Monster Marriage Quest

Back with Teo

You tap your lips thoughtfully. "If I gave you a letter for Neustadt's authorities, would you try to deliver it as best you could?"

Teo, from the other side of the door, says, "If it gets me out into the sun, yes."

"I'll be back in the morning with such a letter, then, plus some supplies for your trip. I recommend you get a good rest tonight."

Teo doesn't respond, and you shrug and head off to Virmire's tower.

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Once in Virmire's tower, you're reminded that the uppermost portion of it has windows with a view to the outside. "I have a question and a couple requests, Virmire!" you say cheerfully as you spot Virmire hard at work writing out... you can't tell from this angle. Then you spot Tanja sitting in one of the windows, legs kicking at the air. Oh. That Tanja journal thing? Probably?

Virmire looks up briefly before resuming writing. "Ask away, Lady Sabrina."

"Um, I was wondering why we're not keeping people in places with more sun access? We have such rooms."

"Security. Ease of access. It's not like they're plants." Then Virmire's writing utensil goes still and he really looks at you. "Please don't tell me humans are plants in some deranged way that has eluded Sire and I all these years."

"Well..."

Tanja interrupts. "The priests say darkness makes one sick because it's made of Teufel's... ickiness? A healthy and virtuous person can stave off the evil of the night, but if you hide from the sun too long, you become one of Teufel's servants." Then she shrugs. "I dunno if it's true."

Virmire dryly remarks, "I see."

You catch yourself smiling, have an urge to stop, then question that urge and proceed to ignore it. "Humans who stay out of the sun too much do get pale. When I was in Soissons the locals were really, really pale."

Virmire cocks his head. "Human coloration varies regionally. Different populations come in different shades. I'd assumed Soissons simply had skewed demographics for whatever reason."

You shrug a bit helplessly. "Maybe that too, but human skin changes color based on sun exposure. People who work outdoors a lot get darker, browner, and stop getting sunburned so often-"

Virmire recoils. "Humans burning in the sun?"

You pause for a moment at that. You'd not really thought about the word in years, but it does sound like that, doesn't it? "It's... not what you're imagining. It's more like a rash. Redness, swelling, the area being sensitive and hurting readily. Really bad sunburn can result in the skin cracking and bleeding, but I've only seen that once. Humans don't... set on fire in the sun."

Virmire reaches over and grabs a different paper -you can tell it's one of his papers for writing down info about humans- and starts writing, sighing. "So humans are not... simply immune to the sun's ravages. I see. Too much sun is harmful, albeit lightly. Too little sun has an effect on coloration. Possibly on health." Virmire sighs again. "I suppose we'll need to make proper guest rooms for humans..." Then he focuses on you (Still writing), and says, "Arrangements will be made."

You nod gratefully. "As for my requests... um, Ada would like potatoes, and I'd like you to write a letter for me?"

"Potatoes? Interesting. I'll handle it, one moment-" Virmire grabs two more pieces of paper and quickly writes on them. "-anyway, a letter? I can spare the time if necessary, but what for?"

You proceed to explain your intentions with releasing Teo, having him take a letter to Neustadt, and having said letter lay out the grievances regarding Burner Worms but also emphasize that if Neustadt stops stuff like this Caras will leave them alone.

"Hmmm. I'd been under the impression the Council expected us to be aggressive?"

You shrug. "I think some of them thought aggression would be stupid, actually, but overall they were pretty agnostic so long as we deliver the sensing Cores they want before we die."

"Ah. Yes, that sounds alike to my own visits. Very well, I can have the letter ready by morning, and we have some recently-delivered food that was meant for Ada but I suppose we can use most of it to prep the boy."

You nod in gratitude again, smiling. "Thanks very much, Virmire! Now I really need to hurry and catch Caras before he leaves."

As you head out, Virmire says, "Just doing my duty, Lady Sabrina."

Tanja starts chattering once you're almost too far to hear. "So anyway, Da, when he was still alive, he..."

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"Oh, hello Sabrina," Caras says as you come into the courtyard area where he's got the Boulders and Crawlers collecting.

"Hi dear! Can we talk real quick before you go?" you say as you step quickly forward.

"I don't see why not. I'm still waiting a couple more minutes for the sun to finish setting."

"Okay, um, first of all, Svenja -the older sister of the two non-prisoners- is apparently in need of a way to occupy herself? She's not coping well with idleness."

Caras makes a considering noise. "Understandable, but I'm not sure what I can do to fix it outside shunting her off to a village. Unless- I guess she could be Integrated? It would be odd to do to someone who isn't actually a vassal, but it would sidestep the problem- Sabrina?"

You realize you stopped walking and are wringing your hands nervously, and make a concerted effort to smile, get your hands away from each other, and resume walking. "Don't mind me! Just, um, distracted." By thoughts of strangling Svenja to prevent this scenario from occurring, which is really mean and unfair and you're going to stop considering it. (You do not stop considering it. It's still in the back of your head)

Caras makes a dubious noise. "I do remember the... alarm signal thing. With the water from the eyes. I certainly wouldn't Integrate the girl without making sure you were okay with it first."

Oh. You... you're kind of touched that he hadn't forgotten that? "Um. Um. Can we... talk about this later? I just- I just wanted the point brought to your attention in case there was anything obvious we could do I'm not aware of. I had- there's a lot of much more important stuff to talk about right now." Too much stuff. Really, you should- yeah, that's what you'll do. "I'd like to come with you tonight so we can get to everything in one go, in fact?"

Caras glances at the gate rising as Workers rotate the wheel. "Splitting up would be more efficient... but alright. I guess you'll be climbing aboard a Crawler, then?"

"Yep!"

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It turns out Caras is actually quite fast when travelling on reasonably open ground. You've only really seen him moving about the castle, his forward third in the air most of the time, and he always looks awkward like that and feels slow. On this trip he instead lays himself fully to the ground and crawls forward so fast that the Crawlers can't keep up if he doesn't deliberately slow down to let them keep up. He turns slower than a Crawler not pushing a Boulder, and in rougher terrain he can have significant trouble navigating efficiently, but when traveling in a straight line on reasonably flat ground? He's shockingly swift.

"So you hadn't covered everything of import?" Caras says curiously.

Talking while riding a moving Crawler is new, so it takes you a minute to figure out how to do this without losing track of your balance or similar. "Well, tax stuff for one thing."

"... 'tax stuff'?" Caras says, sounding pretty confused.

"Tax stuff! I realized in Soissons that I really don't know what's smart to do with this whole thing. I don't know what the rendering process is like, I don't know what all can be used for it, I don't know if we could improve our efficiency!"

"I... don't... follow?" Caras says uncertainly.

"Well, for example, meat goes rotten-"

"'Rotten'?" Caras says in more confusion.

You're brought up short. "Um. You... do you know what 'decay' is?"

"Poor maintenance of a structure resulting in its function deteriorating due to gaps in material forming that undermine its stability," Caras rattles off.

Oh boy. How do you explain this? "No, um. I'm talking plants and animals. You- if something is dead, it starts to smell, it falls apart, scavenger animals start showing up to eat it..."

"Ah. And this is 'decay'?" Caras says. He sounds like he thinks he gets it, but you have doubts.

"An example, yes. And it's dangerous for a human to eat such meat. You might be able to eat it safely with proper preparation, especially if it's early in the process, but eventually it's too big a risk. People get sick from food that's gone bad-" Um. "-I mean, that's decayed. It can kill people outright."

"Interesting. I get less from such flesh, but the Renderer has never gotten sick as a result. The worst it has done is package up undesirable bits -like Burner Worms- in a 'reject' sack. And my Scuttlers still extract some value out of even those," he adds the last bit with a fair amount of pride.

'Renderer'?

Unfortunately, at this point conversation pauses because you get to a part of Caras' 'rounds': Caras spots tracks that head off the road, shushes you, and sends several Crawlers into the woods. Several minutes pass in silence, then Caras makes an annoyed noise, and you pick up-

Alright, that's a waste of time, come back

-Caras calling them back remotely.

"Why did we just go quiet for so long?" you ask.

"I thought they might be bandit tracks. They're shying away from the main roads more. Lost the trail, though."

"Oh."

"Anyway, that's all fascinating, but I don't see the relevance to taxes."

"Caras, humans normally throw rotten foods away entirely. They're just waste."

Caras twists his forward third enough to look right at you. "Understandable to do with poisons, certainly, but-"

"You can use such meat as taxes humans don't mind paying," you interrupt with, a little exasperated.

Caras stares in silence. "I don't follow."

Oh boy... "If a shepherd gives you one of his sheep, that's meat and wool-"

("'Wool'?")

"-and milk he could've gotten out of that sheep. It costs him. If he has a sheep get sick and die suddenly, and he finds out by virtue of stumbling over its rotten body a few days later, he's probably just going to bury it." You pause here. "Maybe feed it to pigs if he has any and isn't worried about making the pigs sick." You've never been fond of that practice yourself, and avoided taking jobs from the board for helping with such. "But if you can safely render it, he'll be happy to have the corpse taken away and not risking making his herd sick." You pause here for emphasis. "Free taxes."

"... 'free taxes?'" Caras says, like the idea is intriguing but also bizarre.

"Yes."

"Hrrrmm. This is the Burner Worm thing all over again. I don't think I entirely follow your thinking here, but it sounds like I'm missing something else important."

"Well, you could describe the rendering process to me, and I can try to explain with that as a reference?"

"... wait, you don't know what rendering entails?" Here is where the Crawlers get back, and the group's movement resumes. "Ah, no, of course you wouldn't know, you've never gone past the Pool... alright! The Renderer is a- hm. I'm not sure what the proper term for it is. It isn't a Breed, the Heart doesn't make it, I have to make it myself-" You blink a few times at that. Caras can do... whatever that involves? "-but it's a creature embedded in my own design, I implant it somewhere in a ground location, ideally actually a ceiling. Flesh and bone goes into it, it processes everything over a matter of hours to days, and it intermittently packages the usable stuff in a form that can be fed to the Heart, and packages the unusable stuff into reject sacks that go into the trash pile to- huh. To decay, now that I think about it."

You... can't really visualize that. And it's not a very complete explanation. "Ah, um. What can go into it safely?"

Caras... laughs? "'Safely'? Pretty much anything. It's a huge waste to put fruits and whatnot into it -they mostly get packaged into reject sacks, a tiny bit of usable material coming out of even an enormous apple pile- but it's not like it's dangerous. Even Burner Worms don't hurt it much, though of course what little good they provide mostly gets spent on its self-repair... rocks go in and just come out the other side untouched... I've never put in anything that caused serious harm to the Renderer."

Huh. "Including rotten meat and animals that died of illness," you say as more a statement than as a question.

"Ye- 'died of illness'?" Caras says in confusion.

"If an animal gets sick and dies it... might make a human sick to eat it. Same with any animal that eats animals, really."

"... strange. Very strange. And you're suggesting I should... put up proclamations that I will take such meat? And this would be... 'free taxes'."

"It sounds like it makes sense." Another thought occurs. "You could do similar with animal meat people find unpleasant."

"That- excuse me?"

Um. "You... enjoy eating Scuttlers, yes? They taste good?"

"I... suppose?"

"Do you enjoy other foods less? Maybe the vegetable mush?"

"Somewhat? This is a very strange tangent," Caras complains.

"Well, for example, people will kill wolves to protect their herds, but wolf meat doesn't actually taste good. You'd probably have to pay people in exchange, as poorer people would rather eat wolf meat than no meat at all, but I think a lot of people would be happy to trade wolf meat for money they could use to buy something they actually enjoy eating."

"Wolves are... unpleasant? They process just fine..." Caras sounds thoughtful here.

Once again, something comes up: this time, it's a Runner bringing a few papers over. "Oh joy, another divorce oversight request... no new bandits waiting... tax fish expected to be ready in two days... nothing else important..."

And then the group is on its way again.

"I will certainly investigate these taxation ideas more thoroughly. Was that all you had in mind?"

"As far as tax ideas, for the moment yes. But I also wanted to talk about, um, extending my Integration?"

"Extend-? Oh. Oh yes, that is an option. Hm. I hadn't given the topic much thought. I'm a little surprised you're broaching this topic?"

"In Soissons I saw that it was very... very normal for the Council's Integrated to take it much farther. The benefits were extolled heavily, though the... costs were downplayed. I'm not sure I want to take my Integration much farther, especially since it seems to often worsen the ability to cope with sunlight... but I did want to discuss what the options are for us."

"Ah, well... I've not done it before myself so the process would be pretty experimental... I do understand the theory a bit better than I did base Integration. It's mostly just issuing orders to your internal partner."

Well, that's a little reassuring. "My impression is it is derived from the kinds of Breed designs we have?"

"Ah? I suppose that's true in a roundabout way... hmm. I seem to recall being told even new Cores could be used with some effort... something about the human body stabilizing the internal partner..."

"Do... you have anything specific in mind? I was given the impression you could 'turn off' my need for sleep... relatively easily?"

"Ah. Ah! I didn't understand what it was for at first, but yes, the internal partner can take on several responsibilities from the host, and I was told, decades ago now that I think about it, that the core function of this was to let the host keep functioning when they should not be able to. I'd understood that in terms of carrying on in the face of injury, but in retrospect I think I misunderstood the meaning there. Hm. I wouldn't want to do that out here, but it should be pretty quick and safe to do back at the castle... "

[]"Yeah, let's do that." It doesn't sound dangerous, and it would help a lot...

[]"Maybe another day." There were so many catches Yvette didn't mention. You'd rather not risk tripping right over yet another one. Not when it's not necessary.

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"As for other options that should be feasible without too much risk, the internal partner has the ability to produce Runner venom. There'd need to be some modification to deliver the venom without affecting yourself, but that should be about it. Otherwise, I'm... not sure my current range has much to offer? At least while keeping you able to walk in the sun without issue. Boulder shell weighs far too much- oh. I'm not sure if you noticed, but while you were gone I got that lightning Core implemented smoothly!"

"Oh?"

"Yes, I have a new Crawler body segment using it. It'll take time to get it distributed to all of them, but I do believe it's a pretty straightforward little improvement. But I was reminded because I might be able to adapt that function to your Integration. It'd be very experimental, though, I'm still coming to grips with that..."

"Maybe later," you say, still wanting to approach that whole thing with caution. "I'd wanted to share my notes about Soissons' Breeds..."

"I've seen them myself, though?"

What ensues is a pretty long conversation where you talk about the potential for specialized non-combat Breeds: builders, for example, though you'd also been thinking in terms of town criers and whatnot before Caras had explained the... possibly-soul-related thing with Breed design. (You still think it has potential, mind, just that it's probably a bad idea to push it at this juncture) Caras is pretty noncommittal overall to the idea, up until you bring up the idea of possibly assembling a fort overnight with a builder.

"Ah. That... hmmm... I already know how to build large from Guardians... never gave thought to focusing on that kind of manipulatory ability... hmmm..."

You count that as a victory of sorts: you don't know if anything will come of it soon given the need to deliver Cores to the Council, but at least Caras is considering the idea in some capacity.

More 'rounds' stuff interrupts, this time of Caras... studying an area near an intersection of roads?

After multiple minutes pass in silence, you say, "Um... is there something special about this spot?"

"Hm? Oh, sorry. I've been considering building light shelters for daytime storage of some Breeds. Suncrawlers and Rollers especially might be useful to have ready in the field if I can find a solution to the problem of long-distance daytime communication, but while they don't incinerate in daylight, they still ideally are out in it only as much as necessary. I've been considering several possibilities in the last week."

Uh... "Why not... place them in villages?"

"I did that with an early version of Runners forty or fifty years ago. I'm pretty sure vassals killed them. No idea why."

Oh. That's... frustrating. But also this doesn't sound like a solution? "What would stop that from happening again with this idea?"

"I've had that thought myself, honestly, but I am hoping making it less convenient makes a difference. And I probably won't try it until this business with the Council is further along anyway: I haven't even properly extracted the Gatekeeper-derived Core once, let alone started mass-replication."

That seems fair.

Once Caras decides he doesn't really think this spot is viable for such, the walk resumes -looping back home now, apparently.

"Um... I'd also meant to ask more about your interactions with Scaled Folk and Szumowiny. I really don't understand Szumowiny at all, and the Commoners in Neustadt think you and they are the same for some reason?"

"Really?" Caras sounds a bit exasperated, but then sighs and says, "Actually, depending on what they know... that might be perfectly reasonable. Szumowiny are- well, I'm not sure exactly where they're from overall, but Freewheeling Raptors once claimed they come from much further east. I've no idea where he got that idea from, mind, but in any event they're a... two-part species? There's the flying creatures, they fly out and grab humans, animals, even Breeds if they think they can get away with it -they're part of why my current Boulder design is so heavy- and then they carry what they've got back to a... nest... thing. It's an animal of some kind, roots itself in still waters, eats things whole. I think it makes the flying ones somehow. I actually did wonder for a bit if this was some Lord with a very experimental Heart design myself... but Szumowiny don't burn in the sun, they don't talk that I'm aware, and they don't change themselves. At least, according to Freewheeling Raptors."

Well... that (gruesomely) explains where the people were being taken. You remember there were rivers and lakes east to northeast of Neustadt according to that merchant's map... something to keep in mind if you range out into that area again.

"What about the Lake De Glace Scaled Folk? You said you cooperated with them against a Szumowiny infestation once?"

"I may have overstated things a little? We didn't... talk. It wasn't a formal alliance or anything. But when I showed up with Divers and my intermediate Crawler design at the lake and started attacking the Szumowiny nest, the Scaled Folk attacked it too, staying away from my forces. I think one of them shouted 'good hunting' or some such when the nest started really coming apart -nasty, sticky mess, and it rendered horribly inefficiently- but overall it was just us each fighting the Szumowiny separately-but-together, if that makes sense."

It does. "Perfectly. What about the North Sea ones? You ever talk to them?"

"A few times over the decades. It wasn't very productive. I paid them twice to leave me alone, it didn't help, I threatened to find their homes with my Divers and tear them down and... never did succeed, though you've explained why... I tried paying them to attack the Northseamen-"

"Fomorians, apparently. The Admiral of Icy Horrors From the Depths is supposed to be keeping them from going this far east, according to the Council."

Caras seems a bit taken aback by that. "Oh. Oh my. Maybe he is dead now. That would be a shame. Regardless, I tried paying Scaled Folk to instead attack the... Fomorians, but got told their current contract was not up."

Hm? "Contract?"

"That might not have been the exact word they used. I just remember them saying I'd have to bid for their service alongside everyone else when the current term ran out."

Hmmm. This feels significant. But you're not sure what might be done with it in an immediate sense.

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Eventually, with dawn approaching enough that the sky is turning lighter and Caras is making nervous sounds periodically, you make it back to the castle.

Virmire has been good to his word and arrangements have indeed been made: Teo is sulking in the courtyard, watched by a Runner and a pair of Rollers, with Virmire waiting for you and Caras to look over the letter (Neither of you has an issue with it), and Virmire also relays that Ada, Svenja, and Tanja have all been temporarily moved to some of the more sun-exposed rooms while he works out plans for 'proper' Human Guest Quarters. And a rucksack with food has been set up for Teo, too.

"Can I go now?" Teo says, shuffling in place in a manner that makes it clear he would be bolting right now if he didn't think he'd be stopped. (Violently)

You tie off the letter and toss it to Teo, who fumbles it (whoops, it's too dark for him, right) but scoops it up off the ground and stuffs it in his pants. "The food is to your right. Good luck with your trip!"

Teo stares doubtfully at everything, inches over to the rucksack like he expects something terrible to happen any second, grabs it just as carefully, and then inches off toward the gate, faster and faster as he gets more into the thin light and away from the Breeds, until finally stopping just beyond the gate for a minute, eventually turning to look back into the room. His jaw works for a moment like he wants to say something, but then the Workers start lowering the gate and he startles and flees at speed.

Well. Here's hoping that works out.

(No end-vote. The Integration sleep-removal vote decides how things happen next, after all. Do poke me if you think I forgot something Sabrina was supposed to talk to Caras about: I've been less consistent about keeping notes on that kind of thing than I really ought to be doing, and will not be surprised if I still forgot something)