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[spümpkin]

Form and Function: Adventures in Animism

OOC Thread.
CHAPTER 0: A Hero(?)'s Beginning

The song of an ancient bard fills the air, accompanied by a cacophony of creaking and groaning, as the very bar you sit at despairs at it's existence. The wind blasts through the open windows, blowing sand into your hair, and drinks. As you look around, you are met with only the sight of the drunken bartender, a miserable looking warty toad, who, ironically enough, is the one telling his troubles to the only other patron in the bar. She is not listening, and you are unsure if she is still alive, as her jet-black feathered body is missing patches, and her eyes have rolled into her skull. Again, bitterly ironic, is the crow picking at her crow corpse.

The other tables could barely be called such, as they have been worn down through the endless torrents of sand and time. An oddly large, misshapen lump of cheese seems to be singing, if you could call it that. The sound seems to blind your ears of the horrendous sandstorm, but is it really any better? She smells, too. Which doesn't necessarily help the smell of corpse and beer, which one could not easily distinguish even in their best moment.

Yet here you are, sitting at a table with your companions, drinking what you have been told is beer, and waiting for the sandstorm to pass. The bounty board piques your interest, one of the few things not torn to shreds in this place. A single bounty lies on it, and boy oh boy do you need the money.

You take in the whole scenery, and the urge to collapse into tears is hard to fight. But, push on. For death is inevitable, but you can only know if you try.

[Pencil_Art]

A tall, lanky figure leans against one of the dusty walls of the tavern, perusing the contents of the lone bounty on the jobs board while occasionally shooting strange looks at the singing cheese. He holds a long, thin object smothered in layers of cloth against his body, and his features are difficult to make out due to the hood and lengthy robe he has draped about his body. After a while he pulls up a chair at an empty table and sits down again with his beer, which he does not even take a sip out of.

[SOLDIER First]

Sitting at a nearby table is what seems to be parts of a suit of armor intermixed with limb-shaped areas of white-blue energy. They have deposited an enormous greatsword in its sheathe on top of the table and ensured nobody else could use it for putting down drinks or anything. This doesn't seem to bother them at all.

The person(?) sits and stares silently at the wall opposite, occasionally turning around in their seat to look at the other patrons for what is arguably too long of a time.

[AbstractTraitorHero]

In contrast there appears to be some kind of plant girl? Some kind of little girl with green skin. Red hair and indeed silver eyes. They quietly hum their leg's swinging about they had pushed away the drink they had gotten after the first sip and their face was scrunched up a bit in disgust. Her eye's watering

She is the first to speak. Her voice is high and excitable with a tiny amount of squeakiness. Clearly disguising her dislike of the situation
"Sooooo I'm Lilly. What are your names?"

[Failbird105]

There was also another figure. Humanoid in shape at least, it wore an orange jumpsuit and a bulky bucket like helmet, both giving the impression of much more being under it then there actually was. It was mostly just absurdly flammable gas. There was an ever so faint yellow tinge from where the eyes would be, and he shifted a large container around. Whatever was inside must have been important as it was being piped directly into the mouth area of the helmet. The good news for him was that all this meant he didn't have to experience most of what the others did, but it made it a little hard to hear when the girl spoke.

"Alec, Alec Wilholm."

His words were muffled partially by the helmet.

[Tiruin]

"^{This was not expected.}"

Eva had already introduced herself beforehand, especially with using her preferred name of "Eva Nova", busy being occupied by the horrible scents and distracting herself by checking the progress of the sandstorm.

Check the bounty and grab it out--have it open or openly read on the table for everyone else.

"Hi, I'm Eva," the girl said to the new folks piling up at the table. "And it looks like some of you are stuck here until the sandstorm passes. I'm grabbing this bounty and taking it myself; I was also thinking of an icebreaker so. . .who'd like to join me?"

[SOLDIER First]

The armored figure turns to look at her (and rotates its head farther than should be posssible if need be). They stare at her silently; their blank helmet expresses nothing.

Then they... "speak".

[Icebreaker?]

[AbstractTraitorHero]

Lilly looks back at Eva Nova with a smile and trys to move her head to get a good look at the bounty paper her tongue lightly out agasint her lip as she trys to see it.
Read the bounty.

[Pencil_Art]

"If it isn't too much to ask, I'll join you guys. There's better things to do than drinking this sorry excuse for drink, anyway."

Peer over at the bounty.

"By the way, I'm Raith."

[spümpkin]

The bounty is sticky, and red. It's either blood or jam, and the smell is pertaining to the former.  The bounty reads an omnious 'HELP' in all capitals, with a smaller, much more ominous font reading 'monetary reward available'. On the back is a map to wherever the location is, and a small 4-panel series of images is displayed on the bounty.

Spoiler: Help? (click to show/hide)

The fourth 'panel' is crusted over with blood, and it refuses to come off. The map indicates that it's not too far away, less than a day's trip in fact. And the sandstorm is clearing up. It seems almost convenient that at this very time, the tavern owner yells at you in a drunken stupor, forcing you out into the wastes.

[Pencil_Art]

While shuffling towards the door reluctantly, Raith squints intensely at the scrap of paper, trying to make out what it says and just barely succeeding. His face lighting up with the revelation, he hitches up his large, cloth-wrapped stick-like object against his back, and begins walking in a direction that somewhat matches that depicted on the bounty paper.

"Regardless of whether you guys want to come along or not, I'll be moving on in this direction. I kind of need the money right now. Anybody care to join me?"

[Tiruin]

Eva re-read the bounty in descriptive format as she shuffled over to the exit.

"This either means killing someone trying to help someone else, or we get a bounty by helping someone else. The redness doesn't help any, nor does this blood sample...which gives me an idea to analyze it; I'll keep the paper but you can all have a good read. And I'll tag along too. Hello Raith!" Eva said.

She gave the paper to the nearest fellow and opened the bar doors for the others to exit through, fiddling around with her vest (which contained a delicate amount of instruments and other scientific-looking paraphernalia tucked inside several pockets), bringing out a sheathed knife.

"If anyone's okay with me cutting out the blood and paper, that is. Could someone act and direct the way? I'm up for splitting the money. Never said how much and we can probably talk to the people we're bountied with."

[SOLDIER First]

The armored figure is very difficult to physically move but cooperates eventually, stepping outside with the others and their sword in tow. They stare around at the others, then Raith.

[Where are we going?]

They also remember(?) Eva, who didn't answer them.

[You didn't answer it]

[Sl4cker]

"Paper and money, say you?" A sudden rustle signals the bustle of a child draped in paper. "I'm interested now, too! If you wish for direction, maybe I could give instruction - as long as you all befriend the new!" Clad in a suit with a tie to boot, the arrival's eyes gleam with dreams of loot. "I am named Cyperus, a warm greet! And I speak in a poem for all those I meet!"

[Tiruin]

((That rhyming is very creative! :3))

"I wondered what your name was. Nice to meet you Cyperus! Can you fly?"

[You didn't answer it]

Eva tilted her ear towards the shining suit of sand-speckled shining armor.
"Oh-um, sorry there. The Icebreaker is a term for opening talks with others. I just got into the bar to check on anything worth doing, then the sandstorm hit, then a bit of chit-chat happened with some fellows here but then I decided to check on the bounty flattering with the wind. Also, I'm planning to go where this bounty is generally pointed; we're not welcome here anyway anymore. It's...better than home."