Ulfr is a bit quicker on the uptake. He's isn't getting smothered by a beautiful woman (unfortunately). Not a dream, Andrezi.
Finally tired of stumbling over words the slayer listen to Uggy but can't risk taking his eyes off the perfection of femininity sitting on top of him for fear he will wake up from his dream.
Ryn starts to chuckle in amusement. "Don't worry no one blames you for not being able to think clearly. The effect apparently runs in the family....though in very different ways."
He entered the room and blinked... not surprised to see the lovely Sarinah had already found another. Not that he was upset of course. . . He had merely hoped he would have been at least memorable enough to give her some pause. He took off his top hat and gave everyone a perfect bow. Though he gave Ryn and Merinah a wink.
A pleasent morning to everyone I hope.
He said returning his hat to his head and adjusting his coat before standing there patiently hands atop his cane leaning against the wall.
My advice friend... is to not argue with a beautiful lady too often, especially not that one.
He said nodding to the lovely Sarinah and shooting her a wink too.
Sarinah seemed quite amused by this turn of events and said, "No, no pointy ears, didn't you know she sometimes comes in other, beautiful, packages?" She looked over her shoulder and Trendon unabashedly and said, "Wise words Trendon."
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As the lace covered cat plays with her nebbish mouse another set doors open into the foyer, with two woman entering. "Terribly sorry to have kept you all-oh come now! You haven't been waiting that long." the woman in the formal green dress set against pale skin and dark hair intricately done up adresses to those assembled wryly but firmly.
Clearing her throat her voice takes on a deeper measure as she tries a greeting again. "Thank you all for answering my Summons, and again I apologize for the wait, me and Koriah had just been discussing a recent trip of hers."
The attractive woman with pointed ears next to her, a stark contrast with her wild red hair held down just by a bandana and with tanned skin mixing with her leather armor, also is obviously armed, with a a very unique looking redwood club that has a silvered hook on one end and a length of cord attached to the other to one side of her and a sheathed bastard sword to the other.
He knew this woman.... no no wait, he didnt but for the moment he wished he did. Never one to let an oppotunity to pass he moved presenting himself before both women with that elegant little bow. He knew miss Heidmarch was a married woman but. . .
The pleasure is certainly mine, Miss Heidmarch, Miss Koriah.
He said her name letting his tongue taste it as he took her hand and pulled it to his lip kissing the top of her hand.
Does the trip have anything to do with us?
he added letting her hand go. . . he didnt look torwards any particular beautiful woman who he may or not be aquainted to already, certainly not any with blond hair...
Ryn snickers slightly at the reaction to Sarina's....entertaining herself, studying both women as Lady Heidmarch speak and taking note of the interesting weapon.
What he said. Ulfr hikes a thumb at the fancy noble. Hopefully she says no and send shim off with Andrezi and that fighter girl. She looked familiar...
With the appearance of the women they were here to see Sarinah broke off her impromptu make out session and climbed off of her plaything. She said to him, "We can come back to this later I think." She picked up her pack and took her sisters over to her and handed it off, "Your things Marinah." With that she turned and gave their hostesses a curtsy, "Pleasure to meet you both, I'm Sarinah and this is Marinah and we're both here to serve." Her tone was light and only slightly suggestive for a change.
"Uhm yeah, a pleasure to meet you Lady Heidmarch." Ryn says with a nod, not even trying to pull off a curtsy.
Looking between Sarinah and Heidmarch, Andrezi furrows his brow. Her summons? But...
As Sarinah dismounts his lap he watches the rest of the ground nod and fall in step as they all appeared to have been summoned as well. Andrezi shoots a quick sideways glance to the center table where the wasps had been, trying to ascertain if what he drank last night was having grandiose delusions.
For now the slayer rises and stays silent, unsure of his involvement here. He studies the two new women, the wild haired redhead drawing more of a study than the hostess.
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The redheaded woman arches a brow as the lothario takes her hand, more out of slight amusement then annoyance. Feeling some focus on her, or rather her weapon she flicks her eyes towards the gladiatrix. "Like what you see?" she quips with a smirk, the innuendo and libido flooding the air unintentionally setting up her words.
"A pleasure to finally meet you all as well," Heidmarch starts, about to say something else she stops when she notices Andrezi's confusion and realizes she also doesn't recognize him. Her eyes quickly dart from person to person present of the visitors as she obviously takes a mental tally of the people in the room opposed to how many letters she sent out.
Marinah kissed her sister softly, in thanks for her belongings. Then she turned her attention to the two women who approached.
"We are always at the service of the Pathfinders." Marina says, offering a curtsey of her own.
"Glad to hear, which is why I've summoned you all here today," Sheila begins speaking, brushing off the abnormality of Andrezi being here for the moment. Maybe he was an acquaintance of others. The light dressed twin riding him just a few breaths again have some credence to that assumption in her mind.
"Miss Azmeren," she continues while holding out a hand to indicate her previous conversation partner, "an esteemed Pathfinder herself and the definitive source of our knowledge reagarding the Darklands beneath us, and who brought to light the existence of the nefarious Drow that dwell there, has recently returned from scouting out a path down to Nar-Voth area from the Fogscar Mountains."
Koriah for her part as Sheila speaks looks rather smug at the praise, though to her credit it doesn't detract from her presence.
"Definitely impressive." Ryn responds with a chuckle, very aware of tone in the room, her eyes shifting to each person there, a little more of a smile flickering when they settle for a moment on Marinah.
"Such an amazing woman should be rewarded." Marinah says, glancing toward her sister. "I hope you come visit sometime soon, Mistress Azmeren."
The half-elf chuckles at the praise offered by the warrior, and the enticing offer from the leather clad lady, both making her smirk deepen. "Thanks. And while I would just love to pay a visit under the watchful eyes of The Lady in the Room with some of her enthusiastic adherents, I'm... sadly far too busy right now."
"You're always busy." Sheila quickly cuts in.
Koriah just as quickly cuts a glance at the Venture-Captain. "And you're complaining?"
The Venture-Captain in turn lets out a tired sigh. "No," she says before addressing the group assembled again. "Koriah has also returned with a surprising number of artifacts of Thassilonian origin and heritage. These discoveries has been what has robbed mine and her time currently, and for which I must sadly get back to..." Sheila stops, obviously as a thought strikes her.
Koriah simply regains her smirk as the other woman mentions more of her accomplishments.
"If you would..." Sheila simply says as begins walking to a door across from the one she entered from and opening it, revealing numerous large bookshelves easily visible without even entering the room. As the Venture-Captain starts to move, Koriah trades her smirk for a more work oriented expression as she quietly follows right behind and into the other room.
He followed their gaze and their movements, shaking his head just slightly at the lack of the enticing Miss Koriah's lack of response to him. He had a feeling he would always be upstaged by the twins as long as he was in their company... no matter that Their was perhaps business to attend to.
Sarinah returned Marinah's kiss but grabbed her hair to hold her a moment longer than Marinah intended the kiss to last. Breaking it she said, "You're welcome sister." She looked to their hosts and agreed, "Yes, we were born to serve." As Azmeren makes her excuse Sarinah said, "No, I insist Mistress, you must come play with us some time. All work and no play makes the Mistress a dull girl."
As their hosts began to get to business Sarinah's gaze followed their hosts to see what they were going to get.
"I'm anything but dull." Koriah responded over her shoulder, her voice sharp.
"Of that I'm pretty sure there's no doubt" Ryn says as the group follows into what she assumes is a study or library.
Stopping once inside the library Koriah arches a brow at the gladiatrix but doesn't otherwise comment, awaiting along for everyone else to enter so that Sheila can continue.
Ulfr follows the group with an amused smile. This was turning out to be far less boring than he'd imagined.
Sarinah grinned at the reaction she got form Koriah and said impishly, "Then you'll have to come prove it to us someday. But for now I'll just take your word on it." As she entered the library with her sister Sarinah took a look at what was around her. Mostly what she saw were books, books, oh, and did she mention, more books.
Completely clueless as to what he was actually doing about to enter the intricate library, Andrezi takes a step forward behind Ulfr. He leans his head behind the barbarian's and asked. "What the hell is going on here?"
Uldr gives him a confused look. Getting or dispatch orders from the Venture-Captain here. Did you not read your letter or something?
Letter?
Andrezi plays it straight. Well, mostly straight. "Nope, didn't read the letter. I was a little preoccupied getting stung with this urgent thing earlier."
Ulfr's confusion turns to suspicion. You got a letter from the Pathfinders, didn't read it, and still knew to come here? Now?
As everyone piles into thankfully large room the original suspicions of a library hold true. Not a wall goes uncovered by a towering bookshelf and the center of the room has numerous tables covered in piles of all manner of scrolls, books, and notes.
The table in the center stands out though, as it's only inhabitant being an ornate stone cube covered in markings those native to Varisia will easily identify as the same covering most of the ancient monuments. Thassilonian.
It is this table that Sheila and Koriah walk to before the Venture-Captain aging adresses the group. ""I apologize for the delay, as I must conclude my business with Pathfinder Azmeren before we meet. In the meantime, though, I thought you could help us with another minor issue. This stone coffer is an ancient Thassilonian puzzle, a cunning feat of magical engineering known as a paradox box. As you'll see from even a casual investigation, what appear to be seams on the sides are only shallow grooves-there's no obvious way to open the thing. Each paradox box has its own secret method of being opened. Essentially, a paradox box substitutes hidden catches and magical triggers for a lock. Given time, anyone clever enough could figure out how to open a paradox box, just as given time, a locksmith can open any lock. This particular box was among those items recovered by Koriah-the scrolls next to the box are her preliminary notes on possible triggers or methods of opening it, but she's not yet had a chance to sit down and properly investigate the thing. So... why don't you put your heads together and see if you can't do that for me? Even if the box is empty, as I suspect it probably is, knowing the method of opening it makes it a valuable find anyway. I'll return shortly, and I hope to see that box open! Think of this as an audition, if you will-because the actual task I want to speak to you about soon will require as much wit as it will brawn!"
Although her request starts out stern and to the point as she goes on the giddiness the likes of a hopeful schoolteacher can be heard in her voice, which causes Koriah to give a lighthearted smirk as she simply shakes her head. No sooner has she finished than she's clasped her hands together in excitement and turning on her heel and heading for the door, obviously resuming her conversation with the Pathfinder. Though the quickness in change of discourse catches even her off guard, who quickly hurries after the talking woman.
As they get to the door the half-elf turns and mouths a good luck before closing the door.
Never one to turn down an intellectual challenge he moved towards the box letting his hands trail along the edges of it. He studied the markings on the cube then glanced at the womans notes before going back to the cube.
The box itself, or rather, a block would be more accurate, is one and a half foot all round, as well as weighing probably upwards of 30 pounds.
From the notes, very verbose and eloquently penned thoughts and conjecture on the box and it's origin, with many of the runes already translated into Taldane. One of the most commonly repeated ones is the Thassilonian symbol for Wrath, which is noted to most commonly be associated with evocation magic, and in the earliest days of Thassilon, the word kindness.
Unfortunately, or perhaps fortuitously for those investigating, the notes come to the conclusion that the runes merely marked the box as belonging to a citizen of the ancient nation of Bakrakhan, ruled by the Runelord of Wrath, and don't have any bearing on opening the box or its effect if opened.
More notes, and from Trendon's observations, point out while the runes on five of the faces are identical, on the sixth there are nearly double the amount of runes. The extra runes not only seem to repeat in a pattern, but touching two different ones cause them to switch places.
The Bard is able to ascertain
From what I can gather, these runes here, merely need to be arranged into a passcode, to open the box and the prize inside. I never bothered with learning old languages a failing of mine I suppose. Do any of you speak ancient Thassilonian?
He asked rhetorically looking about the room for quill, pen and ink, to perhaps write tiny notes on the attempted combinations to not repeat them.
"At this point I'd only be useful if you needed it smashed open." Ryn says with a self deprecating chuckle as the takes a seat at the table, leaving the more clever and skilled to the task.
Sarinah looked at the box and started to mess with it, this wasn't her forte but, who knew, maybe she'd get it.
Ulfr's experience with ritualistic languages let's him contribute somewhat!
After twenty minutes of studying and proding you believe you are making progress, and, even better, also haven't blown yourself up.
Andrezi watches Ulfr explain some complex language-related phenomena silently. He briefly considers pitching in but quickly decides against, clearly out of his league on this one.
Much of this was way over her head, but one thing Ryn knew she was good at was recognizing patterns, whether an opponent's attacks, the staggering weave of a belligerent tavern drunk or anticipating a change in the music when dancing. The moves closer to look at the symbols as they alternate and shift around.
After another 10 fruitless minutes Ryn moves over and observing what she thinks would make the rest of the symbols already figured out flow more coherently manages to rearrange two of them to better suit the overall pattern displayed on the box. Still no explosions.
Boxes and puzzles and languages aren't among Marinah's strengths. Thus, she allows the others to fret and worry over the box while she, instead, watches each of them. Learning.
One can learn ever so much by simply watching others as they put their shoulder to a task.
With a resigned sigh of disgust at the box Sarinah went to stand with Marinah and watch as the brainy people solved the box. Unlike Marinah though Sarinah got bored very easily and quickly began to fidget for lack of anything to do.
He frowned as his attention was distracted but the lovely miss Sarinah's impatient sigh and her figiting. He hated how she seemed to have his eye no matter what she was doing.
Miss Sarinah I dont suppose you could not be.
He ran his hands through his hair clearly frustrated by the puzzle too.
Perhaps you could be a dear and see if any of those books along the bookshelf have to do with Ancient Thassilonian? If I had just a little more knowledge I think I could unlock this box. Im pretty good at unlocking boxes normally.
He said winking at the pretty bored blond.