MERC XVII: You Can't Take the Pay From Me

[Recaiden]

A little easily concealable tag that sends off a peculiar signal. It might be electronics within, it might be tiny magical runes. Nadas has no idea how it works.
"That's a good idea. Where can I find her around here?" Nadas inquires, looking around the main room.

[Zefir]

[Main Room]

Fade looks up and then starts moving back into the base.

"Follow me." he says as he leads the way to Astrana's Office.

[Recaiden]

That's a good sign. This might be a real line of inquiry then.
Nadas follows.
(And can probably be skipped for any talk between Fade and Astrana)

[Artemis97]

[Astrana's Office]

"The one of a animal, a vulture to be precise. So I will need a carcass to offer it, so if you excuse me..." Astrana replies before she walks off towards a backdoor of her office, leading further into the tunnels below the base.
She soon returns dragging a the body of a gazelle behind her. She pulls it into the circle and then sits down next to it, starting to sing a chant. Nothing actually seem to appear in the circle, or eat the carcass, yet Astrana seems satisfied after a while. She pulls out the knife again and cuts open the gazelle's belly, causing all its intestines to spill out. She then rummages around in them as if looking for something. "It seems... like your soul is missing, Raril." She declares. "And you are infected by lycanthropy. That's concerning."

[Astrana's Office]

Raril takes a step back when the offal spills across the floor. The smell of the dead animal was strong. It made his lip curl, and his stomach rumble.

"Missing?" He echoes. "How can a soul be missing? I'm alive aren't I?" He looks down at his hands then rubs his head, uncertain. "Right?" He looks between Astrana and Electra, looking for answers. "And lycanthropy... I'm a werewolf? Gods... should I be locked up?"

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Astrana's Office]

Electra notes Raril's look, and inclines her head towards Astrana ever so slightly. The whole "soul missing" aspect is a new one on her, and while she has a theory, Astrana has a better grip on what's what in regards to souls, at least, here in the Nexus. The lycanthropy bit, though, she might be able to shed a bit of light on from what she saw in the bar.

"I think you may have had a handle on the lycanthropy bit, at least, before you lost your memories." She explains, glancing between Astrana and Raril. "When I came up to your office, you were laying on the floor in a wolf form. You transformed back to your current form before Dena was able to get some kind of healing...thing...going around you. I'm not really familiar with how something like that works here, though I have heard that it's possible."

[Shadowcaller]

[Astrana's Office]

Astrana takes a seat behind her desk, giving Raril a concerned look as she starts wiping off her hands from all that blood. "Soul loss is handled very different from world to world I believe. Back in Elshar, you'd basically be dead. I can't be certain how it is handled in the world you're from though. I mean, there aren't even such things as werewolves where I'm from, we have weretigers mostly. I can continue to investigate the problem though, but if you lost your memories, you might also have lost the control over your condition. I recommend staying here until we learn more."

[Artemis97]

[Astrana's Office]

Raril rubs the back of his neck nervously. "I guess that would be for the best. Keep folks safe from me. Keep me safe from whoever's trying to kill me. Work on solving this."

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Astrana's Office]

Electra looks between the two of them, and nods.

"Sounds like a good idea." She gives Astrana an apologetic look before asking her next question. "Can you help him get settled? I was actually on another mission, and need to return to the Black Dragon's Den to check on Dena and the others. I'm sure Dipsnig will want a full report on this when he gets back. I'll be back as soon as things are wrapped up."

[Green Elf]

[Phone Call]

"Indeed you don't, and Ilpholin wasn't always a demon hunter. She used to be a politician, and a consummate liar. Her word is nowhere near good enough for me to believe she's not hunting Nadas. So this is an academic question, really. Nadas is paying us to protect him from Ilpholin, and that's what we will do. It's not our job to ruminate on whether or not he needs it."

"Well, I do believe I protected Nadas and I believe I should get paid. There's nothing more I can do unless we actually get attacked." Says Jacob.

[Zefir]

That's a good sign. This might be a real line of inquiry then.
Nadas follows.
(And can probably be skipped for any talk between Fade and Astrana)

[Main Room] -> [Astrana's Office 2]

So they head to the office and knock on the door.

[Shadowcaller]

[Astrana's Office 2]

It takes a moment before they can hear Astrana's voice. "Come on in." She is sitting behind her office, looking at them as they enter. "How may I help you?"

[Astrana's Office]

The tiefling eyebrows raise. "I guess... one of the guest rooms?" She eyes Raril, her tail twitching slightly as she looks upon him. "Would you mind if I warded the door, for your own protection that is. I know that the full moon will be in just a day, and I don't want to risk anything."

[Zefir]

[Astrana's Office 2]

"Hello." Fade says. "I got this device here, which is obviously a tracking device. Could you tell me who it belongs to? It's part of a contract."

He offers her the device nadas gave him.

[Morty]

[Phone Call]

"You got his possible attacker's word that she won't hunt him. I'd rather believe the person who's paying us on this," Dipsnig says. "The contract will only be complete if we devise a way to protect Nadas from Ilpholin if she does attack. Such as faking his death, but after you went to her, that might not work anymore."

[Shadowcaller]

[Astrana's Office 2]

Astrana eyes the tracking device. "Depends on how closely attached the person who gave you it was to the objected. They obviously trusted in its function, using it to track you. Might just be enough." She gets up and places the item within her ritual circle in the middle of the room. "Just who it belonged to, yeah?"

[Artemis97]

[Astrana's Office]

The drow sighs. "I suppose I can't say no, now can I? That would just force you to lock me in a cell for the full moon instead. A room would be more comfortable." He reluctantly agrees.

[Green Elf]

[Phone Call]

"You got his possible attacker's word that she won't hunt him. I'd rather believe the person who's paying us on this," Dipsnig says. "The contract will only be complete if we devise a way to protect Nadas from Ilpholin if she does attack. Such as faking his death, but after you went to her, that might not work anymore."

"Faking death would actually still work. I set myself up to look like the enemy of Nadas. I could still do this. The one problem is that Ilophin is in her house. Maybe we could do it in front of her security cameras? Well, we still need to be careful on this, especially since I confirmed the demon thing." says Jacob.

[Zefir]

[Astrana's Office 2]

"It wasn't used to track me." Fade says. "It was used to track our client here." He points at Nadas, who should be around.
"We got a person in mind that may be responsible. I will tell you more, after we got a result."

[Morty]

[Phone Call]

"That's good. Then she won't immediately suspect someone is trying to fool her if she finds out he's dead," Dipsnig says. "She's still going to double-check, though. Like I said, I know her."

[Green Elf]

[Phone Call]

"That's good. Then she won't immediately suspect someone is trying to fool her if she finds out he's dead," Dipsnig says. "She's still going to double-check, though. Like I said, I know her."

"So what am I supposed to do?"

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Astrana's Office -> Front Gate]
Electra nods once more, and looks to Raril. "I'll be back to check on you soon." With that, she turns and takes her leave, closing the door quietly behind her. After that, she jogs up and out the front gate, before once more disappearing in a beam of blue light that shoots up through the sky when she gets past the edge of the dimensional lock.

[Morty]

[Phone Call]

"Does Fade still have his plan with a fake corpse? It's best if you work with him, either with that plan or another one. Faking his death is only stage one, anyway. Convincing Ilpholin it's genuine will be the hard part."

[Shadowcaller]

[Astrana's Office 2]

"Alright, I shall do my best, just let me get the sacrifice." Astrana replies as she leaves the room.
She soon returns, leading a goat by a rope into the circle, wielding a large sacrificial dagger. "Tell Dipsnig I need more animals, with these many requests, I'm starting to run out." She tells Zefir before she turns around and quickly cuts the goats throat. Showing no emotion whatsoever regarding the animals fate. The goat lets out a short-cut bleat before it collapses to the floor, bleeding out all over the ritual circle. The tiefling kneels down into the blood and starts to chant as she uses the knife to cut open the goats stomach and start pulling out its insides.

((I will need Rein to tell me if this works or not.))

[Astrana's Office]

Astrana nods. "Thank you, just give me a moment to clean up then." The tiefling gets up to wash her hands in a wash-bin that had been strategically placed in her office. She needed it with all the rituals she performed.
She then gestures for Raril to come along. "The guest rooms are this way." She will lead the drow back up to the upper-floor. "So Electra told me you can channel magic through music, despite not having any memory, so what made you remember it?" She asks as they walk towards the guest rooms.

[Reinholdt]

Ritual Got My Goat

The tracking device is owned by one M'siq'ql'lig. He's a spider. One of the fantasy families that has no real world equivalent.

[Shadowcaller]

[Astrana's Office 2]

Astrana eventually gets up, her clothes stained with goat blood. "It tells me it was a spider whose name I have a really hard time pronouncing. But it has to have been a intelligent spider of sort, does that sound familiar to you?" She turns to look at Fade and Nadas.

[Green Elf]

[Phone Call]

"Does Fade still have his plan with a fake corpse? It's best if you work with him, either with that plan or another one. Faking his death is only stage one, anyway. Convincing Ilpholin it's genuine will be the hard part."

"Okay then. I'll work on that." Says Jacob as he hangs up.

[Artemis97]

[Astrana's Office]

"I don't know." Raril admits, following the tiefling. "I just saw that my shirt was ruined and started singing. I don't know where the tune came from, or where I might have heard it before. Just felt like the right thing to do, you know? Seemed crazy, singing over a bloody shirt, but it worked."

[Shadowcaller]

[Astrana's Office]

She nods. "Where I'm from, we call people that do that griot's. People capable of making muses do things for them with music, poetry and stories. However, they usually need a soul to do it. I can't imagine the dangers of going around soulless like this. You're basically a open invitation to every hostile spirit out there. Therefore, I will need you as a focus to locate your soul, wherever it has gone." She opens the guest room door and invites him inside. "Souls are a bit harder to locate though, so I'm going to need some time to prepare."

[Artemis97]

[Astrana's Office => Guest Room]

Raril steps into the room, scratching at the old scar one the side of his head, hidden beneath the bandana he wore. Nevertheless, he smiles at Astrana. "I am here for you to do with whatever you wish." Was there a double meaning in those words?

[Shadowcaller]

[Guest Room]

Astrana seems to do a double take on Raril before she continues with a smile. "I'm glad you're so cooperative. Most people would be shivering wrecks right now. In fact, if you don mind I'd like find out just how your body can function without a soul. It will likely help considerably with returning the soul to you." Not exactly true, but it would help Astrana's research a lot at least.

[Recaiden]

"Giant spiders pretty much all have difficult names."
Nadas adds. But that does help.
"Ilpholin has a giant spider companion, but he didn't go by a spider-name. Thank you, though."