As you start your tirade, Tsuto cuts you off. "Save it. You have nothing to offer me, least of all 'freedom'."
One of the garrison guards steps into the room with you. "Conner, sir? Representatives from Magnimar. They're here for the prisoners."
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"So, if it was doomed to fail, why are you even still here? To gloat?" Tsuto leans against the far wall of his cell. "Do you seriously have nothing better to do with your time than *that*?"
"Gift?" Tsuto snarls at you. NOW he looks legitimately angry. "Is that what a lifetime of no privacy or chances to be a normal person is called now? She hated her celestial blood with a passion that I don't think your small mind can fathom--she was put on a pedestal from childhood, forced to meet impossible demands from her father and the townsfolk alike." "Begging her for blessings she couldn't provide... 'Oh, miss Tobyn, would you kindly grant me a blessing? A boon? A lock of your hair, perhaps, to give me luck at night? Might I touch your brow? Collect a teardrop or two?" Tsuto gets up at this point and storms over to the wall before punching it. He whirls back to face you. "And then, when she inevitably declined them, they cursed her name for it." "Then she finds a man before me, who claims to understand what she's going through... and he gets her with child before throwing her to the wolves to save his own skin." "And if your father was so terrible, then explain your sister." "She escaped. Ran off to some boarding school in Magnimar." He flatly answers.
Tsuto snorts. "I doubt I could tell you anything you didn't find out for yourself already. But... fine." "That fire that consumed the old cathedral of Desna? That wasn't an accident. My Nualia started it, after tying her bastard of an old man to his bed. Payback for treating her like an object to increase his standing in Desna's church, and abandoning her cold when she dared date boys behind Daddy's back." He spits on the cell floor. "F&*%er deserved nothing less, if you ask me." "She planned the raid on the town, and had her goblins steal his bones out of the new cathedral's graveyard. They were the first to burn... the first step in shedding the 'holy' celestial blood that f*++ed her life over. Her arm transformed as 'Father' Tobyn's remains burned." He grins. "Ameiko was the next step, she told me. Didn't know why she wanted her blood. Didn't care to ask." "Having lived with an abusive son-of-a-whore of a father my whole life, I felt like I really understood her."
Tsuto snorts. "If you had the balls to do that, you'd have done it back at Thistletop." "But fine. Out with it."
Tsuto looks considerably more disheveled and filthy than when you last saw him. He's not dressed in his old finery any longer--the dirt-stained grey rags he's dressed in seem ill-suited to him. Good. The half-elf glowers at you as you sit in front of his cell. "...what do YOU want?"
Tsuto doesn't say anything as Eostre presents Nualia's head and drops it at his feet. Conner poking him with her severed demonic hand gets no reaction from him either. He doesn't seem moved by the party's threats in the slightest--he just fixes Eostre with an even more hateful look, if that's even possible.
Tsuto sputters and coughs up some blood as Evelyn's wand forces him awake. He doesn't say a word, instead glaring up at the party with a look that doesn't even bother hiding his hatred of them.
"But what you did to your own father? Without even a cantrip?! What kind of monster could not only do that, but WATCH without feeling regret?!" "A monster whose life was made into a living hell the day he was born." Tsuto's mocking demeanour finally drops, revealing a harsh, bloodied scowl. "Hey, you two." He points to Conner & Ekan. "Could you guys please hurry up and kill me so I don't have to listen to the floating b~*++ anymore?"
Ekan finally manages to score a clean shot on Tsuto, his fist connecting squarely with his nose. The half-elf's head snaps back from the force of the punch. "OW!" He wipes his bloodied nose on his sleeve and unleashes his own flurry of punches on the monk!
Moving almost too fast to see, his fists connect with both of the monk's cheekbones. There's an audible *CRACK* of bone fracturing as the punches land.
Tsuto gives Eostre a deadpan look and tilts his head to the side, causing her telekinetic fist to impact on the wall behind him.
Tsuto manages to move to the side of Conner's strike, but not without his hair getting ruffled by the man's blade. "...huh. I almost felt that."
Tsuto parries Ekan's kick and ducks under his punch. "Good luck with that." His foot snaps out...
...and he almost manages to catch the monk in the groin again. His foot ends up striking the inside of his thigh instead. He follows it up with a punch to the face.
The punch is fairly telegraphed, and easy to dodge.
Nicat's sling bullet streaks towards his target... only to be contemptuously swatted aside by Tsuto. "Spoken like someone who's never suffered a day of hardship in his life."
Tsuto rolls his eyes. "Go ahead. You'll just bury your buddies, and my darling will have the last laugh anyway." "Besides, I already know you're just planning on killing me anyway. If you think I'm just going to roll over and die for you, you haven't been paying attention." The wizard continues to cower.
Ekan's first punch connects with nothing but air... ...but his second one meets invisible flesh with a satisfying *CRUNCH*. "OW!" There's a *WHOOSH* of air as Tsuto swings an invisible fist...
...and turns visible once again as his fist connects with Conner's massive shield. He shakes his hand in pain and swings again!
This time he overextends his arm. The wizard next to him loses her grin and her expression turns frightened. "Tsuto! No! YOU IDIOT!"
Tsuto nimbly weaves and ducks under Ekan's strikes and counters with two of his own.
Except his blows are just as easily dodged. "And I thought taking shots to the balls was your only talent."
Despite Eostre's best efforts, Tsuto manages to escape up the stairs before she can complete her spell. The door slams shut behind him... followed by a *click* and the cackling of goblins! "Y'know, I really didn't think that was going to work. That was some of the worst bluffing I ever thought of, but as soon as I said Ameiko was hurt, you practically tripped over yourselves to save her!" Tsuto gloats from behind the door. "Oh, and Nicat? Thanks for helping me escape. Couldn't have done it without you, buddy!" The mockery in his voice is unmistakeable. "I was hoping things would have turned out better, but I guess it doesn't matter if you burn now or later." Tsuto's voice turns serious. "Because make no mistake--this town's going to *burn* for what they did to her." There's a brief silence. "Poog. Mogmurch. Burn the building down."
The grease catches Tsuto by surprise, but he somehow manages to keep his footing.
Tsuto stops as Nicat & Eostre accost him. "What?! But I... but I..." His demeanour suddenly turns annoyed and resigned. "...oh, f+*$ it, it was worth a shot."
Tsuto turns on his heel and starts running like hell!
"Please, can one of you help her? And did you kill all the goblins?" Tsuto moves aside, his face ashen. GM Rolls:
DC 10 Sense Motive: He looks much more curious to know the fate of the goblins than if someone can help Ameiko...
Tsuto nods and follows the blood trail. "She's... she's in here." He pants, leading her down the hallway. They pass by two doors on the way there--one carved from stone, the other made of mahogany. He points at an oaken door at the end of the hall, where the blood trail leads.
"Take us to her, Tsuto! Your dad's dead, we don't wanna lose Ameiko too!" Tsuto stops dead in his tracks. "...dead? What? How?" "Ameiko's hurt? That's terrible! Why was she even here, she can't stand her father? What in the hells is going on?" Before he has a chance to really process what Eostre said, Nicat speaks up and hurries past him. Tsuto blinks as he looks at Nicat. "I asked her to come here--I needed her help to... to confront Father..." GM Rolls:
He shakes his head. "She's downstairs--she's in one of the storerooms in the back. The goblins locked us in there." Heading downstairs, the party enters a stone basement that is mostly unadorned. Two wheelbarrows are up against the far wall, surrounded by bags of sand and other raw materials used in glassblowing. You see that the blood trail from upstairs leads down the stairs and down a hallway to your left.
The man nods. "Yes, I'm Tsuto. Ameiko's too wounded to move--she's downstairs, and I have no idea how to help her." Tsuto leans on the doorframe. "Wait--I remember Father was here. Where is he?"
As Nicat & Ekan approach where Evelyn said the footsteps were coming from, a voice calls up from the stairwell leading to the basement. "Hello? Is someone up there? Anyone?" Peeking out from the stairwell is a half-elven man of Tian descent, his black hair tied back in a ponytail and his fine clothes stained with soot. "Oh, thank Desna--those goblins attacked my sister and I. They threw us down here--I only just escaped!" He gasps, staggering out of the stairwell.
"Oh! There you guys are. I was admiring this blue rose when I lost everyone. How much for the rose, sir?" Tsuto looks over from a couple of sales he's making at Sylvia & the rose she is purchasing. "One gold piece." He curtly says, taking care to make eye contact before turning back to the other buyers.
Tsuto is quite surprised by the number of people swarming his stand, looking to purchase his glassware. He becomes too busy fielding offers for his work to really respond to Nicat's remark, as well-intentioned as it was.
As the party examines the man's glass wares, Nicat picks several of them up and starts juggling them. The vendor looks up and his eyes widen, his face paling. "Wha--?! No! No no no! Don't do that! They'll break and--" A crowd has now gathered around Nicat, watching his juggling act with great interest. They start cheering and tossing money.
Fulko's Perception Roll: Through the crowd, you can see Cyrdak the theatre owner walking around with a bag of what appears to be cookies. He seems to be eying the boulder-lifting competition with great interest, not paying you much attention.
Nicat's Knowledge Roll: "Yeah, yeah, hold on a minute, these things are very breakable!" The man says, walking through the curtain and setting a box down next to the counter.
You recognize the man as Tsuto Kaijitsu, Ameiko Kaijitsu's half-brother. He hasn't been seen in Sandpoint since his father all but disowned him; it's a touchy subject for both him and his half-sister. The Sandpoint Glassworks has long been the Kaijitsu family trade... perhaps this is a sign that things are starting to get better for him. "So, what are you interested in buying?" He curtly asks, setting out several glass figurines on the counter. Several of them are unmistakably Tian in design, with a couple of them resembling long, serpent-like creatures with exotic heads.
GM Rolls:
Nicat doesn't appear to have drawn attention upon himself. Nicat: Peeking underneath the curtain, you can see a man of mixed Tian & elven descent clad in a black vest, white shirt, green leggings & brown boots, with his brown hair tied back in a neat ponytail. He's busily looking through a box.
"Hmm... I hope none of these are broken..." After a bit, he nods and closes the box again, taking it in both hands and starting back towards the curtain. |