"You okay, mate? None of the worries, as they say?"
Maybe a gentle poke?
You step up to the man and poke him gently on the nose.
[Fearful Reverie: 6]
Something snaps inside him, you think, and his expression suddenly changes. He exhales for the first time in a minute and slumps back against the tree. Whoa, ohohoho! Hoho! Haha, woo! He shakes his head and has a few of the dark berries. Hohoho! Oh boy!
Is he all right, you ask after a little bit of this. Don't mind him, the fellow replies, just had a spot of the bleak despair! Happens when he gets proper startled! 'S a good sign, really! He was beginning to wonder he wasn't going to fit in, with all the hazings and the trials and the being sent into increasingly dangerous places! At least he's mastered being afraid, and that is fairly crucial if he understands correctly! Got to have a healthy fear of things if you're in the refuge business!
Anyway, he bats you on the shoulder, you were asking something about dragons, was it? He's never seen one, they usually carry off anyone who gets near, hoho! They leave little evidence, dragons! Frankly he's unsure what he'd do if he saw one, but then it's not like the matter will be in his hands in that case, hohoho... hoho... hoh...!
... you're new here, aren't you? He was a lot like you once, dressed in rags, clueless of the ways in the savage northlands! How distant last month seems now! Lucky you ran into him, you are - there's things here that will rot the flesh off your bones, he's been told! Spiders the size of your head! Aborigines who'll as soon stab you as tell you the way to go! And the dragons! Oh, the dragons!
"Food would be good, yes, thank you. I'm not particularly hungry, but I need something to shave edge off of the hangover. Some water would help too, no doubt. Say, I don't remember anything what happened after the drinking contest and everything before it is a bit hazy too. Mind summarizing some of it for me? I didn't do anything excessively stupid, right? I seem to have new limbs and clothes too, wonder where they came from..."
Learn from another person's experience and put all mushooms aside. Accept any and all foodstuff she offers as well as summary of missing memories should she give one. Oh, since we have light now I might as well observe my party hat in greater detail.
"Was there really a demon? Or was that just another hallucination?"
[A Night To Remember: 3]
To be perfectly honest, she only remembers bits and pieces herself. First you pretty solidly outdrank her - good job there, and great trick with the vodkafruit - then you said something she didn't register on account of being completely pissed, and then everything exploded into debauchery. Usually these others aren't up for all that much, she says incredulously, but by the time she was back in drinking condition you should have seen the shit that was going on. Best night she's had in months. Everybody was cutting loose. The booze supply nearly ran out completely, had to hit the reserves.
Gets a bit hazy from there, she's got to say. Don't know about a demon or nothing, but there was dancing and singing and a lot of minderbooze when the regular stuff ran low. She
may have made out with you at one point during a late-night rematch. Or maybe with Lee. One or both of those might have just been a dream though. Or that bit where you strained so hard you sprouted a whole new arm - she was thinking
that couldn't possibly be real, but there you are, fully limbed and everything.
Mind you, shitfaced as she was, she'd wager she's probably the only one who remembers even that much. Dunno what came over these other people, but they were partying like there was no tomorrow, and they sure as hell don't got her tolerance. It's going to be a real zombie apocalypse around here in an hour or two, mark her words.
She leads you out through the passageway into a maze of small tunnels. Watch your head, the lamplighter instructs. She pauses every now and then next to a brazier or goes inside a side chamber, each hosting at least one passed-out Moth, many of them very familiar-looking to your somewhat pickled intellect, until at last you come to what seems like a small dining hall, cold leftovers lining a well-polished stone table. Most of them seem to have migrated out of their plates, and the few Moths remaining here have either slumped on the table or rolled off along the floor. The lamplighter sits you down next to a less objectionable plate. Dig in! This'll be going off before the day's done, so might as well finish as much as you're able.
By the way, you ask as you try some troglodytic crab, lightly fermented in the original shell (it's like a Norse delicacy in that you're making the best of something a little rancid and expected to smile about it), where'd you get the robe? And the crown, which it occurs to you to take off and look at. It seems to have been hastily cut out of some compressed and treated chitin, the words "Igor, Party God" written on it.
The robe! Yeah, you might have missed it in all the fun, she doesn't blame you a bit, but somewhere along the way they made you a Moth. The elder was so sauced he couldn't remember the procedure for honorary induction, so they all just agreed on the simple thing of saying you're in the clan now and that's that.
Daniels shakes his head to clear it of a rather convoluted train of thought that had been going through it.
"Right, who were you again? Not that I care, but I should probably remember you. Not your name, just describe an easily identifiable feature of yours. Also I think the minder lady with the rainbow bandanna or something like that wanted me to get you to make a sleep potion so I can drug the captain of whatever bizarre land-based mercantile enterprise you people run, absorb what is effectively the summation of his being into an extradimensional storage space that I carry somewhere between the back of my skull and the depths of my soul, and then she'll lead me to a nodal access point to an intelligence that exists in what seems to be the primordial darkness between universes so that I can then trade your captain for notable favours to myself, retroactively deleting him from the memory of everyone he ever interacted with in the process. Also this one stoatman I already have in there, I'm set to make a bundle in a short while. I think the rainbow minder lady probably wants to be captain in his place and is using me to get him out of the way is the point, and she wants me to get your help to do that. She mentioned rewards or something for you, so you'd probably benefit a good deal from the transition of power assuming you don't get gutted during the uncontrolled chaos that's going to result when this affair inevitably gets blown into what passes for the public eye around these parts. Oh, I've probably been talking too long without pausing, conversations are supposed to be a two-way street. You may speak now."
Ramble distractedly, completely spilling all the sensitive details of Rainbow Lady's planned mutiny or whatever it is she's wanting to do in the process.
Peaks looks up at you. Her eyes aren't quite as captivating as Rainbow would have led you to believe, but you do feel a very acute, inquisitive pressure as they rest on you.
Huh, she says and smiles at you. Goes to show you shouldn't trust help hired off the street, wouldn't you say?
She wouldn't want to rock the boat, she shrugs and laughs to herself. The captain is a solid enough sort and, more importantly, pays quite well. Not to mention that drugging a man of over 400, perhaps more than 500 pounds is a questionable and
very expensive proposition, she can say from personal experience.
If you're not very committed to this conspiracy, however, and she gets the strange feeling that you are not, could she perhaps provide you with a sensible counteroffer?
"I can understand her. You can't?" I whisper to the doctor. "I guess that's one more weird magic power I have. You should have seen this squid lady I talked to. Anyway, it sounds like she's taking us near the exit, but we'll have to figure out how to get it open. And then probably reseal it for her, since she blocked it off. But hey, it's something."
I then follow Oggie into the passage.
Frankly the doctor is surprised that the creature speaks
a language. It, er, she looks like she's been maddened by the underground. Scrambled in body and mind. It happens when you're alone and think too much about things. She looks at Oggie walking ahead of you into the dark. You should do something. Maybe talk to her?
Oggie looks back at you to make sure you are following. There is quite an extensive network of tunnels down here. Many of them certainly not natural, clearly clawed out of the bedrock over a long period of time. It is down one such tunnel, the light fading to the point where you can't see anything beyond the occasional eyeshine from Oggie's direction or a firm hand guiding you onward, that you eventually stop. There is a heavy, stagnant smell in the air, and a scraping noise as your host lumbers toward a wall and gets to work.
You are passed a generous handful of insect-ridden flesh of not-quite-fungus. Judging from the noise she makes, you think the doctor gets one too. Eat well, says Oggie. Very nutritious. Will help grow your whiskers strong and acute.
"Ah. How large is his kingdom, then? Are there any others in this land?"
Distance is hard to quantify in the kingdom, the alderman says. The places wander around, and the bog ebbs and flows. Larger than you think, he believes the official answer is, to the point where he is not entirely positive where it might end. He has heard of an end to the far side of the bog, but he has certainly not seen it himself. The King would know for sure, he'd expect. No other kingdoms here, of course. There is Benzerwald, he supposes, but they're somewhat new. Good to have them, an occasional raid does much to invigorate the more piratical citizens. Used to be you had to sail south for months either way to get any real raiding work done, this is considerably more efficient!
He tilts his head a little. Damnedest thing though, now that you mention it. There used to be places nearby, he's fairly certain. The proximal kingdoms to the land of departed souls. Don't hear much from them anymore, not in the past few centuries at the very least.
Leif Erikson, Miner and Lush
- Half-basket of apple-like mushrooms
- Paper party crown (worn)
- Moth-robe (worn)
- Itchy Woolen Britches (worn)
- A Word: INEVITABLE
- A Word: APOCALYPSE
- A Word: DRINK
- Body Count: 228
- Mead of Poetry (4 shining revelations remaining)
- Enders' Friend: The Grave of Red Clouds Parting
- Inscribed Wooden Stylus
- Iron spear
- 1.03 gp
- The Box: ?
- Induced Lucidity: the Aftermath, or the New Beginning
- Compatibility: Minding
- Tricks of the Mind: Perception, Memory
- Tricks of the Mind: Engagement, Negation, Abstraction, Prestige
- Tricks of the Mind: the Self, the Other
- Gods of the Underground: Did You Just What
- A Visit From The Stork: Is What You Yes
- The Voracious Dark: Two Deals Made
- The Voracious Dark: The Promised Sixth
- Moth's Flight: Honorary Clansman
- The Miracle of Life: Wayward Rabbit
Eileen Minett, Vinyl Collector
- Fistful of caveflesh
- Distilled alcohol (in flask)
- Spirits of salt (in clay jar)
- Soaps of elk, bear, bat and snake
- 4 flasks of lamp oil
- Oil lamp (lit)
- Linen stoat shirt (worn)
- Stoat trousers (worn)
- Comfy slippers (worn)
- Never-made scimitar (blackened, slightly dull)
- Tooth-handled hunting knife
- Black leather boots
- An assemblage of amber and amethysts
- Silver thread-necklace
- Onyx spiral earrings
- 2 oaken rings
- Rusty, bloodstained knife
- A Word: HUNGER
- A Word: SYNTHESIS
- A Weapon: Explosive Cysts
- Grenade Jumping: A Solid Technique
- The Good Doctor: Secret Histories
- Sword of the Sand People: Cleaning Supplies
- Sword of the Sand People: The Services of a Minder
- Higher Tonight: There And Back Again
- The Gods of the Underground: A Welcome Guest
Jack Daniels, Karate Man
- Red and gold vest and breeches combo (worn)
- Leather boots (worn)
- Rubber mattress (filled with water)
- 14033 gp (in sack)
- Poor Unfortunate Soul: Forever Captive
- The Queen's Guard: Actual Asset
- Powers of the Beyond: Gardener of Thoughts
- Garden of Thoughts: the Stoat-Magistrate
- Dusty Wooden Speaking-Trumpet
- Crossbow Bolt (in throat)
- A Word: REND
- A Word: SILENCE
- A Weapon: Murder-Thought
- Uncoupled: Strength
- Wooden Door
- The Winding Path of Inspiration: Run Like Hell
- Induced Lucidity: A Garden Well-Tended
- Elongated Affairs: Enemy of the New State
- A Place In History: Vastly Unreliable
- Anglefork Castle: the Great Worm
- 2 rats, crushed
- 1 rat, strangled
- 1 rat, live
- Travels In The Fourth Dimension: Sunday ± 2 Days
- Doomstones: So High Up But Such A Bitter View
- The Majordomo: A Great Divide Between Us Now
- The Voracious Dark: Decreasing Demand
- The Voracious Dark: More Specific Requests
- The Vault of Heavens: The Captain's Quarters
- Body Count: 3
Thomas Minstep, Insurance Agent
- A Word: ABSENCE
- A Word: GOODBYE
- A Word: WORM
- A Weapon: The Sword They Fear
- Make A Man Out Of You: Battle-Tested
- Ranging fork
- 2 feet of sinew-thread
- Tooth-needle
- Traces of Mischief: Whole-Body Radioactive Burn
- A Bowl, Black and Knobby
- Tight Leather Pants (worn)
- Incredibly Tight Blue Dress (worn, mutilated, mildly provocative)
- Travels In The Fourth Dimension: Sunday, July 25th, 409 S.D.
- The Queen's Guard: A Reward Well Earned
- The New Queen: Lasting Gratitude
- Lonely Roads: Walk Away
- The Box: Absolutely Delightful
- Body Count: 2
Oscar Wilde, Chemistry Teacher
- A Word: REVELATION
- The Wicked King's Missive On Economic Reform (in massive silver scroll case)
- Wounds: 1
- Traces of Mischief: Glowing Facial Rift
- The Serpent's Egg: Dissemination
- Body Count: 4
- Cornerstone Helm (worn, collecting light)
- Time-ender's measure (wrapped, processing? stopping?)
- 10 m of rope
- Half a candle
- 1 rat, skinless and smoked
- 6 gp
- Poor Misshapen Dice
- Lock of Hair (unidentified)
- Iron nail, unused
- An Inauspicious Key
- Burlap Foot Wrappings (worn)
- Burlap Hand Wrappings (worn)
- Moth-Eaten Hat (worn)
- Respectable Brown Skirt (worn)
- Old Brown Waistcoat (worn)
- Bright Yellow Tunic (worn)
- A Wealth of Burlap Ribbons
- The Winding Path of Inspiration: The Less Dangerous Friend