(I'm going to give a few people mini-turns between the main just to keep the timing consistent. Of course, you're also free to RP between rolls)
"Sera," says Marcius, mildly familiar with Dunmer honorifics from a lifetime in spoof trade. "How does the day greet you?"
Make conversation with this probable smuggler in a knowing, yet unprotesting kind of way.
[1] Perhaps it wasn't the best idea to surprise her while she was smoking skooma. Before you can react, you find yourself pulled within the doorway, a bugshell knife at your throat and her bug-eyed stare in your face. "Who, who, WHO are YOU, N'wah??"
"May he rest in piece."
Search the body for clues.
[5] The man's throat is intact enough to see clear strangulation marks. He doesn't seem to have bite marks from anything larger than a skeever, so the cause of death looks pretty apparent. In his belt bag, you find a ring of keys, a silk handkerchief, a tiny wooden smoking pipe, a charcoal stylus, a canvas pouch containing about 200 septims, and a scroll of paper, which reads:
Tax Records
Processus Vitellius
Seyda Neen Census and Excise Office
Arrille - 450 drakes - PAID
Asrad - 81 drakes - PAID
Draren Thiralas - 200 drakes - PAID
Eldafire - 130 drakes
Erene Llenim - 78 drakes - PAID
Fargoth - 111 drakes
Fine-Mouth - 54 drakes
Foryn Gilnith - 225 drakes
Gungar Yellow-Hand - 73 drakes - PAID
Indrele Rathryon - 127 drakes - PAID
Kasim - 60 drakes - PAID
Maures Plovius - 114 drakes - PAID
Morvel Andrethi - 75 drakes - PAID
Makes-breaks - 44 drakes
Nahaani - 84 drakes - PAID
Pavel Marctobel - 190 drakes - PAID
Rilis Sarano - 79 drakes
Terurise Grivayne - 98 drakes -PAID
Thavere Vedrano 134 drakes - PAID
Vodunius Nuccius - 87 drakes
Then tangle with mudcrabs and slaughterfish I shall! They shall fear the fists and repetitive healing magics of Bobs-In-Well, mightiest of Argonian craftsmen!
[5] Who ever heard of a grown Saxhleel being taken down by a mudcrab? The tried and tested method of flipping them onto their backs works well enough. Slaughterfish, on the other hand, are aptly named, but you risk the infamous "handfishing" technique: luring the fish close to shore and sticking your arm down its throat to pull it onto dry land. You get a deep bite on your upper arm several times, but you have the magic to fix this. Altogether you manage to get three large fish worth of scales, as pulling them onto land allows you to kill them without overly damaging their skins.
With your new-found burst of confidence, you even feel up to trying one of those gharials. It's a runty specimen, but going off the crocodiles in your homeland, it should have the same alchemical properties as the larger ones. Surprisingly, it's easier than the slaughterfish (if more time consuming): you go for the "tail-trick" method. You take a long stick from the mud and poke its tail, causing it to whirl around to present its open jaws, and circle around and do so again and again until the beast succumbs to exhaustion. From its tendons and the slaughterfish scales, you manage to create a decent swift-swimming paste. From its teeth and the mudcrab meat, you make a shock-resistance poultice.
[3] For these batches, Arrille gives you
100 septims. By this point, the sun is setting. "I can rent you a hammock for the night for just 10 gils. Though the silt striders run day and night if you're in a hurry. You could probably find a boat, too, but I wouldn't recommend taking to the water at night. Or setting out on the roads alone."
"Indeed, I seek the Gentleman upon Little Hill, for he is from another place and time and surely has the answers which I seek. For now, I bid you a good yesterday, and I offer my most fervent hope that your hair does not become sentient in your sleep and strangle you to death."
Move on, keep robbing the place. Move on to surrounding houses after I finish with the tradehouse. After that, book a Silt Strider to Balmora, where the journey truly begins.
"Good hunting," smiles the Nord.
[6] In a move that would leave a Khajiit slight-stepper weeping in envy, you slip in past Arrille as he unlocks and enters his basement storeroom, and duck behind a nearby shelf. As soon as Arrille leaves, you stuff your shirt with as many shiny things as it can hold. There are plenty of easily pocketable trinkets down here, and shirt-stuffable weapons, not to mention bottles of booze and even potions. However, when you turn to leave, you find that Arrille locked the door behind him - and those shitty bargain lockpicks you bought aren't going to cut it on this one.
(Might still be able to catch the noon strider that the other two are on, depending on what happens next for you)
"Taahni plans to join a mage's guild and enhance her skills. An alchemy and enchanting service would be profitable, no?"
She then pays for her and Tyrian's ride to Balmora.
((I seriously owe you. Repairs for your armor, dear? :3))
Tyri thanked the scout for her information and inquired what kind of knives she could use to work on fashioned weaponry, so that she could make herself a bow and set of arrows herself. This land had many things she...was really unfamiliar with, and it'd do best to learn from them.
She also asks if there's anything she could do for an extra bit of coin around here. Before going to meet that nice Khajiit to go to Balmora.
[3] "Just use a regular hunting knife of a good steel, dear. Sorry, but that really is all the time I have."
You ask around while on the way to the strider-port. [2] It seems Census and Excise often has odd-jobs that need doing, but aside from that, there isn't a lot of work around. The offices and the docks are currently fully staffed, and the local fishermen have all the assistance they need at the moment. No one around here can afford a housekeeper, either. Boats do often look for new hands but right now the port city of Ebonheart or the village of Hla Oad would be better find that kind of work.
"Taahni plans to join a mage's guild and enhance her skills. An alchemy and enchanting service would be profitable, no?"
She then pays for her and Tyrian's ride to Balmora.
"Well, good luck to you sera. Perhaps we'll meet again." Jiub waves goodbye as you and Tiru board the giant insect.
It seems that the great round shell of the Strider is mostly hollow: the driver and about a dozen of the passengers sit within. She seems happy to explain to the many outlanders riding for the first time: "Silt Striders store water in the hollow chambers in their backs for trips into the dry Ashlands of the interior. We carve out the front two chambers to use, and with a bit of Restoration there's a nice floor of scar tissue to keep both the passengers and the Strider comfortable. We have to keep this tissue up front exposed so we can steer, but drivers like me know how to take care of our beasts." Other passengers ride on top of the shell, amidst the cargo: these seats are scarier for those with a fear of heights, but of course have a better view, and distance from the odd odor of the creature's insides.
The strider's steps are slow and deliberate, making for a smooth ride, but its stride is so long that it moves along at a fair clip. Certainly faster than most on foot could run for very long. It wades off into the bayou, heading Northwest through the wider channels of the swamp. Slaughterfish and large reptiles swim below, paying no mind to the silt-strider's legs but for to move out of the way. Sometimes you pass by fishermen at work in their wide, flat boats. The driver lights something very fragrant in a clay lamp and instructs the passengers to pass it around to keep the mosquitoes away. The swamp sings, the strider sometimes sings back, passengers talk, and a young Imperial practices on his lute. He plays not badly, and at one point an aged dunmer joins in with a flute but tires quickly, falling asleep against her grandson.
Perched above most of the swamp's canopy, you can see foothills rising in the distance, growing closer. By midafternoon you reach them, and the wide mouth of a river cutting through them. "This is the River Odai. We'll be following it straight to Balmora," says the Driver. On the other side of the foothills, the country becomes entirely different: rolling low, green hills dotted with strange mushroom-trees. Occasionally there is a cottage with little gardens and allotments around. Some are in the familiar Imperial style, but most are in a curious exotic style: squat and rectangular, with curvy protrusions along the side at regular intervals, smoothed over with some dark yellow material, and ovular windows of common green bottle-glass. In the distance, to the East, there rises an Imperial castle or fort.
The sun grows low in the sky and mountains rise up around the Odai, blocking the view of the countryside. Boats and barges of all sizes float on down the river regularly. A shrill call comes down from the mountains somewhere, and several of the Dunmer passengers look up warily. "Don't worry," says the Driver, "They know not to go near striders." The strider has only to walk in a straight line, and so the driver takes breaks with increasing regularity to stretch and talk with the passengers. As the sun sets, she climbs around the rigging to light and hang paper lanterns. The strider passes under a rope bridge and some poor-looking people sitting at a campfire wave as it goes past.
Finally, about an hour after sunset, the mountains open into a small valley and reveal what
must be the city: a sea of colorful lights, parted in the middle by the river. Its hard to make out details at night, but you see a few well-lit features through the city walls. The river flows through the city in a perfectly straight, walled channel, crossed by two bridges. Stairs line the channel walls, leading down to docks and moorings where even at this hour there seems to be plenty of bustle with the riverboats. Everything is built in the same style as those yellowbone cottages, only bigger and grander, and lit by paper lanterns in a myriad of colors. The strider wades across the river and climbs up the left bank, following the city's wall until it comes to a tower rising from it. Seven or eight other striders are gathered around the tower.
"Welcome to Balmora! Take care that you have all your belongings before disembarking. I you feel so inclined, seras, there is no rule against tipping your driver."
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Topic: Roll to Morrowind (6/4) - Balmora: Is that the Main Quest calling? (Read 36621 times)