Inside 72: Halfway to a Gross

[Reinholdt]

[Street Sans Sign]

"Yeah, it took me a long time to get used to being human too. Human-esque. Especially the height thing. Like... being this tall is great, but it still feels wrong, you know?" Venus knows.

Though it is the exact opposite feeling of feeling too short. So maybe she doesn't.

"But you're more fey than anything else now right? Otherwise the being made of belief and getting hit with fresh memories wouldn't have been such a big deal. I presume." Fey are scary that way. Always kidnapping humans and turning them into deer centaur people.

[Artemis97]

Delmah Phor

"So! Um, sorry to change the subject," Jack really isn't, actually, and isn't pretending otherwise, "but I'm a tour guide and these guys have just arrived in the City, and I'm showing them around. But I've not been here before; is there anything here you think we really should see? Or try, like a local delicacy you can't get anywhere else? I've already tried the locusts, they're really good." Jack glances at Rose; apparently she's going to have to buy some more. And see if she can convince the vendor to climb up and attend the next rooftop market, whenever that will be.

[Delmah Phor]

Not with that attitude, lady. Vlad laughs and gives the acolyte a friendly clap on the back. "Of course! Just coffee. No commitment."

Heh. "A bold one." That was a good sign, he thinks. That particular turn of phrase tended to be used by people who found it admirable; people who didn't tended to react a little more like the priestess.

Miranda's read of the situation is... somewhat different. She saw a pissed-off priestess, an acolyte who had to do whatever she said, and a square full of people who either wouldn't interfere if she turned against them, or would actively help. This was not a good place for tourists to be.

Eun and Rose watch silently at what appears to be a tense situation, neither of them daring to weigh in. Well, Eun was sitting quietly. Rose was chewing on locusts again, since popcorn wasn't available.

[Delmah Phor]

"We are priestesses not... tour directors." The older priestess protests.

The younger priestess may have said something helpful, but then Vlad touches her without permission. She glares daggers at him.

"Perhaps I can be of service?" A male drow speaks up. He's dressed in black and silver, but is wearing a blue musketeer's style hat with a large blue diatrama feather sticking out of it (think underdark ostritch). A collar around his neck displays prominently in gold and sapphire the spider-in-web sigil of House Xabaresh Chaeron, the ruling house in Delmah Phor. He's got a pair of matched short swords on his hips, and probably more blades besides, hidden about his person. He wears an easy smile and carries himself with confidence.

"Lord Raril Xar'Cha." The younger priestess purrs, slight forgotten. "I'm surprised to see you here."

"I didn't think Matron Danube let you outside of the palace." The older snaps.

Raril runs a finger under the collar around his neck. "Oh my dear sister has lengthened my leash a bit. Anyway," He claps, changing the subject. "It seems these folks are disturbing your lunch, might I take them off your hands?"

He turns to Jack. "You don't mind if I play tour guide for a little bit, do you? I know all the ins and outs of Delmah Phor." He boasts with a grin.

[Ironsmith]

[Delmah Phor]

It never fails. Vlad thinks to himself. Show a little interest in the hot girl and the guy she's had a crush on for a century swoops in.

Miranda lets out a small sigh of relief. Between two angry priestesses and a seemingly friendly lord, the choice was pretty clear, so long as nobody did anything colossally stupid. She wasn't inclined to actually trust him yet, but at least he didn't have a motive for murder.

Eun and Rose still watch quietly, the former shaking a little as the situation momentarily intensifies and deflates, the latter fanning herself at Raril's approach, disguising it as a response to overly spicy locusts.

[Zefir]

[Searching for Jo]

The color change was unintentional. In fact, I accidentally used three different colors but only noticed one of them and fixed that one.

"Yeah, probably a good thing to check, just in case," Carmen says, agreeing. "Even if it isn't a trap, it's still really weird. At the very least, we probably should find out why it's empty."

She follows him, looking around too.
The outside of the outpost looks pretty...normal. Nothing unusual, mostly. Things are a little dusty, like they were doing great, mostly abandoned so dust and dirt here and there, but all the critical parts of it were maintained every so often.

Most unusually, though, is on one side of the outpost. There's a pretty decent-sized graveyard, with special care to make sure no animals or water would get into the graves.
Carmen looks closer at the writing on the graves (it's all pretty crudely written). "Weird," she says, "Look here. And here. And here. Everyone died on the same day."

[Searching for Jo]

It was a fitting change. It felt like it was meant like she acts different.

Fade follows along. He assumes the little layer of dust is a sign that it got abonded and not long ago.

"It appears something happened. Maybe a fight or illness. But someone must have survived to bury them. For now it seems like they couldn't garrision this place anymore. Let's look pout for the captains room or someone else. maybe they left notes."

not that he would be able to read them if the writing is simular bad to the graves. Fade will then just go on seeking things from the outer ring slowly going closer in. This way he is sure to not get traped. At least not in a way he could prevent.

[bc56]

Heresy Fighters

"Get back here!" But Purple doesn't run towards Gold. She heads instead for a nearby fire escape to climb up onto the roof where Gold threw her sword first. She needs a proper weapon to face this lunatic.

Necropolis of Kysimax

The scrolls and books are indeed sword manuals. A vast catalogue of different techniques and styles is arrayed before Venus. If she had the time, she could learn much here, although it would be no substitute for practical experience.

Abandoned Hospital

Carmen enters the room braced for the worst.
It's not as bad as she might have been expecting.
Just two corpses, but they look pretty fresh. They're crawling with maggots and flies, and look like they've been flayed of their skin. They're both draped over a filing cabinet and their juices coat it in a thin, putrid film.
It's not pleasant.

[5a Violista]

[Street Sans Sign]

"Yeah, I am totes more fairy than anything else. Kinda wish I had wings, though." She mock-pouts, puts her hands behind her head to kind-of lean back, and says, "Fairies are supposed to get wings, right? Feels really unfair."
She goes into a little more detail after removing the pout: "So, yeah, when June's not looking at most people, she says they're still person-shaped. Fairies and some ghosts and spirits and probably some other things don't look like that to her. She told me that when she's not looking at me, I look like bone and wood wrapped up in flowers. That's probably what she meant by the soul-flower stuff, right? Because her eyes were closed when she said that, I think. No idea what that's supposed to mean, but...whatever."

She turns back to face him again.

"So, wait, you're not human? I mean, human-esque?" Venus looks Rein up and down, trying to imagine how tall he would normally be. June was thinking he was on fire and reminded her of cats somehow...if he was shorter, he'd probably be waist-height maybe. So...which great cat is most associated with fire? Probably a lion, their manes are kind-of like the sun. "So, what, you're secretly some kind of fiery lion or something? I mean, you're already hot enough right now, it'd make sense if that translated over literally." In fact, he's flamin' hawt, that's how hot. "Do you change when you get hugged or when you fall in love? I read a story where that happened. Wait, I've read two stories where that happened, both with lions."

Talking about Rein and imagining what he could look like is much better than thinking about how there still might be monsters wandering around that can change her just by looking at them.


[Looking for Jo]

Changing text color to signify that is something I've done before, but that time legit was just an accident.

"Yeah. I didn't think that somebody survived, but it's kind-of obvious, isn't it? Of course somebody survived." Carmen moves away from the graveyard and towards the actual outpost, to one of the entrances. She goes in. "Captain's room seems like a good place to look to find the mystery."

She looks around the place until they find the captain's room.
"So that's actually two mysteries, then. First, this place is empty and nearly everybody died at once. Second, the path to the succubus village is completely cut off. Both of them could have just been bad luck, but...I don't know, they feel related."

In the captain's room, the place is pretty clean and tidy, but also a little dusty. It's like somebody cleaned it up after it stopped being used. There's a desk, with a drawer that probably has notes or something in it. Otherwise, it's a pretty basic room. The notes and reports that they read seem pretty standard. Boring. Detailing wildlife, occasional encounters with the succubi, and messages from the main paladin base.
Then, the reports, for several days, mention that they stopped receiving updates and messages from the main base.
The second-to-last report mentions sending someone back to the main base to find out what happened.
The last report is covered in spilled blood and is illegible, but it seems like after the blood dried it was neatly put away with the rest of the reports.


[Necropolis of Kysimax]

Venus does, in fact, have time! Since she already put the groceries away while waiting for that skeleton to make his sword.

But she doesn't feel like sitting around in this whole place, just reading. She managed to ignore it for a while, but the way everything here is dead is really weird.

After skimming through all the books, she decides what she's going to do: take all of them to keep in June's room in the Black Dragon's Den, and then she can read through them at her leisure there, where the lighting is better and the atmosphere is better.

She starts taking a couple back, reading through one while on the way back, and comes back with a bag to carry more next time, and so on. If it is hers, then it's probably not a problem if she takes them out of here and brings them somewhere more convenient, right? And then after she finishes reading them, she could probably find some library or museum to donate them to.


[Abandoned Hospital]

Yeah, it's pretty gross.
"Abandoned...recently?" she thinks.

She goes over to the corpses to look at them better.
Carmen winces. If she's looking for a key, the filing cabinet is the most logical place. She looks for something she can use, to push the bodies out of the way. If only she had gloves.

Once she does that, she starts to look on top and through the filing cabinet. "Wait. If they're this fresh, how did the hospital get in this state, anyway? Is it just me or is something not adding up?"

[Terumitsu]

Sam's Room

Sam goes over to a drawer and withdraws an entire block of business cards. With his four hands he sorts through them and after a couple of minutes comes up with a business card with a slightly singed edge.
"Here it is. Well, here you go. I can't say the service was great. The lady was kind of rude, to be honest. But the poltergeist did get removed so..." It's been long enough that he's cooled down about the incident. It's just something mildly annoying that happened at his last place.

Sam's Room

"Oh thank you!" she said as she accepted the card. "You know, this makes sense in a logical way but, like... Passing out cards and stuff. Am I weird for thinking it's weird? And, like, is this something everyone does? Do I need to start doing it? I know some people have cards like this with, like, their names and a picture of them and other details in their pockets. Do I need that as well? Do you trade these with people? I know there was this one store that had a bunch of cards with people playing some sport on them and they were specifically for trading from what I heard so is this some kind of money then?"

...It seems Alva may have gotten a few things conflated and, thus, confused.

Reading over the card itself, though, she felt some vague familiarity from a name but couldn't really put a face to it. Maybe it was something that just sounded similar was poking at her brain instead of a real memory. "Um, cards aside, I am a bit curious on the specifics when you say, ah, rude?" she asked, somewhat pensive. "Just, well, I mean, if they do a good job then it should be fine but I've heard of what happens when people aren't at least respectful of haunts."

[Earl of Purple]

Delmah Phor

"No, no! I don't mind at all, you take over as tour guide, just for this bit. I need to buy some more locusts, though. Somebody ate mine. I'm Jack, pleased to meet you. Um, do we address you as 'Lord Raril'?" She'll not ask the last question whilst she's in earshot of the priestesses, unless they've got considerably better ears than Jack thinks they do. She is smiling at Raril, though.

[Recaiden]

[Perfectly Normal Elopement]

"Yeah, no problem," June says, not entirely sure what, exactly, he's being thanked for.

Well.
They get there safely. No weird things going on.

It's a pretty small house. There's bars and a locked gate that goes all the way to the ceiling leading to what's basically a room on the outside of the house, with the front door at the back of that room. The floor's all uneven and mismatched tile, and all the walls are brick and cement. There's a flowerpot and a hammock in the before-the-front-door room.

June knocks on the gate, claps a little, and calls out, "Heeey!"
After possibly-too-long, a woman with really messy black hair comes to the door, opens up the door, stares blankly at June and Vix, then says "No thanks, not interested," and closes the door.

"Wait! It's me, Anani! Long story! Can we stay here?"

After another too-long period of time, that lady returns to the door. She's wearing a really loose T-shirt and baggy sweats. She opens the door, and then comes to the gate and opens that too. "Come on in," the lady says. "I'm expecting a really good story."

June enters the...front-porch-room?thing? and holds open the gate for Vix to go through.

Actually inside the house, it's pretty dark. Sheets instead of curtains covering the windows. A big bedsheet over a couch, too, and in the first room there, the main source of light is a TV that's on the pause menu for a video game. The house goes back to some other rooms, and even has a very-much-walled-in back yard with dirt and a few small trees.

The lady goes inside, and starts saying, "Bring a chair from..." then turns to look at them both. She blinks several times, as she tries to decide if she has any chairs that would work for either of them. She keeps on staring and blinking.

That's when June intrudes to break the ice: "Vix, Chrystalla. Chrystalla, Vix."
He tells Vix, "We used to work together. She quit, though." He then heads into the back, looking for a chair to bring to the front room.

Chrystalla picks back up the controller and a blanket from off the floor, and then says to Vix, "Hi. You two are eloping?" Since there's not really any other reasonable guess why two people would show up together, probably.

A secure-looking building! And a flowerpot. This looks like a comforting place to be.
It doesn't seem like anyone is home, though. Maybe they should just-
Ah, here she is.

Oh. Well, they can't stay here after all. Vix turns towards the street and thinks about where they might-
Anani? His other name that's not June, right, right. She still thinks that's strange.

Vix could probably sit in a normal chair, by turning to the side and resting on her unfurcated leg. It would be perfectly comfortable for a medium length of time.
"Cry-" "Trys-" "Chrys-tal-la." "Hi."
"I" "Can't" "Talk" "Well"
"Sorry"
Although she's doing better than in the moments after that monster attack, at least.

However, Chrystalla's question makes Vix lose her composure a bit. Look how much she's blushing!
"No" "Um" "We" "Um" It's definitely too soon to get married, even if June is brave and nice and cute and-
"Mon-sters" "House" "Not" "Was" "Safe" she manages to answer

Heresy Fighters

"Get back here!" But Purple doesn't run towards Gold. She heads instead for a nearby fire escape to climb up onto the roof where Gold threw her sword first. She needs a proper weapon to face this lunatic.

Gold does not get back there!
In fact they do something much worse. In the process of jumping up towards a different rooftop, they point a hand towards Purple's sword, trying to yank it through the air like they did to the wreckage of the cabbage stall.
It's not important to get the sword themself. Just keep it out of Purple's reach a while longer.

[5a Violista]

[Perfectly Normal Elopement]

If they had called beforehand, maybe Chrystalla would have let them in faster.

"Oh, you're adorable," Chrystalla says. She looks around a bit, and finds another controller. "You can call me Talla. Or Chrys."

She brushes her incredibly-messy hair out of her face, then sits down and exits the game. "Here, I'll switch to two-player. Sit down," she says. She holds a controller out to Vix.
Two-player mode pops up. It's an action-photography game, apparently. "You play a lot of games?"


Meanwhile, June brings a chair in.
He takes off his jacket, hangs it up, and looks at how awful quality his shirt is after everything that happened today. "Hey, you got anything that would fit me?" he asks.
"You'd look good in a strapless dress or a tube top and a skirt." She turns to Vix, and asks, "Don't you think so too?"

June sighs: that's not what he asked, but...she does get at his problem: without buying any specialty clothing, the only things that would fit are things that don't have shoulders and that don't have legs. "Nevermind. I need a shower."

[Artemis97]

[Delmah Phor]

"Oh just Raril's fine." He assures them, leading away from the cafe and back towards the stalls that serves the locusts so they can grab some more if they wish. As they walk the drow looks at Vlad. "You got lucky, my friend. I've seen men skinned alive for less. Well, they probably wouldn't do it to an outsider, but... be careful with the ladies around here, yeah? They're in charge of pretty much everything. I'm only a lord because of an accident of birth, but that doesn't put me above any priestess, really. Only fear of offending my sisters allows me a little respect."

"So what would you folks like to see? There's plenty of shopping on this street. The central square has some nice architecture. You can see the palace there. Hells, if we really want to tweak my sister's nose, we could go inside." He suggests with a chuckle. "Nice gardens out back, actually. There's a lovely park in the south west corner of the enclave. Good fishing there actually. Lots of fruit trees too. My daughter, Erelae, had it put in so no one would go hungry here." The old drow smiles proudly. "Oh there's the theater, too. And, if you really want to see it, there's the temple. But...not the best place for outsiders, I'm afraid. Nice to look at from the outside, though. But I think I heard you folks mention food? Are you hungry?"

[Ironsmith]

[Delmah Phor]

They exchange a glance, processing all of this information. Rose is the first to respond: "So, wait... you're saying the ladies are the ones with all the social status here?" She grins. "I think I could get used to that."

Eun shakes her head. "Not me. It sounds cheap and demeaning for everyone involved."

Miranda sighs. "Look, we can have that particular political debate later. For now, here's the takeaway." She pokes Vlad's chest, a little harshly. "You keep your big mouth shut. The last thing we need is to all go through the tanner special because you can't control yourself."

"But what if-"

"Not. Even. Then." Miranda pokes his chest again for emphasis with each word. "This is serious. No crude jokes, no come-ons, no innuendos, nothing. Am I clear?"

Vlad gives a little salute. "Yes, ma'am."

"Good. Now that we've got that sorted out..." Miranda turns back to Raril. "You mentioned a shopping center?"

"Just as an aside..." Rose mumbles to Vlad. "You know most of the ladies here are probably old enough to be your grandmother, right?"

"Pft! Let me tell you, if my grandmother looked like that, I'd-"

Miranda shoots him a look that could stop an elephant at thirty paces.

"...be glad that's in my DNA pool somewhere. It's nice." He gives a little shrug. "How's that?"

"...Better. Not great, but better."

[Recaiden]

Adorable? No, can't be. Vix isn't like the lost one, or like the first one, or like a puppy or anything actually adorable. Right?

[Perfectly Normal Elopement] Vix agrees. Sitting down approximately as advertised, leaning on the one leg, hooves folded in towards each other.

"Oh." "Not" "For" Years" She takes the controller in her hand, considers it curiously for a moment, and then wraps one whip around the handles and hovers another over the buttons. This should do.
"It's" "Pre-tty" Much more lifelike pictures than any game she remembers. "I" "Make" Vix gets a perplexed look, trying to remember the words, before shrugging and saying "Rec-" "Re-" "Hmm." "Uh" "Things" "Art?"

Now the chair arrives, but she's already sitting here. Wouldn't do to get up just to sit down again.

"Dress" "Yes" Chrystalla is absolutely right, that's what June should wear.

[bc56]

Necropolis of Kysimax

And so this story ends. Venus may note as she's leaving, that life is slowly working its way back into the cemetery. Perhaps whatever kept anything from taking root there is gone now? She'll be free to come and go as she wishes and get whatever books and scrolls she chooses.

Abandoned Hospital

Broken chair leg, cracked fragment of tile, it doesn't matter what Carmen uses. The bodies splat, one by one, into the ground, disturbing a cloud of flies around them. The filing cabinet still smells awful, and it's still slimy. But at least it's accessible now.

Heresy Fighters

Ugh!
Purple really needs that sword back! She runs after Gold across the rooftop in an attempt to get that sword. "Get back here and fight, coward!"

[Reinholdt]

[Street Sans Sign]

"Yeah, I am totes more fairy than anything else. Kinda wish I had wings, though." She mock-pouts, puts her hands behind her head to kind-of lean back, and says, "Fairies are supposed to get wings, right? Feels really unfair."
She goes into a little more detail after removing the pout: "So, yeah, when June's not looking at most people, she says they're still person-shaped. Fairies and some ghosts and spirits and probably some other things don't look like that to her. She told me that when she's not looking at me, I look like bone and wood wrapped up in flowers. That's probably what she meant by the soul-flower stuff, right? Because her eyes were closed when she said that, I think. No idea what that's supposed to mean, but...whatever."

She turns back to face him again.

"So, wait, you're not human? I mean, human-esque?" Venus looks Rein up and down, trying to imagine how tall he would normally be. June was thinking he was on fire and reminded her of cats somehow...if he was shorter, he'd probably be waist-height maybe. So...which great cat is most associated with fire? Probably a lion, their manes are kind-of like the sun. "So, what, you're secretly some kind of fiery lion or something? I mean, you're already hot enough right now, it'd make sense if that translated over literally." In fact, he's flamin' hawt, that's how hot. "Do you change when you get hugged or when you fall in love? I read a story where that happened. Wait, I've read two stories where that happened, both with lions."

Talking about Rein and imagining what he could look like is much better than thinking about how there still might be monsters wandering around that can change her just by looking at them.

[Street Sans Sign]

"Wings are really neat. But you're not going to lose many foot races. That's pretty cool." Is that enough to make up for the lack of shimmering glitter wings though? No. No it's not.

Bone and wood wrapped up in flowers. Hmm... yeah, that imagery makes sense for a living nymph. "This June is very special huh? That's some powerful not looking." Most people have to look harder instead of not at all to see stuff like that. "Honestly, I suspect it just means what it seems like. A lot of fey are tied to trees and nature and you're mostly fey part human. The human is probably the bone. But hey, she didn't say you were divinity incarnate, so that's somewhat good for you right?" It means the cultists are just being silly!

Reinholdt half coughs, half laughs, all blushes. "Ah well, uh, you're plenty hot yourself. Umm... you can say I change when I fall in love, but it's more an emotional thing than a physical shape." He hasn't been cursed like that. Yet. Definitely a possibility in the near future though. "But no, no. Nothing like a fire lion. Where'd you get that idea? I'm more a... hmmm... magical cat. Think of a witch's familiar and you'll be pretty close. Except I exist independent of a witch and also find I need to look like this most of the time to keep my interactions with people... less strange." Usually for them, not him.

[Earl of Purple]

Delmah Phor

"Relax, Vlad. Once we've seen it all here and go to Carousel Court, the ladies there are much friendlier." Also brightly coloured cartoon horses, which is why Jack's smile is a little cruel. "Somebody ate all my locusts, so I'd like to pick some more up. I'd also like to at least see the temple, but I can maybe come back for that later. Even if the priestesses remember me and want to do me harm, they probably won't recognise me then and I could get away easy." She's planning on the visit being in bird-shape. She can just fly away then. Jack doesn't otherwise have strong opinions on where they go, and what they do.

[5a Violista]

[Perfectly Normal Elopement]

Chrystalla was mostly referring to the way she acts. Totally like a lost puppy mixed with an embarrassed little sister mixed with someone that can't handle teasing.
Or, in other words, Chrystalla wishes she could get embarrassed as easily as Vix.
She just gives a half-hearted wave to June to acknowledge him leaving.

She turns back the conversation as if June had never interrupted it in the first place. "Yeah! It does look pretty good, doesn't it? Much better than everything else in the genre, because, see, it uses..." She goes off into fangirl technobabble explaining all the good things she likes about the game and how it's so much better than everything else in the admittedly-small genre.

The shower in the other room turns on.

Chrystalla whispers to Vix, "Hey, after we finish this level, do you want to help me pick out something for him to wear? That shirt is awful and needs to be thrown away, and that jacket is probably really uncomfortable." The shirt is torn and doesn't fit six arms and smells a little like sewer and mutation water. Probably has weird effects as he keeps on wearing it, or something.

Then, after, she once again pulls back and dictates the conversation by saying, "So you're an artist, huh? That's really cool. I don't really do anything anymore. Always wished I was good at art."


[Abandoned Hospital]

Yeah, that's pretty gross.

She waits until the flies die down, and then she reaches for the drawers,.to open them.

If she's going through this much effort, there has to be something useful in there, right?


[Street Sans Sign]

Problem is, she already was pretty decent at footraces. "Pretty good at frolicking, too. Actually won a frolicking competition, as ridiculous as that sounds."

Anyway, June. "Yeah! She's pretty great! Good at all sorts of things, including resisting mind control and stuff." Venus sighs, and then says, "Meanwhile all I can do is illusions and making plants grow. Supposedly, I can also 'charm' people and stuff, but that's the sort of thing you shouldn't do on someone if you don't have their permission." Plus, obviously, she can do leg stuff and apparently merge into the floor or whatever.

Being cursed to change when you fall in love would be really unfortunate. Maybe even a little annoying.
"Oh! Um! I didn't mean it that way, I mean, I was just stating the facts. And the fire lion thing was just a guess." An educated guess but still a guess. "So what about being a magic cat makes things less strange? I mean, witches talk with their cats all the time, right? So if it's kinda like that then it should seem pretty normal."

Not that she's ever met a magic cat before now. But it makes sense that magic cats with witches can talk all the time. "Oh, and that lady you were with from earlier, she looked very witchy." Just staying on the topic of witches.

[bc56]

Abandoned Hospital

The first drawer is full of decaying files in manila folders. So is the second. The third, however, is locked. That's unfortunate, considering Carmen came to this room looking for a key. Now it seems she needs to find yet another one.

[Artemis97]

[Delmah Phor]

Raril opens his arms wide to encompass the boulevard they were on. "Market street. Best place to find high end goods from the Underdark, or just a taste of home. Were you looking for something in particular?" He asks Miranda. The street was lined with glass fronted shops on the ground floor of most buildings. Higher up were artisan workshops, and residences. Most buildings were three stories, and were built from solid stone. A few places used the distinctive purplish or white 'wood' from giant mushrooms. Many buildings boasted magical light, either for decoration or simple illumination. Faerie Fire, the heatless flames most drow could conjure, was everywhere in a rainbow of hues.

Vlad gets a chuckle. "That priestess you patted on the back? I think she just celebrated her 135th birthday. Most drow don't get considered adults until we hit 100. I'm 150 myself." The drow says with a grin. If he were human he'd look maybe 35. Elves, right?

Jack gets a concerned look. "I'll be glad to show you the temple from the outside. I won't be going in. I don't suggest you do either. It's not a... nice... place." Raril scratches at the side of his head, under his hat. "But locusts, we can do!" He says quickly changing the subject. "This one's on me." At the stall he orders more of the spiced locusts for Jack, and a bag of honey roasted cave roaches for himself. If anyone seemed interested in them, he'll gladly share.

[Ironsmith]

Delmah Phor

"Relax, Vlad. Once we've seen it all here and go to Carousel Court, the ladies there are much friendlier." Also brightly coloured cartoon horses, which is why Jack's smile is a little cruel. "Somebody ate all my locusts, so I'd like to pick some more up. I'd also like to at least see the temple, but I can maybe come back for that later. Even if the priestesses remember me and want to do me harm, they probably won't recognise me then and I could get away easy." She's planning on the visit being in bird-shape. She can just fly away then. Jack doesn't otherwise have strong opinions on where they go, and what they do.

[Delmah Phor]

Raril opens his arms wide to encompass the boulevard they were on. "Market street. Best place to find high end goods from the Underdark, or just a taste of home. Were you looking for something in particular?" He asks Miranda. The street was lined with glass fronted shops on the ground floor of most buildings. Higher up were artisan workshops, and residences. Most buildings were three stories, and were built from solid stone. A few places used the distinctive purplish or white 'wood' from giant mushrooms. Many buildings boasted magical light, either for decoration or simple illumination. Faerie Fire, the heatless flames most drow could conjure, was everywhere in a rainbow of hues.

Vlad gets a chuckle. "That priestess you patted on the back? I think she just celebrated her 135th birthday. Most drow don't get considered adults until we hit 100. I'm 150 myself." The drow says with a grin. If he were human he'd look maybe 35. Elves, right?

Jack gets a concerned look. "I'll be glad to show you the temple from the outside. I won't be going in. I don't suggest you do either. It's not a... nice... place." Raril scratches at the side of his head, under his hat. "But locusts, we can do!" He says quickly changing the subject. "This one's on me." At the stall he orders more of the spiced locusts for Jack, and a bag of honey roasted cave roaches for himself. If anyone seemed interested in them, he'll gladly share.

[Delmah Phor]

Oh. Right. With all that was happening by the cafe, Miranda had almost forgotten where they actually were. She didn't have much interest in the market herself, but it was a good place to take a small group with diverse interests.

Vlad shrugs a little at Jack's comment. "Could do without the threat of being flayed alive, yeah."

"Well, that was fun." Rose says, making her way down the street. "I'm off to see how far this shift in mores can take me. Meet you guys here again in a few hours."

Miranda stiffens. Rose on her own out here? That could be a recipe for disaster. "Rose, no, we're not splitting up the-"

"Too late." Vlad mutters.

"Okay, okay, Eun, could you go with her and make sure she stays out of-" Miranda cuts herself off, not seeing that course of action ending with Eun outside of the fetal position.

"Well, actually, Vlad, would you-" No, that was an even worse option. The two of them were volatile enough individually.

"...Ah, crap." Miranda sighs and takes off after Rose herself, disappearing into the market streets.

Vlad shrugs. "I guess it's just us four, then." He glances at the roaches in Raril's hands, wondering how they even came up with the concept.

Eun, also seeing the roaches, hastily directs her gaze elsewhere, not wanting to watch more bugs getting eaten. Her stomach was bothering her as it was.

[Artemis97]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

The two women are let loose on the market street of the drow enclave. One of the first shops they come across is a jeweler's. Fine rings in gold and silver glitter in the window. A delicate hair net of white gold is draped over a black velvet mannequin head. A matching choker with a jeweled black sapphire spider dangling from it is clasped about the mannequin's neck. A pair of bronze arm rings in the shape of snakes twist about, emerald eyes glittering. More things to delight the eye were hinted at in the cases inside.

[Reinholdt]

[Street Sans Sign]

Reinholdt has trouble imagining a frolicking competition. It's not exactly something he's done before. His look is lost behind his blindfold sadly.

"Resisting mind control is top tier around the Nexus. Psychics are by definition the worst thing imaginable." That's not how definitions work... "Illusions are actually really useful too. The problem with them is you have to be very creative and naturally intelligent to use them in the most effective way possible and there's such a gap between those skilled at that and those who... are more generic." It feels like an all or nothing kind of deal that way.

Rein tilts his head a little. It was still a weird guess, mostly because of how close it is to the truths. But he doesn't press her on her source of intuition. "No, no. Looking human makes things less strange. When I'm a cat, sure people will talk to me, but they also kind of want to pet me at the same time or grab my tail and you can really tell they're holding back. And it's even weirder when they don't hold back and you're only kind of ok with it, but you also gotta go along with it to keep them in a good mood to get what you want. I'm sure you've had at least one or two people ask to pet your flank before right?"

"She's only a witch when she's fighting monsters which isn't normally. And I think she prefers the term magical girl? I'm not personally sure what the difference is yet. I'll have to ask her if she wants to try out a familiar, witch combo." The whole Blind Mask thing hasn't gone all that well, even if Rein does look good in this tux.

[Ironsmith]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

Rose happily enters the jeweler's, thinking this would naturally be a place that would see a lot of traffic from the outside world. It was a near-universal constant; everyone liked having something sparkly, or at least the prestige such an item implied. If nothing else, nearly everything in the window was a firm candidate to be a souvenir. As such, she expected the shop owner to be reasonably well-adjusted to dealing with people not from Delmah Phor; that would make this a good place to get the norms of the enclave in an easy-to-digest format.

Miranda hadn't caught up with her just yet. For the moment, it'd just be her and whoever was in the shop.

[Artemis97]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

The shopkeep is a thin drow with coal black skin and long pure white hair tied up in a neat bun on the back of his head, held there with a silver and ruby hair pin shaped like a dragon. He wore a neat black robe with very little adornment. He looked down his nose a bit at Rose. She was an outsider. Did she think she could afford his wares?

"Can I help you?" He asks.

[Ironsmith]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

...Or not.

On the other hand, he should at least be fun to mess with.

"Hi! Yes, I like the look of the choker you've got in the window there." Rose says, pointing at it helpfully. "I assume it's for sale an not a display-only kind of deal?"

Nothing too far out of the ordinary yet. No sense in punking him right out of the gate; that was a good way to get thrown out of the shop.

[Artemis97]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

The shopkeep raises a white eyebrow. "That is a very fine piece. The sapphires are imported from Menzoberranzan." His tone suggests it's above her price range. He doesn't move to fetch the choker. "There are other, smaller pieces..." He gestures to another case, which seemed to be small charms made mostly from copper or bronze.

[Ironsmith]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

"No [crap] it's a fine piece." Rose replies, popping open her Hotbox for a moment so the shopkeep could see it was stacked full of gold coins, each with a thin layer of diamond embedded in the center. "I mean, I'm pretty sure I said as much when I came in." She raises an eyebrow in return, glancing back and forth between him and the other jewelery case skeptically.

[Zefir]

[Looking for Jo]

Changing text color to signify that is something I've done before, but that time legit was just an accident.

"Yeah. I didn't think that somebody survived, but it's kind-of obvious, isn't it? Of course somebody survived." Carmen moves away from the graveyard and towards the actual outpost, to one of the entrances. She goes in. "Captain's room seems like a good place to look to find the mystery."

She looks around the place until they find the captain's room.
"So that's actually two mysteries, then. First, this place is empty and nearly everybody died at once. Second, the path to the succubus village is completely cut off. Both of them could have just been bad luck, but...I don't know, they feel related."

In the captain's room, the place is pretty clean and tidy, but also a little dusty. It's like somebody cleaned it up after it stopped being used. There's a desk, with a drawer that probably has notes or something in it. Otherwise, it's a pretty basic room. The notes and reports that they read seem pretty standard. Boring. Detailing wildlife, occasional encounters with the succubi, and messages from the main paladin base.
Then, the reports, for several days, mention that they stopped receiving updates and messages from the main base.
The second-to-last report mentions sending someone back to the main base to find out what happened.
The last report is covered in spilled blood and is illegible, but it seems like after the blood dried it was neatly put away with the rest of the reports.

[Looking for Jo]

Fade looks at it carefully. He's not a high skilled investigator, but he has some common sense.

"Someone cleaned up after the mess. A guess might be the attacker cleaned up after he killed them." He points at the bloody paper. "If a survivor would have been here he would have taken the last reports. This means the attacker most likly digged the graves as well. If we take the cut rout into acount it is possible that those who did this are hiding there or they are hiding from the attacker. Either way, we need to find a way into the succubus village first. If we can't we can only head for the main base. It should be as empty as it is here."

As he said befor he looks for keys or anthing unusual. Maybe some kind of artifact the paladins left and the atacker didn't take. Fade's not driven by greed, but he won't leave anything that can grant an advantage.

[Artemis97]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

The shopkeep's eyes go a bit wide. "Yes, of course. Let me fetch it for you." Money talks, it seems.

He goes to the window and unlocks the display case and brings over the choker with the sapphire spider. "It's enchanted to protect the wearer from most non-magical poisons." He holds lays it on a velvet pad on the counter and brings over a small mirror. "Does the lady wish to try it on?"

[Ironsmith]

[Delmah Phor - Rose and Miranda]

That actually sounds pretty useful. And here I thought I would only be getting a pretty necklace out of this.

"Thought you would never ask." Rose replies, turning away from him. "...Would you be so kind?" She asks, making a vague gesture towards her neck, indicating she wanted him to put it on for her. She tilts the mirror a little so she can see his face; gauge his comfort level with her request, among other things.