While all of that has been going on, Master Quo has gotten the rescued children calmed down, and settled in for the rest of the night with a promise to return them to their families in the morning.
Search Posts
Master Quo rounds up the children and gets them into another part of the house, preferably one that wasn't filling up with dragon vomit.
The old man chuckled. "Well, I for one am glad you gave her that gadget. And I bet Ryo is too. It sure beats how she used to do complicated calculations. I still don't know where she was getting all that chalk, but you should have seen Master Kwang the time she covered an entire side of the pyramid in equations. Thought he was gonna burst a blood vessel."
"Well, I'd suggest picking some things from the garden for dinner. With Aananda and Ryleh back we'll need enough to feed at least a medium size army." ;)
"There are some complications to all of that. Mostly involving Aananda's brother, Chan. He's pretty much as evil as evil gets. So watch your back. He has a nasty habit of doing unpleasant things to the people around her. The rest of that story isn't mine to tell, but I figure you deserve fair warning."
"Got it, nix the expectations. I'll remmber that" Kar says, taking his seat once again. "So, if you don't mind me asking, what's up with this group? I feel like there's a big backstory to this assortment." "The quick summary? When Aananda was a baby her mother left her at the Temple in order to protect her from enemies that were trying to kill her entire bloodline. And boy was she a handful. There was a bit of a misunderstanding a while back and she got sent away. At some point in that process she ended up working with Tam and Ryo, fell in love with Tam, and adopted Ryo as a brother. Now before he met those two, Ryo already had this place and was looking after Ormarr and Adsila. And then the three of them met Razzule and he got added into this crazy group too. So then they went looking for Aananda's mom and found me instead. And then found Ryleh too. And we all ended up back here."
Kar smiles, "So, Ryleh, Ormarr and Razzule." Kar laughs, "At least now I know what to expect." He says, getting up to shake the old man's hand. The old man's grip was surprisingly firm. Kar has the impression that Quo is much stronger than his frail appearance would suggest. "Well, I doubt that. I find that expectations are just so much excess baggage. It's better to travel light. Especially around this group."
Kar gets a bewildered look on his face, "Yes, I do enjoy the company here." He says, "Exactly how many other people are here that I have yet to meet?" "Well I don't know who you have and haven't met, sonny, but staying here now there's Ryo, of course, it being his house, and Ormarr, Adsila, and Razzule. And then there's Ryleh, Aananda's mother. And me. And Aananda and Tam. That's everyone I know about. It's nice of Ryo to let us all stay at his house. I have to say, it's much nicer than the hut I was living in after the Temple was captured."
An old man wearing loose robes wanders into the room. "Ah. I see I was not hearing things after all. Welcome back.." he does a double take when he sees Tam, "from your obviously very eventful trip." "And a newcomer. Pleased to meet you, boyo. I'm Quo, formerly of the Temple of Falling Water. Unfortunately the Temple has become a rather hostile environment of late so here I am. You must have just gotten here. I know you weren't here when I went for my afternoon na- er, meditation. Hope these young whippersnappers have been making you feel welcome."
The old man chuckled. "Have fun. Good luck. I'll try and keep an eye on things here while you're gone."
"Perhaps you are relying too much on what you see with your eyes. Perhaps that is why you are missing something. Or perhaps I'm just a crazy old man who likes spouting wise-sounding nonsense," he added with a chuckle.
"Well. That was exciting. I am wishing that I had brought a change of robes however," he said dryly.
"Well, since we're out of immediate danger, and it has become a matter of some urgency, I'll transfer some of her wounds to me. Hopefully that will heal her enough to allow her to travel under her own steam as it were." He concentrated on Ryleh and wounds began to appear on his body as they closed on hers. Eventually he stopped grimacing with pain. "That's the best I can do."
"Speaking of...how long does this transformation spell last? It will take several hours journey to reach the spot we saw on the map."
Master Quo is able to knock one of the imps off the skimmer, but three more latch on to the space it left.
"He didn't notice when Ryo used his cards before. Or when we've been using our powers to dig out these tunnels. Of course we weren't this close to his base before either..."
"Hmmm. I can transfer some of her wounds to myself. It's not a technique the girl knows, nor is it one she should be using now even if she did know it. But that's the best I can do."
"I don't think the boy much cares about mundane supplies, if he even remembers these exist. He never paid much attention to lessons, skipped them whenever he could. Should have kept a better eye on him back then." He shook his head. "No use crying over spilled rice. Let's get this thing started."
"Some minor injury to the armadillo," Master Quo corrected. "But luckily nothing serious. Let's get this thing working. I bet she'll wake up as soon as she smells food."
Master Quo chuckled. "I always wondered where we were getting all that rice." "It's an everproducing rice mortar, boyo. I bet it was here so the rest of us wouldn't notice. The council had very definite views on using magic as a crutch." He chuckled some more and shook his head. "Well, how else could we feed growing dragons?" he said with a wink.
"Huh." Master Quo scratched his head. "I was sure this was the right one."
Quo stopped to consider. "Well, either you're right or he's toying with us. But he hasn't noticed us using psionic powers either. Maybe his detection is only good against standard arcane or divine magic. It's worth the risk at this point."
"Well, sounds like you and the girl have a lot in common then. That's good. She's always had a difficult time fitting in with her peers. I used to worry about that. Should have worried more about the other one I guess." "We should go right here," he said as they came to another place where the tunnel branched. They continued down the tunnel for quite a ways before Master Quo stopped and looked up. "I'm pretty sure this is the right place. Time to dig."
Master Quo smiles and leads the way towards the food storage once more. "So, how did you end up traveling with Aananda?"
Master Quo was able to use his abilities to halt the movement of the armadillo soon enough to keep it from actually crushing Ryo.
Master Quo stops and listens to the snuffling sound as it gets closer. An shape the size of an elephant can be seen in the tunnel ahead moving closer. "Yep, that's an armadillo alright. Hopefully it will just pass by and leave us alone," he whispered.
"It's not something I'm accustomed to observing. At the temple we were taught to set aside all attachments. The only times I went among the villagers was to battle bandits or marauding animals. Not a lot of time to observe what their lives were like. I've had time these last two years as I sat in the village there, but two years compared to eighty...it's not much." "Now, I'm pretty sure that we go this way," he said, pointing to the left and heading off into the tunnel.
"Well, keep a sharp eye out. We'll be back soon. I hope. I haven't got the girl's direction sense. But I'm pretty sure I know where I'm going. Mostly." "Keep up, boyo. And watch out for wildlife. The armadillos can be a bit tetchy."
Master Quo raised an eyebrow. "Well, as long as the boy doesn't mind...this isn't one of those things where you're seeing the future is it?"
"Well, that was bound to happen. So who wants to go searching for the next storehouse with me while the girl gets a nap? I'm pretty sure we're near more food and we all know she does better after she's eaten enough for a small army."
Master Quo nodded. "Seems like as good a place as any to camp for the night."
Master Quo chuckled. "Never try to reason with a pregnant woman, boyo. They aren't right in the head. What? You think I didn't know. Nothing wrong with my ears, even if I am old."
"Dunno. Can't read 'em. Old eyes ain't what they used to be. But if they are you're looking for the year of the wombat....or was that the fruit bat? The house cat? Well, it's something that ends in at. Sonny, at my age, you're lucky if you can remember the right decade."
"Well, guess they aren't alphabetical. Maybe they're arranged by year...."
"Oh, sure. Master Bim was meticulous about it....too bad he never shared his system with anyone else. Just looks like random piles to me."
Master Quo shrugged. "Life is hard, child. Not every story is a happy one."
"Yeah... luckily rice gets bigger when is absorbs water... Still might not be enough. Is Aananda's appetite the reason some of those storehouses were empty? I can imagine her eating that much easily, and so can my kitchen 'staff' for that matter." He chuckled. "Well, we never really had much extra to store after Aananda and Chan showed up on our doorstep. Makes more sense now that I know that they're dragons."
"I'm still not sure we brought enough...."
Master Quo sketches out a quick map in the dirt showing the locations of all the storehouses. He's a little vague about what was stored where, but there were supposed to be some that had food or medicine or belongings. It was common for small children to be left on the temple's doorstep and it seemed disrespectful to throw away what little they brought with them, so one of the monks would put it in a bundle with the child's name on it and send it to the storehouse. The ones whose locations he was quite sure of contained parts and fuel for various mechanical contraptions.
"Eh? Of course. They were left in a basket and everything. There was even a note with their names on it. It's all there in the storehouse."
Master Quo sketches out a quick map in the dirt showing the locations of all the storehouses. He's a little vague about what was stored where, but there were supposed to be some that had food or medicine or belongings. It was common for small children to be left on the temple's doorstep and it seemed disrespectful to throw away what little they brought with them, so one of the monks would put it in a bundle with the child's name on it and send it to the storehouse. The ones whose locations he was quite sure of contained parts and fuel for various mechanical contraptions.
"You did well for your first lesson, boyo," the old man said, grinning as he heartily clapped Ryo on his sore shoulder...which suddenly hurt less.
The old man chuckles. "Oh, she was always a terror. She scared the piss out of most of the other monks. Powerful, dedicated, determined, and better at fighting than they were. They did their level best to make her doubt herself, and it worked for a while." "I always expected great things from her." "Woohoo! Good job kiddo!" he called out as Ryo managed to stand against the onslaught of rocks.
"Hmmmm...some of it might make good eating....of course that's if it doesn't kill you...ah, well, life's full of little surprises." ;)
"Huh. Guess we shoulda done a little more maintenance over the years."
The door creaks open revealing a small, dark space full of spiderwebs. "Looks pretty undisturbed to me. Anybody got a torch? The girl may be able to see in the dark, but I sure can't. I'd hate to fall down the stairs and break a leg. Can't very well fight if we get defeated by stairs before we even get there."
"It's an old storehouse. We've never actually used it. Another of those little quirks. There's dozens of them throughout the jungle."
"spoilsport."
"Ha! Mental! I like it." "Oh, and that's a good trick, boyo, but we should move now. Magic and all that. I know just the place." Without moving he knocks Tam over using telekinesis.
"What?" he said, as innocently as he could manage to Aananda's exasperated expression. "They started it."
"Don't be so quick to judge Master Quo, considering we wouldn't even know about the dragon without magic. If Ruji wasn't so good communicating with illusions, I might have forgotten about it, what with a fiery troll leaping at me witht he intent to eat." Master Quo cackled. "Oh, you should see the look on your face. So serious. You young people are always so earnest. Lighten up a little. You'll live longer," he added, eyes twinkling with amusement.
|