The locals call the city Shuǐmén. In the commontongue of the Northwest, it is better known as River’s Mouth.It is called one of the so-called Three Sacred Treasures of the Goldenriver Men of the Far East; of them, it is perhaps the most renowned. Its spice, silk, porcelain, and especially their alchemical medicine is so world-renowned that the merest scent of them can lure Man, Dwarf, and Elf from across the desert-dry and bandit-besieged expanses of the Goblin Wastes, or through the warring beastman chiefdoms of the cold rim of the world. It is said that the great alchemical philosophers of the Goldenriver Race, whom they call ‘cultivators’ in their commontongue, can turn water to wine, lead to gold, and rejuvenate the elderly so that they may be young again.You came seeking one such man who went even further than that.His name was Ziwei Bo, the enigmatic and outwardly-unimpressive proprietor of the Emporium of Wonders. To a layman, his shop was just one more overstuffed bargain bin of magical and alchemical curiosities. Neither shop nor shopkeeper was as they seemed, though, as the most learned hedgemages and occultists of the East alone knew. Ziwei Bo was a lich, and his emporium a demiplane where even Death Himself, the Lord of Endings, could not find and claim the undead cultivator’s soul.At least, not until you showed him the way.
>>6297401You are the demontained goblinoid occultist self-styled ‘Carazzi Yosef’. You made a deal with the Emporium’s master, for alchemical medicine which could help transform you into a better class of being, worthy of the noble name you’ve recently reclaimed.And you are also her nilbog soul-sister, Zith-Zi, the sword-swinging leader of the Monstrous Regiment. Ever since your other half was removed in a ritual to purify and prettify you, you have been looking out for CZ’s best interests however you can.Originally, the two of you had intended to capture and turn over the legendary shapeshifting hundun in exchange for the potent pills which would awaken and empower Carazzi’s potential. Fortunately or unfortunately, those plans fell through: the hundun, styling itself ‘The Naked Emperor’ of the northeastern steppe, proved strangely charismatic despite being a mentally-unstable blob capable of producing random organs and extremities…(…or maybe BECAUSE of that, depending who you ask…)...And thus you had decided to steal the power of Ziwei Bo instead. You pretended to proffer The Naked Emperor, only to spring an ambush that swiftly incapacitated the lich, and cowed his subordinates. In his deepest and most secret sanctum, though, a vampiric watchman and a magically-tapped doorway delayed your triumph and weakened your warriors. By the time you bypassed these threats, and Carazzi chugged the still-liquid potion in a fit of demonic hedonism, the undying alchemist had arisen anew.You bested him… But at no small cost.The Naked Emperor lost one of his loyal gyrfalcon fairy followers, an ageless ally of old named Nasir.And you… You lost your apprentice. His name was Xoldur, of the Steelwood’s Wolfpack Horde. He was a young half-orc whom you had taken under your wing as a sword-student, and with whom you had begun to forge a bond of mutual respect.Until Ziwei Bo drained the life from his body, then ripped his beating heart from his still-living chest.…
…Welcome back to CAMBION QUEST, the tale of two goblinoid girls striving to stake their place in an ever-weirder world. They struggle in the shadow of greater forces and grander designs than either can conceive, yet the decisions they make promise (or threaten?) to shift the very foundations of their world.Previous volumes are at https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive.html?tags=reptoidqm , as well as the earlier quests set in the same world; only CQ is really required reading, though long-time players will recognize recurring characters, areas, and motifs.It’s been a hell of a ride, but we’re entering our final arc now. Thank you all for joining me, putting up with my typographical errors, for helping to shape these characters and their universe.With Ziwei Bo slain—by way of Ayla communing with Death Himself as you may recall—we pick back up right where we left off: in the interior of a demiplane without a dominus.…
>>6297405You are happy. You really are! For one thing, you’re alive, and for a while there that was touch-and-go. You’re sore as shit, with a glorified zombie-wizard’s gross shadow-splooge all up in your wounds? Okay, sure. But that smug fucker is dead and dusted like few beings have ever been before, dragged kicking and screaming down into Death’s Domain. You’re alive, and your sis even MORE alive, being chock full of special Oriental super-sauce or some shit. That’s a win!But Xoldur is dead.You stand over the pale grey body of your first-ever student. His expression ought to be at peace, at least, having died (technically) in his sleep… But it’s not. His barbarically-handsome, tusk-framed mouth is stretched in a pained grimace. His eyes are half-open, unseeing but angry, defiant to the bitter end. No peace for this young fighter, then, even as his slayer joins him in the afterlife…But then, maybe that’s how an orc would want it. Even unconscious, he died in a state of barbarian rage.“We have to go,” Ayla reminds you urgently.You turn to the cambion caster—your sister’s OTHER sister, from a different and deadlier sort of dalliance than that which produced you and CZ. You feel no great love for her even now, being the doppelganger of your old friend’s manipulative bitch girlfriend and all, but she’s earned her place among the Regiment’s ranks. Plus, she knows her shit: it’s her magecraft, and that of her man Veigar, which will soon allow CZ to have the life she always wanted… And, for good measure, turn your already-monstrous regiment into a true force to be reckoned with!(A fortune-teller recently reassured you this was so… Well, more or less.)“Carazzi is going to metabolize the last of the magic soon, if we don’t get her back to Patmo-Shoka,” Ayla nags you. “Remember how she DRANK it? ALL of it? That is NOT the intended method of ingestion!”You sigh, turning your weary gaze from Xoldur’s corpse, and put on the brave face expected of a goblin Boss—an archetype you’ve become well-accustomed to playing.“Yeah yeah, I hear ya,” you say with a smirk. “Ya oughtta be thankin’ CZ, ya know that? If she hadn’t got herself all suped-the-fuck-up, we mighta died back there.”Ayla huffs and crosses her arms. Both of you look towards the cambion in question, and Carazzi looks equal parts sheepish and proud. Eventually Ayla sighs and nods, to CZ’s visible delight.“Nonetheless, we NEED to leave, and NOW. Otherwise, it will all be for nothing.”Now THAT, you can’t have. Xoldur—uh, and Nasir or whatever-the-fuck that fairy was called, you guess—dying for no practical gain would be a loss you’re not sure you could stomach… And you’re already feeling pretty sickly, to be honest, between all the bloodloss, the concussion, and the dark magic.
>>6297406“Alright, whip up a Dimension Door and let’s blow this joint,” you say.Ayla opens her mouth, then shuts it, looking away in embarrassment.“What?” you groan. “What the fuck is it NOW?”“Calling upon De—upon the Lord of Endings, it wasn’t an easy thing.” Ayla’s eyes flit back to you. “I can only transport four.”“Four?” you repeat dully.Now, arithmetic ain’t exactly a high priority where you were born and raised, but no adventurer-for-hire gets by without some basic math. Between you, CZ, Ayla, and the hundun, you’d have four—croak!—or five, counting your little golden-feathered drake buddy, Hershy, but he’s so small he doesn’t really count for this teleportation shit. But then there’s the matter of the other body—still breathing—on the floor beside Xoldur:Your other apprentice, and his sister, Murbal.“Can’t CZ just, I dunno, give ya some extra juice?” you cajole the caster.“Uh,” Carazzi begins, shifting from foot to foot.“No,” Ayla says bluntly. “Use your qi sense, Zith-Zi.”You roll your eyes, then focus them and do so. Carazzi’s ‘aura’ still seems as bloated as her body ever since she gorged herself on Ziwei Bo’s special recipe, at first. Then you squint, and really see it: the thinness and sort of… Sparkliness?... Of the engorged energy-field. It’s just like the proverbial candle that burns twice as bright: it’s burning itself too damn fast.Ayla’s right: it’s now or never.But can you really just leave someone behind here? Abandon Xoldur’s still-warm body in the home of his killer? And even if you did… Who would you leave with it? The badly-injured hundun who the stragglers here would chop up for parts? Unconscious and helpless Murbal?(…Stay behind yourself, like some heroic goddamn moron?)It can’t be CZ, obviously, nor Ayla: one is the subject of this all-important ritual; the other is maybe the only one who can see it through to fruition.Specify at least one character to travel through the Dimension Door. It can be more than one.>Zith-Zi>Murbal>The Naked Emperor>Everybody—you’ll all stay here together until Ayla recuperates her MP, even if it cost you the cultivation magic
>6297408>Write-in: sage goes in all fields
>>6297408Cant Ayla go around and kill some people to restore her mp? Cara comsumed mana from one of the foundlings grabbed and killed https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2025/6179729/#p6209638I assumed draining mana from beings you kill was a universal ability amongst demons.And pretty sure some Ziwei's staff is still around here somewhere.
>>6297430[The urgency is the thing, but I would allow it. Just be aware it will be a oervnrile roll for how it goes, and losing/dying or failing to capture them befor ethey leave and running out the clock on the metabolization of the pill-potion are on the table.]>>6297415[Sage does nothing here, anon.]
>>6297408>Zith-ZiMurbal is still knocked-out, so let's take care of the big guy.
>>6297449> be a oervnrile roll*be a percentile roll
Write-in: Help Alya go kill some of Ziwei' stragglers to recovery her Mp.Anyone we leave here will be in great danger.>>6297408But can you really just leave someone behind here? Abandon Xoldur’s still-warm body in the home of his killer? And even if you did… Who would you leave with it? The badly-injured hundun who the stragglers here would chop up for parts? Unconscious and helpless Murbal?And splitting the party without finshing off our enemies. Was how we got ourselves Into the situation in the first place
>>6297494>+1Ill support this write in, I say we go for Ma Wufeng, see if Ayla can root any secrets out of her head in the process, maybe have an idea where this lich kept specific stuff that we can snag on our way out, if not possible Ill concede to just draining Wufeng, just saying magic item shop probably got a few cool magic items Ziwei didnt keep up front that the lady of the house would know about, plus I dont want that bitch coming back to get us or finding some loophole to bring Ziwei back to come and get us (pretty sure he dead dead though as he got taken by deaths avatar)
>>6297494+1
>>6297405>It’s been a hell of a ride, but we’re entering our final arc now. Guess this is it, huh.>>6297494+1
>>6297616[Yep, the next 1 to 3 threads are the grand finale! I'm not going to hurry it along depending on how choices go, but that should be obvious since we've been running for months longer than expected, eh? Remember when this was supposed to be a short mini-quest?]>>6297511>>6297494>>6297553[Just to be clear, and not to steer anybody, but this does run a real risk of failing the main "mission" of the last couple threads in various ways. Being in the final stretch, I also won't be pulling punches.]
>>6297408>The Naked EmperorCZ needs it for moral supportWe can stay here with Murbs and give her brother a proper orc burial, and browbeat Ma into showing us a more mundane way out of here.
>>6297637We already rolled 1. We're karma-safe, as we say in my language - NoNoobNoArnak which mean NoNoobNoScam
>>6297637That scares me so im changing my vote to bring empy as hes more inclined to protect CZ if Ayla tries any underhanded shit and will want to be with his posse especially with the loss of Nasir, ZZ will stay with Murbal as leaving Xoldurs body will not go over well and the steelwood orcs still need a heir to their chief, Murbal is going to be emotional from this and will need CZ for support as shes the closest thing Xoldur and her had as family besides one another in the Monstorous Regiment>The Naked Emperor
>>6297408>Specify at least one character to travel through the Dimension Door. It can be more than one.alright, I misread it at first. changing vote to:>Murbal>The Naked Emperor
>>6297807>>6297654>>6297639>>6297616>>6297553>>6297494>the vote count nearly doubles from tail-end of Thread 7[Hooray!]>It's a tie[Aww dang.][Alright, so here's what we're going to do...]This being an important vote that will determine some major events for the endgame, it will stay open until tomorrow!During that time, I want any 1post IDs to log a second comment here, and any newcomers to log a vote, and then sometime tomorrow confirm your IP. I will, per previous threads, count repeat IDs as a higher priority if the tie remains.To make up for the lack of udpate, I'm also going to take any lore questions you might have, a general AMA/FAQ about this or otehr quests (except spoilers), AND...You can also cast your vote for the character you most want to see art of, and I'll prioritize that for a commission!
>>6297848Chibi version of Naked Emperor smoking would be funny
>>6297848This is me>>6297639won't be getting the ID from that post backWill try to remember to post from this one again tomorrow morning before going back to my life at the workplace
>>6297848Emperor Art Moment
>>6297848>>6297884Confirming IP and requesting Ziwei Bo art
>>6297848I’m still here, just vote rarelyGot a TL;dr on the two contentious options? I might’ve forgotten how eating people would risk failing the main ‘mission’?For the art? Maybe Xoldur and Murbal, given recent developments.
>>6298199>how would eating people fail the mission[It's less eating people and more taking the time to find enough people to eat, without anyone getting injured or killed in turn, and before CZ metabolizes the contents of the cauldron. You are in a pocket dimension taking the form of an elaborate web of backrooms connected to several physicsl storefronts, trying to hunt down fleeing or hdiing people who work (and live) there all day, some of whom are beastmen capable of illusion magic and others which may be armed with magical weapons or tools. If the percentile roll comes uo poorly, you could be ambushed (several character sstill have low enough HP for that to kill them), or people might just evade you long enough that CZ will finish digesting the magic before she can meditate and undergo the forge transformation to lock it in. Max-upcasting Fear last thread used up some of the power.]
Rolled 1 (1d2)[Since >>6298199 didn't vote and, after >>6298178 we have no more 1-post IDs, we're rolling for whether to stick it out togteher here or send Empy, CZ, and Ayla on alone while ZZ and Murbal stay here.]>>6298043>>6297871>>6298178>>6298199[Also, The Naked Emperor will get the art this time around!]
>>6298386[The write-in wins! Writing...]
>>6298388“We’re not leavin’ anybody,” you decide.“It isn’t a matter of is we want to,” Ayla tries to reason with you. “It’s a matter of—”“—of fuckin’ PRINCIPLE,” you finish for her, raising your voice. “Ain’t no way I’m leaving anyone here ta get picked off by the lich’s goons, alright?”(Not even yourself—you might be a responsible Boss, but you ain’t no ‘hero’.)“Zith-Zi, be reasonable…”Ayla wheedles as hard as she can, but you’re not listening. Your mind is made up, and no amount of khoblis cajoling can change your course.“CZ!”Your bark interrupts whatever-the-fuck Ayla was on about, to her visible irritation. Your other half, meanwhile, jumps at the sound, and shuffles over with a hangdog expression. She must be feeling keenly self-conscious right now, both about her appearance and her role in the argument between sister and sensei: it was her chugging of the potion which put you all in this predicament, and the effects have left her looking like some overgrown goblin-orc hybrid in a crocodile skin-suit.“You did good back there,” you assure her, earning her surprise and a look of—admittedly quite monstrous and disfigured—gratitude. “If you hadn’t done what ya did, we might all be dead, instead’ve just… Well, ya did good, alright?”Ayla tuts at that, too, causing your eye to twitch. You won’t have your resident super-witch fucking up your sister’s already-fragile sense of self-worth over this, though, even if Ayla IS right and it all goes to shit. This decision was yours, just like Carazzi’s decision was hers, and there’s no telling how badly things might have gone if you’d decided otherwise… And no arguing with the Boss Bitch when her foot has put down, THANK YOU VERY MUCH.
>>6298404You turn your attention then to Murbal, still unconscious, and still clutching her shining steel shield to her chest. That, too, was a decision you made: to save her mother’s heirloom. You wonder if it didn’t play a role in saving her from her brother’s unfortunate fate by protecting her abdomen and its organs against Ziwei Bo’s ultimate spell? Either way, though, you need what muscle you’ve still got.“You still got any’ve those magic sandwiches?” you ask CZ.“Oh! Yeah, I totally…” Carazzi stops rummaging through her pack for a moment, then looks up with faintly-iridescent eyes wide open in revelation. “Ayla! Food!”Ayla’s annoyance grows as Carazzi holds up a sandwich, and she shakes her head as her hair frizzes up and begins to flame again. “Those silly sandwiches don’t contain NEARLY enough magic to allow us to bring anyone else. Even You can surely see that.”Carazzi flinches at the dig, and you bristle at Ayla’s attitude. Before you can intercede, however, CZ speaks up again:“Not the sandwiches. Uh… here, ZZ.”You take the proffered food and unwrap the Steelwood ham sandwich—made with bread purchased by the late Iorund Copperbelt from the nearest human settlement, and pork procured by yours truly from Xoldur and Murbal’s village. The other Steelwood orc in your party—a recently ‘reforged’ hedge-witch named Dura—had enchanted it before you left. Now, you kneel beside Murbal and begin trying to force-feed the slumbering giantess to repair what damage Ziwei Bo and his minions inflicted.Carazzi, meanwhile, grabs Ayla by her arm and pulls her along, despite her best efforts. She leads her not to some local oriental delicacy, but to… Well, okay, you guess technically the lich’s spell-choked and likewise-incapacitated head maid SORT of counts as a local oriental delicacy, actually.…
>>6298405…“…I don’t understand,” Ayla eventually admits.“Sure ya do!” you insist, and gesture again at Wa Muckbang or whatever her name actually is. “Magic’s just lifeforce, right? Qi, reflected through a prison or whatever?”“ReFRACTed through a PRISM.” Ayla’s prim, corrective look looks as if it will be followed up by a lecture, but she stops herself as comprehension dawns. “You mean for me to… To…”“Ta eat ‘er up!” you say.Ayla’s face reddens a little as she stares down at the unconscious Eastwoman, and you realize she must be confused.“Not, like… In the fun way. Or the meaty way. Just, you know…” You lower your voice. “The, like, succubus cambion kinda way?”Ayla hears you, but she still says nothing. You begin to worry you’ve fucked up again, misunderstood something maybe. After a few second, though, she speaks.“Veigar… He prefers that I not… I mean, I’ve never… Not since the Unseelie, anyway.”“Empy’s buddy?” you ask, confused.“Alas, poor Nasir, I hardly knew you,” The Naked Emperor bemoans. “Or… Hm, is a century much time, for a fairy? For a hundun? I cannot seem to recall the temporal relativity of it all. Oh well! Ashes to ashes, dust to… To… Well, something or other, I’m sure of it!”“No, not that one, the other... Ugh, it doesn't matter!” Ayla frowns again at the pale-faced, passed-out servant-woman. “It could work… But her soul alone still won’t be enough.”“Oh,” you say sadly, slumping in disappointment. You were really sure this would be how you redeemed yourself!But… Wait…“Heeeey,” you say, “there’s more’ve ‘em around, right/ The ones what ran away?”
>>6298406Ayla turns to you, and you see—and feel—complicated emotions warring behind her eyes and rippling through her aura. There’s anger, at you and at your sister. There’s lingering trepidation, about doing what you’ve proposed… But excitement, too, like a former alcoholic being offered their first drink in years.“We’ll have to be fast,” she decides.“Hells yeah!” Relief washes over you. “Fast is my middle name! I mean… Shit, it might be. ‘Carazzi Fast Yosef’? Howzat sound?”“Awful!” Zith-Zi shouts over to you, as Murbal groans and begins to rise, confusedly chewing her late lunch. “Besides, who ever heard of a goblin with a middle name? Ya already have one too many!”“Well, I for one quite like it, Miss Yosef,” Empy chimes in. “Though I’ve never had a name, myself.”“Aww, thanks! And sure ya do. Empy's, like, TOTALLY a—”Ayla clears her throat.“R-right, fast…” You thump your head. “Heh, sorry, sensei.”Ayla sighs through her nose, but says nothing more. Instead, she kneels down over Ziwei Bo’s fallen servant, to finish what the defeated lich started.You, meanwhile, turn to Zith-Zi and Murbal… Who has just discovered her brother’s fate.You can taste the emotion from here, and it’s a bitter brew indeed.…
>>6298407…“XOLDUR!” Murbal roars again, shaking her pallid, lifeless sibling again.You watch, unsure what to say. The she-orc shakes him so violently that his head hits the ground repeatedly; normally bad form but, well, ol’ Xol ain’t waking up either way. It’s only when she starts punching him that you finally decide to interject yourself.“Murbal… MURBAL!”The half-orc shield-maiden wheels on you, deep-set eyes ablaze with anger and filled with… Well, for the first time in EVER as far as you’ve known her, tears. Her carnivorous dentition is on full display, and you take a step back for a moment in fear that she’ll start punching YOU, instead. She doesn’t, though… She just deflates.“…Murbal?”“…najor rog alnej…”Your Orcish isn’t the greatest, and between the mumbling and the natural slur brought on by their tusks, you don’t quite catch what she said.“HE SAVE ME,” she bellows in your face when you press, then quiets to a miserable mother again. “Stupid human try slip past, get to zutaagon… Uh, lich. I try stop him.. Not watch back. Dog-man stab for back, Xoldur hit him. Fight started… Good fight!”Her briefly-brightened demeanor dims.“Distracted. Both, then. Then… Something. Fire. Zutaagon come back and… And…”A picture of what went down begins to form in your mind, despite Murbal’s sketchy grasp of Common: she’d let herself get baited by a feint, which had provoked a sneak attack, spiraled into a brawl, and given one of Ziwei Bo’s little helpers a chance to liberate their flash-frozen master. That, in turn, had led to your half-orc apprentices’ comeuppance, and ultimately—in a way that Murbal very obviously realizes and blames herself for—to young Xoldur’s untimely demise.You don’t have a lot of time to spare on condolences—Ayla’s tapping foot and CZ’s anxious shuffling makes that clear, though you try to ignore them. Equally, you know you need to say SOMETHING, if you’re going to get Murbal out of her own head enough to help.What do you say?>You’re right. It’s your fault. >It’s not your fault, it’s THEIRS. >It wasn’t your fault… It was mine. >Write-in
>>6298406>“Veigar… He prefers that I not… I mean, I’ve never… Not since the Unseelie, anyway.”Brainwashing is ok with him though? Interesting>It’s not your fault, it’s THEIRS.So help us punish them for it
>>6298412>>It’s not your fault, it’s THEIRS.
>>6298412>It’s not your fault, it’s THEIRS.
>>6298386Sorry, was stuck at work all day.>>6298412>It’s not your fault, it’s THEIRS.
>>6298412>It’s not your fault, it’s THEIRS.We need to get moving. >>6297871
Rolled 11, 13, 7, 3 = 34 (4d20)>>6298654[No worries, I just didn't want to delay again.]>>6298712>>6298591>>6298586>>6298548You shake your head.“It ain’t anything you do,” you tell the shuddering young she-orc. “Ain’t anything any of us did.”(That last part, you say for yourself.)“But… But I…”“It’s THEM that kill your brother.”Murbal stops her sobbing and looks up, expression indecisive but attentive.“Those sons’ve bitches out there…” You point down the hallway that led you here, and down which your opponents fled. “THEY killed yer brother. They killed, uh, Nasir, too. THEY did all this shit for their demented fuckin’ khoblis boss.”She’s listening. You can see it on her face, even if her watery eyes remain inexpressive. You place a hand on her burly arm, and the muscles are tense and taut.“Now, are you gonna let those Easterling asshole just get away with this shit?” you demand. “Or are ya gonna help me punish ‘em for it?!”Leadership roll…
Rolled 3, 1 = 4 (2d6)>>6298733Murbal bares her teeth in a warlike scowl again, taking deep heaving breaths and visibly hyping herself up for action…13 for Leadership: Failure!…But when her eyes again alight upon fallen Xoldur, the fight goes out of your surviving sword-student. Where you expected a roaring call to ‘WAAAGH!’, as her folk like to say, she instead emits a guttural wail, and falls forward upon the floor, burying her face in her arms. She speaks to herself in her own tongue—or perhaps to her brother—and between the weeping and the muffling effects of her posture, it takes you a while to translate what she’s saying, over and over. You do, though.“I’m sorry, Mother.”You crouch next to her for a while, completely lost for how to comfort a crying kid like this. By comparison, your pep-talk to Khorine back at base was child’s play. You pat Murbal’s broad back awkwardly, to no obvious response, and try to think of some way to motivate her, but nothing else comes. Eventually, Ayla clears her throat; you shoot her a deadly look of reproach, but you know she’s right.“Look, Murbz, we gota… We gotta move,” you say as you stand. “You stay here. Watch yer… Just, you know. Stay. Got it?”The half-orc doesn’t respond, just rocking back and forth. You are, regrettably, forced to leave her behind for the moment.“CZ,” you command, “pass me one of them sandwiches, wouldja? We’re a woman down. Gonna need my strength.”Rolling healing…
Rolled 8, 17 = 25 (2d20)>>6298741Zith-Zi's HP: 9/30Rolling Athletics as a stamina proxy, for the ongoing effects of Ziwei Bo's taint...
Rolled 86 (1d100)>>6298746 17 for Athletics: passed!Zith-Zi feels no serious effects of her poisoning… Yet.Rolling percentile dice for the success of the hunt for Ziwei Bo’s minions. Higher roll is better. Base DC: 30. Increased by +10 for Murbal’s lack of participation. On a 20 or lower, you are ambushed and attacked; nobody alive and with you has Vigilance, so they will get a surprise round. On a 1, they score on auto‐critical.
>>6298741>>6298746>>6298749……You can feel the grief and frustration roiling around inside your opposite number. You keep wanting to say something, but you don’t. You know Zith-Zi like you know yourself, after all. She doesn’t need comfort. She needs a win. And so, dutiful doppelganger that you are, you focus on acquiring one.You can’t use your Mentalism anymore—not anything more than your passive empathic sense. Using ANY more magic risks you burning through the last of the pill-potion you guzzled in Ziwei Bo’s study. This slows down the process substantially, especially with Ayla, obviously, being too tapped-out to use her Divination magic either; it would defeat the whole point if she used her magic to acquire MORE magic, only to end up still having too little to transport you all back home, after all!…And all this, in turn, means you have no time to loot the lich’s lair.“Aww maaaan,” you whine, passing by shelves of stored items and alchemical ingredients. “Some a’ this stuff’s gotta be worth a FORTUNE!”“Not as much as we stand to lose if we don’t return to the forge before time runs out,” Ayla reminds you brusquely.You shut your mouth and buckle down. Focus, Carazzi!86: success!It’s several minutes before you ping a person, registering the faint whiff of mortal terror on the stagnant, musky air of the Emporium of Wonders. You click your tongue to get everyone’s attention without alerting your quarry, and the Regiment—such as it is, all four of you that are here, alive, and able to do battle at the moment—slow down.“I must say,” says Empy, at his usual volume since he’s only talking telepathically anyway, “I’m not sure I like being so… Limited in energy. Without the ability to expand my consciousness or generate eyes and ears freely, I feel rather claustrophobic. I dare say, I’d give my KINGDOM for a nose!”“What kinda nose?” you whisper, picturing a whole range of cute and comical options which the hundun might manifest.“What fuckin’ KINGDOM?!” ZZ demands. “The empty goddamn STEPPE?”“Well now, there’s no cause for that kind of—”“Shaddup! CZ?”“Right, right, sorry ZZ…”
>>6298755You focus in again, newly rugged brow scrunching up even worse than it already was. Your aura reaches out, expanding ever-so-slightly, to feel out the contours of the hidden foes.“They’re around the corner,” you say. “Three of ‘em. Two humies and a beastie-boy… I think it’s that raccoon-dog-thingie you were talkin’ to earlier. Remember him?”ZZ grunts in response, noncommittal or indifferent, and place a hand upon her radiant saber—still currently collapsed and inert, energy-blade hidden in its little metallic shell of silvery-blue. She can’t activate it yet, not without creating noise. The Naked Emperor cannot manifest any limbs or organs to attack, having to rely upon his enormous size and natural strength. Ayla can’t spare any spellcraft, just as you can’t…Which leaves you and your natural weapons as ZZ’s only immediate back-up, until Empy catches up.What will you do?>Stealth in ahead and take down the beastman—the most dangerous, most likely>Charge, all together, and blitz them as best you can!>Circle around to cut off their escape route, then give the signal>Suggest ZZ go out alone and play diplomat, to lure them into an ambush>Write-in
>>6298757>Charge, all together, and blitz them as best you can!Speed is key
>>6298757>Charge, all together, and blitz them as best you can!
>>6298757>Circle around to cut off their escape route, then give the signal.Flanking them might be beneficial.Me>>>6297494
Rolled 100, 65 = 165 (2d100)>>6298812>>6298914>>6298993>>6299123Speed is key. While flanking them might be to your benefit, losing them in this maze—or taking too long to catch them, for all your caution—could cost you EVERYTHING. Everything you and Ayla have been working towards hinges on getting back to Patmo-Shoka—your captured dungeon home-away-from-home—before you burn through the last of the potion. Zith-Zith comes to the same conclusion, you sense; you and she exchange a silent nod, drop down into a crouch, and count to three….And you’re off!You dash around the corner, side by side. Among archives and oddities, you see the lich’s servants gathered around in a circle, discussing something in mumbled East-Common. Neither of you lets loose a war cry, lest you tip them off, but neither are you trying for stealth; they hear your footfalls, and turn to face you. Their expressions, formerly a mixed bag of concern and dismay, turn to alarm; this only worsens when ZZ’s holy sword flickers to life, and they fully understand that they’re fighting for their life.Rolling for their armament! This also serves as something of a loot roll, if you take them down.
Rolled 1 (1d2)>>629930165…As you draw nearer, you see what Ziwei Bo’s one-time lackeys were arguing about: each of the three, human and beastman alike, are loaded up with loot. Bundles and bags of stolen booty have been taken as a self-directed severance package. There are the queer, beetle-shaped little ingots of stamped metal which serve as Goldenriver’s currency in lieu of coinage, jangling in boxes, as well as scrolls potions, silk scarves and medicine jars. You’ve hit the jackpot! At least, that’s what you’d say if the racoon-man didn’t turn on the two of you, choosing to fight, rather than flee like his fellows, and reveal probably the greatest of ALL their ill-gotten goodies.…and 100.In his opposable-thumbed paw, the tubby tanuki (as you’ve heard Ayla call the creature) is holding a golden object. It resembles a double-headed club with a short and lumpy handle, and cage-shaped head. He holds it out before him, pointing one of the two gem-studded heads at the two of you, and your confusion and curiosty turn to alarm.“Oh fuck, it’s a—!”You don’t manage to fully vocalize the thought before, with a loud crack and a blinding light, the strange artifact-the WEAPON—looses a bolt of blue-and-gold lightning, and a shelf-shaking boom.Rolling for target...
Rolled 10 (1d20)>>6299307Rolling his attack roll against Carazzi Yosef ...
Rolled 1, 4, 2 = 7 (3d20)>>6299309You drop to a headlong dive and a diagonal roll. The avoids the electrical attack and carries you into the wall, which you hit with a thump and rebound off of and into a feral semi-quadrupedal crouch, like one of those monkey-men that paddle the boats at River’s Mouth’s great river-gate. The beastman’s cute little doggy eyes go wide, and he takes a step back, trying to adjust his aim in time to save his tail.But you didn’t come alone, and he’s left his flank open to your better—at swordsmanship, for sure—half.Rolling Zith-Zi’s attack…
Rolled 5, 1 = 6 (2d8)>>6299313Zith-Zi lets loose a scream of wordless mockery, and victory, as her rad-saber rips through the lightning-split air of the hallway and splits the tanuki in two. You let out a whoop of joy as well—she got ‘im! Only a second later do you remember you were hoping to take him alive, to feed Ayla his lifeforce… But those other two, the humies, couldn’t have got far.And it’s just as you’re about to say so that the tanuki’s two halves explode into a puff of strange smoke, revealing a leaf, and a log, rather than a bisected beastman.Rolled a 1, and no successes: Critical failure!Your eyes widen as you understand that ZZ’s been had by a clever illusion spell. You’re about to say so when, for a second time, you hear the crack of lightning…Rolling damage…
Rolled 20, 18, 18, 8 = 64 (4d20)>>6299314Zith-Zi is thrown across the space, smashing into the wall beside you and crumpling up like a paper doll. You scream your sister’s name, seeing her laying there in her own smoking wreckage.6 damage dealt!Zith-Zi’s HP: 3/30Mama Zi didn’t raise no fragile flowers, though: Zith-Zi is alive. You breathe a sigh of relief when you sense that, even if she’s still spasming, stunned by the bolt’s direct blast. You tear your eyes away from her, and focus your fury on the bastard who inflicted this injury: the true tanuki standing there and holding his strange, sorcerous sceptre.“You hurt ZZ,” you snarl. “You shouldn’t have done that. When people hurt ZZ… I take that PERSONAL.”Rolling CZ's attack...
>>6299315You don’t know if the beastman understood your words, spoken in the Common that men speak in the northwest of the world. You don’t know if he understood exactly WHY he was doomed, just HOW he fucked up…Rolled a 20: Critical hit!…But you make him understand, by ripping claw and bloodied maw, that he surely sinned in this life, to suffer as he now suffers. The screams of the beastman turn to whimpers by the time Zith-Zi has picked herself up off the floor. You feel her hand on her shoulder, and only then do you stop.“CZ,” she says, “that’s enough. ‘Sides, he’s for Ayla, remember?”You snarl at being denied, still hungry despite your recent, and rather succulent, Easterling meal. Nevertheless, you stand up and step back from the broken, butchered beastman beneath you. He’s still breathing, though it is a bubbly-sounded, belaboured sort of breath that he now draws… And probably not for much longer.“Fascinating… To think that Ziwei Bo had one of these in his collection! The old fool ought to have used it against us.”Ayla has joined you and ZZ, and is speaking of the golden sceptre. She doesn’t pick it up, but regards it where it’s fallen, and with no small awe.“What is it?” you ask, when you’ve regained your sense of self.“A vajra,” she answers you. “A sort of powerful wand, said to have been created in ancient times by the Gods Above—the Gods of Law. It can protect and destroy, according to legend.”“Bet the undead asshole COULDN’T wield it, then,” ZZ reasons. “Liches hate holy shit, right?”“Not just liches,” Ayla admits.You focus your sorcerous senses upon the odd object, and understand then why Ziwei Bo left it alone, and why Ayla also hasn’t picked it up: it tingles with the same heavenly energies—albeit a good sight more powerful—than the Patmo-Shokan rad-sabers. A demon-spawned cambion like you or your sensei couldn’t hope to wield it, and yet…“The raw magic alone, properly channeled, should be enough to get us home and then some,” Ayla voices your own unspoken thought.“Oh? Is that so? Then will we not be needing these two, after all?”You all turn to see The Naked Emperor approaching, his great girth wrapped ‘round the two unfortunate humans who foolishly chose to escape past the two of you and ran smack-dab into your monstrous mate.“Atta boy, Empy!”“No mere boy, I assure you! Nor a girl, come to think of it. But am I an ‘atta’? Hmmm…”
>>6299323You giggle at his goofy ramblings, a product of his chaotic composition and origin as a semi-divine descendant of a union most unholy. You relate to his confusion, sexual and otherwise, which is probably why the two of you (ahem) get along so well.“Puh-rease,” pleads one of the humans, in broken and accented Northwestern Common, “spale us! We all onry sel-oo-vants! You can take are we have, just puh-rease, ret us riv!”You can't help it: you laugh even louder at their funny foreign accents. Then, you look to your sister. She’s the Boss, after all. You see her eyes narrow: these men were among those who were attacking her with their master’s magically-materialized weapons, who nearly slew her under Ziwei Bo’s orders.Their actions, even if indirectly, contributed to Xoldur’s death.You wonder what she will say, now that you no longer NEED to kill them, strictly speaking?>Spare Ziwei Bo’s servants>Take bloody revenge for Xoldur>Press-gang them into the Regiment>Write-in
>>6299301>100The "nice" to "oh no" whiplash is real>>6299324>Spare Ziwei Bo’s servantsTIMEIf Murbal had come along we might need to kill them, but we're in a hurry here, killing or conscripting them is gonna take longer than doing nothing.
>>6299324Would drawing out the vajra's power and converting it to raw magic for Ayla's teleportation, damage or impair the magic weapon? Or would it work fine after givin time to recharge?
>>6299341[The latter.]
>>6299352>>6299324Well if murbal is to distraught to desire revenge and their is no benefit to killing them I guess letting them scraper off is the best option.>Spare Ziwei Bo’s servants
>>6299392This is me.>>6299123
>Spare Ziwei Bo’s servantsLoot as much as we can, tp out, get empy to release
>>6299324>Spare Ziwei Bo’s servantsWe're a merciful nilbog.
>>6299544>>6299501>>6299392>>6299338“Leave ‘em.”Empy drops the pair of simpering stooges, who bow and scrape before scampering off.“That was remarkably merciful of you, Zith-Zi,” Ayla comments, though she makes no move to intercede.“Yeah, well I’m a merciful nilbog,” ZZ says with a shrug.“I’m not so sure I would have been, in your place,” admits your sensei.“It’d be different if Murbz was here, ‘n she wanted revenge, but if it’s just payback for me…”Zith-Zi trails off, but you understand. Of course you do—you two, who were once one, share a history. You don’t recall every sordid detail of life in the Goblin Wastes, but you know what it is to kill out of obligation to an overlord. It’s tough to begrudge some poor shmuck for doing their job, however dirty or bloody, when you’ve been in their shoes before.“Grab the loot, though,” ZZ commands. “We sure as shit ain’t leavin’ empty-handed!”(Heh… And some habits from the old days die hard.)You gain 65 points worth of trade-goods, ingredients, and magical items!You and The Naked Emperor take the role of muscle, instead of the dead-or-distraught Steelwood siblings. On Ayla’s instruction, you drag it back down the long hallway you came down.“Even in the master’s absence, his realm is… Exceedingly difficult to transport beings or belongings in or out of,” Ayla explains. “We’ll need to do so from the storefront, closer to the Priem Material Plane.”By way of payment, you leave a single <Faerie Nectar>-infused sandwich, force-fed to the fat furry you tore to ribbons mere moments ago; it’s not quite enough to rouse him, but its magics stabilize his condition. Zith-Zi takes another to eat as she goes to collect Murbal, leaving you only one more in your stores… Not that you plan to be here long enough to need it.When your trio arrives at the entrance of the Emporium—one of many, as you understand it—there is already someone waiting there.“Why hello there. I was wondering when the staff of this most auspicious and remarkable store might return… Oh! But you are not such a person, are you?”(Oh shit! It’s that guy!)
>>6299600Standing in the store, idly perusing the unattended wares, is Chang Lanseoul—the makeup-wearing prettyboy swordsman whose flower-bedazzled ass you encountered out in River’s Mouth, before arriving at the Emporium. He’d been asking suspicious questions, including to tag along, but Zith-Zi had given him the cold shoulder. Now he’s back, smiling that demure smile as she sets down a small and lightly-enchanted idol and turns to face the three of you.With a start, you realize you’re still all monsterfied, looking more like a troll or an ogre than even your normal not-quite-goblinoid self. You yelp and duck down behind Empy… Though a moment later, you realize that hardly helps matters, as he/it is out in the open, too, and even more unusual. Chang, however, seems oddly unperturbed.“It is a pleasure to make your acquaintances once more, most lovely ladies,” the swordsman says with a bow.Ayla braces herself, tensing up as if ready to fight. She hasn’t yet performed the rite to drain the vajra-wand of its holy energies and convert them to something more useful—that relic is with Zith-Zi, as she alone seemed a safe carrier. That leaves the both of you—and Empy, too—all but tapped for magic, should a fight break out.Chang Lanseoul rights himself from his gesture of respect, and eyes you each in turn with his narrowed gaze and impassively-friendly expression.“I see some of your party are missing,” he comments casually. “Are they, perhaps, in negotiation with the proprietor of this place?”What do you say, or do? >Tell the truth—Ziwei Bo is dead >Lie—yes, they’re chatting with him in the back, and will return shortly >Lie—you came to meet with the man who owns this store, but he never showed up >Stonewall him—it’s none of his fucking business! Go away! >Probe him in turn—what would he do if you said yes? Or no? >Attack! This guy’s a high-level adventurer, he obviously followed you, and he’s a danger! >Write-in
>>6299601>Tell the truth—Ziwei Bo is deadif he managed to follow us and isn't startled by cz and empy, why not ?
>>6299601>Tell the truth—Ziwei Bo is dead No reason to lie, Ziwei was a lich and had a literal vampire as a minion, all around bad dude, plus he called the girls beautiful despite CZ being hideous and gross, he seems chill
>>6299601>Write-inWith Ziwei Bo dead, the new proprietor is Ma Wufeng, right? Last we checked the proprietor was napping, but if Chung here wants to come in and wait for the proprietor to wake up we're sure he's welcome to do so.
>>6299601>>Tell the truth—Ziwei Bo is deadWe aren't even the one that killed him. Somehow death itself came knocking at the door. That was weird
>>6299601>Tell the truth—Ziwei Bo is deadHis goons are still about the place, though.>>6298712
>>6299873>>6299788>>6299727>>6299717>>6299673“Uh… Ziwei Bo’s dead.”Ayla gives you a glance as you peek out from behind the hundun, but you sheepishly shrug. What’s the harm? Chang’s going to find out one way or another, and anyway, he called you ‘lovely’!“Ah I see.”Chang Lanseoul’s muted response isn’t quite what you expected. Shouldn’t someone like him—who you take for some kind of knightly goodie-two-shoes—be glad to see such an undead abomination wiped from the face of the world? They’re all about that shit, ain’t they?“Are you the ones who killed him?” Chang asks next.You open your mouth to answer, but your teacher beats you to the punch this time.“He was a lich, so nobody killed him at all. Death simply arrived, long overdue, and claimed what he deemed to be his.”“Y-yeah,” you chime in. “It was, like, TOTALLY weird.”“A great shame,” says Chang, bowing his head. “I thank you for your honesty, even if the news you convey is to my disappointment, and to my master’s detriment.”You blink, and haul your chin up and over the hundun to regard him more closely. “Ya mean you still woulda wanted to meet the guy, even knowin’ he was an undead, like, occultist or cultivator or whatever?”“It is not about what I desire, but what I have pledged to procure,” Chang Lanseoul says gravely. “Time is not on my side… As The Emperor of Entropy came to claim Ziwei Bo, so too shall he… Well, nevermind.”Chang cuts himself off, but you get the gist: someone’s sick, or dying. Maybe this fancy lad’s hoity-toity noble lord or something?“Hey, uh, I think this Wu Wufan lady—”“Ma Wufeng,” Ayla corrects.“—right, Ma Wufeng. I think this Ma chick is, like, the owner of this joint now, if… like, you wanted to wait ’til she wakes up? She’s… just havin’ a nap is all.”(After all, you no longer need to kill her, so ZZ probably hasn’t.)“What of the other attendants?” Chang Lanseoul inquires.“They were given the day off,” Ayla again interjects. “Some may still be around, if they make their home here. Others have left. A few, I believe, have quit entirely.”(Ha, yeah, quit this whole-ass mortal coil!)“To abandon one’s duty is a sin most grave,” says Chang with a sigh. “A servant is bound, by oath and honour and by ties of the heart, to fulfill his duty to his master or mistress. It is the ultimate virtue.”“As an Emperor of sorts myself, I must wholeheartedly concur! Though a little bit of rebellion can make for a fun diversion, every now and again, it can grow so wearisome…”For the first time, Chang Lanseoul regards Empy more directly, really taking stock of him. If he’s shocked at the hundun’s psychic speech, it doesn’t show upon his delicate features. Rather, it’s he who surprises the two of you.“You are a hùndùn, yes?”
>>6299927“Oh HO! My reputation precedes me, does it? Yes, it is I! Or so I have been told. Truthfully, I’ve never heard the word until I met these fine people, or if I had, I had long forgotten it.”“No, not YOUR reputation. Not exactly.” Chang smiles thoughtfully. “There is a seminal text in my master’s possession which described what must be your ancestor or relative, the Sovereign Jiang… A primordial chaos spirit, of both the Celestial Court and the Sea of Darkness.”“I am!” The Naked Emperor pauses. “Am I?”“You are,” you whisper, since you heard the hundun’s ultimate origin straight from the mouth-analogue of the Dark Goddess who spawned the first of their kind, through the rapine and consumption of an ancient fairy-god.“I confess that Ma Wufeng—though she is surely a most fair and lovely countenance, and wise and kind of soul—can probably not provide that which her former master could have… And which MY master requires.”“Such a shame,” Ayla answers the strange swordsman, with a tone implying that he should probably scuttle off and leave you be.“But it is said that the Sovereign Jiang could provide many a miracle cure, in his nigh-infinite power and wisdom…”Your hackles—hairier than ever right about now—begin to raise. Ayla’s aura tightens around her chakras, too, the free flow aligning for arcana—ready to cast. All at once, the atmosphere has shifted and changed.“I was tasked with securing such a miracle, from the late proprietor of this place,” Chang Lanseoul continues, as calm and collected as ever. “How fortuitous to find it here. Perhaps you even brought this hundun to trade, only to find Ziwei Bo sadly absent?”You narrow your eyes. That’s not entirely wrong… Except, of course, for the bit where you never intended to give Empy up, and always meant to rob Bo instead. Your grip tightens on the soft and pliable surface of your strange, dumpling-shaped demigod. You see where this is going, and you don’t like it.“Perhaps you would acquiesce to trade with this humble servant, instead?” Chang Lanseoul asks innocently. “My master is quite wealthy, and has given me considerable leeway to trade in his stead.”“Oh my! It is rather flattering, to be so desired, ho ho…”
>>6299928Just like your sister—where IS she, already?!—you sense that there’s more to this ‘Chang’ guy than a pretty face and some flowery perfume. He’s not decked out in magic gear or nothing, but his mind is built like a lockbox, reinforced by ritual against psychic intrusion. His aura is almost unreadable, impregnable, a wall of unmoving ice encasing a hidden heart. And his sword… He hasn’t moved to unsheathe it, but you get the intuitive feeling that you wouldn’t want him to.All of which is to say: he’s playing nice, but you wouldn’t want him to stop, and telling him ‘no’ very well might have that effect. He may, in fact, see fit to try and take your Empy away from you.What will you do?>Tell him ‘no’—there’s nothing else for it.>Lie and tell him ‘yes’, then stall while ZZ and Murbal catch up and Ayla can teleport you out>Tell him ‘yes’… Just, you know, after you and Empy get a chance to go home and ‘freshen up’>Attack! Strike first, strike hard, no mercy!>Write-in
>>6299927>aNot "the"? There's more than one?>>6299929Tell him Empy isn't for sale, and we're in a hurry right now, but after we deal with our current business we MIGHT be willing to cooperate with him if the pay is good enough.
>>6299929Alright. Telling him about our forge is definitely the wrong answer. I somehow feel like he's got a good lie detector.>Write-in :"We MIGHT have a solution. However we are also on a time-critical thing here and now. We could have more to offer than just the Hundun. Could you kindly give us 14 hours [end of day + forge + mana back for Ayla to TP] so that we conclude our extremely urgent business necessities then come back to you and see how we can help you?
If Chang's master is dying of illness, maybe Veigar can heal him? And if not their are the stasis pods back in the forge that the blue goblins used to wait out centuries if not millennia.Maybe we can put his master in suspended animation until a cure can be made.
>>6299986yeah, I'm feeling this pod-master thing is how we are scammed of the Forge according to the "fates". Otherwise, we have options including Veigar, Hundun-partial chopping...
>>6300011I'm not gonna lie, i assumed if the smoke soothsayer bad half of her vision comes true and we get scammed and robbed. It would be by someone local to the steelwood steel wood. Like the orc chief or an elven patrol. The fortune teller did say that we already knew the identity of who would scam us. And we still don't know who Chang's master is.
>>6299929>Tell him ‘yes’… Just, you know, after you and Empy get a chance to go home and ‘freshen up’
>>6300143>>6299986>>6299984>>6299947With your party injured and exhausted, there’s only one safe way out of this: you need to convince this mystery-man to willing let you all leave, without any violence. Thinking quickly, you devise just such a solution… At least, you sure hope so.“H-ehy, uh, Chang?”The man in question raises his thin, plucked eyebrows as you step out into full view. Sel-conscious as you are of your stretched-out and bulked-up form, he still doesn’t shrink or sneer.“Yes, milady?”(M-Milady? You? Imagine~)“Y-yeah,” you say out-loud, feeling your face heat up as you squirm. “Uh, well, that’s what I’m hopin’, soon. Uh, that I’ll be back to bein’ a proper lady! Not that I’m not a chuck! But, like… You know…”“As you appeared before, you mean?” You hesitate, then nod.“It’s actually kinda time-sensitive. Like, even more than whatever you got goin’ on right now, a-at least I think so. Tough to tell with you bein’ all hush-hush about it.”“I understand,” the man says. “The sensitive nature of the particulars are sadly such that my discretion is a part of my oath, else I would share the details gladly.”“Right, yeah, I get it! TOTALLY.” You take a breath. “But I figure, from what you DID say, I can work out that you got a sick person or somethin’ back wherever-the-f—wherever the HECK yer from. Amirite?”“You… Are a most shrewd and insightful woman, milady.”“Well shit,” you say, “I bet we can help with that, then!”“Carazzi,” Ayla hisses, stepping up and sinking her fingers into your shoulder. “What are you doing?”“Trust me, sensei, I got this!”Ayla doesn’t seem convinced, but nor does she have the willingness (or means) to stop you. You gently shrug off her hand and turn again to Chang Lanseoul.“We gotta go home ‘n sort this sh—stuff out. Should only take us about, uh…”You hesitate, and begin to count on your fingers. Ayla (with a sigh) supplies the answer instead.“Including time to recuperate my energies, with use of our… New find… We should be done within twelve to twenty-four hours.”“Right!” you agree. “So then, after that, maybe we can come back? Talk business? We got all kinds a’ stuff that could help, I bet!”(Like Veigar’s combo of Feycraft and heterodox hedge-magic, or Empy’s ability to generate and regenerate whatever ingredients this guy’s boss needs, or the forge, or…)Chang Lanseoul bows his head. “You are most generous, Lady Carazzi. But… And I mean no offence, of course, nor would I ever impugn your most noble and purehearted character… But how can I know how to find you, or you to find my humble self?”“Oh, uh…”“Perhaps I should come with you?”
>>6300148Chang stands up, still smiling that beatific and beautiful little smile of his. “I understand it is a rude thing to ask of someone I have just met but I believe fate has brought us together for a reason. If you could see it in your heart to accept, I pledge to cause for you no trouble, so long as our business remains unconcluded and I am your guest.”“Oddly specific phrasing,” Ayla notes.“I understand your suspicion,” Chang Lanseoul says sympathetically, “but my oath evermore is not mine to give. However, you have my word as well, that I shall recommend to my master that no harm befall you… And anyway, I have been honour-bound since my youth to never, under any circumstances, strike a woman.”Ayla’s eyes only narrow further. You sense she wants to refuse, to annihilate this man with magic… But that interfere with your ability to geta way, and her ritual will take time. Worse, it could attract eyes from River’s Mouth proper to this edge of the demiplane, further complicating your escape.Zith-Zi’s still not back, and as her representative, you make a judgement call. You…>Accept>Modify the terms [how?] and accept>Refuse this, but offer a demonic contract—unbreakable by your nature—that you will return to this place>Make to agree, then attack as soon as your backup arrives>Write-inAny attempt to stall, attack, or wheedle out of this will require a roll, and could initiate combat*
>>6300150>AcceptAll our forces (yeb, the blue goblins, the rest of the fey, Khorine) are back home. So if we have to get rid of Chang. We are better off jumping him at the base then trying to deal with him here.Me>>6299393>>6299123
>>6300150>AcceptBeing a guest doesn't give him complete access. Keep him out of the forge and we're good.
>>6300150>Accept
>>6300192>>6300198>>6300226……When you step out of the late Ziwei Bo’s maze of extradimensional backrooms, the first thing you see is an annoyed and exasperated Ayla. The second thing, then, is the source of that agitation: your shadow-sister, ‘Carazzi Yosef’, shaking a paw with a confused and bemused Eastman plainly unused to the custom. This would be eye-raising enough under any circumstance, given CZ’s current level of monstrosity, but the son-of-a-bitch with whom she’s clasping hands is that enigmatic asshole who was probing for info back at the River’s Mouth market.“The fuck did I miss?!”All eyes (and whatever the hundun has going on) turn to you. The humie—Chang Lanseoul—then has the temerity to smile and bow, and to greet you:“Milady! You are, as before, lovely as the dawn. Not even your injury could so mar a face and soul as yours.”“Wh—The fuck kinda compliment is that?!” You choke back your womanly outrage for a moment. “Hey, no no no, no changin’ the fuckin’ subject. What in all the layers of Hell is goin’ on here? CZ, what’d you just shake on?”“Oh! ZZ! U-uh, well, ya se…”“I am to be a humble and deferential guest of your home, for a short while.” Chang bows low. “I am gracious, and will make of myself a most unintrusive presence, save for when you have need of me.”You stare at him for a moment, before looking to Carazzi. She cringes, the effect amplified by his currently-ugly mug, and pats her head as if to say ‘silly me’.“…Is good?”You look over your shoulder at Murbal. It had taken you a while to get her up and on her feet again, but the big gal eventually followed you out. In her arms, of course, she carries the body of her lost brother; you’d stolen some of the lich’s stockpile of silk to wrap his torso and hide his wound, which had seemed some small comfort to his sister—at least, it had coincided with the end of her waterfall of tears.Nasir, dissolve to nothing, had needed no such labour.“Ah, you have suffered a loss.” Chang Lanseoul’s smile has the decency to disappear when he sees Xoldur’s body. “My condolences, Milady Shòurén.”“…name is Murbal, of Steelwood Wolves. Not ‘Shoo-Ren’. Dumb name.”Chang bows his head deeper still in apology, saying nothing more. You cross your arms, unsure what to make of all this.“Zith-Zi,” Ayla reminds you, “time is…”“Yeah yeah, I know, I KNOW.” You wave her off, then sigh, and turn to CZ. “We’re gonna talk about this when we get back, ya hearin’ me?”“I hear ya, ZZ,” CZ mumbles, cowed.“Good. Ayla, I assume ya got room for one more.”“If you have the vajra ready?”
>>6300271You reach behind you, to where you stowed the sacred weapon in your belt and beneath your winter-wolf cloak. Chang’s eyes widen at the sight of the bejeweled battle-wand, but again he has the courtesy to remain silent. Following Ayla’s instructions, you place the item at the centre of a magical circle which she and CZ draw around it, with pilfered charcoal sticks from around the shop, and set with gemstones and geodes which she has you and a sluggish, slumping Murbal scrounge up.“Hurry, hurry!”“We’re hurryin’, alright? Fuckin’ hell…”When your work is done, Ayla utters the usual wizardly gobbledegook, wiggles her fingers and shuffles her feet, the various shiny stones begin to glow. The energy of the vajra travels along the charcoal lines, into the epically-marked glyphs, and fills the vessels with the sort of raw magical whatsit that (apparently) a demonic sort of spellcaster can make proper use of.“You are most talented mistresses of the arcane arts,” Chang says.“Aww, well, uh… I’m just a student, technic’ly…” replies your sister.You frown at the flattery, wondering what this sneaky swordsman is up to. You make a mental note to post guards on the forge until he’s gone. Just because he’s (apparently) going to be your ‘guest’ doesn’t mean you’re going to give him freedom to roam around and snoop.Ayla gathers up the stones in her arm. Each of them she clasps to her breast, speaking a whispered word of no-doubt Dark arcana; the gems then crumble to dust, as even your largely-untrained eye picks up her increased energies with your magical sense.“We good to go?” you ask.“<Dimension Door>,” is her answer.One by one, the members of your Regiment step through the portal thus produced: like a two-dimensional disc of somewhere else, in the open air and wreathed by golden-orange flame.“Marvellous,” murmurs Chang, as he steps through.You follow him a moment later, keeping an eye on the man and a hand on your rad-saber.…
>>6300272…Once you are done explaining the situation to Zith-Zi—and once she’s done chewing you out over the matter—you immediately hurry down through the levels of Patmo-Shoka, toward the forge.The uncanny smoothness of the stone walls is broken up only by precisely-carved geometric patterns, and by those glyphs which are nearly invisible until activated to open doors. You pass by the boglins on your way—the dungeon’s original denizens, or at least their left behind security personnel—who offer stiff and militaristic waves unbefitting a goblinoid. You can feel their dismay and disgust at your current countenance, and the shame spurs you deeper, faster.You’re hurrying such, and your horned head is hung so low, that you actually crash right into someone without noticing. You are both knocked onto your asses, and you are torn between the urge to apologize and a countervailing compulsion to rip into the offending obstacle both rhetorically and maybe LITERALLY.Well, at least until you realize who it is.“VeigaR!” you cry. “you’re back!”The wind is knocked out of the minty-green caster-clone by your second, more deliberate impact, as you throw yourself into his midsection and all but hug the life out of him. You only stop when he starts tapping your back insistently, in his desperate need to breathe.“It’s… Haaaa… It’s good to see you too, Carazzi.”It’s funny to think that it was Tips—and thus Veigar, too, sorta—who originally gave you the odd-for-a-goblin name which you’ve since embraced. Just like you, Veigar is a ‘monstrous’ doppelganger of a prettier and pinker ‘real’ person, though in your opinion he’s still PLENTY pretty. Of course, he’s also Ayla’s, so you don’t say that last part out loud; you, better than most, know what a cambion’s envy and wrath can metastasize into.“You came just in time,” you tell Veigar. “We’re about to do the, uh, you know. The whole forge thing!”“I know,” he replies gently. “Ayla summoned me here and told me what happened. Well… More or less.”His half-sour, half-smiling expression is that of a man (well, half-man half-elf, embodied in reworked goblin-flesh) who has married a demon, and well knows her propensity for deviousness and duplicity. So, too, is his face that of a man who loves her anyway.(Now YOU’RE the one who’s envious…)
>>6300274“I had enough time to gather most of the… Um, MATERIALS, which we’ll be needing.”“Oh yeah?” you ask, feigning understanding and feeling somewhat foolish.“…The blood?”“Oh!” You slap your forehead. “Right! So… Where is it? Ya got it in some vials somewhere, or like… Oh, is it in the forge-room?”Veigar looks vaguely uncomfortable, biting his lip and avoiding your eyes. It’s kinda cute, which doesn’t help matters, especially with your elevated <WANT>, but with a bit of Ayla’s meditative technique, you keep yourself under control. Not much matters, besides the need to get down to the forge before you run out of pill-power—not Veigar’s methods, or his androgynous gobbo-elfy good looks, or anything else.You drag him down to the base’s basement, where Ayla is awaiting.“Slow down!” he half-laughs and half-gasps, huffing and puffing as you tug the bookworm along. “I have… Huff… Have to ask you what you even WANT, Carazzi!”“Oh shit, sorry!” you say, realizing how fast you were going.Before you’d sent Veigar on his errand, to visit Hawksong and the surrounding region and retrieve the blood necessary to reshape your more permanent, perfected form, you’d given him instructions. However, you hadn’t been sure exactly what you wanted, except to be pretty and not green… Well, and to have a vag.You’d been leaning towards making a halfling or gnome out of yourself. Because of Martyn meadowgrass. But that… Well, that was before the two of you broke up. Before he left, presumably never to come back.…And that was before you, um, mutually penetrated a certain hunk of hundun on the rebound.
>>6300277With a sinking feeling, you realize that your entire conception of the form you were going to take—already undecided—has been thrown into total disarray by the departure of your former boyfriend. As for The Naked Emperor… Well, Empy pretty much proposed to you on the spot after you two got drunk and danced off back in his northeastern steppe ‘kingdom’, but even a somewhat-unstable demonspawn like YOU can tell that the demigod’s not all there upstairs—it might not even remember that, or have any idea what it means!And even if he did… What would a hundun want? What does an ever-shifting blob of protoplasmic meat-sauce desire?…Does it even matter?What are your feelings about The Naked Emperor, and your relationship to it?>You think of it as a sort of semi-sentient companion, kind of like a pet>It’s a friend, maybe even a sex-friend, but not… Someone you could commit to>You think you really like—maybe even love—the hundun, and are deeply invested in your relationship>Write-inWhat sort of form do you desire?>Nothing's changed—you want to be a cute little gnomely girl!>You kinda liked being all tall, the first time you were out East, actually…>While your current form is a bit too warty and weird, being big and strong is sort of nice…>With Martyn out of the picture you’re actually, like… Not so sure you want to be a ‘girl’ girl anymore…>Write-in [strongly encouraged, instead of or in addition to the above options, if you have anything specific in mind]
>>6300279>You think you really like—maybe even love—the hundun, and are deeply invested in your relationshipWe rebound hard!>Nothing's changed—you want to be a cute little gnomely girl!
>>6300279>You think you really like—maybe even love—the hundun, and are deeply invested in your relationshipI don't think we have better options. Even if we change our race, most normal people are going to be turned off by the fact that we are a soul eating demon.>You kinda liked being all tall, the first time you were out East, actually…>Write-in: a human sized goblinoid women with delicate elven ears and facial features. Somewhat like Veigar but taller and more elven looking.(pic. Related.)Being a goblinoid is fine most of our allies are goblins. Our problem is our bottom almost tusk like canines, our warts and uneven skin and raggedy ears. And I guess being a midget is a detriment to, makes it difficult to command respect.If Cara is tall and hot most of the problems of being a goblin are mute.
>>6300279>It’s a friend, maybe even a sex-friend, but not… Someone you could commit toempy can our friend with benefits, but not much more than that.>You kinda liked being all tall, the first time you were out East, actually…gnome form has too much baggage now.
>>6300150>Modify the terms>I pledge to cause for you no trouble, so long as our business remains unconcluded and I am your guest>If we can't come to a fair agreement, pledge not taking by force what we couldn't give or trade.
>>6300357[Sorry, anon, but you're an update behind, though I will keep that write-in in mind...]
>>6300279>It’s a friend, maybe even a sex-friend, but not… Someone you could commit to>Nothing's changed—you want to be a cute little gnomely girl!More life "Halfin". After all, they make perfect burglars if we need to get into Theral's hoard
>>6300361yeah, realized it. It's ok though.
>>6300362>Theral's hoard>hoard>Sad Dragonborn Antipaladin noises as you pawn more of your demigodly ancestor's furniture to buy cattle to feed all the enormous apex carnivores in your extended family>TFW you have to take out another loan from your distant cousins in Hawksong finance
>>6300365Wait, does he have so many Skill Issues? We never financially recovered from Big Red Mind-possession?
>>6300366I'm shitposting a little. He just has a very small territory with very few livestock and little arable land, and a growing population of people who can only really eat meat, especially his kids and 'siblings' among the True Dragonborn who can grow to giant sizes. It's like living in the middle of the Rocky Mountains and having to feed a small population of growing tyrannosaurs. However, as mentioned last time it came up he IS approaching a point where Bloodrise can't grow if he doesn't secure food or land, and standards of living will fall if he doesn't find a solution in the next decade or so...Which will be a probable plot point in the next quest.
>>6300279>You think of it as a sort of semi-sentient companion, kind of like a pet>With Martyn out of the picture you’re actually, like… Not so sure you want to be a ‘girl’ girl anymore…The urge to turn into a Bimbo Zith-Zi for pure trolling purposes is too tempting for me to properly consider.
>>6300279>It’s a friend, maybe even a sex-friend, but not… Someone you could commit toNot a pet. A friend. But a husband…? I’m not so sure.>Nothing's changed—you want to be a cute little gnomely girl!ZithZi sized. Or something close to that.
