giving them something small and annoying to fight. Strategic/fight suggestions are what I'm looking for here, of course.

[deificAnuran]

Aw durr about the father question. I keep losing track of the loose threads to tie up, so to speak. Also the "says/said" is working fine, I didn't even notice it.

Honestly, I feel like these guys are way too strong to need much effort against a single one of these.
> One of the party: kill it anticlimactically.

... but a whole bunch of them could pose a real threat. So just in case that happens, or if this thing is stronger than I bargain, here are some possibilities that apply to any number of enemies.
> Leona: Cast illusions allowing others to flank
> Conall/Shazak: Flaming crossbow bolts
> Charlotte/Khazu/Leona/Terminus: Go for the underbelly if possible

[Crumplepunch]

I'm no outdoorsman by any stretch of the imagination, but I do know that running into a grizzly at short range is bad, bad news even with modern firearms in hand. Running into a big grizzly with a dog's head (presumably including a dog's far more intelligent brain) is going to be quite the test.

Things for the party to consider:

1) Bears are not pack animals, but dogs are. Best to keep an eye out for more.
2) Nose and eyes will be the sensitive spots, shots to the face should hurt it a lot.
3) Envenomed teeth will probably be pointed and/or hollow, try smashing them with something solid if it tries to bite.
4) If in doubt, kill it with fire.

That last one should be part of every list, everywhere.

[Ellume]

The "says" worked out in my opinion.

First thought of how to resolve this monster problem was:
Terminus > Teleport behind it. Teleport the monster with him a few miles up into the air. Teleport back safely and let the monster fall the few miles to the ground.
OR
Terminus > Taking into account the dangers of teleporting.. teleport the bear into a nearby tree..

If that for some reason doesn't work, or is too simple.
General > Keep distance to avoid teeth, kill it with the array of ranged weapons that people have.
Shazak > Have a mini moment of glory to show off skills.
Charlotte > Show off some firey skills. Let us know what she is about.
Leona > Illusions sound good. Bear-dogs that attack the air aren't too much of a threat. But if it isn't that big a threat, then save your energy.
Conall > Yawn..... or shrug and shoot it in the face.

It's a few thoughts anyway.

[Xindaris]

Leona concentrates first with her newfound mind magic, reaching out a bit to check if this one has any nearby friends. Dog-heads frequently do. "Two more, not far from here. If pairs of us can take one each we should be alright. I'm used to working with the strong pup here." She indicates Khazu as 'the pup'.
"I think we can handle this one," says Conall. The first one in view has started moving toward them, and Charlotte's thumb gently brings the hilt of her weapon a couple of centimeters out of its sheath.
"I could take one myself," says Shazak, and Terminus nods--though he means to help all the same.
That decided, the mostly-elf begins concentrating on a little bit of light magic. The basic element of Fylenis magic is concepts, which makes it relatively easy to create a full image of a creature that never existed. Illusions produced by light magic are different--their basic element is existing light rays. It's far easier to move an image over or make a small change to its appearance than to completely hide the original and make a new one on top of it. All it takes is a small bend in the direction of the light reflecting off a person to project their image over to one side, and have one's enemy swinging at the air.

Charlotte makes the first move, running up to the dog-head and, in one swift motion, slashing it across the stomach and sheathing the blade again, before ducking to one side. The dog-head hits air, fooled by the illusion and outmatched in speed by its assailant. And she is talking the entire time. "So as I was saying, then Kalzen handed Irys his glasses. And Irys said, 'I thought you were under the Ritharan king's patronage. And also suffered from siezures.' Kalzen said he'd gotten tired of sitting around and a friend of his had taken care of that problem--and by the way he was blind."
"Would you give it a rest!" yells Conall, taking a shot with his drawn crossbow--and the wooden round, on fire--at the dog-head's neck. "The monsters. Do not. Appreciate. Your story." The bullet goes through where Charlotte was before ducking to one side and hits. Then another one comes from his other crossbow, aimed at the stomach, and lands just above the cut from his sister's sword. The monster starts screaming because two parts of its fur are slightly on fire.
"They don't? Well, they should." Charlotte ducks around to the monster's side, out of the way of another bite, and then cuts its leg in a similar fashion to its stomach, except that this time her sword is briefly on fire while drawn.
"Is this how you've been hunting down monsters all this time? Talking to them until their brains jump out of their ears looking for a modicum of peace?" Conall is still reloading his weapons.
"No, but I have distracted bandits enough to escape capture by telling them a story or two." Charlotte has to backflip out of the way of the dog-head's flailing claws. She reaches out with her left hand and seems to pull a whip made of fire out of midair. She tosses it around one of the monster's shoulders and pulls.
"What? You've been captured?" He fires both shots simultaneously, both at its head, from different angles. One of them grazes an ear; the other buries itself in its skull from the side but fails to kill it. The monster tries to turn and face him, and nearly pulls its own shoulder out.
"Only about five or six times. All of them totally on purpose. I was helping arrest them at the time." She lets go of the whip at the last possible second before the monster's strength would have started pulling her, and it dissipates immediately. Then she draws her metallic weapon again and stabs the upper torso of the monster five or six times before backing away from another attempted biting.

"Shouldn't they concentrate on the fighting?" says Khazu, somewhere near the beginning of that conversation, while watching the direction Leona has indicated for their opponent to show up.
Leona pauses. "Actually..this is incredible. They're both completely aware of what the other is doing. It's like looking at the brain of a well-oiled machine. I think--I think the bickering is actually passing their positions back and forth to one another without so much as a glance.
"--There it is." Leona points at a dog-head coming out of the woods into the open, relatively wide path. It's charging at her. Khazu jumps in front of her and grabs its forepaws with his hands, planting his feet at the same time. The heels of his feet dig through the ground for a few inches, dissipating the monster's momentum from the charge. Stopped in its tracks, the monster tries to bite him but he leans his upper body just out of its range.
Leona swiftly moves around to behind the monster and starts cutting up its back. The monster opens its mouth to roar, and Khazu takes advantage of the momentary distraction to let go with one of his hands and punch straight up at the bottom of its muzzle. The monster's mouth is clamped shut on its own tongue, and one or two of its teeth audibly break. Then he punches it in the stomach, and it reels back in pain, allowing him to let go with his other hand. He swings both hands up, and using his Black Earth spell, flips a large chunk of ground (including what the monster is standing on) upside-down. The dog-head lands on its back.

At her own request, Terminus teleported Shazak to the top of the same tree he was on so they could both watch for their monster's arrival. When it comes, they can still barely see it through the foliage. "It is..too thick here for a clear shot." Terminus nods, and teleports behind the beast and grabs some of the fur on is back with both his hands.
Then he teleports toward the road, as well as a few yards into the air. His spell has a distance limit, and momentum and orientation are both conserved. He doesn't like to teleport straight up more than once because gravity would probably not take too long to give him enough momentum to break his legs upon hitting the ground. If he put it inside of a tree he would most likely also be inside the same tree--not a pleasant thought.
So instead he just lets go of the monster and teleports back to the tree, allowing it to fall straight down onto the dirt path, limbs flailing in confusion the whole time. Once it's landed, Shazak fires at its head and scores a direct hit. The long distance from her tree to the monster's head is less of a problem for the long barrel of her weapon, but that doesn't account for her ability to aim so precisely. Then she takes another shot, not needing to manually reload since her rounds are created and fired by the weapon's earth-elemental magic, and hits its head again. That dog-head is probably not going to be getting up, but it's still struggling. She fires again, and scores a third hit into its skull. Terminus barely has a clue how metal crossbows even work and he's still far too stunned to do much of anything.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

The amount of information yahoo answers users have about shooting a bear in the head with a pistol is impressive.

In keeping with Khazu's mythic origin, of course he's 'STRONG' enough to wrestle a grizzly.

What we need to remember is that Aurica (whose skills we briefly saw in Callor's flashback-dream-sequence) trained Charlotte for at least half a decade in the art of 'using a katana to kill things really fast'. That was the hint before now of what her battle skill set is in this adventure. Non-battle skill set is meant to be as close as possible to the Undercity original, though I don't know how well I'm doing on that front.

I tried to keep what exposition I felt was necessary here--with regard to Khazu's spell, Terminus' distance limit, and light magic illusions--brief, and use that last one to build a small amount of tension before the fight. Did it work?

[deificAnuran]

The little bits of explanation worked well, especially the one for Terminus; I read Ellume's comment and was thinking "well crap, that sounds really cheap, but it's totally plausible...," but you dealt with it well.

Not entirely sure if the fight is over, but if not:
> Corral remaining dog-heads into a bunch and finish them off
Oh wow and another name for the gang:
> The Conall Corral
... or a name for Conall's startup when he gets too old for the courier business, but whatever.

If the battle is over, though:
> Story time

[Ellume]

I was a bit curious how you would handle my suggestions. I admit I have no fear of cheap tactics I thought the short descriptions worked, but I also don't mind having lengthy explanations mid battle either.

Group > Take whatever it is off the corpses you need to get some cash for your monsterslaying.

[Crumplepunch]

I'm not sure if it was intentional, but "It's like looking at the brain of a well-oiled machine" is a fantastic stealth insult which I am going to use in conversation whenever the opportunity arises.

On Charlotte, you're doing fine. In Undercity I was still hammering out the characters' personalities, so Charlotte had occasional bouts of being more grumpy and choleric than she later turned out to be, but you seem to have avoided that. The name of the game, really, is deception. She usually lies when asked a direct question, feigns intelligence when speaking to dupes, feigns stupidity when talking to everyone else and generally prefers obfuscation to clarity. Even when she decides to tell the truth, she usually does it by telling lies that are obvious. Most of the time, she is just doing all this to annoy people.

Descriptions here worked well, Khazu's in particular. His earth-moving reminds me of a weaker version of a top-tier Exalted spell called Gaia's Rebuke. Cast the spell, a small island of earth under the target launches itself miles up into the air with the target on top of it, flips over and crushes them into the ground at supersonic speed. I always liked that one.

[Xindaris]

Leona draws her sword, the same one used to briefly duel Arozi the day before, and stabs the dog-head in its upper chest area, hoping to find a heart. The monster keeps struggling, so Khazu punches straight down on the hilt to dig the blade a little deeper into the ground, firmly pinning it in place. Then he moves carefully around, keeping his distance, until he is behind its head. He kicks it in the top of the head a couple of times, and it stops moving.

Meanwhile, the Reynolds siblings' monster is clearly on its last legs, blinded by rage and its numerous injuries, and flailing randomly at the air around it. Charlotte just backs away from it. "Really? Can you name a single one of them?" says Conall, before firing another shot at its head. He manages a hit on the first try this time, and the monster staggers forward a couple of steps before going down.
She kneels over, turns the beast around, and pulls a small vial from her pocket. Then she carefully breaks one of the dog head's venemous teeth and places the vial in its place to collect some of the poison from it.

Shazak and Terminus reappear on the ground nearby. "I know the tooth is proof of its death, but what is the venom for?" asks the former.
"I know a guy who's studying this stuff."
Walking nearby, Leona asks, "What does he hope to find in it?"
"Oh, the usual, world domination by mass-producing it in gas form and threatening to unleash it on cities."
"She means he is attempting to develop an antidote, and looking for practical uses, if possible," says Conall. "While it can wear off, it can also kill..and not everyone has Xindaris' willpower." Terminus starts to wonder if he should have been more concerned about appearing within two feet of one, much less grabbing its fur.
"That sounds nothing like what she said," says Khazu. Charlotte, meanwhile, gets up and goes over to the one Shazak shot in the head thrice.

"I am fluent in 'obvious lie'. One must be, having a sibling like her."
"Whoa! Conall, come have a look at this."
Her brother walks up and kneels on the other side of the monster's corpse. "What is it?"
"See these holes? Three shots clean through the brain from up in a tree. If you were half as good as this, we wouldn't have had so much trouble with that dragon four years ago."
"On the other hand, I have neither a long barrel nor well over a century of practice."
"Whoa, back up. You fought a dragon once?" says Leona.
Conall stands up. "...Yes. It is a long story." He goes over toward Shazak.
"Well forget about Kalzen then, I want to hear that story! It's one I don't already know, after all."

"My sister does have a point--I could use improvement. If you would not mind giving me a few tips?"
Shazak regards him for a second or two, what expression there is to an Ekim's face neutral. "I would need to see you fight more. So, later."

The other human, meanwhile, launches into her tale as the group gathers up around her again and starts moving down the road once more. "Like I said, it was about four years ago. Well--that was when we actually fought her, it was five years ago we got started on that journey. About that time, we were in the Ritharan capital looking for work, and then all of a sudden there was this half-satyr Shadow Fang who wouldn't stop talking. You want to help me out on this one?"
"If only to keep the facts straight," says Conall. "Yes. That girl would not. Stop. Talking. But at the time I thought it was because she had a perfectly legitimate reason to be on edge. She was working in a predominantly dwarven workshop, helping with their design of some tricky magic imbuements. I say she was because, according to her story, that day she walked into her workshop to find the place ransacked and her coworkers and employer dead. She seemed far too cheerful for someone in that situation, honestly. I thought we should leave it alone and let the local law enforcement take care of it. We were in the capital for moon's sake, a quintuple murder in a workshop the prince occasionally patronized should have already gotten the attention of the palace guard."
"But I said the guard would definitely miss something important. Law Enforcement officials always do, that's why they hire adventurers to help them out sometimes. So we went to the scene of the crime and found all the clues before the guard could get there, and then we left town to chase after the people responsible!"

"You left out a few details about the inspection, and our exit."
"Yeah, but they're not important. So, long story short, we had to cross over to Draconis to chase this guy down, and when we finally caught him he'd already delivered the stolen item to someone else. It was a bunch of dragon-worshipers from way up north, and they wanted to get their hands on this powerful weapon the workshop had been working on, hence the murder and theft."
"That something in particular had been stolen is one of those unimportant details you left out. As well as the fact that we took the poor girl with us despite not needing her help with any of this, and the palace guard reporting her dissapearance as a kidnapping and going on entirely the wrong chase--after us."
"Well now you've said it so I don't have to. Anyway, we found this old town that had a huge ice wall around it, and that was where they were hiding out. There was a gate, heavily guarded I might add, but that's really not necessary when the wall is made of ice and you have fire magic. And thanks to my foresight in bringing the girl along she was able to use her spell to spy on them and figure out that some kind of ancient artifact being held by the single dragon in the place was being used to hypnotize people into worshipping her. But of course, having a city of worshippers and being protected by a wall of ice--she was a light-blue dragon, by the way--wasn't enough for her. She wanted to take over the world!"
"I doubt it was that extreme. She just wanted to expand her territory, prevent people from snapping her 'worshipers' out of it,have a way of dealing with people who were somehow immune to that artifact. Which group, it turns out, includes Dragoons but excludes half-Satyr-half-Neshoba."
"Right. So after sneaking in and finding the artifact nearly getting killed by the girl we were trying to help out all along, and finally breaking the artifact by shooting it five or six times, that was the part where we fought the dragon."

Conall nods. "She took her true form and could easily have flown away, but by that point was so enraged at the three of us that she was hardly thinking straight. There was an inordinate amount of lucky shots and near misses in our favor throughout that battle. If luck exists in limited quantities for each person, then we have completely lost the right to ever rely on it again."
Charlotte continues. "And when it was finally over, the royal guard marched into the city and arrested everyone. There was a lot of paperwork, but once it was clear what had happened the queen officially recognized us as heroes for defeating a megalomaniacal dragon and freeing a whole bunch of people from her grasp. And there was one other thing--you know the myth about dragons hoarding a bunch of gold and jewels?" Everyone nods except for Terminus. "Well, that dragon defied the entire world by taking that myth and owning it."
Conall says, "Some of the wealth was put into the royal treasury as compensation for the trouble we had caused, but the rest was split evenly between the three of us. I do not know what the half-satyr did with her part, I have not seen her since then."
"Neither have I. As for us, well, Conall had always had a certain dream in mind. Hmm?"
"Yes. I had slightly over half enough for a basic privateer-class airship."

Leona looks between the two of them for a second or two. "So, wait, you mean you just..?"
"I lent him the rest of what he needed," says Charlotte in answer to the unfinished question. "I had no idea what to do with that much money anyway. But hey, anytime I or any of my friends need to go cross-continent or long-distance.."

show spoiler

hide spoiler

This is the debt I talked about in Charlotte's introduction. Although at that time I hadn't decided exactly what adventures ended up in the two of them having enough money between them to buy an airship. I haven't really said it in-story yet, and I intend to sooner or later, but this might count as an extremely minor spoiler so I'll put it in an extra spoiler tag:

show spoiler

hide spoiler

The Reynolds siblings grew up relatively poor.

I'm seriously considering revising this chapter's title to something like "Tales Be Told" in light of its content so far.

(The following message is probably only directed at one person) Name that half-satyr!
And I don't know why I went for a half-satyr when a half-elf might have worked better, other than we already have some elves and no Satyrs among the character list. Although I guess this is probably just going to be a minor background character anyway, so whatever. But even though I wrote this part of the spoiler before finishing this post it's already kind of cemented in my head and there's no going back now, so full speed ahead captain!

I'm going to admit right now that I ended this post when I ran out of things to say. So, suggest anything I suppose, possibly including clarifying questions about that hastily-told story or whatever.

EDIT: I have made a couple changes to the character chart. My idea of what class names represent is some bizarre freakish hybrid of D&D, Final Fantasy Tactics Advanced, and something else I can't bring to mind at the moment, so bear with me.

[deificAnuran]

F- yeah, FFTA. Too bad I played that game with an all-ninja party, or I'd recognize more of the names...
I think including a satyr is a good touch; I'm not sure they'd been officially introduced into the story as a potential race.

> Feels like they should be reaching the bandit hideout destination soon, eh?

[Xindaris]

The second one, which is for DS, is also involved. And I remembered what the third thing was--Enix's Dragonwarrior III for the Gameboy Color. That's where I got my weird notion about fighters vs. warriors.

[Crumplepunch]

Hmm, elf satyr girl, magical imbuements in a workshop with dwarves, compatriots murdered, will not shut up, only one person will recognize?

show spoiler

hide spoiler

All aboard the fairy barrow!



This is still incredibly silly.

Satyress is a pretty good fit for Tri, I think. Never one to let opportunity for pedantry slide, I will point out that the original Greek satyr (before conflation with the Roman god Faunus) was a man with the ears and tail of a horse, very similar to the human form of the Glashtyn, a Manx water-horse closely related to the Pucca.

Interestingly, Glastyn is also cognate with the Scots Glaistig, which sometimes resembles the Satyr's more conventional faun-like form and I'm going to stop talking now because I've taken this too far.

Anyway, yes, what to do. I'm curious, the story seems to miss out exactly what happened to the dragon. If they killed her, how did they do it? Maybe one of the classics. Fated arrow? Lance to the spleen and a public execution? Lamb stuffed with sulfur? Hundred eyed giant? Be swallowed and incinerate her from the inside with a holy relic? Dropped a mountain on her?

(Internet cookies for whoever knows where all those are from. A couple of them stretch the definition of "dragon", though.)

Other than that, I think it's time our party pressed on. Maybe someone else has a story?

[deificAnuran]

OO OO ME ME

http://bettermyths.com/shoemakers-ar...-than-knights/

Even if this isn't what you were referring to, CP, I recommend this site to you since you sound like a mythology buff.

[Crumplepunch]

OO OO ME ME

http://bettermyths.com/shoemakers-ar...-than-knights/

Even if this isn't what you were referring to, CP, I recommend this site to you since you sound like a mythology buff.

That's the one! Well, more or less. This is a humorous retelling of the 12th century Polish legend of Smok Wawelski, the Wawel Dragon. In the version I read, the King promised his daughter's hand in marriage, and made good on his promise, but other than that it's pretty much the same.

Also I love this site.

[Ellume]

Out of curiosity, will Verra and co play any part once they get to the destination? Maybe we could do a short character shift while this group walks the rest of the way or something? Or maybe they are already there? *shrugs*

[Askia]

suddenly... BANDITS!

[Xindaris]

"Wait, how'd you kill the dragon?" Leona again.
"We shot, stabbed, burned, and bludgeoned her numerous times. I believe I recall dropping a few chandeliers on her back and head, as well," says Conall.
"Yeah. Dragon scale's hard, but--big secret--it's not invulnerable."
"I knew that..." she says. "It's hard to fight an entire war against an invulnerable race and actually get them to retreat. They would've suffered literally zero casualties." (She's referring to the Ritharan war, of course.) "I was just wondering if you finished her off with anything special, you know, to top off the story? But I guess being royally declared heroes and given a ton of money is pretty great too. You also repeatedly used the word 'defeat', leading me to wonder whether you'd actually killed her at all."
"Oh, well, we killed her. Rest assured of that," says Conall.

Since no bandits, monsters, or angry dragons have conveniently shown up to bookend the conversation, Charlotte returns to the tale of Irys, Kalzen, and the child who would eventually be named Aura. But we aren't going to follow that, because something more pertinent is also going on this morning.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

show spoiler

hide spoiler

"So then the royal guard marched into the city an' arrested every'ody. And not the royal gaurd of any nearby country, ayether. All the way from the other continent, it wuz. Seems the ones what did in the dragon 'ad led them on some kind of chase." Ewk and Verra sit at a table in the mess hall of the Gran Daora, the former casually juggling a knife while the latter inspects an eight-sided die with her uninjured arm and eye.
"They broke the artifact, yes...but I can't imagine they would make only one of those. You think there's another one weighting to be found somewhere else?"
"Probl'y. But I 'ear tell it only worked for dragons anyway. You could make it work with a figurehead, I suppose."
"I'll keep it in mind if I ever have a dragon to play around with. I'd just need to be careful, find out what if anything it does to Fylens magic. Pick a number?"
"Seven. I'm just going to lose again. Where's the first mate, aye?"
Verra rolls the die on the table, and it lands on the side with eight dots etched into it. "I cut him some slack today. He blinded himself yesterday acting as an instrument of my tremendous luck, and regardless, this spider eightn't going to sail until that dwarf finishes repairing the engines."
"Where'd Bernard even find a fellow willin' ta hike out to a forest and repair a ship, anyway?"
"He's very resourceful. I find it's best not to question his methods. Not like I care about the ethics in the first place." she shrugs.

"Hey." Callor shows up at the door. His eyes look mostly healed; he might even have a little of his vision back already. "You remember the provithionth of the contract, right?"
"Of course I do. I wrote them," says Verra, giving him a suspicious look.
"Relakth, I jutht want you to know what I'm doing and why. 'No thtrategy-relevant thecretth,' correct?"
"Yes." She still has an air of suspicion about her. Ewk looks on with the mild interest of a curious rubbernecker. Callor walks over and sits down across from her.
"Tho latht night I had the weirdetht dreamth. And did you know today ith my birthday? Becauthe I didn't yethterday. You don't have to get me anything, though, I already got thomething. Four and a half thenturieth early, in fact."
"...What are you getting at?"
"Verra. I have a thecond thoul. Do you want to know who it ith?"
After taking a moment to process what he said, Verra responds, "What do you theightnk?"
"Relakth, I'll tell you. I thpent my entire time athleep figuring out who it ith." He pauses, momentarily savoring the ability to keep her in suspense for once. "It'th Lithare."

"Whoa," says Ewk, nearly dropping his knife. He catches it with his other hand after second or two of fumbling.
"Seriously?!"
"Of courthe. I don't tell joketh. You want to meet him?"
"Sure, why not? Unless he's going to attack us or something."
"He promithed me he wouldn't. Here."

He pauses briefly, shutting his eyes and shaking his head as if to clear it. When he opens them again, his red eye has changed to a bright blue color, and he seems an entirely different person. No physical change has taken place, but there is something in his posture and the expression on his face that make it seem that an entirely different Neshobe stands before them. And indeed, he does.
Callor tends to slump a bit, and of course always has a bitter, sarcastic glare. Lisare's face wears a very carefully balanced neutral expression; he sits straight and moves with an absolute seriousness, as if every tiny movement he makes is important, and could have dire consequences. "...Thalutationth. Pardon the thaliva." He is clearly unused to having a lisp.

Verra proceeds to interrogate him. "So you're the greeeeiiiight Lisare, are you?"
He turns his head slightly away from her, to prevent any more accidental spit from going her way. "I would not call mythelf that, but yeth."
"Why are you so early?"
"I have no control over that, nor recollection of any reathon being given me."
"What is a second soul for, anyway?"
"A thecond thoul is returned to life in another'th body for the thole purpothe of lending athhithtanthe to thaid perthon."
"Well, what kind of 'athhithtanthe' can you provide then?"
He doesn't react at all to the imitation lisp. "I am ekthtremely well-practithed in medithine, well read on the anatomy of all of Aranor'th ratheth and thome animalth. I have thome ekthperienthe with thtrategy and the uthe of a metal crothhbow, although I am woefully out of practithe with the latter. I would primarily provide advithe to Callor, ath he ith generally better off in control of hith own body."
"And you have no problems assisting a dethpicable pireight?"
"It ith my duty to rethpect Callor'th dethithionth, and aid him in hith endeavorth regardlethh of my perthonal opinionth."
"Then I suppose you're as hired as he is. Now get him back up front, I have some ideas to dicuss."
"Of courthe."

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And with that, we rejoin Charlotte's group--err, the Makeshift Misadventurers. It seems nothing interesting happened the rest of the morning, because the group is returning to their original, faster pace after finishing lunch. The forest is behind them, a hilly, grass-covered region before them, and they approach a fork in the road. "According to Bernard's directions, we're supposed to take the left here, keep going for half a day's journey, and then east off the road to reach the tomb," says Charlotte.
"How exactly did he quantify half a day's journey?" says Conall. "On horseback, walking, as the eagle flies?"
"He used the word 'about'. But there's supposed to be some old ruins of a village to mark the spot we head east."
"How old are we talking here?" says Leona. "Too old to recognize? Is there some kind of statue still standing to mark the ruin?"
"Does 'older than me, but not as old as you' work?"
"That's still a very wide range."
"Well I don't think he would've mentioned it as a landmark if it was unrecognizable."
"I was just doing some simple math is all: A half a day from now is sunset. And if the village isn't too old to provide shelter for the night, or wood for a campfire.."
"Ah, I see. That's a good idea!"

Khazu, walking beside Terminus at the back, notes a degree of nervousness in him. The younger Neshobe is looking around and sniffing the air occasionally as if he expects to find something. "What seems to be the problem?" he asks, nearly making Terminus jump.
"<It smells like rain, but doesn't look like it,>" he says in reply.
"Oh?" Khazu sniffs a couple of times. "You are right, it does."
Leona drops back in the group, closer to the pair. "There's nothing to fear in a little storm."
"<The noise just makes me nervous. I tend to move quickly without meaning to when I am nervous.>"
"You mean you teleport around when the thunder makes you jump?" she asks. He nods, leading her to giggle a bit. "Well don't worry, if anything nasty shows up in the rain I can take care of it."
"<You alone?>"
"Hm..probably. Do you know what the Rain Clan is named for?"
"<Not exactly. Rain?>"
"Close enough. We carry an enchantment on us, along with our unique birthmark." She rolls up her left sleeve to show the shoulder on that side. There she has what looks to be a tattoo, the dark blue outline of a teadrop shape. "Elves of the Rain Clan are significantly weaker in pleasant, sunny weather. But when a storm hits, be it of snow, sand, or thunder, our power is greater than that of other elves. It's a mixed blessing, especially with what bearing the mark says of our ancestors, but I always have reason to look forward to a storm."

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Thith wath a thurprithingly difficult converthation to properly thcript. The thing about Lithare ith that he liketh uthing lotth of big wordth, not becauthe he thinkth he'th better than anyone elthe but becauthe he wantth to make thure what he thayth ith ath clothe to ekthactly what he meanth ath pothhible. He altho doethn't take the lithp into account when choothing hith wordth the way Callor doeth. Thhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

I decided to commit to a change of chapter title. The new one not only has a bit of alliteration, it also more interestingly follows a small pattern I noticed while doing some listing and planning the other day. The old one is still struck through on the first post of the chapter, though.
"no bandits" count: 2
I'm kind of mixing the personalities and stories of the post-scratch trolls with their ancestors. Which explains why Verra has a pirate ship, and hasn't met Arozi before. (Remembering that Terezi's ancestor met Vriska's ancestor in the course of an attack on the latter's ship, promptly arrested her and then she escaped again at the trial.) I think I'm going to simplify things by not getting involved with the pre-scratch trolls at all here, if I can help it.

There's a general thematic thing on Aranor where souls have distinct colors, and as the windows to the soul, the eye color can often tell you something about a person. I don't know if I've mentioned or implied that before, but it's so.

And LOOK, a new adventure has suddenly popped up in my signature! It is self-advertised as "The world's most ill-conceived fanficrossoverventure", and I mean to live up to that name. The spoiler on the first post there explains what the concept of it is, if you want to know what's up with it.

[deificAnuran]

Change of chapter name was probably a good idea. At least that way the (back)stories aren't just tacked onto the beginning of an adventure chapter.
IDE/theory spoilered for spoiler:

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Bernard is leading the party to encounter Verra, where she will exact her revenge with the help of the Ekim who is going to betray the group because she's on Bernard's payroll (or maybe some other form of payment, or blackmail). She's also one of the "dedicated" followers Bernard was talking to Verra about.

Welp, looks like a nighttime campfire, and we all know what that means:
> Scary stories

I completely skipped over Mindfang's journal in HS.

Also I'm glad you like the blog, CP, I've never been able to sell anyone on it.

[Xindaris]

"Perhaps a song would calm your nerves?" Leona offers, pulling out her small harp.
Terminus takes a long look at her. He briefly saw her fighting with a full-size sword earlier, the claws today, and now this harp. She has to be carrying supplies, too. Her clothing is modest enough, but there are no lumps in her cloak large enough to accommodate much stuff. "<Where do you keep all of your things?>"
"Ohh, here and there. I was taught to hide my things from thieves at a young age. It was a...chaotic time back then. But it's just a few parlor tricks, not even any magic to it. I could teach you sometime if you like. But for now..'Ey, Charlotte!"
"Yeah?" she calls back from the front of the group.
"You sing, don't ya?"
"Sure do!" The group approaches the top of a hill.

"Er, p-pardon me a moment," says Khazu, reluctant to interrupt them, "but--do you hear humming?"
"Hmm..now that you mention it, there is some up ahead. All in the same key, too." Leona strums her instrument a bit, finding a note on the same harmonic. It's getting louder.
Charlotte stops at the top of the hill, putting a hand over her eyes to look down. "Why do I get the feeling this is not good news?" Conall draws one of his metal crossbows as he comes up next to her.
"Actually, there's a little good news. I've never seen nor heard of anything like that before. We might get credited with the discovery, or at least a rediscovery..."

What both of them are looking at is several yards away still. It looks almost like a small, dark cloud floating a few feet above the ground, with sparks of electricity dancing back and forth across it. Shazak reaches the top of the hill next, followed by the rest not long after. She retrieves her own weapon, but turns it to the form of a club rather than the gun.
"You are better off with magic," she says, turning her head slightly at Conall. "The chance of hitting those is near the chance of shooting a bullet out of midair."
Leona, meanwhile, continues to strum her harp, humming lightly herself: Warming up. "This does not seem the appropriate time for a song," says Conall, putting away his weapon.
Charlotte grins, and then disagrees, "No, this is the perfect time for a song. Go ahead!"

The creatures in question have been steadily approaching the group at least since Charlotte reached the top of the hill, likely longer. Now they are close enough to discern their forms. They at first seem to be unusually large bugs--three or four inches long, with heads and tails like bees. However, the bodies between are clearly covered in plumage. And the electricity dancing around the swarm seems to never quite hit any of them, as if they are directing it.
"Do you have any more suggestions?" says Conall, to Shazak.
"Do you have any song suggestions?" Leona asks at the same time, and roughly the same volume.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

I am sorely disappointed with myself for taking this long to write this. I knew exactly what I wanted to happen in this post and I had all those afternoons and just..rrgh.

I couldn't really use that suggestion because it's just past noon, not time for the night-story yet. And I think we already established what that would be, unless you don't want to know what's up with Xindaris and Lisare and all them. Also because I wanted to use a much, much earlier suggestion here.

dA, if you read Aranea's account of what happened in the post-scratch universe, you've pretty much got the cliffs notes for all of the ancestors. It's possible that's why that section is written, as sort of a quick recap of all the ancestor shenanigans for anyone who doesn't remember, or didn't bother reading them.

I would really, really appreciate any vague hint of inspiration on a sort of folk song I could throw together real quick for the next update. Possibly just a title could get me what I need.

[deificAnuran]

Ah, I was kind of anticipating a time lapse to night.

> Leona: Use illusions to concentrate the bugs(?) into a small space, something they would all swarm onto.
> C&C: Fire.

Some folk/country inspiration maybe (I'm not sure where you're going with this so I'm also not sure where I'm going with this):
A song!
And another song!
Cattails! Wooden fences! Orchards! Autumn! Horses! Possibly some mythos-specific variant of horses!

[Crumplepunch]

I have to suggest this one.

Seconding the illusion-and-fire plan.

[Xindaris]

Ok. So. I kind of wrote myself into a corner here. That's why there haven't been any updates for a while. Well, that and general laziness, but he's being court-martialed, so we'll find out about that later. Anyway.

What I wanted to do was have a scene displaying just how awesome a mage/bard type can be on Aranor, Leona in particular. The fight would start out going somewhat badly, probably getting everyone stung and Conall complaining about getting electrocuted twice in two days. But Leona and Charlotte would still be singing a merry tune, whose lyrics would be both thematically appropriate and displayed line by line stuffed in italics in between every couple of paragraphs or something. At some point the storm would actually break out and Leona would start using sound magic, and use the sound of her (and Charlotte's) singing to literally blow the bugs away, because sound magic basically manipulates vibrations and as such can be used as a sort of rough telekinetic ability, slamming things into things, knocking things away and blocking projectiles. (The physics are sketchy but it's too awesome to deny sound magic this use). It would help that rain, snow, or other 'bad' weather basically gives a member of the Rain Clan about twice the power of your average non-RC elf (while sunny or generally pleasant weather gives them half the power. It's a trade-off.) And then they'd be on their way and I probably would just skip to night because this chapter's seriously gone on long enough and we need to get on to the 'Why Xindaris And Lisare Are Important To The People Of Aranor' bit.

So the reason I can't do that is because I would need to write said lyrics myself. I don't want to use an Earth song because a nagging consistency tic in my brain would be all "how would they know that/it's too big a coincidence/the languages are different so it probably wouldn't even rhyme there!" And, well, me and poetry don't hang out much these days. I think the last scrap of rhymed or rhythmed verse I tried to write was two or three years ago, and it was pretentious and terrible. And as silly as it probably sounds, that idea I outlined up there just doesn't work if I can't put a poem to it.

So, yeah. This is a largely informative post, I'm probably just going to go ahead and truck on into the next part, but I guess I can ask if you have any advice for what else I might be able to do, or what to do if I ever start writing myself into a corner again...

[deificAnuran]

When in doubt, plagiarize. I don't know if it matters too much to you whether there's unoriginal content in the story, but Googling around for wind/poem/singing/famous gives (of course) a huge number of poems.

Or you could just have it be in its "original" language. Throw some letters and symbols (like ß, ï or ø) together that look like words, maybe have them rhyme.

Or olde English.