We are going to solve the situation, it's just not time to do it yet, we still have slavery on the Material plane to abolish, then the next slave trade to be targetted, is the one the Brazen Throne controls, after we have accomplished ending those slave trades, Hellvens slave trade might be next on the list, though personally I think we should work on disrupting the slave trade in Elysium first, as there we can work with the Githzerai and the Fortress cities to do so, whereas Hellven have no powerful anti-slavery faction we can ally with, to take out the slavery faction.
I really think we should be beginning our anti-slavery operations in Elysium soon though, not the all out fighting the slavers operations, but there's many in Elysium who don't like slavery, but are forced out of desperation to work with slavers, or even forced to buy combat slaves to survive, beginning to hire out Flesh/Fungus Forge creatures as mercenaries, to factions that don't use slavery, or are ready to abandon slavery when given an alternative, could be a good start.
I was a tad surly there and it didnt help me. What I wanted to say was thus.
Basically I think that now is the time to be laying the foundation for our eventual move into hellven.
Getting a handle on the drug problem, or sending a trickle of resources to the rebel factions is the kind of stuff that can be done off screen and will have a big payout in a few months when we ARE ready.
Having a list of potential allies, and more detailed knowledge of drugs and addiction will give us a headstart when we officially begin working on hellven.
Edit:
It's just the jarring between "I see something I dont like" and "There is literally nothing I can do."
I was a tad surly there and it didnt help me. What I wanted to say was thus.
Basically I think that now is the time to be laying the foundation for our eventual move into hellven.
Getting a handle on the drug problem, or sending a trickle of resources to the rebel factions is the kind of stuff that can be done off screen and will have a big payout in a few months when we ARE ready.
Having a list of potential allies, and more detailed knowledge of drugs and addiction will give us a headstart when we officially begin working on hellven.
The slave market still smells of blood, sweat and withered flowers, the eager calls of merchants touting their 'merchandise' a grim dirge set to the melody of clinking chains. There are common folk as mortal as any other you might now find in the markets of Yunkai or Meereen, ephemeral petitioners speaking softly of their life of kindness and good deeds rewarded with this, archons fallen and unbowed, and demons hissing in rage and whispering promises, fresh from the battlegrounds of the Blood War.
You are almost confused at the half-dozen figures standing in the shadow of a rage devil idly snapping an adamantine-spiked whip for the tanar'ri themselves save for the fact that they remain in dignified, almost defiant, silence. Though their skin of living iron and dagger-sharp bristles give them a fearsome mien, there is no touch of the Pit upon their souls, nor even Baator.
These, memory's voice informs you softly in the back of your mind, are bladelings, mercenaries without a home wandering all the Spheres of Law and offering their services to any who would pay fair enough coin for it. Alas for this particular company fate had dealt a cruel hand. Driven from the field by the sheer terror of a balor's advance, against which few mortals could stand, they were later captured by their former diabolic employers and enslaved for their treachery. Yet even in this blackest hour there is a quiet dignity about them that you do not believe their master sees, a tempered rage that promises retribution even from amid the chains.
Farther along the market path is a far bleaker sight, a woman with sky-blue skin garbed in an assortment of silver bells and translucent veils, obviously meant to titillate and entrance, dancing to the tune of an imp's bone flute, a spirit of dance and grace, music and poetry sold as a pillow slave. You taste bile in the back of your throat.
"Your Grace," Ser Richard's mind-voice, the touch of his gauntleted hand on your shoulder as if to steady you, brings you back to yourself. Right, mustn't turn the revolting bastard into a smear of ash on the cobbles. It would rather defeat the purpose of all the care you have taken so far in Heaven's Shore. At least Dany isn't here to see this, she would doubtless take it even worse than you.
You struggle to pay attention to what the bloated sire devil beside chained angel is saying, something about 'enhancing the experience with fire'. Taking a closer look at the dancer, doing your best to keep your rage at what sort of gazes that dance is supposed to elicit in check, you see what the patraavex means. The spectral arms of the dapsara are not shimmering silver as is common in her kindred, but instead flicker and shift with the light of a thousand flames, the grace and passion of fire, a blessing turned curse.
Turning your eyes from the sight to look at something else, anything else, you spy a bare-chested giant with skin the color of cobalt dust being auctioned off by the same trumpet archon with whom you have previously done business, albeit under a much different guise. A mage, you wonder bemused. As far as you can recall from memories not your own, the firbolg of Elysium had no great tradition of sorcery, though perhaps in the shattering of their realm they too had to adapt or perish. That is when you see the spark of another mind, another soul behind the soft dark eyes.
"Two for the price of one," the merchant trumpets with silvered voice that had once heralded the grace of Heaven, selling yet another of his own kin into slavery alongside the giant. A hound archon you learn, from the account of how the two had run afoul of the authorities by sheltering a fugitive and 'fought valiantly against overwhelming odds'. For all that you had thought to see wrath in the giant's gaze at the slave traders' 'compliment', there is only pity there.
You cannot afford to buy too many, but three purchases would not seem overmuch for your current persona, and a trader captain on the oceans of Paradise would not be remembered over-long for odd choices.
OOC: Not the best rolls for slaves available, but at least you did not get a crit fail on any of the dice, that would have triggered a tricky random encounter. The costs above include already rolled for haggling to save on time.
Made a few additional edits to the chapter, @DragonParadox.
And yet we continue involving ourselves, keeping the Slavers directly profiting by buying the slaves.
"Moral" thing (or the most IC-consistent, I guess) would've been to not visit the auction again, no matter the intent to "save" some, until we can actually do so with no-strings-attached policy.
And I mean the real sort of such policy, not the "One of the best diplomancers around the Planes will talk at ya and try to convince you that serving him is a good idea before potentially letting you go"-thing we are always doing.
I mean, yeah, Viserys is a Hypocrite. That's fine.
But this one just seems mite... glaring in how hypocritical we are being.
Just my personal SoD straining at this, I suppose.
It doesn't seem OOC for me. We've had a long history of buying and freeing slaves since long before we ventured out into the Planes. We bought Leila in the market of Tyrosh when we had set out with an entirely different purpose. (Nothing to see here, just me showing off the early signs of Far Realm Alzheimer's).
We stole Leila from a slaver in Tyrosh, while leaving the rest of the slaves to their fate. At the time we couldn't do anything else, as we were too few in numbers and our power hadn't reached the necessary level to succeed, but eventually that changed and we conquered Tyrosh along with ending slavery in Western Essos and the Narrow Sea.
We'll do what we can, when we can, and when that changes we'll do farmore. That's how it is in Hellven right now. We cannot fix this place yet, but in the meantime, we can help a few beings without overly endangering ourselves or our interests.
We bought Leila in the market of Tyrosh when we had set out with an entirely different purpose. At the time we couldn't do anything else, as we were too few in numbers and our power hadn't reached the necessary level to succeed, but eventually that changed and we conquered Tyrosh along with ending slavery in Western Essos and the Narrow Sea.
Ah, my mistake. That's my poor memory playing tricks on me again.
The point stills stands, however, in that we could only do so much at the time. Stealing Leila from a slaver in Tyrosh, when magic was new to the world and only Muggles were involved, wasn't nearly as dangerous for us as it would be to do the same in Hellven. It's an unacceptable risk.
Ah, my mistake. That's my poor memory playing tricks on me again.
The point stills stands, however, in that we could only do so much at the time. Stealing Leila from a slaver in Tyrosh at the time, when magic was new to the world and only Muggles were involved, wasn't nearly as dangerous for us as it would be to do the same in Hellven. It's an unacceptable risk.
We could free some slaves here and escape with them before there is much reaction.
But we can't keep all of them Mindblanked forever, so eventually we would make the various factions in Hellven into Viserys' foes and force them to retaliate.
We could free some slaves here and escape with them before there is much reaction.
But we can't keep all of them Mindblanked forever, so eventually we would make the various factions in Hellven into Viserys' foes and force them to retaliate.
That's what I mean. It's not just the stealing of the slaves, which I'm not convinced would be all that easy given the difficulty in Teleporting or Plane Shift large numbers (not to mention the danger of doing so at all in Hellven), but the followup, the pissed off Devils and Fallen Celestials with ready access to Divination and travel magic. We can't afford to keep them Mind Blank'd forever and trying to hide them is just too risky right now.
Would you also support gathering information on Nirvana, at least by asking the Githzerai who's who there, ideally with the aim of determining, which factions in Nirvana we want to trade with?
We aren't ready to fully get into Nirvana, but we are ready to begin renting out Flesh/Fungus Forge creatures as mercenaries there.
Doing it would also be preparation for our war with the Illithid, as Nirvana is the front most of the Githzerai are fighting on, propping up them and their allies with Forge creatures, mean the Githzerai will be able to afford giving us more assistance, when we go for the Illithids on our home plane.
Yeah I mean Nirvana, I tend to get those 2 names confused.
Would you also support gathering information on Nirvana, at least by asking the Githzerai who's who there, ideally with the aim of determining, which factions in Nirvana we want to trade with?
We aren't ready to fully get into Nirvana, but we are ready to begin renting out Flesh/Fungus Forge creatures as mercenaries there.
Doing it would also be preparation for our war with the Illithid, as Nirvana is the front most of the Githzerai are fighting on, propping up them and their allies with Forge creatures, mean the Githzerai will be able to afford giving us more assistance, when we go for the Illithids on our home plane.
Starting Nirvana should probably be before the City of Brass, because we aren't getting the City of Brass done within the next few months, and we will soon be facing the Illithids, which will be easier with more Githzerai support.
Ideally we first do a quick survey, of what the Githzerai are doing in Nirvana, so we can determine where we can help them, and how many of their troops that will free up to help us, send them the help we determine is worth it, for the Githzerai troops it free up to help us, and then we start the Westeros invasion, because when we invade Westeros, it's likely that our truce with the Illithids will break, and war against the Illithid will break out on our plane in earnest, so seeing how many Githzerai we can shake lose, by providing aid on Nirvana, would go a long way, towards making sure our Westeros invasion don't get disrupted too badly by Illithid interference.
I don't think we should do any major operation in Nirvana before Westeros, but determining how many Githzerai we can get for Westeros, by the simple measure of sending Forge creatures to Nirvana, seems like something we should do to prepare for Westeros.
There is absolutely nothing we could do in Nirvana that could gain us more support from the Gith, other than outright replacing their forces there with a proportionate amount of our own.
We have the specialist support from them we desired already, asking for more when we could just use those forces for our own fighting seems pointless.
