[Nexus] Trog's Tavern CCXLIII

[FireFox]

Could be better. The thief shrugs, looking bored. How're the mercenary business and your own magic stuff?

[Lady Serpentine]

I'm a sharp foist and file, of course. Ally leans back on her stool, slipping into thieves cant with proud braggadocio. I'm an expert crackswoman and second story girl, having done the odd job as a glazier, jumper, and darksman budge. And me name mi' as well be Kate, seeing how I'm such a rum dubber. You'll find no be'er gilt as can work a charm, screw, or betty with my fingers' skill. She winks flirtatiously at Lynette, completely unaware of Ashley's presence. I'm also an ole hand at the counterfeit crank game and ha'been contracted by jarkmen to do hard jobs, ones they couldn't themselves, see.

To translate into modern english, Ally claims to be an experienced pickpocket and burglar, as well as very skilled at opening locks, which she considers herself to be the best at. She also claims to be an excellent con artist and such a good forger that professional forgers turn to her do jobs they can't. I'm not sure Lynette knows thieves cant, but if she doesn't, Ally will let her know what she means.

Ally waves at Rein after spending quite some time deciding if she should. On one hand, he's psychotic, on the other hand, he's one of the few people she's talked to in the Nexus. So if he looks in her direction, he may see the redheaded thief waving and nervously smiling her best "Please don't cut off your other ear in front of me" smile at him. Then she returns to waiting for Lynette to reply to her.

Lynette caught most of it, but jarkmen are known as featherhands in the City, since quills are more common than pens or printing presses there, a jumper would be an acrobat from the Web-circuses, and a darksman budge would be one of Riddletongue's (wo)men, after a thief who was good at using that method.

However, as her player not having time to actually write up a proper post here has resulted in Lynette being out of continuity, I rather suspect that her actual reply doesn't really matter at this point.

[Reinholdt]

MHF tilts its head... the other way now! Still curiously staring at Kullervo. Perhaps it finds the doggy scary wolf creature cute.

Reinholdt frowns and goes to step out of the square before rolling again.
At least he didn't have to pick it up every time he rolled it.

[Devixer]

"It's going," Ashley says. "I'm taking jobs, learning some new magic, keeping my place from falling apart."

[Rebonack]

Second roll!

Rein gets a 1!

A red ray of light arcs out of the die and paints a nice five foot square of red right under the totally a cat vampire's feet! Now there's a red square next to an indigo square. Yay?

The squares don't appear to be doing anything.

Aside from being red.

And also a square.

Then the explanation all comes tumbling down on Rein's mind out of nowhere. Each square has a different effect depending on what color the Kitteh is standing on!

Red enhances his physical power!
Orange empowers his durability!
Yellow greatly augments his natural healing!
Green boosts his speed and agility!
Blue improves his reasoning and deduction skills!
Indigo allows for instant teleportation to colored squares!
Violet grants eye lasers! Pew pew!

Jumping out of one square onto a nearby area will paint that five foot square in the same color. Walking leaves them unaltered.

An eight, of course, results in a Rainbow Square. That grants ALL THE COLORS!

[Morty]

Kullervo decides to leave the creepily staring wrong-smelling thing and returns to Dipsnig.

Dipsnig himself is, meanwhile, watching Reinholdt mess around with some magic dice with curiosity.

[FireFox]

That's good. Ally looks around and notices Ashley's boss, whom she met once. Any of those jobs require a talented and attractive thief?

[Devixer]

Ashley giggles in response to that. "I can't think of any off the top of my head, but I'll be sure to let you know of any." She doesn't notice Dipsnig.

[Morty]

Dipsnig's ears twitch and one of them moves slightly so as to try and overhear Ally and Ashley's conversation. He has very sharp hearing, even for a goblin. He doesn't move in their direction apart from that, though.

[FireFox]

The young redhead isn't trying to be surreptitious, so the goblin can hear what she's saying. Ah well... I can try to find a job that requires some magical assistance, if you're interested.

[Devixer]

Ashley grins. "Of course I'm interested. Be kinda hard for me not to be interested in a job that you offered." She starts to slowly move her hand along Ally's hip, unless stopped. She isn't making any effort to be quiet, so Dipsnig can probably hear her as well.

[Morty]

So the red-headed thief is interested in working with them. Worth keeping in mind. But the way this conversation appears to be heading, butting in now would be unappreciated, probably.

[FireFox]

Ally did talk to Dipsnig a while ago, when she was looking for Ashley, about doing jobs on contract for NO, but he didn't have anything then and he probably forgot all about it. Is that so? She grins and leans in for a soft kiss.

[Devixer]

"Yeah, I'd say so." Ashley returns the kiss as always, but pulls back sooner than normal. Probably because they're in a more public place than a high rooftop.

[Reinholdt]

Hmm... this requires testing.
Via hopping. Like a bunny.

Reinholdt hops from one place to the next, making trog's a little more colourful. Every once in a while he stops to roll the die and get a new colour. Well, unless he rolls the same as previously. But that's the chance you take.

[Rebonack]

Rebo trusts Rein to roll his own dice at this point now that it is known what the item does =P

Anywho...

Rein hops around!

The floor of Trog's is now VERY colorful. If there were some way to make the squares strobe between different colors this would be a great set up for a disco!

Sadei giggles softly at the display!

Meanwhile!

The plastic lewt and remaining dice (which also happen to be plastic) are sucked back up the portal which promptly spirals shut!

Woohoo, encounter over!

[nanobot_swarm]

Ivaz shakes her head. Eh, no. No way, no how. No joining some religious group.

Also, something you might want to consider during your time here. Your deities are probably unheard of around here. You can go ahead and mention them all you want, but odds are good there aren't many people here who know them.

Ivaz will lean against a table near the Crusader. And it's true the other way around. Like my home, for instance. We don't have gods. Just spirits. Ten, in fact. One for each element. And you haven't heard of any of them because they don't exist in your home.

Also, odds are good that some of your laws don't exist where other people are from. Should probably learn the law of the land before you start telling people they're wrong and sinful and stuff.

And I will fully admit that I can easily be called evil. I have no shame in that. I am a proud, sexy, murderous woman.

He pauses a moment and then looks around the room and says, "So you are telling me that none here know of my Lady? The great radiant matron? Surely you jest, it seems nigh impossible, for these folks to not know of her, for they bask in her glory each day as they live their lives, soaking in her eminent illuminesence. There is no way this is anymore than a joke.
Come now," he shouts out to all in the tavern, "you are all worshippers of the Divine Light, are you not?" He is genuinely asking this, and seems a bit shaken by this possible revelation.

[OrchestraHc]

"Umm, I'm sorry Sir, but no," the flumph says to the crusader. "I'm not even from this planet, so I really don't even know the local religion. Were you not aware this was a different world?"

[KerfuffleMach2]

Ivaz laughs at the Crusader. Wow. How long you been here, buddy? Couldn't have been too long. Hour? Maybe two?

She turns to the flumph. There is no set religion here. You can find a bunch of deities, and a bunch of people who worship things that aren't even found here. This place is kind of a crossroads of all realities deal.

[Rebonack]

"Ooooooh!" comes a rather silly interjection from Zee. Seems she has finally decided to comment on this little debate that's so busy raging. "A sun worshiper! Heehee! That's one that sure does come in plenty of flavors. Hopefully you aren't talking about Psyrrak though."

She wrinkles her nose slightly.

"Psyrrak is generally bad news. You don't smell like the sort that mucks about with Eldritch forces though, so your Lady must be one of the bazillion other sun goddesses!"

Bazillions!

"I dunno. I've never been that keen on worshiping giant burning balls of radiation and solar plasma. Seems kind of silly to me!"

[Murkus]

"Only a fool would say otherwise," Percival attests, enjoying another draught of his drink. Whatever that was when he ordered. "But enough about me. What was this keeping you from drinking?"

[nanobot_swarm]

The Crusader is thoroughly bewildered by what he hears from these people, it truly boggles his mind. Also kind of makes him amgry, "I am in a den of heathens in a land of pagans?! This is pure madness, I had been riding out from my glorious homeland of Alvalar to the other kingdoms as part of our crusade to vanquish evil and save the souls of the peasentry and yeomen, and I am expected to believe that I had somehow ended up upon another land entirely?! Pure lunacy!"
He's now drawing his sword and shield, and his mind, disbelieving the situation before him, concludes that this must be trickery of some fiends. Now as he backs away, inching towards the door, he shouts out, "Vile fiends, thou shalt not bambozzle me with thine foul tricks! I did not fall to the beckonings of thine false god, and I will surely not fall for your treachery now!"
He then turns to Zee and shouts, "How dare you insult my Lady so with your lies, apologize for your fell words, or face the consequences of your heresey!"

[KerfuffleMach2]

Ivaz shakes her head a little, still grinning. Somebody's taking things a little hard.

Look, how about I show you some fancy item that I'm fairly certain you haven't seen before, hm? At that, she will reach under the table she is near. Her arm moves as if she were sticking her hand through the table. In reality, she is shoving her hand into the shadow under the table. From that shadow, she draws out a revolver. She holds it out to show the Crusader.

See? Fancy future technology. It's called a gun, and it's a way better ranged weapon than anything you got. Even crossbows.

[OrchestraHc]

"C'mon, remember how friendly we were earlier? Let's stay on that track. Let's you and me sit down to some tea and cucumber sandwiches?" The flumph tries to lay a few calming tentacles on the crusader's shoulder. "I can explain your situation a bit better with you calm and my stomach not so rumbly from potential violence. Please, be calm." The poor flumph sounds really desperate.

[Rebonack]

Welp.

Weapons are being drawn.

That means it is now officially time for Zee to step in as her other role in the tavern. Well... when Baby isn't around at least.

It may suddenly become dreadfully obvious to anyone looking at Zee that she's by no means a perfectly normal human female. Not a transformation, no. She's always been that perception-warping thing of dimensions not meant to meet the mind of mortals. The Far Chimera is massive almost beyond comprehension. There's no physical way she should be able to fit in the tavern, and yet there she is!

Looming over the Crusader in all her preternatural alien glory.

"There will be no fighting amongst patrons in Trog's Tavern," the Far Chimera rumbles, her voice like a vast multitude all speaking in harmony. "Put your weapons away or leave. Or fight and I'll throw you out."

[Chas the mage]

The machine seems to contemplate this for a second, as if slightly confused. "How did you break past the brainwashing? Was it something that had to be done every so often?"

"The brainwashing," he states, and pauses. "It was almost like, say, the tooth fairy or many similar things. I'm not familiar with what fits in with your culture, but it was quite like that." He decides to order himself some water. "Once I was on the outside of the lie, looking in at the crashing empire who's citizens hated me, it seemed rather obvious."

((sorry for my delay, I was in the wilderness of the northern cascades for a few days and I didn't get a chance to warn you))

[nanobot_swarm]

The Crusader looks at the strange device in puzzlement, or at least we can guess puzzlement, his helmet hides his face and all, or maybe the expression is confusion. Hmmmmm, it could be genuine curiosity, or maybe fear as some sorcery or....screw it, he's looking at it with some expression of something. He says, "What sort of nonsensical contraption is that, it looks like one of the mad devices an alchemist would create that spits out strange chemicals for whatever purpose alchemists use them for."
He is about to respond to the flumph, till he hears and gazes upon the hideous chimeric form of Zee, bellowing its threat to him in its harmonious mutitude. He quakes in fear at the sight of the fell creature, but manages to strengthen his resolve. In his mind, he stands before a demon of the wastes his holy books speak of, and knows it is his solemn duty as a knight to vanquish these fell creatures if ever he encounters one. He shouts to those in the tavern, "People within this establishment, I care not that you are heathens, flee! Flee from this fell beast that seeks to tear your souls asunder! I will fight it off as best I can! Make haste in thy escape!"
He then turns his attention to the flumph and speaks, "Strange being, I know not what you are, you may perhaps be a fiend, but thou seemest a friend. I beg of thee to run whilst there is still time, and that if it is possible, warn other warriors that a fell monster doth dwell within this wretched tavern."
Finally, he focuses all attention on the far chimera, trying his best to not fully gaze at its horrifying form. He delivers a final speech to it, "Blasphemous beast, thy treacherous words will not fool me! I will neither let you harm the misguided souls in this tavern, nor shall I let you blight this land into a twisted image of your own barren home! Fell monster, I will not let you harm another whilst I draw breath! Face me demon, as you will soon face the Lord of Cinder in Tarturus!"
He then shouts a battle-cry, and charges the beast, intent to kill, or at least fight it long enough so that others may escape. Of course, those he hoped would escape are instead probably watching with amusement, and placing bets on how long it will take this zealous fool to get massacred.
This isn't going to end well.

[OrchestraHc]

"No, wait, please!" the flumph tries to argue, "She's not a demon, she's the barmaid. Go ahead and ask her for a sandwich, she'll give it to you. She hasn't even threatened anyone, except you, but you kind of threatened her fir- and there goes my stomach." It has to go float over and slump on a table like a beached jellyfish. He really doesn't have a stomach for violence.

[Mr. Moon]

The crusader will suddenly find himself being faced with a bundle of grey anger. Well. 'Faced' is, perhaps, a misleading term. A grey-skinned elf, coming up to chest level if he's sized the same as a human, is charging at him from his shield-bearing side. She's not heavy enough to pin him, but she's relying on his focus on Zee to let her catch him by surprise. She reaches up to grab him by the collar, pulling him down so she can punch him in the face and throw him to the ground.
"I really hate people like you," Moon Called growls. "Shut up and let me enjoy my whisky."

[Reinholdt]

"Well I'm out." Reinholdt says, hopping his way out of the bar and leaving colours in his wake. Seems like nasty stuff is going down that doesn't give treasure. No point in sticking around for that.