Riverside 16: Turn and face the strain

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

The manager doesn't seem to be around, which leaves manning the store up to the designated clerk-imp. Exar looks up, standing up at attention from his stool.
"W-welcome to the Third Circle, miss. How can I help you?" stutters the imp.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

"Well hello there."
Cleo peers at the imp curiously.

"Are you quite alright?" Anyway I was wondering if you had any storybooks. Or songbooks. Or magic books, or textbooks. Basically anything but cookbooks.

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

The imp shakes his head furiously.
"We have all of the above, miss! Feel free to browse! I'm perfectly alright!" he says, quite clearly nervous as he belts out his lines.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

"Mhmmm."
With a suspicious look at the imp, she heads to the nearest stack or shelf.

"I don't imagine you're supposed to tell me where they are?"

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

"Eeep!" squeaks the imp under the scrutiny.
"Fiction is right in front of you, songs are three rows down on the left, textbooks are near the back on the right, and magic tomes are way in the back against the far wall!" he says, quick to fix the mistake.

[ThirdEmperor]

[The Toy Tinker]

"Well, yes and no." Hex very pointedly keeps his back to the shopkeep's accusing stares, preferring to watch 'his' creation swoop and flutter about among the beams. It's significantly more welcoming company.

"I'm not human, I suppose I should tell you that much. Because if I was a person, I'd be rather a terrible one, turning people into frogs and such. No, I am definitely no power-mad sorcerer." With a whistle he calls the robin down again, and the bird alights gracefully on his arm, lifting it's head for him to pet with the crook of his fingers and trilling a happy note of reply. The details on its wings seem to have grown deeper, more real, the feathers actually separated instead of lines on a flat piece of tin. "But in the course of my duties, I made a little mistake. That curse had gone very wrong when it reached you. Being that to err is only human, you do understand that I need to know why, yes?"


[The Museum Heist]

Something gives beneath Cassidy's fist with a fleshy pop, black and tarry blood that smells of burning metal coming away on her fist. It certainly shuts the Burglar up, and the angry kick he responds with is more reflex than conscious motion, pathetically easy to avoid.

Mainly, it ends up leaving his foot the last bit of him within her reach - as the ground seems to have split open and swallowed up the rest of him.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

Cleo heads down and browses through the songs, trying to convince herself not to buy every one of them.

"Not been working here long?"

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

Exar nods. "We just opened two days ago, Miss." he says simply, unaware of the woman's mental struggle.

[Shadowcaller]

Cell

Certain sighs and says, "Spare me the theatrics. If you were going to kill me, you would have done so while I was unconscious. And if you must know what I was doing to Azare, I was enlightening her. The gods are evil, and this is an empowerment to let me fight them. Most mortals are blind to their evil, though, and I can share my gift, showing them the evil of the gods, freeing them from the cycle of mortality, and empowering them to fight back."

Cell

This time Tarim doesn't reply, instead he grabs Certain's hair while standing up at his full length, pulling her up so they're eye to eye. The chains strain a bit as the mage turned demon leaves the floor but that pain is probably nothing compared to the hair dragging. "Make no mistake, unless you can name one reason for me to spare your miserable life. I will give you to the fire so it can judge you for the deeds you done. If I'm not mistaken it will turn you into ash, despite whatever sad justification you use to justify your life." He let's go of her, letting her drop back onto the floor. "So I will ask you this, did you work alone or are there others like you around here? Do you take orders from someone?"

[Ionbound]

Cell

Certain cries out as Tarim pulls her hair and glares at him, tears of pain in her eyes, as she says, "You will let me free. Now," her voice dripping with hypnotic magic as she weaves the most powerful spell she can to try to dominate Tarim's will.

[Shadowcaller]

Cell

Tarim grins. "I wouldn't be a servant if I'd be capable of falling for that." He himself isn't immune, in fact, demons of his kind are very susceptible to mind control, but his armor protected him from that. "So again, answer my question or it's the flames for you. I don't think you know all that much honestly considering your methods."

[Ionbound]

Cell

Certain glares and says, still clearly is a "I know a lot more that you do...But fine. I am alone, if that makes you happy...I wanted to enlighten Azare because she was nice...And I wanted her to be the first to know the truth."

[Shadowcaller]

Cell

"Yes, how could I misinterpret your noble intentions?" Tarim asks in a sarcastic tone. "At best, you're like the ones selling corruption, at worst I probably should just skip the questions and throw you in the fire right now. But tell me, why did you come to this citadel of all places? There had to be far less defended places for you to choose from. Either you're extremely stupid or you had some kind of agenda."

[Ionbound]

Cell

Certain shrugs and replies, "Well...Clerics, first and foremost, deserve to see the evil of their god. And to be honest, I only meant to scout out the temple to see if it's worth trying to convert. But Azare...She was nice. I felt like she deserved the truth. Is that so wrong?"

[Gullara]

[Northside Hospital]

Obriane finally turns to Kitty, sniffing loudly as she attempts to control her own tears. "I can't move Kitty. I can't even more." She utters, her voice weak and shrill from her sobs.

[Northside Hospital]

Kitty strains to reach across the gaps between their beds and grab Obriane's hand. "Nothing is going to hurt them, okay?" She meets Obriane's eyes with a look that really shows that she means it.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

"I see. Try not to be afraid of customers. Really, we should be afraid of you."
Cleo moves up and down the aisle with a stack of books and papers already in one hand.
"Is this the sort of place where we haggle over how much these are really worth, or where that would end violently, or somewhere in the middle...?"

And now she's wandering into the magic books section, seeing if there's anything particularly interesting.

[Shadowcaller]

Cell

Tarim almost looks like he's about to laugh. "Poor fool, so blinded by your own perceptions you don't even realize other people might have other opinions than you. I would almost pity you if your blindness didn't hurt other beings. But I had enough of this charade, I will let the light judge you instead." Before even Tarim finishes that sentence his hand attempts to grab Certain by the throat and infuse her with the burning light.

The burning light is a sentient being in a way, once it touches a person it attempts to look through all memories and then basically burn through them. Whatever the person might have done, it always hurts like hell, but a persons misdeeds will hurt especially much. They might even lose some of these memories in the process, or see them in a completely different light afterwards. It's up to the player.

[Northside Hospital]

Obriane squeezes Kitty's hand tightly. "Y-yeah, but we can't stay here. We gotta get healed." She rambles in the same shrill weak voice as before. "We have to move."

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

"We only haggle for exchanges, miss. The prices are as listed."
The magic books are pretty paltry in selection, because not many people have sold such pieces. Killick's minor Preserver tome is there, along with a few assorted apprentice spellbooks, and a few magic scrolls, though not the ones Killick brought.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

"That's a shame. Probably good though. Keeps fraud down."
Cleo flips through the preserver tome, curious. But not for her. She already has all these levels in bard, plus her racial hit dice. There's no way she'd live long enough to get that high level, much less all the things one would have to go through.
The scrolls, though. Those she adds to the stack, which is then brought to the counter.

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

Exar doesn't make any question of her purchases, and rings Cleo up for a rather reasonable sum for her large pile of books.
"Anything else, miss?" he says quietly.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

Cleo nods at the price. Not that bad.

"Do you sell bookmarks?"
They have to sell bookmarks, right? Every bookstore does.

Either way she gets out her budget and starts counting out whatever the accepted currency is. I wouldn't put it past Malenchar to have their own type of money.

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

Exar points to a rack next to the counter, full of novelty bookmarks of all kinds, from ones with puns and faces on them to the kind that change image as you look at them from different angles to one particularly expensive one that makes the book appear blank if you put it in the book and then open the book without saying the password.

[Ionbound]

Cell

Certain screams as the light pervades her being, bringing forth her sins for all to see. The weight of her sins are so great, her eyes and mouth both let out light as her skin also begins to glow. Every bad decision, every mistake, and every simple, immoral choice play back and forth, over and over again before her. She rattles against the chains, desperately trying to clutch her head and curl up.

When the pain abates, she glares at Tarim and pants, "What...Was that...Supposed to do...Torture...Will get you nowhere..."

[Shadowcaller]

Cell

Tarim stares down at Certain, for the first time unable to hide his surprise. She still lived, somehow. "Like as if you would be able to grasp the light!" He sneers at her his fist tightening around her throat for a moment before he simply let's her go. "You survived and yet you have learned nothing?!" His gaze bore's into her in frustration.
"What do you feel?" He finally asks as he seems to have calmed down a bit.

[Ionbound]

Cell

Certain coughs as Tarim grabs her throat, and when he releases her, chokes, "Nope...I still know...That the gods...Are evil...And nothing...Will change that...It's fact...As for...What I feel...I hurt...A lot."

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

The bookmarks are looked over and all found insufficient.
"That will be all, thank you."

[Deathkeeper]

The Third Circle

Yeah, that was one rack Tep didn't bother to restock from what was there before he bought it at all.
Presumably payments are made!
"Thank you miss. Come again some time." says the imp, starting to sound like he's not reading off note cards. A little bit.

[Recaiden]

[The Third Circle]

Payments are made.
"Mhm. Keep practicing your lines."

Customer accomplish!

[Morty]

[The Third Circle]

Dipsnig comes riding to the newly-opened store, mounted on Viima. Strangely enough, he has no other mercenaries with him, save for one of his lieutenants, despite commanding a considerable force in the gloomy city.

[Shadowcaller]

Cell

Tarim shakes his head. "I have no idea what you just said. The burning light isn't a god anyway so you're barking up the wrong tree. That you survived the light yet come out as the very same person only tells me how ignorant you must be. The light really should have killed you one the spot." The servant grumbles. "If it can't judge you, then I will find something else that will. Tell me, would anyone know about you?"

[The Third Circle]

Dena is walking alongside the wolf, wondering if Dipsnig was trying out that whole cynophobia thing on every new client he meet, just in case. Or maybe the wolf was just there to make him feel taller. But it was probably just for security and transport, though her theories were funnier. "So are you sure this is a good idea, boss? Heard the owner is some kind of demon and those aren't fun to deal with." That whole demon temple had just been trap after trap without any reward. A total waste of time.