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[ZBridges]

I: Complaints Office.

[mightymushroom]

My first pick would probably be either G or J for specialized knowledge that might be useful in especially tricky situations.

But I have no complaints about I.

[micelus]

The Complaints Office, ah the Complaints Office. You'd rather not think about the Complaints Office.

Formative Choice 3. Your name. Names tend to sound like what certain residents of a distant realm would call 'Iberian' or 'Arabic', but there is a certain diversity of naming customs, especially in Costaba.

Formative Choice 4. Age. You are at the very least 25. Traditionally, those of older age are given more nominal respect than those younger than them.

Formative Choice 5. Gender. The State promises nominal equality between all genders, although local laws, beliefs and traditions oft results in imbalances of power or differences in treatment. In general, it is understood that anyone working as a clerk at the Emerald Inspector identifies as a Working Man or Working Woman (the peculiarities of gender is something understood by anyone raised in a society and incomprehensible to those raised outside it) and are thus allowed to do most things.

Formative Choice 6. Appearance. Be as descriptive or laconic as you desire.

[Demonic Spoon]

Aw, sad we didn't choose to be taxman. (Or mildly competent at combat)

3: Lorenzo Rodriguez

4: 35 A young up and comer in the Bureaucracy

5: M

6: A nondescript mousy looking man with calluses on his hands from holding writing implements for long hours, ink stains so deeply embedded into his skin they refuse to come out no matter how much he washes, a slight hunch, frown wrinkles from having to listen to the silliest of complaints, and the enviable ability to give the impression he is intently listening to your argument about why roads to dairy farms should be exactly 3 paces wide while his hands are busy with actually important paperwork.

[Kilojoule Proton]

Choice 3: Alfonso Al-Tahafut

Choice 4: 74

Choice 5: M

Choice 6: A small, wizened, and crotchety Senior Deputy Regional Public Relations Management Officer, none can claim to have heard every complaint in the book as truthfully as Alfonso, (un)acclaimed author of the doorstopping Triannual Record of Lodged Lamentations. Although more experienced in directing complaints to the appropriate department than addressing them, Alfonso's decades of experience navigating the stifling hierarchy of his organization has given him an affinity for the bureaumantic arts of Stamping and Sending in addition to an exemplary aura of monotony and tedium. These gifts will surely serve him well as he moves to take on the additional duties of his new position.

[King Zultan]

Choice 3: Alfonso Al-Tahafut

Choice 4: 74

Choice 5: M

Choice 6: A small, wizened, and crotchety Senior Deputy Regional Public Relations Management Officer, none can claim to have heard every complaint in the book as truthfully as Alfonso, (un)acclaimed author of the doorstopping Triannual Record of Lodged Lamentations. Although more experienced in directing complaints to the appropriate department than addressing them, Alfonso's decades of experience navigating the stifling hierarchy of his organization has given him an affinity for the bureaumantic arts of Stamping and Sending in addition to an exemplary aura of monotony and tedium. These gifts will surely serve him well as he moves to take on the additional duties of his new position.

+1

[mightymushroom]

3: Zetia Khashie

4: 41

5: Working Woman

6: Few would have predicted that Zetia would rise far when she first entered public service: her bearing not haughty enough, her posture not stiff enough, her dress not prim enough. She turned all these things to her advantage in the Complaints Department, since her relatively casual appearance encourages those with genuine troubles and disarms those who merely need to bluster in front of a faceless bureaucrat. She also has several commendations in her record from bringing forward complaints from the workers of the Complaints Office itself, improving dispute clearance efficiency in her branch by just over 3% despite the troubled times of the Great Wallaby Displacement.

[Demonic Spoon]

Choice 3: Alfonso Al-Tahafut

Choice 4: 74

Choice 5: M

Choice 6: A small, wizened, and crotchety Senior Deputy Regional Public Relations Management Officer, none can claim to have heard every complaint in the book as truthfully as Alfonso, (un)acclaimed author of the doorstopping Triannual Record of Lodged Lamentations. Although more experienced in directing complaints to the appropriate department than addressing them, Alfonso's decades of experience navigating the stifling hierarchy of his organization has given him an affinity for the bureaumantic arts of Stamping and Sending in addition to an exemplary aura of monotony and tedium. These gifts will surely serve him well as he moves to take on the additional duties of his new position.

+1

[micelus]

Alfonso Al-Tahafut, the epitome of middle management and possessor of the Stamp Case Key, you have proven your worth time and time again, being a near-eldritch elder of the Complaints Office.

It is for such dedication, shown both by your age and and your wisdom, that you have been entrusted the Soapstone Form 1a-c and allowed to mark it with your own personal stamp. After a 3-6 day waiting period, you'll officially be an Inspector and be inducted at the next Memoria Day later in the year. Until then, you'll attending to the usual humdrum business of the day, with the scurrying of the postmen and the scrawling of letters. Your replacement, an ambitious woman half your age, has already gotten a new personal stamp (with your current position obtusely emblazoned on it) and has made seductive passes at your desk (you know for a fact that the desk is not to choosy about its current partner and is open to many fantasies, especially late in the working night).

That said, no one would object if you were to slack off until your form arrived. While you'll be expected to come and do a few days of work, other days could be spent doing anything else. Whilst you're not an Inspector yet, you might as well be. A lowly complaints clerk grade I (or even revered grade IIIs) might even see it as just and inspire them to reach such as vaunted heights so that they too, might one day rejoice in bureaucratic inertia.

No one would mind if you for example, went to schmooze in the other departments, spent some time in the cafes or markets, or even took a stroll down the riverway.

Course, you could also do something constructive, like getting a new wardrobe or buying some tools. There's always manservants or supplies that might be of use to an Inspector and it is well known that the bazaars of Costaba are a great place to hear about the affairs of the world.

You could always just take a snooze at your desk, of course. If anything, some of the newer clerks might worship your aura of bureaucracy as you slumber.

You have time to do three things over the coming week. What do you do first?

a) Put in a good effort at work, working as usual.

b) Schmooze around the departments.

c) Explore the marketplace.

d) Go to a cafe.

e) Take a stroll down the riverway.

f) Sleep at your desk.

g) Something else?



Retroactive Formative Choice 1. It occurs to you, that as a man of venerable age, you would clearly have some form of family. Do you? Who are they?

Spoiler: An explanation on the Call (click to show/hide)

 The Call is a bit of a sixth sense associated with the Emerald Inspectorate, although you know that other organisations have developed equivalent abilities. Its the ability to 'know' who to contact about dealing with various problems, where they are and if they're available. For many, this ability is relatively undeveloped and unwieldy but to a senior bureaucrat of the Complaints Office, its as easy to use as your eyes. If you for example, wanted to know where to get the strongest cup of coffee in Costaba, you'd know after a few moments that an old matron by the Domina Fountain on the east side of the river has almost-fatal brews in her selection.

It has its limits of course. It is less specific and sometimes inaccurate in places you lack familiarity with and even more-so when you lack knowledge on the topic you are dealing with. As a man inclined towards Finances due to your work, you would have an easier time locating a banker in a city you've never been to than a bricklayer. Its abilities are also limited when looking for specific people. For whatever reason, the Call cannot parse the qualities related to names.

Making use of the Call can be taxing both mentally and physically, but you are more than used to its effects. To one such as you, Calling for someone in Costaba brooks no effort, although you might sweat if you tried to do that in another city.

[Demonic Spoon]

b) Schmooze around the departments.

Connections are the grease that keeps the wheels of bureaucracy turning!

(though sleeping is a close second for best option here)

[King Zultan]

B

[ZBridges]

C

[IronyOwl]

C


As for family, let's see...

Our first wife was named Maribel seeing as she was from Maribel, a small town largely composed of foreigners called Maril brought in for their fine carpentry, and what with the town having a bell and all the name sort of stuck. Ol' Maribel wasn't Maril though, her folks were a weaver and medicine man from down south a ways, though her father claimed distant ancestry from some feather-clad savage conqueror who supposedly sailed here centuries ago.

Anyway Maribel gave us four healthy children, two girls a boy and then another girl, before dying of malaise. Rather dull girl all things considered, but we were young and impetuous and the soothsayer was very precise in imploring us to find a weaver's daughter employed as a clerk. Coincidences and serendipity and all that.

Sa'adah is our eldest daughter, with pale green eyes. Like a snake, obviously. Had a healer check that out, said find a priest. Had a priest check that out, said find a sorceror. Had a sorceror check that out, said find his dark master and revel in the darkening of the world. That was enough of that, thank you sir. We'd have no unscheduled darkenings of anything in this house, of that we were quite certain. Otherwise a pretty regulation girl, married a banker, has six well educated snake eyed children. We still get invited to formal financial functions and blood cult revelries from time to time, usually politely decline. Wine was never to our taste when we did go.

Rasha is our second daughter, pale blue eyes, also like a snake. Got a second healer's opinion, which turned into a second priest's opinion, which turned into a second sorceror's opinion. Communing with a pale green fire we were informed of some nonsense or another, which turned into a first scholar's opinion. He eventually tracked it down to some kind of curse or cult plot under the town of Maribel, possibly confounding circumstances related to the wife of Maribel and her profession, ancestry, or proximity to a local bakery. He concluded it was likely not a health concern for your children or the town, so you filed a formal notice with the appropriate department as is your specialty. Rasha is otherwise a fairly regulation girl, married a pirate turned merchant-sometimes-pirate, went on some adventures, had three children, had an affair and a fourth child with a cobbler-turned-adventurer-turned-jester (long story), had a fifth and sixth child with a Taife's married warrior brother, and finally settled down to run an orphanage which later turned out to be an untaxed drug laundering scheme for the Taife. A lot of paperwork and fines later she got into horse breeding, horse racing, horse gambling, and breaking the legs of people who don't pay up. Also carpentry.

Mas'ud is our only son from that marriage. Light green eyes, oddly not like a snake. Not that it's odd to not have snake eyes, but his sisters always teased him about it. He wanted to be a clerk like us, until he saw us working. Then he decided to join up with the army, then wander around as an adventurer, then rejoin the army as an outrider. Married a foreign girl named Si, they have four children together and live a long ways off in some frontier outpost or border fort. Every now and then you get an animal fur or scrimshawed jawbone in the mail.

Zayna is our last daughter from that marriage. Pale blue snake eyes, very sweet girl though. Followed in our footsteps but ended up in the Office of Agriculture. Met her husband there, they have five children plus two orphaned nephews from her husband's brother, who died in an opium fire under rather muddled circumstances. You keep in relatively frequent contact with them, as your work occasionally overlaps and they live very nearby.

Anyway if you thought that was odd wait until you hear about our second wife(s).

[mightymushroom]

C

+1 to snek cult family
I blame the soothsayer who set us up.

[Kilojoule Proton]

A. The complaints must go through!

As for family, let's see...

Our first wife was named Maribel seeing as she was from Maribel, a small town largely composed of foreigners called Maril brought in for their fine carpentry, and what with the town having a bell and all the name sort of stuck. Ol' Maribel wasn't Maril though, her folks were a weaver and medicine man from down south a ways, though her father claimed distant ancestry from some feather-clad savage conqueror who supposedly sailed here centuries ago.

Anyway Maribel gave us four healthy children, two girls a boy and then another girl, before dying of malaise. Rather dull girl all things considered, but we were young and impetuous and the soothsayer was very precise in imploring us to find a weaver's daughter employed as a clerk. Coincidences and serendipity and all that.

Sa'adah is our eldest daughter, with pale green eyes. Like a snake, obviously. Had a healer check that out, said find a priest. Had a priest check that out, said find a sorceror. Had a sorceror check that out, said find his dark master and revel in the darkening of the world. That was enough of that, thank you sir. We'd have no unscheduled darkenings of anything in this house, of that we were quite certain. Otherwise a pretty regulation girl, married a banker, has six well educated snake eyed children. We still get invited to formal financial functions and blood cult revelries from time to time, usually politely decline. Wine was never to our taste when we did go.

Rasha is our second daughter, pale blue eyes, also like a snake. Got a second healer's opinion, which turned into a second priest's opinion, which turned into a second sorceror's opinion. Communing with a pale green fire we were informed of some nonsense or another, which turned into a first scholar's opinion. He eventually tracked it down to some kind of curse or cult plot under the town of Maribel, possibly confounding circumstances related to the wife of Maribel and her profession, ancestry, or proximity to a local bakery. He concluded it was likely not a health concern for your children or the town, so you filed a formal notice with the appropriate department as is your specialty. Rasha is otherwise a fairly regulation girl, married a pirate turned merchant-sometimes-pirate, went on some adventures, had three children, had an affair and a fourth child with a cobbler-turned-adventurer-turned-jester (long story), had a fifth and sixth child with a Taife's married warrior brother, and finally settled down to run an orphanage which later turned out to be an untaxed drug laundering scheme for the Taife. A lot of paperwork and fines later she got into horse breeding, horse racing, horse gambling, and breaking the legs of people who don't pay up. Also carpentry.

Mas'ud is our only son from that marriage. Light green eyes, oddly not like a snake. Not that it's odd to not have snake eyes, but his sisters always teased him about it. He wanted to be a clerk like us, until he saw us working. Then he decided to join up with the army, then wander around as an adventurer, then rejoin the army as an outrider. Married a foreign girl named Si, they have four children together and live a long ways off in some frontier outpost or border fort. Every now and then you get an animal fur or scrimshawed jawbone in the mail.

Zayna is our last daughter from that marriage. Pale blue snake eyes, very sweet girl though. Followed in our footsteps but ended up in the Office of Agriculture. Met her husband there, they have five children plus two orphaned nephews from her husband's brother, who died in an opium fire under rather muddled circumstances. You keep in relatively frequent contact with them, as your work occasionally overlaps and they live very nearby.

Anyway if you thought that was odd wait until you hear about our second wife(s).

+1