Kleine pried her eyes off of the amulet around the Captain’s neck. She had felt an instinctual surge whenever he brandished it, an almost insuppressible urge to swing her crossbow up and loose a bolt right into his neck. She stayed her hand however, and the moment passed after its initial burst. She could have sworn that Jeeves had snarled during the confusion, though he seemed his original calm self now. Something definitely was affecting her now, she would never have thought to kill someone if they offered help before, no matter who it was.
After she regained her composure, she turned to the Captain.
“We’ll use all the help we can get. You know of the humans, obviously, but I’m sorry to say that our sorry band hasn’t heard of you. What should we call you?” “We do be the Naga, misssss. That be the name that the land dwellersss give to usss. Our real name isss a bit hard to pronounccce in your tongue. My name be Morbal, Captain of the Redfin, fassstessst ssship in the Obellion Sssea. Thisss here be my firssst mate, Finnigan.” He gestured towards the Naga he had been arguing with, she could only imagine the face he was making was a scowl. It was difficult to read the Naga when their faces differed so much from their own.
Kleine proffered her hand.
“Kleine Feuersturm, recent Champion and leader of the human rebellion.” Morbal seemed taken aback, looking her over again before shaking her hand. She could tell he was trying to crush her hand, but it didn’t seem to be half of what Ustris could do. It was slightly more than what she could exert, however, and she squeezed back with her own might. Morbal noticed the strength of the grip and nodded. “Ye didn’t tell me you were a Champion yourssself. Do me the honor and presssent to me your Ssshard.”
“That would be rather difficult as my Shard is within my chest.” “Now I know you be joking with me. Ssshards come in amuletsss or ringsss. You cannot put a Ssshard inssside sssomeone, that would kill them.”
“I assure you that I am indeed a Champion. Would you care for a physical test?” Kill her? Did Gilgamesh do something odd when he placed the Shard into the both of them? He was already odd enough, didn’t Jeeves mention something about using Shards as jewelry making them more inferior? She would have to straighten that out soon, something was very off about the two of them.
“That won’t be necccessssary, missss. If we be done here, I do want my ssspiccce.”
“Very well, it should be nighttime and the other Champion should be in the warehouse. Between the three of us, I’m sure we can piece together a plan to overthrow the city. We’ll get you your spice and more.” With that, she backed out into the hallway and re-summoned her fireball, lighting up the hallway more brilliantly than the lamp on the table would have.
Morbal saw the fireball suspended in the air above her hand and gave a short barking laugh, shaking his head from side to side. Kleine felt it to be a decent bet that Morbal himself couldn’t use magic. The Naga filed out of the room, in total fifteen. She hadn’t seen the ones in the back, apparently they had been hiding just out of sight in case something did happen. She wasn’t sure she could have taken the fifteen of them on at one time, but then again she had explosive magic in a small confined room. It would have been up for grabs as to who would have walked out of that mess.
They walked in relative peace until Kleine’s curiosity got the better of her, she began asking Morbal question after question about his past and his ambitions. Luckily, Morbal seemed rather pleased that someone was taking an interest in him. He spun wild tales about his previous ventures, apparently he was a rather egotistical Naga, and through those tales she could gleam some bit of the truth. Morbal had apparently received his ship and his Shard at the same time, through a violent takeover of a ship they found headed towards a town on a coast. This, by his accounts, happened to be on the other side of the continent, near another God’s territory. Morbal was within his prime, and happened to be just strong enough at the time to overpower the old Champion who had possession of his Shard before him. To hear him tell it they had had a swordfight that lasted for years, with magic being thrown against his impervious scales, with fleets of ships being lost on both sides. Kleine figured it was probably a new Champion himself getting into a fight with a much bigger creature than himself.
Viktor eventually came into view, scowling and muttering quietly to himself, only noticing the rest of them when Kleine got his attention. His head snapped up and he seemed to reach for a sword that wasn’t there. After Kleine made introductions he seemed to calm down a small bit. His eyes shifted disdainfully between each of the Naga, and he seemed on the verge of spitting, but he thought better of it and fell in behind Kleine. He still seemed as though he were trying to protect her from the Naga however, and seemed to shift himself constantly between her and them. Jeeves also took this time to chime in and tell her that he could make a few changes to her physique again, if she so wished it. She pondered for a moment before silently telling Jeeves that she wanted to be stronger, and slightly more charismatic. He declared that it would be done, and that within the day she would be stronger than their new acquaintance. He relapsed into his strange silence almost instantly.
Morbal continued on about the past year, regaling Kleine with fantasies that were entirely untrue, or had some hint of the truth behind them. He ended up mentioning that his Shard came from the God Pisces and that the Skrellit’s God was named Libra. He talked about how the Skrellit’s spice was precious enough to buy anything you wanted with a “sssmall handful,” and how he had used to have a contact that would provide him with spice. Though that contact ended up attacking his honor, apparently the Skrellit had insulted his ship in an offhand manner, and he ended up killing him in a duel. Kleine asked him if he had felt any different in his mind or motivations in the last year, since he had acquired the Shard.
Morbal stopped walking for a moment and looked thoughtful, or that’s what she imagined him looking. “You know, it do be funny. Before I got my Ssshard, I never ssso much thought of making money, jussst taking it. I do think I’ve been doing much more trading thisss year than I ever have before. I never thought of it before now.”
Kleine almost thought he was going to renege on their agreement before Morbal simply shrugged and kept walking. His tales became less grand as they traveled however, she could see that her question weighed on his mind. Somewhere along the way she noticed Morbal had stuffed his symbol back down into his tunic, she almost commented on it before she noticed that they were at the end of the hallway. She hadn’t realized they had walked this far again, apparently his stories had hastened the time somewhat on the way.
…
Ustris had woken some time ago, and had been exploring the room underneath the warehouse with the torch that had been in the sconce. He could hear the humans upstairs milling about occasionally, though for the most part they seemed content to sit there in silence. As he had been exploring had found that most of the room was empty, a few crates were here and there, along with some barrels full of liquids, but nothing of real interest. He found the door into the hallway that Kleine had entered, but he decided that they would be back eventually and he would meet them here. Jeeves had also contacted him during this downtime, telling him that he could make modifications to his body again if he wished it. Ustris went ahead and asked Jeeves to make the modifications to his agility, intellect, and charisma this time. Jeeves told him that he would be done within the day, then told him that Kleine would be here soon with guests, and lapsed into an odd silence.
Ustris decided that if Kleine was to be here with guests, he might as well make a welcoming committee, and began scavenging around the room for anything relevant. In short order, he found a couple of goblets, a sealed bottle of Skrellit wine, three Skrellit chairs, and a rather low set table. He arranged them to his liking, and then used his earth moving spell to create a sconce for a torch, then he sat down and waited for Kleine to return. During the time however, his mind raced, creating a plan for the destruction of the Skrellits.
…
Kleine and Morbal entered the area beneath the warehouse and could see a small area lit by a torch. Curiosity immediately took Morbal, even though he had been focused on getting his spice just moments before. He took off towards the light, everyone trailing behind. Kleine saw Ustris sitting in the chair at almost the same time Morbal did, and took off towards him. Ustris had stood when he saw them coming close. In one flowing motion she had dissipated her fireball and tried to engulf Ustris in a hug. Almost two days away from each other and she felt immense relief now that he was back. She could have sworn she felt Ustris hug back, if briefly, that damned chestpiece made it hard to tell. After a moment she realized that she was putting on a rather poor show to about seventeen pairs of unwanted eyes and pried herself away from Ustris hastily. Coughing into her hand, she began introductions.
“Right, Ustris, this is Captain Morbal of the ship, Redfin.” Kleine still had trouble imagining the ship, seeing as how she had never seen one herself. She didn’t understand why it made Morbal so proud to be associated with it, either.
“Captain Morbal, this is Ustris Gayitu, the other Champion of the Human Rebellion.” Morbal had walked up to Ustris and began trying to puff himself up. Ustris could tell that he was trying to assert dominance, to which Ustris simply smiled and offered his hand.
“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Captain Morbal.” Morbal took his hand in a crushing grip as he had tried with Kleine earlier, but was completely ineffectual to Ustris. Ustris however, returned his grip with gusto. Morbal seemed to be having difficulty keeping his composure. “A pleasssure, my good sssir. May we dissspenssse with cussstom, and get to the reasssonof thisss meeting?”
Ustris let go of Morbal’s hand, which he snatched away quickly. Ustris gestured to the chairs and they each took one for themselves. Ustris handed the bottle of wine to Morbal and gestured to the goblets. Morbal opened the seal on the wine and sniffed it, obviously checking to see if it had been poisoned. Satisfied at the pleasant aroma, he poured the wine into the three goblets, and chose one at random. Kleine and Ustris both grabbed a goblet themselves. “A toassst, to the death of the Ssskrellitsss.”
“I’ll drink to that.” The three of them touched their goblets, and drank at the same time.
After a few moments with nothing happening, Morbal nodded again. “Ssso, where do we ssstart?”
Kleine
STR: 5 / ??
AGI: 12 / ??
CON: 4 / ??
WIS: 4 / ??
INT: 8 / ??
CHA: 9 / ??
Ustris
STR: 10 / ??
AGI: 6 / ??
CON: 8 / ??
WIS: 7 / ??
INT: 6 / ??
CHA: 5 / ??
Crystal Staff
SPD: 1
POW: 1
PRC: 2
Effects:
None
Crossbow
SPD: 1
POW: 1
PRC: 1
Effects:
Automatic Bolt Generation
Fire Armor (Evoke) (Limited)
Fire Ball (Evoke) (Projectile)
Expl. Bolt (Evoke) (Projectile) (Temporary)
Exp. Trap (Ritual) (Trap)
Alrt Trap (Ritual) (Trap)
Erth Wall (Ritual) (Fast)
Hrdn Erth (Ritual) (Perm)
Buff Many (Ritual) (Temp (long))
OOC: Okay, sorry about that belated update my friends. I hate writing when sick, it makes my writing terrible because I suddenly become accepting of everything I write, which normally I'm reeeaaally anal about story details and stuff.
Anyway, suggestions for the siege would be nice. Where and what do we strike first? How hard? Do we delay for a while? Are there any other questions that need to be answered?