Lore of Leyuna RPG (FRPG)

[The Kingpin]

"It only gets crazier from here," responded Andruil with a smirk. If there was one thing he could be certain of, it was that.

A few moments of silence followed, his expression melting away to give way to a thoughtful, somewhat unsettled expression. Concerned, perhaps, was a better word. "Do you remember what you asked me when I got back from my mission a few weeks ago?" he asked, his tone even, betraying nothing of what he would say next, or why he was saying it.

[Hopeflower]

The innkeeper's green gaze sharpened attentively, searching Andruil's face for a reason he'd bring the topic up now before she replied. "Of course. Is everything alright?" Vix asked, both echoing the question he was referring to and wanting to know if he was okay.

[The Kingpin]

"Yes," responded Andruil, addressing both her concern and her answer. "I realised I never told you what actually happened during those few days I was gone. Why I seemed a bit... distracted, at first. The silence, the reflection. We have a couple of hours yet before we reach Brodudika's gates... So perhaps now is the best time to tell you everything," he stated. "That is, if you are still interested in learning of it," he added, meeting her gaze with his own, a barely perceptible smile on his face.

[Hopeflower]

"I'm here to listen if you want to talk," Vix replied. No hesitation, no questioning whether she really did want to know. Just the way she had of opening her arms and inviting people to trust her, even if it took time.

It would have made her a dangerous assassin, if she'd decided to formally join the guild.

[The Kingpin]

The Knight let out the faintest of sighs at that. "The mission itself was simple, straightforward and over within hours of my departure from Riverdale. It was simple; to check in on Brodudika and find out if there was any cause for concern. Our informants had told us it seemed he was building an army of elementals, and had recently recruited a psychomancer. I had to investigate to make sure our representatives were not being manipulated. The psychomancer in question turned out to be Viho. He was teaching there at a school Desrium had established," he explained.

[Hopeflower]

Vix stiffened in alarm, glancing at Arsenic. "And...was he manipulating anyone?" she asked, keeping her voice low. Suddenly Andruil being worried about what Arsenic would find in Brodudika made a lot more sense. Racism was a concern, certainly, but running into Viho...there was no telling how Arsenic would react to that. No telling what the repercussions would be if things went sideways.

[The Kingpin]

"No. He was... behaving himself, to the best of my knowledge. I warned Desrium to be wary of him... But Desrium believes that Viho's changed his ways, or at least, is seeking to. It is why he is there as a teacher of psychomancy. He seemed surprisingly... protective of his students when he saw me on my way to meet Desrium. More so than I have ever seen or heard of him behave towards his family. So perhaps... Perhaps he actually is seeking to turn a new page with someone he hasn't already hurt," responded the Knight, thoughtful. It was a strange thing, hindsight. He remembered being very reserved in his interactions with the psychomancer, very wary and alert. He remembered expecting to be attacked. He hadn't paid much attention to the purposes of the psychomancer's behaviour at the time, but now... It painted a new, more complex image of Viho...

[Hopeflower]

Vix wasn't one to deny a person a second chance, but she couldn't stop herself from reaching up to rub at the back of her head with her free hand. "Good for him, I suppose," she said, unable to disguise the note of uncertainty in her tone. "I can't imagine this is going to go well for him or us, though."

[The Kingpin]

"As far as I'm concerned, so long as we don't cross paths, I don't think it is something we should worry about. I don't intend to take us by the school, so with luck, we will avoid him entirely," responded Andruil simply. Viho was a sore topic for them all, and he did not like lingering on the matter. The less he did, the less likely he was to let it seep into Arsenic's currently pleasant mood.

"But returning to the matter at hand, the real reason I brought this up, is what happened after the mission itself ended. It involved a trip to the desert, and a conversation with the king of Silverlake. And," he added more enthusiastically, "What that conversation ended up bringing me to."

[Hopeflower]

"And that was?" Vix asked, letting the conversation flow away from Arsenic's father. Even as she did, part of her worried. Their friend was likely to notice a school that taught psychomancy while they were researching, and he was likely to learn that Viho was the one teaching the class. It was probably going to be a very ugly situation whether they kept this from Arsenic or not. She supposed they would just have to hope for the best - and brace to handle the worst case scenario if it came to pass.

[The Kingpin]

"A journey into the desert to meet an Elemental," said Andruil.

"An awful, hot, sandy journey into the desert," corrected Pyranex, more than a bit bitter at the memory.

"But one that earned you some very impressive effects," commented the Knight, smirking as the gryphon puffed up with pride.

"The Qa'id acknowledged my worth," answered Pyranex simply.

"As I was saying," said Andruil, trying not to derail their conversation further, "I met the Elemental and was given a Trial; a test of my fabric as a leader. But the things I saw in that trial...perhaps it is better if I described it to you," he said, a thoughtful hum escaping him as he tried to decide what he should and should not include.

"It was another life...What life I could have led, if things were a bit different. My father was dead, my brother was a 'traitor' to the Kingdom...The previous King of Valenhad had not died, and had different goals...His son was a warmonger...and you were a princess. Princess of an Adsila Kingdom that was still alive and well," he began.

[Hopeflower]

The revelation made Vix flinch, if only slightly. The life Andruil described could very well have been hers...if her father had been a different man. If humans had taken a different path. If, if, if. "This trial assumes much," she said softly. Maybe a little defensively, though it wasn't unjustified, given the long series of events that had brought them to this very moment.

[The Kingpin]

"It was an...imagined circumstance, yes," agreed the Knight. "But its purpose was best served by those circumstances. A test of morals, a test of character...a test of worthiness," he explained.

"In this trial I was watching the world turn on Valenhad. Your mother, in that trial, was ailing. Your father, preoccupied with her illness, and you scrambling to fulfil their duties in their stead. It drew Valenhad's attention. I knew that, if I did nothing, your kingdom, that is to say, the kingdom you ruled in the trial, was destined to fall. Riverdale's people wanted no part in it, nor did I. So we made a pact. I seceded from Valenhad, founded a new Irrydil Kingdom, and fought by your side. I saw Crestvale fall, fought Prince Sebastian...won. But the amount of death...the amount of needless death I saw there... People I swore to defend, people I fight and kill and bleed for...all gone," he trailed off. "It was a nightmare... unlike anything I have ever imagined. The battlefield had turned to red mud with the blood of the fallen...and in a way, I was the cause of it..."

[Hopeflower]

Vix searched for a response to that and found nothing. What could she say? That it didn't happen? Those people hadn't really died? Andruil spoke as though he'd been very convinced that it was real. In the end, instead of saying anything, Vix squeezed him gently, offering what little comfort she could.

[The Kingpin]

It was enough. The gesture was returned eagerly, the Knight remaining silent for a few minutes, enjoying the moment.

Eventually, he continued. "It was a trial to test if I was worthy of wielding a certain...artefact I needed to enable me to operate as I did in the event that..."

His trailing off was telling that it was another thought that was difficult to wade through. Still, he pushed through it anyway. "... In the event that they are killed, and I am required to take up their duties and role as head of the family. I have also earned the respect and support of the Desert tribes and the Thimeyran Elves. Should things ever grow so dire that I need it, I can rely on them to stand beside me," he concluded.

[C S]

Two hours later...

A cold fog sat over cold, unmoving waters. So thick it was from above that the trees that managed to reach over the mist appeared to be extending out from a void below. A wintery bog out there, many miles before the wrinkled earth that became Aster's eastern mountain ranges. A patch of land that was consumed by white and gray under blue skies. It looked like a place where sorrow was drawn. In a way, it was just that.

She must have already known what was coming by now.

Like before, he knew where she was long before the thumping of his wings reached her ears.

It was but a few minutes later when the denseness in the air started to swirl around her, billowing and then parting underneath the barrage of the charcoal dragon's outstretched wings. Pebbles and soil were blown away by the torrent, speeding past her figure, but she simply stood her ground and watched the shadow of the drake descend.

Morrelie was standing on a narrow, snaking path of dry land that dared to reach into the wide lakes in the swamp. Reeds stuck up through ice of varying thickness atop the surface of the marshwater, ice stained the colors of dirt and mud.

Jahkid landed partly in the water, smashing through the ice and then heaving as his mass settled. It caused a small quake to rock the surrounding naked trees. A resounding crunch and rustling was audible in their surroundings as snow cascaded from high branches to the underbrush.

"You are a troublesome one, aren't you?" Morrelie stated flatly to the dragon.

"And you, resilient," Jahkid replied with a growl that lifted his lips to reveal the arrangement of teeth that lined his snout.

Unimpressed, Morrelie responded, "For once, perhaps magic is not the easiest method of dealing with this problem. Maybe there is a reason why the stories of you creatures always end with swords."

Jahkid's eyeless visage loomed over the Interceptor, the dragon replying, "Humans in their normal state can destroy so much as is. You--"

The dragon stopped speaking when the mage's wand found its way into one of her hands. He felt a rush of energy from around the woman bound in her uniform, then witnessed a volatile stream of white and red emerge from the coils of the bony instrument. It wrapped itself into a fine point a few feet in length, like a rapier.

"Luckily, I have been known to make due in less than optimal circumstances." Morrelie raised her wand and turned over her wrist to point her immaterial sword to the dragon's neck.

And in the same moment, her chains blasted their way from beneath the water's surface. Jahkid was washed with a freezing spray that was nothing against his Hueilin skin, but he had a much more pronounced reaction when the ethereal bindings fell upon him and twisted around his form. His arms, legs, wings and neck were tangled in the magical, strength-sapping hex. What started as a roar to shake the hearts of man became a limp and pathetic groan. His limbs were pinned to his body by silvery light that morphed, producing barbs that stabbed into the drake every few seconds or so.

"Now make no mistake," Morrelie said as she walked up to the Shaman. She flicked her wrist downwards, and the chains tightened and forced the dragon closer to the ground so that he was just about lying in the mud. "I don't intend for you to escape this time."

Her mana blade hovered dangerously over Jahkid's scaled neck, strategically placed over a fold that was indicative of a major vein.

"Why did you not do this before?" Jahkid rumbled weakly.

Morrelie paused. She looked upon his static, metal face, found the brand she placed upon him, and the dragon could sense a sadistic joy emanating from the woman in purple.

"Because I wanted your suffering to be long, is all." In a mood, Morrelie pulled her wand away from Jahkid's neck and walked around his giant head to look him straight on. "I can crush you and your kind like gnats. Even the Stormweaver, with all of his trickeries of the mind and his imprisonment of the demonic, would bend and break before me."

Morrelie's magical aura became a torture to endure. Much like the chains digging into his body, Jahkid felt a stabbing pain every time her energies spiked to a worrisome height, corresponding to the emphasis in her boast. How much power could one person wield?

"So long as we are talking about suffering," Morrelie purred in the most patronizing way, leaning forward in a deep bow so that she could almost gaze upon her reflection in the Shaman's mask. "I knew this time would come, eventually. You've finally discovered the extent of what that mark means, yes?"

"No," Jahkid admitted with a tired grumble. "I came back for answers... and to see if I could not prevent my fate from befalling another."

"Ah!" Morrelie laughed. "Answers! Some things never change!" It was so amusing to hear that line from their first meeting again. "And furthermore, a dragon, acting so nobly and selflessly? My, very rarely do I actually feel my age. What ever happened to the days of dragons pillaging cities and raiding the coffers of entire kingdoms?"

Her laughter, bitter and spiteful, Jahkid listened to it all and waited. He had to conserve what little might he had left. This magic, it did not just weaken the body. It numbed the mind. It was a tool to break a spirit utterly. It was the thought, the sympathy for victims of this terrible spell that kept him clutching stubbornly at wakefulness. He had to outlast this horrible woman, or he would die.

This was what he knew long before he met her in this frozen floodplain. Jahkid did not attack her outright in the hopes that he would have been able to take her off-guard, but it was evident by now that his plan had failed.

His head lolled to one side when he detected a change in Morrelie's voice. No longer taunting. Or marginally less taunting. It was difficult to tell.

"I will humor you, drake. I will give you answers, but in exchange, your life is now forfeit." And that made Morrelie especially happy in a way that Jahkid was only about to find out.

"I have placed a burden of undeath upon you, if you can imagine such a thing, particularly now that you are a broken husk," the Interceptor explained in the most nonchalant way.

"Undeath?" Like how the Dark God ravaged Aster?

"When you die, your body will wander this land for an eternity, aimless, senseless, until you are otherwise disposed of past the limits of your body's integrity. You will be a testament to the power of Morrelie." She sensed Jahkid's repulsion, and continued in her taunting way:

"Remember when I said the only thing I would learn from you is how you're put together on the inside? Oh, I learned. I have to thank you for linking your mask to your very soul, you idiotic lizard!"

The Shaman felt a sickening pit in his stomach. He was defiled. He was shamed. To be branded on his most treasured possession was an injustice enough, to have his life essence marred by this woman's magic was enough to shun him into bleakness. He felt himself slipping into the darkness and as his consciousness neared that threshold, he wondered, was it worth it to resist?

"No other." Be they nakhriin and hulukhriin of kinds outside of the Hueilin, immortal or otherwise, no one else should suffer this woman's sick mind. For that alone, it was worth it, Jahkid decided.

"Now, I would learn how you are physically put together, but you wouldn't be much of a testament to myself if you were just--"

"Vile *****!" Jahkid boomed. Morrelie cried out against the volume of the voice, but she did not let her chains waver. There was no second chance, and no way was that going to work again.

But Morrelie underestimated the Shaman, for it was not just his roar she had to be concerned about. She felt the magic running to his mask, saw its golden light in the branded eye, and found herself flying backwards. In a fraction of a second, her legs had been caught in the mud, now hard as granite, and she was being dragged away at speed.

Morrelie slammed against the side of a tree, her head flying back into the bark. Her chains disbanded with a flash of light and a puff of smoke. She crumpled to her knees afterwards when the shackles around her legs broke apart and held herself up on all fours, wand half-pressed into the swamp, its collected magicks dispersed into harmlessness.

As for the dragon himself, he pulled himself from the marsh and struggled onwards after the mage yards away. His head was filled with a ripping pain and magic was not an option. He was too drained to fly. His only recourse, his best hope, was to crush the mage underneath his clawed hand and put an end to this madness.

It took a few moments for the hulking earth-mover to reach her, but Jahkid wasted no time in raising his hand, balling his fingers into a fist as he did, and bringing it down upon the Interceptor.

The swamp turned to mush underneath the blow. Handicapped as he was, a dragon's strength was more than enough to ruin many things. The impact sent mud and a surge of swampwater rippling outwards.

It should have been the end of that.

It wasn't.

The air itself around the mage had condensed and froze, thoroughly robbed of energy in the nick of time. The sky-blue ice of frozen atmosphere was further enhanced by the mind of the mage herself. A kinetic barrier that absorbed the shock and sent it elsewhere. Jahkid's knuckles braced against the dome, the dragon in a state of shock.

Morrelie stood up. She should have been flat on the ground, unconscious from the impact. Did her warped appearance speak to some higher tolerance of pain, or greater durability than a regular human mage, or was she truly so unhinged that such things had been redefined in her unyielding nature?

"Change of plans. Undeath is too good for you. I am going to rip your soul from your corpse when I am done with you, no games; and I am going to use it to power my wand for another eon," Morrelie conveyed, her black eyes as angry slits through the covers of fabric.

The malice inspired a miracle in the dragon's favor. He screamed with the onset of agony, but drew magic to his mask and slammed his claws upon the mage's shield. It was not to break the thing.

Rather, Jahkid sent Morrelie down.

How far into the underground she went was something he could not control, gone was his finesse over terramancy. He just needed her far away.

Far enough for him to make an escape.

Jahkid turned away from the hole in front of the marsh-tree, and crawled, once more on the verge of death. But she had to be stopped, this Morrelie from parts unknown.

The places where her chains had pulled on the Shaman would scar. He would look as worn as dragons thousands of years his senior. Until then, his armored back and soft underbelly were raw with cuts, pink and bleeding.

The light was pale, deep down in the realm of stone. It was the inverse of what Jahkid had seen, flying over the swamp. The rough, sharp walls that were the walls of this drop appeared to disappear into nonexistence towards the irregular hole at the very top. A blank, pale screen. A portal, past which was the world where her true enemy lurked.

Morrelie was standing in her pit, surrounded by ice that slowly dissolved into vaporous streams around her. Her eyes were staring upwards through the tunnel.

"What a puzzlement," she said to herself. To kill the dragon before or after the Blood Omen was slain? What a decision to make. In her mind, regardless of what she chose, the Hueilin's fate was already sealed. His life was already in her hands. As these things went, it was only a matter of time until she squeezed her fingers tight and smothered the light of his soul out.

"What a puzzlement," she repeated. This time, as a comment on the dragon's predicament. "If this was supposed to kill me, then you are in for quite a disappointment."

It was a telekinetic cocoon that had prevented her collision with the tree from imparting its full damage upon her. After being thrown into rock more than a month before, she was not going to have that happen again, either. The same cocoon was around her as she was banished to the underground, primed to turn into a full blown shield had the dragon attempted to use his mastery over the earth to pulverize her.

"What. A. Puzzlement,"

An imperceptible change overcame the mage. She jumped, and soared, lighter than a feather. Her shoes found the wall and pushed off of the stone, alternating back and forth as she wound her way about the tunnel.

"to think that this would slow me down in the slightest."

[The Kingpin]

Elsewhere far to the West, two worn warriors could be seen dining at a restaurant in Niyera. The establishment was not what one would call high class, but it was a respectable place nonetheless. Iron-wrought, vinework railings wrapped around the porch leading into the restaurant, and the doors were made of sturdy oakwood. The inside was another matter. The chatter of dozens of customers drowned out individual conversations, and it was difficult for one to identify specific individuals among the masses. By the bar counter, a rather burly man could be seen churning out drinks with an efficiency only rivalled by that of those drinking; fifteen very loud, very excited dwarves. As it turned out, the bartender himself seemed at least part-dwarf, having a shorter than average stature for his otherwise imposing physique. From what Matthias could gather, he had recently come into ownership of the place, and they were relatives --Brothers? Cousins? It was difficult to say--, here to celebrate his good fortune and success the only way dwarves knew how; by drinking themselves senseless.

Several elves in what could only have been uniforms served as the waiters of the establishment, going to and from the kitchen with trays of food that seemed to disappear as fast as they were being produced. To one end of the restaurant, there was a stage, with an elvish ensemble performing on drums, lutes and pan-flutes to an energetic and cheerful beat. It was almost jarring to see the contrast between the staff and the people they served; an odd clash of elegance and crudeness.

It was why Matthias had chosen the place. Given his inescapably grizzled appearance, he found out fairly quickly that he stood out among much of the deceptively clean and well groomed populace. Even tidied up as he had made sure to be, there was only so much one could do for a face carved by the chisel of hardship. And then there was the issue of trying to keep his face concealed; he was Elias's twin, after all. A wide brimmed hat and a sash serving as an eyepatch obscured his features considerably, but it was still somewhat difficult to make sure he was completely unrecognisable.

Still, he had managed to pull it off, and now, at noon, he was able to dine somewhere that wasn't a filthy tumbledown tavern in the slums; A rare luxury for the Forgotten Wanderer.

[C S]

Though he wasn't quite forgotten in his present company. In a twist all of its own, said company was going by a name completely unfamiliar. Urlox, or Thimeas was neither in this instance, wearing a black tricorn hat with a red lining and a black blouse shirt with a puffy collar and sleeves. His name, one of several aliases donned and discarded over the weeks, was Sparrow, and his beard had been braided in an elvish style so that ropes of red hair were looped on themselves underneath his chin, decorated with multicolored beads.

No matter what name he bore, Urlox was always Urlox. His eyes drifted from and to the canvas screens that were behind the players on the stage, which had been painted with a fine style reminiscent of calligraphy to invoke images of tall grass and taller trees on open plains. Colored lights, be they magic or special candles, lit up the screens in time with the music, a treat for the eyes and ears.

The other object of his interest was the bartender. There was something about the way he was put together that seemed a bit... personal. From his hair to his frame, the man could have easily been a distant cousin of the guard captain. Only a cousin, though, for anyone more closely related to him would have surely shared his height and girth. Still, seeing as this region of Aster was where most of the first Daavenians owe their family roots to...

"I think the drink-fixer over there and I share some blood, Morgan, heh," grunted Urlox.

[The Kingpin]

"You n' fifteen others," grunted the elf with a nod in the direction of the bar as he cut into a slice of venison. It was a relatively mundane dish, but one that, in typically elvish style, had been made up to be something very ornate and in this case, pointlessly fancy. Mint sauce, carrots cut to resemble flowers, a drizzle of some mysterious brown sauce criss-crossing over the dish, and of course, mashed potatoes mixed with what must've been at least seven other vegetables. Despite the clientele, the restaurant owner was trying very hard to raise the standards of this place to something resembling high class dining.

[C S]

"Aye. I feel kind of bad, missing out on the reunion," Urlox replied. His hand found his throat, as it often did, and he stroked some invisible scar ponderously for a moment before he decided he was better off following in Matthias' example. His meal was a kind of seafood, breaded and fried. What it used to be was something unrecognizable. A generous helping of the long morsels were lined up on a plate and he had a special bowl filled with a lemony sauce to help himself to.

Urlox broke one of the fried fish in two, flakes falling onto the others, and then dunked one of the halves into the sauce before chomping down on it. It made a satisfying crunch, and tasted vaguely of coconut to the Daavenian. Coconut wasn't something Daavenians knew from back home; Urlox became acquainted with the taste from his time in Niyera. An import from elsewhere in the kingdom, like the fish itself, he supposed.