At one of the squares of Foghaunt...If the suspicion that he was going to die was only a very real possibility up until this point, the latest announcement had turned it into a dreadful certainty. There it was, plain as day. They were going off to hunt dragons. And whatever that old bastard who made them extinct the first time had, they most certainly did not. Pilk was up shit creek, and the paddle had just been devoured by a ravenous sea serpent that thrived on the souls of the drowned. With his luck, there probably was one of those in the Phibe.
"Very well. If there is anything particularly well suited to dealing with dragons before we set off, shall we acquire it?"Perhaps a powerful diuretic to coat their armor in to have some chance of giving a dragon some trouble, Pilk almost said. He was held back primarily by the frightening thought that one of the kingspawn might have gone for it, as evidenced by the way their own little prince turned to seek advice from his ever so trusty gang of guards.
"So, I don't suppose any of you have fought one of the lizards before? I think it would be good to find some kind of survivors of their attacks, that way we can get a better idea of how to fight them, where to set traps and such," "Sir, nobody's fought dragons for generations. They were supposed to be hunted to extinction," Kerrh started off in his typical manner.
"Yeah, old Heer Fogeye shot them all down. They never saw it coming, the stupid lizards," Poike added, and Pilk had a thought.
"Maybe they just hid very carefully until now? Biding their time, planning their return. Maybe they were smarter than we thought," he said more to himself than the others. They seemed to hear anyway.
"Nah, that doesn't really work. If they were smart, why'd they not do something sooner?" Poike replied immediately. Pilk wondered if it might be appropriate to describe to him how planning something insidious actually worked.
"And why would they hide for this long? They're large and menacing, and they'd have free reign in the mountains. Maybe these are just different dragons. You know, they might have migrated from someplace else," Kerrh then added, which did indeed seem like a reasonable guess. Who could say that dragons had to be in one group in one spot? They seemed plenty competitive, at any rate, being more dangerous than pretty much any other creature in the wild.
Problem was, none of it made Pilk feel any better. Things being what they were, he still knew he was going to die the most terrible possible death, possibly even worse than being merely eaten by a dragon. Maybe he would be bathed in fire. He was certain that would hurt immensely. Getting bitten in half would probably not be nearly as bad. And not dying, though this was a lot more remote of a prospect, was more attractive still.
He glanced over at the wizard-fool, who seemed displeasingly excited.
"Dragons?! What strange creatures! Scales harder than steel, flames hotter than a forge, faster than an arrow in flight - What majestic beasts! Quite the foe indeed to myself, if my knowledge presents itself, dragons cannot be killed by fire - But I suppose, neither can wizards!" he said and cackled, and Pilk wondered if he would say the same thing while facing a tidal wave of flame bearing down on him from above. He probably would, he concluded, if his name was any indication. He hoped that, when that man finally exploded or whatever it is that his kind tend do, it would happen somewhere not very close to him.
At the expansive dungeon of Castle Foghaunt...You could not trust anyone these days, Turnkey Lurg had realized today after returning to the dungeon. Especially not Deputy Turnkey Holm. Deputy Turnkey Holm was a bastard, and Turnkey Lurg sincerely hoped his ill wishes toward him, filled with every bit of hatred he could muster, would eventually manifest in some way on the man himself, as superstition held they might, preferably as a nasty case of the great-pox, or maybe a particularly virulent form of the clap. But really, anything very terrible and painful would have done just as well.
Deputy Turnkey Holm was a very enterprising sort, apparently, a fact that Turnkey Lurg had not observed until today, as Deputy Turnkey Holm had been completely beneath his notice, being a perfectly ordinary and boring sort with a wife, children and quite the active social life beyond his soul-crushing daily job of being a deputy turnkey under the watchful, terrible eye of institutional justice, personified in this case by Turnkey Lurg, who had admittedly fewer troubles with watchful, terrible eyes on him, as very few tended to look at Turnkey Lurg for very long before turning away. But Turnkey Lurg had clearly not been watchful enough - it had been just his luck to be out to lunch right when the orc raid started, leaving Deputy Turnkey Holm in charge of the dungeon for at least two hours longer than he had any business being in charge of a dungeon for, and the little rat bastard had seen an opportunity there, and had made off with the prison keys, though not before unlocking all the cells and letting their entire stock of convicted criminals out without as much as a stern limb severing for correctional purposes. It was indeed a sad day when one found one's dungeon completely empty of anybody but the prisoners that happened to be already dead and thus impossible to execute or properly set free, though it was obvious that someone had tried to perform both on
them, too.
And, in what knocked the day squarely into the territory of being some kind of conspiracy by fate itself, one of the Princes of Allochthon turned up, and it was not to inspect the dungeons, which Turnkey Lurg felt he could have somehow managed to get through by lying through his teeth, oh no, it was to issue royal pardons to whatever hopefully non-murderous prisoners were willing to accompany the kingspawn on some kind of quest. So Turnkey Lurg had to explain how there were no prisoners, sir, and how the justice system of Foghaunt would hopefully correct that issue as well as the problem of his missing deputy turnkey, sir, and how those people in the cells that sir saw were actually quite dead, sir, and how he was definitely going to get rid of them post-haste as soon as possible, sir, and how it was really a darn shame sir had chosen today to come and find prisoners to recruit, as there had been many more yesterday before the... efficiency of due process had all but emptied the place of life. The prince did not look like he was buying that last line, though, but was probably keenly aware of how further investigation would provide only mounting disappointment, and chose not to pursue the horrible truth.
Instead, he asked Turnkey Lurg where to find any apothecaries in this town, explaining that he, in his searching over the past hour, had found neither hide nor hair of any such thing, and Turnkey Lurg was ashamed to admit that he had no idea. He suggested that sir could perhaps ask sir's highly educated older brothers, like that one who actually was an apothecary of some description, if he remembered it right, but the advice was not taken well, and the prince only looked like he was about to slap Turnkey Lurg, so he just shrank back and remained silent, at which the prince merely sighed and moved to leave. Turnkey Lurg knew that sigh - why, he had made one exactly like it not an hour ago after he was done breaking all of the unbroken furniture in a fit of rage upon his discovery that he had no more criminals to hold until rightful justice or at least corporal punishment could be properly dispensed.
In the streets of Foghaunt...Myrica was starting to feel a little hopeless as she followed her new employer through the streets of the city - apparently, they were looking for two things - somebody who might carry all their things, and a coach for the mostly inexperienced prince to safely ride in. Unfortunately, neither looked likely to be found in the streets - the people of Foghaunt apparently did a great many things for good pay, but never could they be convinced to become beasts of burden for their betters, and any coaches and horses were obviously hidden away, given the orcs' tendency to steal horses and burn wooden objects on their raids to create distractions.
What was even worse, though, was that Betu seemed to be getting bored again. She always got a little unpredictable when that happened. Well, maybe 'unpredictable' wasn't the right way to put it. She was, in fact, very predictable, at least to Myri, and it was unfortunate to see her fulfill her expectations nearly every time. Like now, for instance.
"Sir, perhaps we're going about this the wrong way," she said to the Prince.
"The job of a porter is very uncomplicated, and I believe that any peasant we find would be entirely qualified to do it. They merely need some motivation, sir, and if that does not help, perhaps some intimidation as well. I believe I can demonstrate, sir, if I may?"Though, of course, Betu did have her decent, though nonetheless barbaric ideas on occasion.
Outside a particular house in Foghaunt...The air smelled great, and all the colors swimming before his eyes, while pretty distracting, felt really friendly for some reason. This provided some solace in the grave task that Veltipp was about to undertake. He looked at his best friend - he was as tall and healthy as ever, but you could see it in his eyes. There wasn't any true life in them, the evil poison in the groundwater had gotten to him. Now all he could do was put the poor guy out of his misery before he started foaming at the mouth. He took out his longbow, closing his eyes.
"It's going to be okay, man. It's all going to be okay," he said to himself. He could hear the shape of his old buddy, still as ever, looming over him with his immense form, so mighty and yet so weak at the same time. He drew back an arrow, then let it loose, followed by another and then a third one as well, and all three flew and stuck true, piercing deeply into the poor guy's flesh. It was done, Veltipp thought, and sobbed a little. The sadness continued welling up inside him, and his sniffling soon turned into genuine tears as he knelt down and turned his arms to the heavens, cursing whatever entity had poisoned his fate so. Now he was all alone in the world, with only the voice of the never-ending grass to keep him company.
Or, rather, he was until the unthinkable happened.
"Hey, uh, V?" the voice of his bestest buddy came from his left. Veltipp nearly upchucked from the surprise. He turned to look at the source, and there he was! Jum! In living color!
"Jum!" Veltipp exclaimed.
"V!" Jum exclaimed back, in his typical echoing fashion. Veltipp noticed a guy standing next to him.
"Who's that?" he asked.
"That's ATF," Jum answered.
"'Kay. Say, Jum, ain't you dead?" Veltipp pointed at his friend.
"Not as far as I know, V.""Don't you think that's weird?""Maybe if I thought about it some more, but no, not really," Jum said, scratching his head. The sunlight shining on his armor made him look a bit like a spirit, so Veltipp wasn't sure what was going on. The other guy said something as well, but he couldn't make out what exactly.
"You wanna come on an adventure, V?""Where?" Veltipp said, wondering where his buddy might be going with this.
"Down where the dragons live," Jum told him, and Veltipp got the feeling that this was some kind of critical moment - was he going to go along with his buddy, or was he going to stay here, alone forever? The gate to the otherworld beckoned, and Veltipp was suddenly possessed of a sense of destiny.
"Dragons?" he asked, and Jum nodded yes, as did his companion. Some kind of angel, maybe?
"Uh, okay... I'm up for that, yeah," he said. He'd always wanted to see a dragon. Jum looked really happy in a serene sort of way, and Veltipp noticed something, like a golden halo made of butterflies, encircle both of his visitors' faces. He had made the right decision, clearly.
Veltipp got up, clutching his bow to his naked chest in both hands, and bowed reverently to his friend and his friend's spirit guide.
"I'm ready. Let's go."You can freely assume you have all the supplies, bedrolls and tinderboxes you need at any given time when it would make sense - these are both easy to get and unnecessary to keep track of.
Also, guess what - lots of crappy rolls this turn!
Finally, I stopped marking out the individual princes in the turns. If you think it's really required for me to point them out, for legibility's sake and whatnot, feel free to tell me.
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Topic: Kingspawn of Allochthon: important question! (Read 19681 times)