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"Syvet. Nice to meet you."
"To put it bluntly, we've hijacked the Chicken Hut. And we're operating it sorta blindly. We're on the trail to find and free Baba Yaga, and we've been finding the keys to the Hut that she left behind like breadcrumbs, but we have no idea where they actually are going to take us."
"So yeah, we'd like to get out of here so we can find the next set of keys and continue our search."
Quasit is calm and pleasant to the cat, but moves not a step closer to it.
"Free Baba Yaga? Whyever would she need that?" The cat asks, waving a paw disdainfully.
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Quasit nods after Findurel whispers to her.
"Free Baba Yaga? Whyever would she need that?" The cat asks, waving a paw disdainfully.
"Well, mostly because one of her heralds told us so with his dying breath." answers Quasit. "That and the fact that Queen Elvanna is spending a lot of energy trying to stop us."
She looks the cat over for a moment, then begins a strolling back and forth pacing.
"But I'll be honest with you, I kinda want to meet Baba Yaga. I've heard all the stories and legends about Baba Yaga, especially when I was little and my mother was trying to scare me. 'Baba Yaga comes at night! Little children run and hide!' You know the song. And I've now seen Baba Yaga's Hut and visited some of the places Baba Yaga has lived in, and seen a lot of Baba Yaga's books and toys and such. Why we've even heard Baba Yaga's voice. So I'm curious now to meet the old lady herself. Why? You wanna come along and meet Baba Yaga?"
"Oh I've met the old hag. My mistress was her daughter. Until she killed her and trapped her soul. Is that what you're hoping for?" The cat's tone manages to combine disinterest with venom.
"Any idea she would do that?" Selena pipes up with a question in a confused tone.
"Look there's no love lost between Baba Yaga and me... she's an evil, impossibly powerful witch but she's mostly off doing things far away. Elvanna is an evil extremely powerful witch on this planet who's really upping how actively evil she's behaving." He pauses.
"She's no friend of yours either and for much more personal reasons but after Elvanna's done with her current scheme she's not going to stop. Being so closely aligned with one of her elder sisters you could potentially have certain knowledge or insights which would make you a target for removal. Helping us helps stop that possible future or at least forestall it... and if we can feasibly put an end to both we'll go for it." Bulvi looks at Selena feeling she might interject with an opposition. "Or at least I will, but dealing with Elvanna's difficult enough."
"Because I was Yelizaveta's familiar. I felt it happen. Do you have any idea what a scream feels like, reverberating back and forth along a dying mental bond until it's finally snapped forever? It echoed for days. Obviously I didn't quite get exactly what happened, since I was in a bit too much anguish to be asking questions of my mistress as our link frayed, but I could feel her dying but sense her soul being prevented from moving on."
"As for why? Well, Baba Yaga comes for her queens every century. Maybe she does it to all of them? If Elvanna has rebelled against her mother, maybe she managed to figure it out before my mistress did, early enough to do something about it."
"You're my great grandmother's familiar!? We'll have to free her soul somehow!" Selena says determinedly, before suddenly stopping to think. "If that is what Baba Yaga is doing, we need to end that, but we also need to stop the queen as well. What a dilemma." Selena looks deep in thought.
Winter actually poked her head out of Selena's scarf to look at the cat, sizing it up.
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Quasit really has no answer for the gangrel gray cat, and seems to feel bad for having pressed it. The cat's initial bored insouciance had put her on her guard, but this cri de couer was something else entirely.
And when Selena pipes up, Quasit turns to look at her in surprise. Her reaction seemed so out of character. So sincere.
"Well... a century is a pretty good run. Most people don't live that long. But yeah, stealing her soul is wrong." she comments lamely. Her mind goes back to the little girl and the sapphire soul gem in Taldor. She fidgets in place and puts her hands on her hips, twisting her lip in puzzled thought.
"So... you must have used the Hut yourself quite a bit, when your mistress was alive?" she ventures.
"For you and me it's not... Fin might feel a century is a bit of a short run. The soul stealing is right out, speaking as a peasant. I'm sure someone with the right noble blood could twist and contrive justification to feel it was necessary."
"Hmm, I thought I saw the resemblance," Syvet comments after Selena speaks. "What is Elvanna up to, anyway? I didn't see much of the hut when my mistress was alive. Baba Yaga doesn't exactly come by very often between her once a century visits. And since her death... well, I haven't exactly thought it wise to ask her for news."
Selena looks at herself, "Well, a few reincarnations will wreck one's family image. Still, I'm standing, others aren't. If Baba Yaga is stealing souls of her daughters, we need to get her to stop the queen but also need to stop Baba Yaga from stealing souls. Care to help in this crazy endeavor?" Selena asks, then adds with some amusement, "Or teach Winter how to talk the ears off the elf?" Selena indicates her own familiar as "Winter."
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Quasit blinks in alarm and looks with surprise at Findurel, then looks back at the cat with a more suspicious appraisal.
"No. I suppose not." says Quasit to the cat, trying to keep the strange conversation going.
"Is is speaking telepathically? But then why the illusion? And this doesn't feel like telepathic communication...
"So tell us what you DO know about this place. You've been here a long time, so you must've had plenty of time to explore. And I'm sure Selena would like to hear more about her great grandmother."
Then she leans back to Findurel and whispers to him.
"Get ready to attack on my signal. Pass it along."
Then she smiles encouragingly at Syvet.
"Stop Elvanna from what, precisely? You still haven't told me. And I'm afraid I won't be of much help, I'm trapped in this version of the Hut. Even a cat's luck runs out eventually..." Syvet pauses and grimmaces--though the grimmace is illusory. "What do I know about this place? There's a lot of deadly plants. The exit is in the building on the 'west' side, up the chimney if I recall. A lot of unpleasantness that way, not all of it planted by Baba Yaga. The gardner is to the north, but crazy, I stay away from him. The herbs on the east are safe as long as you avoid the greenhouses and the separated beds."
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Fin gives a nearly imperceptible nod, whispering back, ”Seems the cat speaks the truth about the hut…it’s like a bad puppet show…the cat controls its words but not its physical motions…”
While the cat answers Selena and Quasit, Fin quietly passes the word down the line to his friends to be ready for Quasit’s signal…
…and then continues to be on high alert, keenly watching the cat and it’s immediate surroundings for any sudden movements or changes, ready to fire in a heartbeat, if necessary…
"Elvanna's been opening portals to make it always winter! We need Baba Yaga to stop her! But I have been thinking about a plan to just open a bunch of summer portals to just cancel the winter ones out!" Maka yelled down from up high.
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"Even a cat's luck runs out eventually..." Syvet pauses and grimaces--though the grimace is illusory.
"Is that what happened to you? Your luck ran out?" says Quasit. "Because I'm not crazy about this puppet show you're putting on. I'm guessing undead spirit of Syvet somehow using witch magic to look like a living cat? You might have gone to the trouble of properly grooming your illusion."
Selena face palms, "Cats can't talk without help Quasit. An illusion spell for sight and sound is naturally a good way to give a cat speech. It's one thing to be aware of potential danger, it is something different to assume that evil and betrayal are the only explanations for something."
Syvet nods. "Yes, my luck did run out. I managed to evade the dangers of the hut for a while, but eventually, to my embarrasment, Stumpy here got me."
And with that, the stump Syvet is standing on suddenly explodes into motion, its roots pulling up and surging towards the party.
Fin's arrows strike home in the creature's woody flesh, but Quasit's strike finds nothing vulnerable. A toothy maw opens in the 'stump' and tries to take a bite out of Quasit, while a pair of 'roots' lash at her.
Fortunately the nimble rogue is able to dodge the thing's slow strikes.
Syvet's voice continues to speak calmly in spite of the sudden combat. "I am sorry about this, but I can't hold Stumpy back forever. I... really didn't want to die. Maybe there was some pride too--a witch queen's familiar should not die such a stupid death! I was so stubborn I managed to find a way to live even while being eaten. But now... after being chained body and soul to this slavering beast for so long... death doesn't seem so bad, and you all seem quite capable of killing us."
Maka twirled in the air to build momentum before launching a blast of fire. "Who do we do that!?" She shouted down to Fin.
Bulvi charged towards old stumpy to back up Quasit but wasn't sure the blade made it through it's thick bark.
Selena seems particularly motivated at the moment but doesn't really speak, just watching the stump and cat as she summons a little cloud to attack the stump and draw her sword.
'Stumpy' finds it tried to bite off more than it could chew when the party's barrage of attacks strikes it. A few strikes fail to cause damage, but the vast majority find their mark, and soon enough the creature shrieks discordantly and collapses.
In contrast to the noisy demise of 'Stumpy', Syvet's voice (which is clearly not coming from the body of the cat) is even and calm as it fades. "Ah, thank you..."
And then things are still. You can see now that Syvet's body was in inanimate corpse, attached to the stump by a twig-like appendage.
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And then things are still. You can see now that Syvet's body was in inanimate corpse, attached to the stump by a twig-like appendage.
Quasit squats down and pokes the cat corpse a couple times with her sword point. Without looking up, she addresses Selena. Her voice is quiet but hard.
"If you want to admit that I was right and you were wrong, I promise to be gracious about it."
Then she looks off toward the northwest.
"Syvet said the way out was... what was it, through the chimney of a building to the west? And there was a lot of unpleasantness that way? I'm inclined to believe it, since the information about the mad gardener and the herb gardens was true, not to mention that the cat spirit was clearly pulling for us at the end."
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Quasit squats down and pokes the cat corpse a couple times with her sword point. Without looking up, she addresses Selena. Her voice is quiet but hard.
"If you want to admit that I was right and you were wrong, I promise to be gracious about it."
Fin hides a smirk, murmuring, ”Good luck with that, Q…you’re more likely to get a lengthy and pedantic explanation than an admission…”
"Syvet said the way out was... what was it, through the chimney of a building to the west? And there was a lot of unpleasantness that way? I'm inclined to believe it, since the information about the mad gardener and the herb gardens was true, not to mention that the cat spirit was clearly pulling for us at the end."
”Aye, I believe it was…I was hoping Tez’s magic might save the cat, but alas I guess it was too far gone…I would’ve liked to know it better…I can at least give it a proper burial…”
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Sakitu's stance relaxes when the creature collapses. "I think we're getting better at handling monsters. That didn't seem to be hard at all." She glances only briefly at the dead cat body. "Why would we resurrect that? Does it even want to be? Besides, shouldn't we be focused on getting out of this thing we're in? In all the other places we had to go find something to continue. Probably the same here."
"Quasit, I said to not make assumptions. Didn't say there wouldn't be a reason to fight."
Selena grabs a bit of the cat. "I'll reincarnate her when I finish an item to do so. It only works on willing souls, so if she really doesn't want to, she can stay with the dead."
Her downtime will be spent putting together a SIB (spell in a box) of reincarnation, a little wrap that wrap the body part of the one to be rezzed.
"Syvet said the way out was... what was it, through the chimney of a building to the west? And there was a lot of unpleasantness that way?
"There are some trees over that way, probably where the building is." Maka replied as she descended to the ground. "Probably also where more witch monsters are hiding."
Sakitu's stance relaxes when the creature collapses. "I think we're getting better at handling monsters. That didn't seem to be hard at all."
"You've just gotten strong Saki!" Maka grinned as she pulled Saki into a tight side hug.
Selena sighs, then on inspiration, "Maka, if you think about it, you are a dangerous creature that travels with a witch, thus you are a witch monster yourself." Selena says thoughtfully.
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Quasit plants her hands on her cheeks and yanks down the skin until her lower eyelids are pulled all the way down away from her eyes and her mouth is dragged down at the corners and she gives a growl of frustration. Then she loses it and starts to yell.
"Selena! What is it with you always beating this drum about how we don't understand how to judge good and evil? Enough already! If you don't agree with the moral choices we are making, then in the name of all nine Hells, please just go! Don't let us offend your moral compass any further!"
"I swear! If we were in a fruit market in Absalom to buy plums, and we came to a stand labeled 'Plums, 2 for a copper' and the lady behind the stand was yelling 'Plums! Plums! Plums!', if I went up to the stand and picked up two of the fruits and said 'I'd like these two plums', you'd roll your eyes and face-palm and scold me about assuming that these things are plums since any number of things are purple and round and only a wicked fool would want to sink her teeth into the poor things without observing them further!"
Selena sighs, then on inspiration, "Maka, if you think about it, you are a dangerous creature that travels with a witch, thus you are a witch monster yourself." Selena says thoughtfully.
"I don't travel with you, you travel with us." Maka replied nonchalantly.
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Having already had his say earlier, Fin defers as he looks over the cat corpse. He then turns and tentatively asks Selena a question after she mentions reincarnation. ”What are your options for reincarnating this cat? Do you get to pick its form or is the spell more random in what it’ll return as?”
Then he draws his bow, looking to Quasit. ”If you’ve no objections, I’ll scout ahead towards the exit that Syvet mentioned…”
He then turns to Maka. ”Mistress of Fire, if you’d be willing to provide air support once more, I’d be much obliged…”
Fin draws his bow and does his scouting thing to the northwest…