Forge of Destiny(Xianxia Quest)

Pah. Personally I have faith in our robes, and our skill in Darkness/Wind. We can get away and regroup with our housemate.
 
Okay, well to answer this. Art 'chains' typically require you to have mastered the previous arts. So it's kind of a moot point.

Going right for higher arts in areas you have no eperience with might result in a dice penalty, possibly a pretty significant one depending.

Thanks!

On the same note, and his might be something you want to keep secret (though we could have plausibly learnt it from Ying), but how would it affect our foundation? i.e. is training an art up 5 levels to Late Yellow better for that than grabbing an art that starts at late yellow from the 3rd Floor?
 
I think we should talk with her
We don't now what she wants and we stop them from entering the battle but i believe that they wouldn't enter the battle between cai an sun liling anyway

And if not than the fighting opinion appeal to me
I mean was it not fighting helps cultivation
Or something like that?
And she fights with handy cap

And something totally different someone gave her information which location we are
Or were cultivated

And that person is a man
I think it the information broker
But to little information

If we talk to her should ask about that
 
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Yep. But we don't have to fight any of them as long as we keep it to a duel. I'll be honest, I'm fine with both 'Talk' and 'Fight.' But run will get us f**ked up.
The Spirit is relevant only if we run.

Though if we fight, we get to Dave an opponent of higher cultivation than us, and this is with us not being specced for 1v1 in the first place. I do NOT like our odds. And if we lose, they get to take a trophy - which may very well be something irreplaceable like our flute or armor, at least unless our opponent is feeling generous.

I'd rather not.
 
So here's the thing, she came here to stop us from entering the ruckus down below. However, she had a stealth talisman-- she didn't come overtly. If we never detected her, she could've just sat there keeping an eye on us and we wouldn't have known anything was going on. When we did detect her, she told us about Sun Liling and her plan, rather than just lie or attack, and is perfectly fine with just talking. If she is that much better than we are, then why didn't she just attack and knock us out? Weakening us and preventing us from giving any aid to Cai?

This gives me the impression that Chu Song is not all that confident of her success if a fight breaks out, or rather: she doesn't care if there is one or not, and ultimately isn't all the concerned if she wins or loses a duel-- regardless, she stalled us and fulfilled her objective.
 
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"My name is Chu Song. I suppose I caused you a bit of trouble, since I told that demon's thugs to shove it when they came around for Lil' bro Rong,"
So this is in reference to Cai. She's calling her a demon -> some sense of enmity
"Nah, I just promised that bloody princess that I'd keep you out of the ruckus she's raising, you know?" The girl responded with a shrug, striding forward out of the underbrush, Ling Qi backed up, keeping an even distance. Chu Song wore a pair of dark grey baggy pants tucked into knee high armored boots. "I didn't mind doing her a favor, since I wanted a chat with you anyway."
"bloody princess" is likely a reference to her blood art but doesn't seem very respectful. Apparently more interested in us than either Liling or Renxiang.

"I will have to stop you if you try to leave," Chu Song said casually, likely reading her expression. "I gave my word and all," she drawled easily. "You shouldn't worry so much. That princess is only after that Cai demon at the moment. Miss Bai'll be fine."
"Miss Bai" most respectful term of reference so far in my opinion. Also her word seems important to her. She later gives her word that if we duel she'll take us on one on one. She doesn't seem to have an issue with Meizhen who she says will be fine and she's trying to keep things amicable with us but she gave her word she wouldn't let us interfere with Liling's attack on Cai.

A thought though, could it be possible to convince Chu Song to talk as we walk? If we can convince her that we won't interfere between Sun Liling's duel with Lady Cai, then there is no reason to stay here for the talk and we would like to make sure that Meizhen isn't involved in the fighting.
So why not ask her if she's willing to prove her word by going with us to see Meizhen? I'm assuming if they knew where to find us they could find her as well. We could talk on the way and as long as we don't move towards Cai we should be able to avoid battle.
 
In our admittedly short time with her she emphasised giving her word twice. We don't know she won't be willing to fight Cai if she's unable to stop us and living up to her word seems important to her. Considering she was willing to fight Cai for Ji Rong after knowing him for such a short time I don't think she's afraid to fight Cai so much as she had no reason to.
Living up to her word doesn't mean fighting Cai, it means stopping her from getting there. If she fails, that doesn't mean 'her word' suddenly becomes 'fight against Cai'.

So, I think that Ling Qi has been doing efforts to actually try to keep her friendship and be honest with her actual allies. 'Not caring enough about Cai' when we gave our word to help keep the peace, and were paid for that, strikes me as going back on that. Even if we don't care about going back on that, though, we just can't trust Sun Liling hasn't done anything to attack Meizhen either.

[X] She has outright said that she is here to stall you. Escape and join back up with as many of your friends as you can manage. Even if it means dealing with her two lackeys too.
-[X] Tell her we'll have to postpone your talk before escaping.


We can jump out of the cliff, and we can run away quickly (or even fly). The moment we are out of view we can also easily make sure we aren't being tracked. While talking to Chu Song could create an alliance for later, we can definitely postpone this talk. I don't want to betray the trust of our allies, and I don't want to risk our friends being attacked.

Incidentally, while Han Jian and Han Fang can't be found, Gu Xiulan can, and is alone. As part of the ones who beat up Sun Liling the first time, she probably is having her own encounter right now, even if Meizhen isn't- and I suspect she is, too.
So this is in reference to Cai. She's calling her a demon -> some sense of enmity
Demon is not a negative term.
 
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We look a bit shifty because we ran away from a fight, and we give up the 'honorable warrior' protection so they gang up on us and take all our stuff.

... What?

No, really, what? Fighting as an "honorable warrior" isn't going to protect you from getting looted to the ground. Or from being ganged up on, for that matter. Suggesting that a failed escape would mean "total lootage!" is... kinda bizarre. Or suggests mendaciousness on your part.

What would protect Ling Qi from being looted is a mixture of:
1. Chu Song's idea of how *she* should behave. Particularly as she's a realm up cultivation-wise and has a couple allies. Those kind of odds and taking, well, just about anything is going to label her as a bandit.
2. Chu Song's goals involving Ling Qi herself - which probably *doesn't* involve "make a mortal enemy of her".
3. Ling Qi's talent and future potential to ambush either Chu Song herself or make the lives of her faction members miserable.
4. Ling Qi's allies retaliating. While Cai Renxiang might not get involved, Bai Meizhen definitely *would*. Gu Xiulan has been seen going around as Ling Qi's battle buddy, so the Golden Fields group is a possibility as well. f course, if the gift dress is also looted... Renxiang might be highly offended.
5. Tit for tat. Particularly in mind with #4, looting everything Ling Qi has is going to mean that Chu Song and her faction are opened up to similar ruthlessness.
6. What does she have that Chu Song would think as worth her attention? She's got a flute - Chu Song doesn't play the flute. She's got some knives - cheap ones. She's got a bow - Chu Song doesn't use the bow (I think). She's got a dress - it probably doesn't fit Chu Song and is liable to cause offense to a peer power who gifted it. She's probably got some stones on her - big deal. She might have some pills or slips - the latter require time to cultivate and probably aren't beyond Chu Song's own from the archives, and the former are probably equally common.
7. Ling Qi might react with willingness to escalate to serious injuries to protect her stuff.

In short, I would be extremely shocked if a failed escape led to any kind of looting at all, let alone a total "take everything she has" you're claiming.
 
"Nah, I just promised that bloody princess that I'd keep you out of the ruckus she's raising, you know?" The girl responded with a shrug, striding forward out of the underbrush, Ling Qi backed up, keeping an even distance. Chu Song wore a pair of dark grey baggy pants tucked into knee high armored boots. "I didn't mind doing her a favor, since I wanted a chat with you anyway."

Ling Qi glanced to the side, her heartbeat picking up. Sun Liling was back? She had known the girl wouldn't say away forever, but there hadn't been any warning at all? She needed to get out of here, if Meizhen was caught up in this, she needed to back the other girl up.

"I will have to stop you if you try to leave," Chu Song said casually, likely reading her expression. "I gave my word and all," she drawled easily. "You shouldn't worry so much. That princess is only after that Cai demon at the moment. Miss Bai'll be fine."
Even if what Chu Song says is entirely truthful it is plausible for the older disciples to take advantage of the ruckus, and target Ling Qi's friends. I mean it's not like Gu Xiulan has been fighting older disciples, and has at least two outer disciples of the same year who want revenge, or anything.

Actually thinking about it further Chu Song's goal for doing Sun Lilang a favor might be to insure a rival group for the inner sect is weakened while their leader is training with a sect Elder, or to put it bluntly she is helping others suppress Han Jian's group without taking the reputation hit from doing it directly by using the excuse of doing Sun Lilang a favor to keep one of their allies occupied.

[x] She has outright said that she is here to stall you. Escape and join back up with as many of your friends as you can manage. Even if it means dealing with her two lackeys too.
 
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[X] She wants to talk, then she can talk. You'll listen and plan.
If we don't like what we hear, then we start running.
 
It will be too late to run once we talk. She flat out told us she wants to delay us. Talking means accepting the delay and deciding we are giving up on helping Cai. That's a decent choice if we don't mind breaking our own alliances first chance we get, but it's still what we are doing.

OTOH, it's very possible to get a good alliance with her if we talk.
 
Incidentally, while Han Jian and Han Fang can't be found, Gu Xiulan can, and is alone. As part of the ones who beat up Sun Liling the first time, she probably is having her own encounter right now, even if Meizhen isn't- and I suspect she is, too.

Tactically this makes sense. I would suggest that one of the things that Sun should have learned from the last fight is that our side has stronger team fight than her. With Meizhen's Gaze, our everything, Han Jian's buffs etc., we're really difficult to deal with if we're all together.

Split us up, however, and allow her to fight Cai without all the rest of the support, and things are much more in her favor.
 
[X] She wants to talk, then she can talk. You'll listen and plan.

We might be able to escape, but if we fail that's gonna be a 3v1. We might be able to win a 1v1 duel, but it seems unnecessary; and given her goal is to 'keep us from interfering', she'll drag it out or tire us out if she can. Talking keeps us in top form while also fishing for information.

Either escape or talking, the duel is entirely unnecessary and feeds right back into helping her goals (i.e. delay) even if it is an 'easier' fight.
 
[X] She has outright said that she is here to stall you. Escape and join back up with as many of your friends as you can manage. Even if it means dealing with her two lackeys too.
-[X] Tell her we'll have to postpone your talk before escaping.
 
[X] She has outright said that she is here to stall you. Escape and join back up with as many of your friends as you can manage. Even if it means dealing with her two lackeys too.
 
Doesn't talking help them even more considering it's guarantied to delay us?
In the Duel, we actually have to beat her before the other 2 would let us pass so she could delay us just as much. In the escape option vs. all 3, all we need to do is escape.

Thing is, we don't know if we can escape, given that whoever planned this seems to have a decent handle on how we do things. Talking keeps us in top shape while also gaining info on what the hell is going on, even if it still delays us.
 
[X] She has outright said that she is here to stall you. Escape and join back up with as many of your friends as you can manage. Even if it means dealing with her two lackeys too.
 
In the Duel, we actually have to beat her before the other 2 would let us pass so she could delay us just as much. In the escape option vs. all 3, all we need to do is escape.

Thing is, we don't know if we can escape, given that whoever planned this seems to have a decent handle on how we do things. Talking keeps us in top shape while also gaining info on what the hell is going on, even if it still delays us.
We never know if we can win a fight or any kind of contest unless it's a stomp. We are very well equipped to tempt to escape, though, and most of our abilities when it comes to escapes are secrets that no one knows about.

Also, 'She has wonbut we didn't lose our Qi' doesn't mean she hasn't succeeded. It's possible the talk will 'change our mind' about what we want to do, but the talk itself is tacitly giving up on helping our friends or Cai and instead choosing to plan.

The problem, 'planning' only works if we have time to plan and if the delay itself doesn't render said planning moot. Given we know Yrsillar has time running when we do actions, this means that right now the rest of Sun Liling's plan is unfolding. There is a chance that everything will coincidentally be just slow enough that we have the time to plan and then act, but that's basically gambling Sun Liling's planning is inept.
 
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[X] She wants to talk, then she can talk. You'll listen and plan.

We should ask were she got the information were we are
 
[X] Duel her, even if she is above you in cultivation you have a shot. If you can take her out her lackeys shouldn't interfere and she won't be causing any other trouble today.

Row, Row, fight the powah !
 
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