Lore of Leyuna RPG (FRPG)

[C S]

Natalie felt the slightest twinge of distrust hearing those words. Jesse was not nearly so open or amicable, and she'd led her on with the illusion of kinship. The dress she wore even now was a gift given to uphold a lie. Now that the bitter truth was out, Vix seemed like the next step: making that truth easier to cope with. Give her a reason to continue docilely and carry out her part without incident. Where Natalie was at, the innkeeper simply seemed too good to be true. It would have been a testament to how cold these personalities she was surrounded by were... if she didn't know that Johnathon had only met her today.

Natalie supposed this was what a blessing was. It tore her apart, as she felt she did not deserve it. She let her head bow and took Vix's hand in hers, holding it close to her chest as the only means to show her gratitude now that she found herself unable to speak. "I promise to not waste this," she pledged.

Johnathon hummed and turned his eyes away as well. True to his word, he kept what Vix told him in mind. Madness. Natalie felt like she was going mad. He was concerned about her relapsing a second time and returning to madness. He was at risk of going mad. Would he be his own worst case? Or would he be someone else's if he did leave the realm of the law behind him after all of this?

Pick themselves up and recover, she'd said. Go on to do great things...



Dahnae was off again, her hand rapidly taking the place of the paw along with the mitten to cover it. She sprinted down the hall, even though she probably wasn't supposed to, and hooked the turn around the corner, where the stairs were. She jumped onto the railing and ran down a length of it before dropping onto a step without breaking stride, running down the rest of the stairs uninterrupted. Until she was interrupted at the lobby level of the building, at which point she tucked into herself and fell flat onto her back, sliding between the legs of the obstacle in the shape of a person.

Dahnae was back on her feet and out the door by time they turned around, leaving the poor person with a moment in time and nothing else to make sense of it.

[The Kingpin]

Andruil observed the interactions in the calm classroom with sharp ears and a sharper gaze. It was an unsettling reminder of days he'd hoped were behind him. Days of wavering trust, stolen peace and an uncertain future. Those days had threatened to bring down an entire kingdom, while this day existed in a time and place where one had already fallen, and a city state had risen in its place. The age of a settlement seemed to be irrelevant to the problems it stood to face. It was a curious contrast, between the coup and subsequent civil war that gripped a Valenhad at risk of falling apart, and the raids of a rampant band of lunatics in a budding Brodudika that stood tall under a banner they sought to symbolise their unity in the face of any threat, without or within. Nevertheless, the general feel of anxiety in the room, and the efforts made to dispel it, to offer comfort and restore faith, were the same. Choosing not to step into it this time, he rested where his legs had brought him, on one of the desks, sipping his tea. Luke warm. Nearly empty.



Far from the troubled rooms of a school in a fallen realm, the Scholar stood in meditation. He had reassumed his draconic form atop one of the more sizeable buildings in the city, seemingly looking out across what could, from this angle, have been described as a labyrinth of narrow hallways weaving amidst tall square buildings.

He saw nothing, however. The Son of Storms saw through sight beyond sight. His eyes, much like all his other senses, had been drawn to parts unknown through the power of the Eye. He found himself reaching across a void to a dragon he had not spoken to for some time.

"Hulukhriin...May I speak with you?"



Ceridwen, meanwhile, sat in an alleyway near the stable, preening her feathers quietly as she rested beside the Mage. Relief had washed over her once she woke enough to see that the Scholar had returned. It was little surprise that now, even as he communed with the Onokruun dragon she had never met, she found it in her to twitter a tune while she preened her plumage.

[C S]

"nakhriin," the Shaman greeted the Scholar.

Huge bubbles rose sluggishly in the water past his scarred snout.

"You are well."

The bubbles popped, throwing viscous swamp-slime about and sending ripples underneath the icy surface. Loose flakes bobbed as the small waves went their course.

"Is there any news to be had of Chassan?"

The swampwater flowed away from the center of the marsh pool. It gathered in a ring as an earthen mound was willed to rise, atop of which fish flopped about. The healing drake trundled forwards through the resulting moat and then into the mud, gathering up the small morsels that came in such plentiful supply with his snapping jaws. He owed that bearded human a token of thanks, wherever the man was now.



Syria idly turned her ball of ice in her palm. Magic kept it as ice, naturally. A small exercise in elemental magic, a school of magic she was never talented in, but the meaning of the object in question meant there was no exceptions in preserving it. The mage could still see Beshayir's wide, impressed eyes from when she was shown the simple marble of frozen water, the dust inside scattered yet held in a curious pattern.

"Am I too young to be feeling these mothers' blues, Ceridwen?" asked the redhead, breaking a prolonged silence.

[The Kingpin]

"None, I fear." It was a disappointed statement if ever there was one. He had grown since they last spoken, but it seemed that so too had the gap between himself and the exiles he was tasked with bringing back.

Lightening up, he continued, "But yes, I am well. I pray that you are likewise."




Ceridwen paused in her singing and her preening briefly, her head tilting towards Syria, curious. "About a hundred and forty years too young," she stated simply. After all, that was around the time Hueilin females had their first young. Oh. Hueilin young. "Well, if you were one of us, at least. I can't speak for human feelings," she added, feeling the urge to disclaim the potential misunderstanding.

[C S]

"I am alive," Jahkid replied. He was already done eating, and the mound he stood upon was being relinquished to the swamp. The dragon rapidly sank into rolling water that reached up to his elbows in depth. The fish never lasted long, and hunger's pang had become a familiar companion to the Shaman by now. To overconsume the swamp's bounty was something that was out of the question for the shamanistic drake. "That is good enough." Until he was well enough to hunt again, and regain his strength and energy. Only then could he confront his malady, and then the one who placed it upon him.


Syria chuckled quietly and said, "That's fine. With magic in my veins as it is, I will live to be so old. Not that I will be having children when I do reach that age. Not that I can with Septimus as my husband." She took her eyes off of the ice and pursed her lips. What a tangent this was.

[The Kingpin]

"I see," responded the Son of Storms, sensing something was amiss. "What transpired since we last spoke to inflict this upon you? I sense you're not quite what you once were," he explained, giving voice to his thoughts.


"Doesn't it bother you?" broached Ceridwen. It was a thought that had bothered her for a while. To be of a race to which young meant the world, the thought of being unable to bear them was a frightening prospect. Indeed, it was yet another reason why Arashi and Tanwen had been thought damned long before word of Arashi's curse came to light.

[C S]

"Is it really so obvious, nakhriin?" Jahkid turned about on himself, then eased into the water for rest. His nostrils were comfortably above the waterline, puffing vapor into the cold air. A rumbling conveyed across the distance between dragons, and the Shaman continued. "In my search to extend knowledge of magic's craft across cultures, in every nook and cranny that I can find it, I found something else. A human with a longevity, and a command of mana, so as to walk amongst one of us as dragons. In her small body is a reservoir of wrath deep as any ocean, and I have been subjected to it."


"It took some getting used to on my own terms before it ever came up in discussion with Septimus," Syria admitted. "Moments of introspection that would err towards prospects of the future. I never knew my own mother. All I have of her are stories that Willow told me. They were friends when my mother met my father, though she was getting along in age even back then." Syria stumbled over her words after uttering that sentence. Heavens above can only help her should she ever insinuate that Willow was old. Calling her "grandma" was fine but anything else would split the mountains and boil the seas.

"Uh. Anyway. I used to wonder about... well... birth. The act, and the bond of mother and child. The thing my mother was looking forward to until..." Syria swallowed, and moved on. "Time went on, as it does. And then I found out about my father's involvement with the thunderbird. And then I found out that I am a conduit of it. So as of late, I am at peace with not having children of my own. Beshayir is sweet, and I would like to help her heal her pain when she's ready. Quite frankly, the magic I carry in me does not seem to take passing through generations... well, either."

[The Kingpin]

The Scholar's blood ran cold in that moment. "Morrelie," he responded, knowing immediately of whom the Onokruun drake spoke. "I have met the one of whom you speak. She is foe to many in this land. A foe to me, and to many whom I call friend. My father has sought to eliminate her, though has stated that it must be done indirectly. She is dangerously powerful, and a talented Peredomancer."



"Ah," responded Ceridwen, thoughtful on that explanation. "I suppose races don't all handle mana the way my kind does," she mused. "Usually among Hueilin, if magic is going to complicate anything, it'll complicate the conditions of the young, not the parents."

[C S]

"Like a whelp tempted by the novel and mysterious, I have blundered, and I have paid dearly for it," Jahkid replied. "Peredomancy is a magic that is unknown to me. It is a deadly art, and one that excels in... torture. My impression is that it was developed as a means to combat monstrous entities that mortal blades cannot defeat, but this Morrelie uses it as a versatile, sadistic tool. I bear a mark that means to animate my emaciated body after my soul has left it. It may not be the limit of her ability, either."



"It is fascinating. I wish there was more recorded of it, but the magic in me is something that the likes of the Life Bringer has only seen so many times."

Syria cupped the ice in her hands. She directed her ability to block the heat of her palms from melting it.

"While you were singing that lovely song of yours the other day, Septimus and I spoke to her. She said that some elementals of a certain kind impart gifts onto those that have proven favorable to them. Not like herself, she was very adamant to point out. Her interest is rewarding the worthy to maintain strength of leadership of the desert peoples. She doesn't know why others do what they do. I can only speculate that the thunderbird wanted my father to oversee Daaven's formation to its end in his lifetime. I don't think it is a coincidence that the only Daavenian to learn magic -- to teach herself magic -- bears the power as well."

She closed her eyes.

"My mind hasn't been in the right place in recent times, but I do take the moments of quiet to think, and hypothesize. It could be that when elementals transcribe their mana into other beings, those of flesh and blood in particular, it changes them on a baser level. Morrelie was a human, once. After being exposed to a mana well being destabilized, she looks anything but human. Maybe the same principle is at work when elementals choose their... thanes, let's say. The result could mean unviable copulations and dubious offspring."

Of which, she counted herself, in the most scientific way possible. Sylias didn't know what she did. He had no clue. The tragedy of her birth wasn't something worsened or relieved when she thought about mana's behavior in the world. She could only be grateful for being born at all, without all kinds of unfortunate defects that some children untouched by magic suffered.

"Perhaps the men of my generation were saved some manner of heartbreak by my bookish nature, shy tendencies and more discerning tastes," Syria joked, smirking as she opened her eyes again. "On the off chance that I am not completely human, I mean. Or maybe it explains the lack of attention I used to know before I met our dear Scholar..."

[The Kingpin]

"So a necromancer and peredomancer both..." trailed off the Scholar, struck by the morbid implications. Why get new recruits or call for aid against Desrium when she could simply resurrect her fallen comrades and keep them fighting indefinitely?


"He is a strange and peculiar one, I will agree," chirped Ceridwen as she resumed her preening.

[C S]

"Give thanks for your blessings, nakhriin; to stand before a foe like this and be well enough to have this conversation is a humbling experience."

Jahkid's sympathies went out to the young drake. The Scholar and all he held dear were possible targets in this rogue mage's crusade, spared solely by her way of prioritizing her efforts. Once her primary goal was attained, Jahkid could see her plotting to end the Stormweaver next, and any other below him until Septimus himself was in her sights, and then any under him. Should at any point Morrelie feel especially vindictive, any one of these potential victims could be her monuments in death.

Jahkid dug his claws into the earth that granted him his greatest strength, as if pleading for an expedited recovery. His resolve was strengthened knowing others opposed this terror on two legs, and he cursed his present weakness.




Syria hummed wistfully. "It can be argued that I have a weakness for both the strange and the peculiar."

[The Kingpin]

Almost as if sensing the Terramancer's thoughts, Septimus shifted to thoughts of the Stormweaver. "My father has crossed paths with her. He's managed to delay her for now, apparently by using her own ego against her. She currently is seeking out a demonic cult. He intends to strike both her and them down once their conflict whittles them down. Or if nothing else, weaken her further so that she may be thoroughly destroyed through the combined might of our allies," he explained.

"But that is not why we speak. This matter is something more...personal. And something for which you may be our only hope."



"You may be extraordinary, but you're definitely human. I think I'd be able to tell if you weren't," chirped the dragoness matter of factly, pressing her snout into her chest plumage with a series of rapid snapping sounds, third eyelids sweeping up over her eyes as she tended to her feathers.

[C S]

The masked dragon tempered his drive to act and pulled his claws from the dirt, letting out a ragged sigh. "What twist of fate would have you looking to a shamed Shaman as your last resort?" he asked, and the full weight of how beaten he was descended on the Scholar. Beaten, tired, yet unfaltering.



"Think about it, though. You've heard of the Vanguardian in Brodudika who calls herself 'Lady of Light'? She's human as well, but also not," retorted Syria. "The matter may be more complex than the two of us realize." And just like that, Syria's blues were dissipating like a cloudy dawn. Her magic worked to preserve the ball of ice, and her interests in the mystical overtook the sadness in her heart.

[The Kingpin]

It was the Scholar's turn to sigh. There was no sugar-coating it, he supposed. "How familiar are you with the story of Elwen of Clan Onokruun?" he asked briefly. It was more rhetorical than anything. She was the black sheep of Onokruun, said to have been a prodigy at one time, now reduced to a disillusioned, arguably insane dragoness who had practically drooped and decayed until she looked and acted like a dragon a thousand times her own age.



"I met her once," responded Ceridwen thoughtfully, recalling the memory of that day through the seventh floor window of Septimus Place. "Evisa Canton, of Vanguard," she twittered, echoing the Lady of Light's introduction. "She barely even looks human to me, though. She has the shape of one, but she glows, and she turns hot when she gets annoyed...You just...worry and overthink things."

[C S]

"The Matriarch of Maldevians," conveyed Jahkid. "What can my command of the earth do for her?"


Syria turned her head and arched a brow at Ceridwen, amused with a fraction of confusion and disbelief. "Oi. Septimus is the overthinker."

Always so quick to try to put things together. Not everything's a riddle, Seppy, she had told the dragon once.

It was notwithstanding happenstance that just so had him be correct about her connection to the mountaintop elemental. "I'm just saying that there's something out there that we don't fully understand yet. Such as how a so-called regular human can have elemental powers and perform very superhuman feats, and how a regular human can channel a spectral manifestation of a mythical force of nature when she's... upset."

[The Kingpin]

"It is less your command of Terramancy that she needs and more your command of the Onokruun Mask Arts. We have learned that her...condition was the result of a curse. But the magic is bound to the mask and is too intricate for a non-Onokruun dragon to unravel," explained the Scholar, relaying the information he had been given by his father, thoughts rather than words having been passed along to hasten matters.



"Implying that you're any different from him," jabbed Ceridwen, her neck craning until her beak was almost close enough to press against the mage's nose. "You're two sides of the same leaf." It was something that aggravated her, frankly. It was hard for her to see the justification of such insatiable curiosity. Granted, had she not been the same, in regards to everything human? She supposed, in a way, that she was as aggravating as either of them.

[C S]

"A favor for a favor. A coin for a trinket, and a trinket for a coin." Jahkid grumbled. Indifference or indebted to uphold leverage over a lord. He could not claim to be any more righteous. He'd swooped in on a lonely soldier to make the most of the opportunity her possession of a blighted amulet presented. At the time, the contempt of a human was worthless to him as long as he got what he was after.

Things had changed. Perhaps this Morrelie, in her own way, was a force of balance, a means to reshape and regain perspective. For this, Jahkid communicated to Septimus, "I need no trinkets, and I need no coins. I will put my claws to use tearing apart this paltry curse, and in doing so, cure my ailments as well."



"Has Septimus ever mentioned what we've discovered about staves and their effects on Hueilin?" Syria replied sweetly, and then leaned in the rest of the way to press her nose against the tip of Ceridwen's beak. What existed inside the dragon's mouth was something to give even the most hardened men a moment of fright, but the same was true of the Scholar's own jaws. Syria had grown accustomed to them both.

[The Kingpin]

"Thank you, hulukhriin. But be careful. The Artificer himself was the one to create the curse to cripple her. I don't think I need to stress how complex a curse made by one of the most talented Onokruun in Drakhunmiir could be." There was an anxious tone in the Scholar's words, clearly concerned for the safety of the elder dragoness.



"No, he hasn't," reacted Ceridwen, her head tilting in a distinctively avian way, her feather crests fluffing ever so slightly as a result. "I suppose it's not that far fetched to believe they would...The Onokruun dragons make masks with roughly the same idea in mind," she added, intrigued and a bit bewildered at the same time, having never really drawn the connection. Was she even right in saying they were similar? It was something she had never actually thought about.

[C S]

That was grounds for the Shaman to chuckle. "The one who has sent me on my journey to discover all the applications of magic across Aster for the betterment of Onokruun's craft. He will not be pleased with what I have learned, and what I already know, nakhriin. I do not care."


Syria said nothing, though she did appreciate the factoid. It did shed a little more light on the encounter with the masked dragon in the Wispwood, the one that emerged from the ground in a way that was distinctly un-dragon-like in the mage's mind. However, that was something to ponder another time. Her staff, obeying her silent call, shot out of the satchel and flipped end over end to shut the bag. It then twirled through the air to Syria, coming to an abrupt stop a few feet away from her and Ceridwen.

Syria looked to it, then to the Maelgwynni dragon, and smiled.

The staff then ensued to poke the flower-gem against the underside of Ceridwen's jaw.

[The Kingpin]

"I see," responded the Scholar with a sigh of what could have been relief. "It is for that reason that we have not succeeded in finding another to help us. Many fear the wrath of Dyrineyr, or seek favours in exchange for their help, as you said."


A complaining twitter escaped the dragoness as her neck craned, her head pulled back so it folded again over the neck, sheltering her throat from the staff's gem which, even now, disappeared in the fluff of her chest.