Mira walks away from the stable back toward the other party members. On the way, in a shady and uncrowded part of town, she hears the twang of a bow, and the hiss, thud, gurgle sound of it finding its mark in someone. By the time she makes it around a couple corners to where the sound might have come from, the poor guy was already too far gone. There laid a rather rotund man in the middle of the alley, a pair of arrows protruding from his throat and chest respectively. Laying on his chest was a small writ reading "PAID IN FULL". The killer was nowhere to be found.
Mira immediately takes cover and looks to see if anyone else is taking notice.
Okay. There's only one responsible thing to do here, Mira.
>loot corpse.
That way, she can... uh...
Clues... for finding the bad guys?
Yes. That. Clues. This is definitely not actually loot-related and is 100% altruistic.
No one happens by. The large man isn't carrying much besides a half eaten sweetroll, but the two arrows have Mithral tips worth a plat each.
On the back of the writ, you find a name. Stiny Wesav, a local barrister, or Lawyer. He is- ahem- was one of the top prosecutors in Kintargo.
Why yes, that sounds like a good thing to steal. She pockets them--which leaves only one more thing to do. Mira takes a deep breath, pockets the note with a mental note to see if she can fast-talk the party into at least telling the next of kin (in case there's a reward--like hell does she know the guy).
An assassin who kills someone out of nowhere who's flashy and loaded enough to do it with mithral-tipped arrows, on an otherwise sunny enough day, in this town? The odds were close to zero... but. Her luck.
"Oi. Old man." She's a little bit louder than her usual speaking voice, the better to voice her ire as she walks away from the body. "If you're still around, how about ya' quit playing hard to get?! Heard there was a bounty out on you, and we both know I could use the cash!"
A pause, as she looks around.
"We both know you'd break out five minutes later using a spoon and a bit of lint! Come on, do a girl a solid! For old times' sake!"
After another minute or two of waiting (and making sure she's somewhere not near the body), Mira shrugs.
"Nah. Of course it couldn't ever be that easy. Well, then..!"
Time to get running back to the hidey-hole to meet up with the others again. There's some things about a stable she needs to tell them, some things about a body she should tell them, and some things about her suspicions she's not about to mention to anyone.
Septima nodded along, falling into a somewhat small lapse of silence as the allure of food brought her back to her meal. She was still fairly hungry...
"...Was he...In the fire?" She asks, voice a little low. After all, this was a pretty sensitive subject, and septima mentally kicked herself for even bringing it up to someone she barely knew.
"Huh? Oh no no no. My Parents where quite old when they had me. They both died about four years ago. My mother had heart palpitations and father had respiratory problems. They weren't long for this world unfortunately. But they tried to leave me with all the tools I would need to survive!" Alexis smiles.
"Honestly I am glad they didn't live long enough to see this. My father would have been furious about thrunes very existence in our city. Probably would have made a fuss." Alexis takes another bite of the food, still amazed by the quality.
Ankara returns, minus the bag of gear. She walks around to everyone passing out their share of the loot.
"Fifty gold for each of us. The rest is going into a group fund for emergencies."
"Fifty gold each? Quite the haul. I am Curious, how did odalis react to the thrune amulets? I mean they clearly paid you something for them but I can't imagine they were to happy to take them." Alexis shifts in her seat towards Amass some, so she is facing both people currently, as well as anyone else entering though the door.
Amara scoffs.
"I didn't get nearly what the stuff was worth, but there was a Chelish Citizens' Group member trying to buy the stuff off of me. I ran him off."
"Ha! Bet that was fun to see. They have good reason to give you a wide berth now."
"Indeed.... though why would they want holy symbols for their own cause? I can't imagine they lack any pendants, especially bronze ones." Alexis seems to ponder this new mystery.
"F!*% if I know. Maybe they're lazy? All I know is I got them sold."
Mira returns as well, sitting down heavily in her chair.
"Okay, so. You want the bad news or the worse news?"
Amara walks over and drops Mira's 50g in her lap.
"Start with the worse news."
She pockets it quickly, then tosses the two mithral arrowheads (worth one plat each!) on the table. "Saw some guy get murdered on the way home. Dude was a prosecutor, Stiny Wesav? If I had to guess he got on the bad side of some crew or another. Th'a&$!$~% left a note."
She puts it on the table. "May wanna tell the next of kin. I dunno, not my problem past that. He was dead when I got to him."
Septima pushes the now empty plate out of her way, and frowns up at the others. "and the other news...?"
Mira quickly tells the story of the bleeding door and the weird shaking, leaving out the part where she was scared at all in any way.
"So the upside is that there probably aren't any of Thrune's guys or the Chelish Citizen's Guard there. The downside is that we're dealing with ROUS's that have some sort of freaky magic or ghost powers or something."
Amara shrugs her shoulders.
"Could just be a defense mechanism of the Silver Ravens. What better place to put a base of operations than a place people try to avoid?"
"Could be... but I didn't see any magical traps..."
"I'm doesn't mean they aren't there. I mean it would be a pretty awful trap if it was easy to find. We know what to expect now so as long as we are on guard it should be safer to traverse."
Alexis leans back in her chair and makes note of the trap a d where it happened so they could keep track of things.
Amara begins taking off her armor and getting comfortable for the night. She finds a clear space to do her evening exercises before bed.
Alexis looks to gremlin, who as far as she knows has yet to get any food.
Sh3 approaches the Ratfolk host.
"I hate to be a bother, but could we get any food for our feline friend? I don't know if he has had anything to eat. Alexis bows politely as she asks.
"Ah yes of course, I have some cream and a bit of chicken left in the icebox that he is welcome to. Best that it's eaten, the ice man didn't come by today on account of the protest." he retrieves the treats and goes back to tending his shop in the front.
Gremlin emits a deep purr as he munches the offering. "Thanks," he says between bites, "I can usually fend for myself, but it seemed awkward to hunt for mice here." He looks back at you with an unnatural looking expression akin to a grin.
Mira takes it upon herself to have a good stretch out, before sinking down in her chair and relaxing.
"Well... I'm going to think about anything other than the horrors awaiting us inside that stable. Wake me when it's time to go?"
"Yeah sure. I will probably just stay up with Septima and Gremlin.....Unless you both rear too....then I will probably do some light reading, write my notes, boring stuff. Good night. Alexis pulls out two books. One blank one and another extremely beat up book that looks a bit burned up.
Septima raps her fingers on the wooden table, her mind far away. "I should rest." She says simply, waves to Mira and Amara, then leans her head forward on her crossed arms.
After a moment, she peeks up at Alexis. "...What are you reading?"
"Oh, well this is just a journal to take notes and such. This book however."[b] Alexis turns the burned up book to Septima and opens to a random page. While singed a bit the Picture painted is quite clear. A young girl sleeping slack jawed on a desk with a book under her, while an older women is gently placing an blanket on her while looking quite amused. The backdrop seems to be a library.
[b]" Dad preceded to paint actual situations. Mom found me passed out on some book, and they thought it was a riot so mom put a blanket on me while dad took his newfound inspiration and began to work. He had a silly sense of humor." Alexis chuckled looking at it.
Septima chuckles. "I can see that. So it's his sketchbook?"
"Yes, I had to go through heck to get that book! Got a few others but nothing valuable." Alexis sighs, a bit dissapointed.
As the time passes, you all doze off into a pleasant nap with your bellies full. Even Alexis, who tried to stay awake and read, ended up asleep on her journal much like the little girl in the picture. The dreams that come to you are not entirely from your own minds, however...
You find yourself in a stained glass room. The walls are all made of intricate mosaics of glass and metal. As you approach any wall, you can see that the depictions are of what your character might comprehend as past lives. They are in fact your previous characters. Any of your creations could be there, perhaps even imaginings from childhood. Many of their defining moments depicted in stained glass. Each of you are alone in your own room for now...
Mira looks at some barbarian-as-hell looking guy who is approaching a conspicuous stone with the bodies of a s%$$-ton of dead soldiers behind him. He's covered in blood, looks half dead, and is reaching for it.
Next to it is a woman on a throne, face obscured aside a penetrating, glowing glare that seems to pierce through one's soul. It's somehow more terrifying than the guy who took out the army.
Mira continues looking around at who-even-knows-how-may depictions until her eyes find a white haired girl in an eyepatch, poised atop some great serpent as if ready to jump off and stab someone.
"...Yeah, okay, this is officially weird."
Septima squints at the image of a badly dressed ninja running from a manor, a red stone in her hands. It would have looked daring, maybe, if not for her panicked face. (and, you know, the large hulking barbarian behind her, with a young girl hefted over her shoulder.)
However, beside it is a beautiful image of a angelic, winged woman leaping through the air, swinging a glaive at weird eldritch stuff. The glass around her is multicolored and arranged like a halo. Obviously a paladin of Shelyn, but what in the world is that thing she's fighting?
Septima continues past a line of others and frowns. "This is not any church I know of..." She says, exasperated.
All right.....Here we go.
What....is this... Alexis looks at the massive room. Like a museum to glass art! Alexis approaches the first work on her right
A man. large and imposing with eyes of cold blue. He appears to have wings that are slowly burning away as he clutches the body of a dead women. Fury, sorrow, loss.....Alexis doesn't understand but feels a connection.... A name plate is seen under it. She reads out
Morgan Stern
Her eyes drift to the next one which seems very different. Across from the first is a glass mural with the name plate reading.
Devaren and Squire.
In this Mural a man and a women stand hands locked, embracing another. The women is short, about 4ft9, with black and red hair. The man is almost a foot taller, his hair hidden under a fancy brimmed hat. Both seems to have burn marks yet regardless of how painful they look, Both still smile. In the background men can be seen removing chains from each other.
Alexis moves along to the next glass mural. It's plate reads.
Geralt Hawkthorne.
The glass depicts a man on the floor, back against a wall, facing the viewer. His face heavy as he clutches a whiskey bottle. Chains dangle from his neck with weights attached, six in total. Behind him the wall to his right (viewers left) has a monster creeping into it. whispering into his ear dark clouds. On his left (viewers right) is an angelic figure, crying and whispering white clouds into his ear. In the uppermost part of the mural is a man, with a monstrous smile and eyes of cold, Hey blue. He holds one skull with six others falling to the man on the floor.
Alexis shakes her head at this. A feeling of dread filling her the more she looks. She looks across at the next mural. This one was significantly different. The plate read.
Jewels Veilshredder.
This one had a strong large women with blood red hair standing on the corpse of some demon, a large katana on her back but holding a large hammer. an earthbreaker maybe, in place as it's head crushes the demons skull. Energy seems seep from the monster and into the Katana. In the background is a Caravan with many smiling people in it. One looks like a strange ninja girl with a huge Ruby.
Alexis nods and moves on.
The next mural is more simple than some. It's label reads.
Rosie Vhardenfell.
However unlike how the name would suggest the women in the glass looks completely unlike how a sunny name would picture someone. She is gloomy, a look of annoyance splashed across her face as she tickets with whatever she seems to be making. Behind her is a mirror, but it seems to be reflecting a small girl. The girl looks cold, tears frozen to her face. A picture sits lonly at the base of the Mirror, a small happy family are pictured.
Alexis moves towards the glass mural behind her. It seems there are 3 on each side if she has counted right. She reads the Plaque.
Tulious Stratokai.
In this picture a neatly dress man sits at a table with thousands of people rushing the desk. They seem to be holding things like papers and such and He seems busy filling them out. His eyes are tired and He looks a mess, yet he is obviously still sitting straight and powering on through. He seems like a good man.
She finally turns to the wall. A large wall that sits at the end of this hallway and the glass portrait takes up the whole thing. The plate reads
Solomon "Hydra" Stratokai. This one is the oddest of all. In the center is an old man, sitting lazily on a throne looking quite bored. But around home five long, dragonlike heads decide the glass mural into sections. Each seems to be telling different stories (technically since there are five heads that's six parts). One shows the same old man using these Dragon heads to tear apart an angel as others crush an army. One shows the old man sitting on the throne with others....who are actually the same people on the other murals, save the one named jewels, standing around talking seriously. Aside from the old man who looks quite border. Another yet shows the old man speaking to four kids, laughing as one seems to challenge him. Another one shows him standing in a castle with a group of people holding Crimson banners standing adjacent to him. One shows the old man watching the world be turned to dust by a large horror from the sky. The final one, right above his head is just a void of stars and such, empty.
Alexis blinks at the Glass, then the others.
"What is any of this.....What does any of this mean!? Who are these people.
! I haven't heard of any of them before.... Alexis's chest starts to feel heavy.
Amara walks cautiously through the hallway, Ramón in her hand. As she passes the stained glass she notes that each of them bears the likeness of a person. The first is of a male elf, plate mail and shield gleaming in the sunlight, a large sword held aloft as his long black hair waves in a breeze. Next, a devilborn female, eyes alight with fire and black leathery wings spreading behind her. Then a female catfolk, dressed ostentatiously and wearing a red chapeau, a drink in her hand and laughter on her face. A raven-haired female human, clad in dark robes and caressing a skull. A half-Elven archer accompanied by a winged wolf, horns protruding from its skull. A small bear-like creature with small bat wings and a pompom on its head riding a strange two-wheeled vehicle down a white hallway, pursued by sharks.
The hallway stretches on seemingly endless, every alcove a depiction of a person never met but intensely familiar. She stops and looks back. The way behind stretches just as far as the way ahead.
Gremlin comes to in his own room. It's oddly shaped, with coves, odd corners, and halls that loop back around. hmm. This again?
He pads around past the assortment of murals. One of the largest and most intricate was of a man in a long black coat wielding a bastard sword that was split down the middle like a tuning fork. The entire section was dark and dreary, save the ice blue eyes and glowing red runes on his right arm.
Gremlin continues on toward his favorite section. The first was of a grinning Catfolk, the captain of a ship. A strong and lovely half orc woman was by his side. Further on, a beautiful girl, half catfolk herself, was depicted shattering a man's sword with her Falcata. Finally, there were two proper cats next to the empty space Gremlin had walked out of the night he had awoken fully. The orange one wore a collar inscribed with the word Dragon. The creepy looking black and grey cat had one reading Djinn. Gremlin caught his reflection in the empty space and saw that he was wearing a leather collar embossed with his own name.
His contemplation was interrupted when he heard someone enter his dream room...
Into each of your rooms, through a hidden door in the glass, walks... you. Not a copy of your character, the real you. I won't decide for you how your character perceives this. I'm just interested in what follows.
"Book?" Mira draws her sap.
"What was that word?"
Mira was only sort of half sure what he was even saying, but... "Wi--"
"Then... Why do we exist?"
"...is that it?"
And then exactly what you're expecting happens.
"Why...what are you wearing?"
"Wait, wait. Slow down. We're in your head?"
The hallway in question is off to the side and lined with windows as well, one of them shows a boy in darkness, his neck tied in a red noose that's held by another person.
...or at least, that's all Septima sees before the figure flips a lever and the doors to that hallway slam shut.
Alexis glances around when she hears something.
Alexis turns towards the large mural. Out of the galaxy above the Mural a set of stairs rolls out and a man walks quickly down the state's. Feet moving fast eyes down. The man in the mural moves, looking around the stairs and actually hoping out of the glass to approach the very NOT glass person a walking past her.
"Oooh stuck writing again?."
The old man groans.
"Yeah yeah...Well why don't you ask her?"[/ooc]
The man turns and looks right at Alexis who jumps at this.
Alexis raises her eyebrow.
[B]"Book, what book? What is any of this!!!?"
Alexis, before being able to ask a single one of her POINTLESS questions is shocked awake by something....or was it nothing? Alexis glances around the room. Whatever dream she was having seemed to have shocked her, but for the life of her she couldn't remember a thing!
"Oh it's you." Gremlin pads over to the man with the scruffy beard that had just entered the room.
He picks Gremlin up and sits on a couch that happened to be there.
"I am. This group seems to suit me. May I ask a question?"
"On your childhood wall there is an imaginary cat. Do you suppose I could be some odd extension of that part of you?"
"Dude, don't make it weird."
"Thanks, Cap."
At that moment, Alexis woke with a start. What she hadn't realized is that Gremlin had curled up on her lap and was startled awake by her movement. He skitters across the room before stopping to try and regain his dignity.
The bearded man walks out of the stained glass. He looks around, confused.
Amara cocks her head to the side.
"Hell if I know. Who are you?"
The man smiles.
Amara shakes her head.
"An infinite hallway with no doors doesn't seem like a way out."
The man begins examining the stained glass. He chuckles and looks over at Amara.
Amara just shrugs.
[ooc]"Look, I'll give you this advice. Let it go. S&!#'s always gonna suck if you hold on to it. I mean, don't ever let anyone tell you that things get better. They don't. You do, however, get stronger."
The man claps Amara on the shoulder. A bark can be heard from behind the window he came from.
With that, the man turns and walks back through the window.
Amara, you offered encouragement. You awaken with a hopeful attitude. You are granted one charge of fumbleproof. Next time you fumble in an important situation it'll work out well for you.
Alexis, you brought in a third party. You awaken feeling refreshed, if a bit confused. You may design one important NPC and I'll add them to the rebellion when appropriate.
Septima, you referred to something dark. You have a use of dire strength. When the situation looks bad for you or an ally, you may let me know that you'd like to use it.
Mira, you went metaphysical as hell. You awaken feeling enlightened, for better or worse. You gain a use of insight. At some point, you may ask me any relatively specific question about the book and I will answer it to the best of my ability. Mira will happen to know the answer somehow.
Your dreams fade into the usual fuzz and jumble in your memory as you wake. It's just after sundown.
Alexis streches....She feels like she saw something she shouldn't have but.....Ah it was probably just a dream getting to her. Happens sometimes, wake up freaked out and can't remember the dream that did it.
Alexis looks to the shocked gremlins.
"I am sorry my fuzzy friend. Didn't mean to scare you....is everyone else up and ready? Let me get my spells in order and I'll be set." Alexis hurriedly packs up the drool covered notebook and the picture book and shows them away, then pulls out her spellbook to prepare spells.
Mira stretches and stands up once more, pulling out her sap and giving it a good whirl in her hand.
"Yeah, I'm up." Up and thinking that she's seen something weird just now... but dreams are dreams, and weird ones moreso.
"Let's get going. We'll have to dodge the guards since there's the curfew... but that shouldn't be too hard, right?"