Dark Lord Accidental Lieutenant Quest
- Thread starter Academia Nut
- Start date
- Original Fantasy
- Location
- Germany
[X] Highlands
[X] Someone insignificant
Highlands because it sounds like the wealthiest of the three Options
Someone insignificant because we have not enough Information to hit somebody more important
Best to hit a Farmer family first to get the basics and get a bit more info's on the situation in the Highlands before we decide our actions
Also @Academia Nut
A few Quick questions
1. Set or individually?
2.
[X] Someone insignificant
Highlands because it sounds like the wealthiest of the three Options
Someone insignificant because we have not enough Information to hit somebody more important
Best to hit a Farmer family first to get the basics and get a bit more info's on the situation in the Highlands before we decide our actions
Also @Academia Nut
A few Quick questions
1. Set or individually?
2.
Can we regain some more of the power/knowledge of the demon or was the intial choice everything we could get from that particular demon?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Nah, there are so many permutations that I generate on the fly.
Individually.
There are training actions to recover more information.
- Location
- Southern Virginia
Are these plantations worked with slave labor, by the way? Though even local peasants are likely to be disaffected working the land to raise cash crops for others, possibly just for scrip rather than real wages.
Also it's implied we know how to refuel the power, but refuse to. I think.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
There's a mix of slaves, sharecroppers, and impoverished yeoman farmers/hunters. The island doesn't support mass scale luxury plantations like some of the other areas in the archipelago, but you can support a wide variety of tropical crops in the hills, most notably sugarcane, coffee, and chocolate. These crops, especially sugarcane, tend to use slave labour. In terms of money brought in the slaves are the most profitable, but the terrain often hinders expansion so they are unlikely to ever become a majority of the worker population.
The sharecroppers are only not serfs due to the nature of who gets brought over for colonization. These people tend to work fruit plantations and orchards that are basically wild forest where everything that didn't bear fruit was progressively replaced with fruit trees over the post century. In terms of caloric output and population this group is the largest, but since most of their output is for local consumption they have low financial returns.
The final group are freemen who live in the wilder areas, gathering wild fruits, tubers, roots and hunting things like boars, deer, and monkeys. Sometimes they also collect rare and valuable herbs and spices that don't respond well to intensive cultivation. The successful members basically push the forest back by turning wild fruit trees into tended groves and then orchards, at which point the farm gets gobbled up by a wealthy
aristocrat and the family becomes a new batch of sharecroppers. The hunters often also get recruited by pirates and mercenaries for their skills in the forest.
More that you sort of know a way but don't want to think about it too hard.
StellarMonarch
Myrmidon
- Location
- Québec
[X] Highlands
[X] Cult cell
[X] Cult cell
Finding a home
- Pronouns
- He/Him
"I think... I think if we head up into the highlands and find someone of little consequence, a yeoman or peasant or the like, we can quietly convince them to let us camp out in the forest near their home without being bothered, while we figure out our first steps," you state, detailing out your thoughts.
Az considers this for a moment, before he says, "Hmmm... I agree that we should avoid the cult and anyone important to begin with, but I think you are being too cautious. I choose the closer wilderness over the further. If you choose to join me, that would be most 'appreciated', but if you choose not to join me do know that I will remember that."
You have no real answer to that, and so instead you just nod and say, "Mangrove swamp it is."
The journey across the rough terrain that protects the city proper of Sarna takes the whole remainder of the day, and you aren't down the opposite side of the slope to the swamps and shores proper by the time you stop to make camp for the night. You are ravenously hungry, sweaty, exhausted, and all around beat down by the time you collapse to the rocky but leaf covered ground in the twilight, but you have to admit that at least the view of the sun setting behind the horizon on the ocean is another little joy you didn't realize you had missed. Az sits down across from you, rolling a stone around in his hand, and notes, "You're quite good at navigating the forest."
You nod quietly, too tired to offer much commentary. You had found some edible berries and shoots, but those weren't particularly filling, although you do note that he is correct. The actions feel... familiar. While these trails are unknown to you, you never got turned around in the dense, tangled forest, and you knew to pass by a number of toxic plants. Hugging your knees up to your chest, you look down at your feet and wiggle your toes, which are thoroughly caked in mud and have been rather battered by walking bare across the rough terrain, although at least they aren't bleeding.
"I'm not sure that I need to sleep, so rest if you are tired. I will wake you if I need it," Az says, noting your demeanour.
You nod and let your head rest on your arms, which are cross across your raised knees. Maybe you'll just rest for a bit before...
You can't find the trail. You have something to do, someone to see, but you can't find the trail and you're lost and everyone is depending on you to get home and...
Green, green in every direction, no distinction to tell fair from foul, so you can't get back to where...
It's just around this bend, people need you to find it...
Shivering abruptly forces you from sleep, your body seizing up with a sharp inhalation of air and a jerk of your frame. Cold sweat covers you, chilling you in the cool humidity of the night, and you shudder uncontrollably. Az is still sitting across from you, but he has obtained a stick from somewhere and is using broken rock chips to sharpen one end into a point, apparently working by feel and starlight and possibly the faint glow of his own eyes... which might permit him some sort of hellish acuity of sight in the darkness, now that you think about it. He glances at you and notes your open eyes before saying, "I was starting to wonder if you would wake up on your own before morning."
You begin to rub half numb fingers against half numb legs, trying to heat everything up a bit. You're not sure what to say for a moment, your tongue dry from not enough water while sweating profusely, but eventually you croak out, "I... I might have been from the highlands. I think, I think the demon tormented me with nightmares of being lost in the jungle. When it had me, it was like that non-stop, and I just... I just couldn't wake up."
"You're awake now, and the demon isn't," Az offers while devoting the majority of his attention to his little project. You're not quite certain what to say to that, but caution steals the possibility of questioning him from you.
After a time of just watching him while you try to warm up, you eventually ask, "What are your plans in the swamps?" You probably could have asked this during the day, but you were too busy navigating and being wary of the avatar of tyranny to also ask about his plans, and he had not been forthcoming at the time.
"Oh, probably locate some smugglers, make contact with them to begin worming into the underbelly of Sarna and the pirate groups who work with the smugglers, accumulating various forms of power. I'm currently not planning too much beyond that horizon because something will inevitably come along to upend any medium or long term planning and require modification of my plans on the fly. If I weren't certain of something like a major political upheaval, plague of ghosts, or major natural disaster I might posit trying to usurp - overtly or covertly - the position of a Merchant Prince and then attempt to take over all of Sarna. If nothing interrupts I'll probably even go for that, but I've had such plans made pointless too many times in the past to not keep my options open when doing this sort of thing," Az notes while intently peeling away slivers of wood that do not fit into his vision of the spear he is making.
You nod at that, feeling oddly ill at ease by his at ease attitude. He doesn't feel nearly as imperious as you feel he should be.
"It is the nature of the world to make a mockery of the works of men, so I long ago learned to take advantage of the unexpected rather than gnash my teeth and wail that I did not get my way. I would have been dragged under by disappointment by twenty if I learned any other lesson," Az says, before holding his spear horizontal and resting it upon the nail of his littlest finger near its midpoint. After watching it start to slowly tip in one direction, he nodded in approval before he stuck it in a gouge he had made in a flat piece of bark and began to vigorously twirl.
Your brain slowly turns over what he said, and after a moment you are glad that your chills cover for the fact that you let out a little shudder. You suddenly wonder if he sees you in a similar manner to that branch; needing to be tended and sculpted into a useful shape instead of simply using it as a club as is, but still ultimately a tool and ultimately disposable, no matter how much prior work was put into it. You watch him intently for a time, before your eyes flicker shut once again.
While the rising of sun in the morning rouses you, you cannot say that your dreams were particularly more pleasant for the rest of the night.
Tiredly you get to your feet, noting that Az has completed another pair of spears, their tips a shiny dark from where he apparently friction charred them, so that the wood would better hold a point. There is obvious experience in his skills despite the absolute lack of materials or tools, and yet somehow seeing him with weapons in hand is both right and proper and yet also faintly terrifying. It was like he had been born armed and even these crude weapons were merely returning him to his natural state.
The sun is perhaps only two diameters above the horizon when you are reaching the sandy tangle where the jungle hills give way to the mangrove swamps, and you get to see your instincts proven right. There is a boar rooting about along your path, and when it hears you coming, it almost immediately takes exception to your existence. Possibly literally, since now that you think about it there are stories of animals being driven mad by the unseen presence of evil spirits, which both of you probably qualify for. You don't have time to really process what to do next before Az is suddenly upon the charging boar. It's all over with so quickly, and even though you don't really trust your recollection, you don't feel as if the First Emperor was displaying the strength or speed of a hell god, the moment of violence is still completed with bored ease. One spear casually slips into the boar's right eye socket, the creature's own charge providing the energy to drive it to the back of the skull. The second spear is planted with a bit of force in the boar's neck as it stumbles past Az's adroit sidestep along its blindside, while once the boar actually hits the ground he drives his final spear into its chest and assuredly where its heart would be.
You think you actually start breathing again a second after the boar exhales its final shudder, the poor beast probably never even aware that it was doomed, the whole thing was over so fast.
The fact that Az frowns and says with disappointment, "Iron weaponry just moved up on the list," only makes the whole scene even more surreal.
Something giddy bubbles up within you and you ask, "What, so you could do it in one blow?"
The look you get in return silences your giggles, and you just hang your head in embarrassment and fear and say, "Right, dumb question."
The rest of the morning is spent in butchering the boar and getting a proper fire going to cook it, which you figure you can risk without drawing too much attention that you might otherwise wish to avoid now that you are solidly away from the scene of yesterday's crimes.
Of course, just because you avoided the sort of attention you wanted to avoid didn't mean that you avoided all attention, and as morning melts away towards midday and you are chewing on a hunk of fat mixed with some berries, your reverie is interrupted by a voice suddenly chiming up, "Hey! Who are you two?"
Your head whips to the side to see a man in the late afternoon of his life. While his stringy hair has faded to a mostly solid steel grey interspersed with wisps of black and white and his muscles are sagging, he still clearly has a labourer's strength about him, and his back is not yet particularly stooped. By his appearance, he is probably one of the local fishermen who ply the shallows of the swamp and reefs, barely scrapping by except for the payments he might receive from smugglers to guide their boats across the treacherous waters.
You just stare at him and panic, grasping for a solution. In response, you feel energy flow from your chest to your eyes, and for a moment the man's mind expands outwards towards you. Hostility and suspicion are at the forefront of the complex flower, but there are elements of curiosity and friendliness that you tug on. Just as quickly as you activated the power you drop it in fear and horror over its application, as well as simply feeling exhausted after such a minor exertion. Still, in that brief application, the suspicion drains from his eyes and he softens his tone to ask, "Wait... do I know you?"
Az takes this opening as if he expected it to be there and he sweeps out a deep bow, saying, "I do not think so good sir, we are simply humble religious folk, and we did not mean to intrude upon your home."
The man seems confused for a second, but the alteration you made to his mood causes him to interpret the situation in the most generous way possible. You are both wearing heavy robes, Az has been keeping his hood up despite the heart, and you suppose your shaved head could be interpreted religiously too. He does ask, "Religious folk?"
Sliding his pale hands out from his sleeves while keeping his head down, Az says, "I am afflicted with a condition that shall lead to my ending, and I have chosen retreat from others to be in peace, only my relative Camilla to assist me these days, bless her soul."
It takes you a moment to realize that not only had Az only lied a little, under some interpretations of what he said he might not have lied at all, despite the fact that there was a definite gulf between what he said and how the fisherman would interpret things. The older man took some time to process this, before he pointed at the smoky fire and the boar roasting away upon the crude implements, and asked, "What is all this then?"
Gesturing to the boar, Az says, "This animal appears to have confronted something stronger than it that did not drag it away from here after the kill, and not wanting to waste such a bounty, we took it upon ourselves to make good use of the meat. I can assure you that we were not hunting and this find was entirely accidental, and intensely apologize if we poached on your territory. You are of course entitled to it."
The fisherman looks away and mumbles something, almost certainly "Not my territory..." before he shakes his head and says, "No, no, I know what its like to not want to waste food. I don't care, so long as you don't bring trouble by making a habit of it." After a moment he asks, "You two have a place to stay yet?"
Shaking his head, Az replies, "As of yet, no. I had hoped that I would be able to find some place isolated where I might establish myself, away from others. Camilla agreed to accompany and help me build, for the time being."
Running a thumb and index finger across the grey stubble upon his chin, the fisherman considers for a moment before he shrugs and says, "There's more pig than you can deal with there, so if you're willing to let me have a cut, old Adam here might have an old fishing shack that you can bunk in to be out of the rain while you 'get established'. Might even have some chores I can trade for fish with you two for."
"That is most kind," Az says magnanimously from beneath his hood, and you just nod along.
Flash of Memory
Use of Skills
Character Sheet Updated
Choose an action
[] Aid Adam
[] Hunt/gather in the swamp
[] Learn from Adam
[] Learn from Az
[] Learn the terrain
[] Meditate on memories
[] Practice magic
[] Relax
[] Seek out others
[] Speak with Az
Az considers this for a moment, before he says, "Hmmm... I agree that we should avoid the cult and anyone important to begin with, but I think you are being too cautious. I choose the closer wilderness over the further. If you choose to join me, that would be most 'appreciated', but if you choose not to join me do know that I will remember that."
You have no real answer to that, and so instead you just nod and say, "Mangrove swamp it is."
The journey across the rough terrain that protects the city proper of Sarna takes the whole remainder of the day, and you aren't down the opposite side of the slope to the swamps and shores proper by the time you stop to make camp for the night. You are ravenously hungry, sweaty, exhausted, and all around beat down by the time you collapse to the rocky but leaf covered ground in the twilight, but you have to admit that at least the view of the sun setting behind the horizon on the ocean is another little joy you didn't realize you had missed. Az sits down across from you, rolling a stone around in his hand, and notes, "You're quite good at navigating the forest."
You nod quietly, too tired to offer much commentary. You had found some edible berries and shoots, but those weren't particularly filling, although you do note that he is correct. The actions feel... familiar. While these trails are unknown to you, you never got turned around in the dense, tangled forest, and you knew to pass by a number of toxic plants. Hugging your knees up to your chest, you look down at your feet and wiggle your toes, which are thoroughly caked in mud and have been rather battered by walking bare across the rough terrain, although at least they aren't bleeding.
"I'm not sure that I need to sleep, so rest if you are tired. I will wake you if I need it," Az says, noting your demeanour.
You nod and let your head rest on your arms, which are cross across your raised knees. Maybe you'll just rest for a bit before...
You can't find the trail. You have something to do, someone to see, but you can't find the trail and you're lost and everyone is depending on you to get home and...
Green, green in every direction, no distinction to tell fair from foul, so you can't get back to where...
It's just around this bend, people need you to find it...
Shivering abruptly forces you from sleep, your body seizing up with a sharp inhalation of air and a jerk of your frame. Cold sweat covers you, chilling you in the cool humidity of the night, and you shudder uncontrollably. Az is still sitting across from you, but he has obtained a stick from somewhere and is using broken rock chips to sharpen one end into a point, apparently working by feel and starlight and possibly the faint glow of his own eyes... which might permit him some sort of hellish acuity of sight in the darkness, now that you think about it. He glances at you and notes your open eyes before saying, "I was starting to wonder if you would wake up on your own before morning."
You begin to rub half numb fingers against half numb legs, trying to heat everything up a bit. You're not sure what to say for a moment, your tongue dry from not enough water while sweating profusely, but eventually you croak out, "I... I might have been from the highlands. I think, I think the demon tormented me with nightmares of being lost in the jungle. When it had me, it was like that non-stop, and I just... I just couldn't wake up."
"You're awake now, and the demon isn't," Az offers while devoting the majority of his attention to his little project. You're not quite certain what to say to that, but caution steals the possibility of questioning him from you.
After a time of just watching him while you try to warm up, you eventually ask, "What are your plans in the swamps?" You probably could have asked this during the day, but you were too busy navigating and being wary of the avatar of tyranny to also ask about his plans, and he had not been forthcoming at the time.
"Oh, probably locate some smugglers, make contact with them to begin worming into the underbelly of Sarna and the pirate groups who work with the smugglers, accumulating various forms of power. I'm currently not planning too much beyond that horizon because something will inevitably come along to upend any medium or long term planning and require modification of my plans on the fly. If I weren't certain of something like a major political upheaval, plague of ghosts, or major natural disaster I might posit trying to usurp - overtly or covertly - the position of a Merchant Prince and then attempt to take over all of Sarna. If nothing interrupts I'll probably even go for that, but I've had such plans made pointless too many times in the past to not keep my options open when doing this sort of thing," Az notes while intently peeling away slivers of wood that do not fit into his vision of the spear he is making.
You nod at that, feeling oddly ill at ease by his at ease attitude. He doesn't feel nearly as imperious as you feel he should be.
"It is the nature of the world to make a mockery of the works of men, so I long ago learned to take advantage of the unexpected rather than gnash my teeth and wail that I did not get my way. I would have been dragged under by disappointment by twenty if I learned any other lesson," Az says, before holding his spear horizontal and resting it upon the nail of his littlest finger near its midpoint. After watching it start to slowly tip in one direction, he nodded in approval before he stuck it in a gouge he had made in a flat piece of bark and began to vigorously twirl.
Your brain slowly turns over what he said, and after a moment you are glad that your chills cover for the fact that you let out a little shudder. You suddenly wonder if he sees you in a similar manner to that branch; needing to be tended and sculpted into a useful shape instead of simply using it as a club as is, but still ultimately a tool and ultimately disposable, no matter how much prior work was put into it. You watch him intently for a time, before your eyes flicker shut once again.
While the rising of sun in the morning rouses you, you cannot say that your dreams were particularly more pleasant for the rest of the night.
Tiredly you get to your feet, noting that Az has completed another pair of spears, their tips a shiny dark from where he apparently friction charred them, so that the wood would better hold a point. There is obvious experience in his skills despite the absolute lack of materials or tools, and yet somehow seeing him with weapons in hand is both right and proper and yet also faintly terrifying. It was like he had been born armed and even these crude weapons were merely returning him to his natural state.
The sun is perhaps only two diameters above the horizon when you are reaching the sandy tangle where the jungle hills give way to the mangrove swamps, and you get to see your instincts proven right. There is a boar rooting about along your path, and when it hears you coming, it almost immediately takes exception to your existence. Possibly literally, since now that you think about it there are stories of animals being driven mad by the unseen presence of evil spirits, which both of you probably qualify for. You don't have time to really process what to do next before Az is suddenly upon the charging boar. It's all over with so quickly, and even though you don't really trust your recollection, you don't feel as if the First Emperor was displaying the strength or speed of a hell god, the moment of violence is still completed with bored ease. One spear casually slips into the boar's right eye socket, the creature's own charge providing the energy to drive it to the back of the skull. The second spear is planted with a bit of force in the boar's neck as it stumbles past Az's adroit sidestep along its blindside, while once the boar actually hits the ground he drives his final spear into its chest and assuredly where its heart would be.
You think you actually start breathing again a second after the boar exhales its final shudder, the poor beast probably never even aware that it was doomed, the whole thing was over so fast.
The fact that Az frowns and says with disappointment, "Iron weaponry just moved up on the list," only makes the whole scene even more surreal.
Something giddy bubbles up within you and you ask, "What, so you could do it in one blow?"
The look you get in return silences your giggles, and you just hang your head in embarrassment and fear and say, "Right, dumb question."
The rest of the morning is spent in butchering the boar and getting a proper fire going to cook it, which you figure you can risk without drawing too much attention that you might otherwise wish to avoid now that you are solidly away from the scene of yesterday's crimes.
Of course, just because you avoided the sort of attention you wanted to avoid didn't mean that you avoided all attention, and as morning melts away towards midday and you are chewing on a hunk of fat mixed with some berries, your reverie is interrupted by a voice suddenly chiming up, "Hey! Who are you two?"
Your head whips to the side to see a man in the late afternoon of his life. While his stringy hair has faded to a mostly solid steel grey interspersed with wisps of black and white and his muscles are sagging, he still clearly has a labourer's strength about him, and his back is not yet particularly stooped. By his appearance, he is probably one of the local fishermen who ply the shallows of the swamp and reefs, barely scrapping by except for the payments he might receive from smugglers to guide their boats across the treacherous waters.
You just stare at him and panic, grasping for a solution. In response, you feel energy flow from your chest to your eyes, and for a moment the man's mind expands outwards towards you. Hostility and suspicion are at the forefront of the complex flower, but there are elements of curiosity and friendliness that you tug on. Just as quickly as you activated the power you drop it in fear and horror over its application, as well as simply feeling exhausted after such a minor exertion. Still, in that brief application, the suspicion drains from his eyes and he softens his tone to ask, "Wait... do I know you?"
Az takes this opening as if he expected it to be there and he sweeps out a deep bow, saying, "I do not think so good sir, we are simply humble religious folk, and we did not mean to intrude upon your home."
The man seems confused for a second, but the alteration you made to his mood causes him to interpret the situation in the most generous way possible. You are both wearing heavy robes, Az has been keeping his hood up despite the heart, and you suppose your shaved head could be interpreted religiously too. He does ask, "Religious folk?"
Sliding his pale hands out from his sleeves while keeping his head down, Az says, "I am afflicted with a condition that shall lead to my ending, and I have chosen retreat from others to be in peace, only my relative Camilla to assist me these days, bless her soul."
It takes you a moment to realize that not only had Az only lied a little, under some interpretations of what he said he might not have lied at all, despite the fact that there was a definite gulf between what he said and how the fisherman would interpret things. The older man took some time to process this, before he pointed at the smoky fire and the boar roasting away upon the crude implements, and asked, "What is all this then?"
Gesturing to the boar, Az says, "This animal appears to have confronted something stronger than it that did not drag it away from here after the kill, and not wanting to waste such a bounty, we took it upon ourselves to make good use of the meat. I can assure you that we were not hunting and this find was entirely accidental, and intensely apologize if we poached on your territory. You are of course entitled to it."
The fisherman looks away and mumbles something, almost certainly "Not my territory..." before he shakes his head and says, "No, no, I know what its like to not want to waste food. I don't care, so long as you don't bring trouble by making a habit of it." After a moment he asks, "You two have a place to stay yet?"
Shaking his head, Az replies, "As of yet, no. I had hoped that I would be able to find some place isolated where I might establish myself, away from others. Camilla agreed to accompany and help me build, for the time being."
Running a thumb and index finger across the grey stubble upon his chin, the fisherman considers for a moment before he shrugs and says, "There's more pig than you can deal with there, so if you're willing to let me have a cut, old Adam here might have an old fishing shack that you can bunk in to be out of the rain while you 'get established'. Might even have some chores I can trade for fish with you two for."
"That is most kind," Az says magnanimously from beneath his hood, and you just nod along.
Flash of Memory
Use of Skills
Character Sheet Updated
Choose an action
[] Aid Adam
[] Hunt/gather in the swamp
[] Learn from Adam
[] Learn from Az
[] Learn the terrain
[] Meditate on memories
[] Practice magic
[] Relax
[] Seek out others
[] Speak with Az
- Location
- Australia
[X] Learn the terrain
Everything can really be done a little later, other than this. We have shown that we can survive the terrain safely, so now its time to map it out, find things of interest, and start getting established.
Relaxing is a valid choice too, if we are exhausted, but we do not seem that weak yet.
Everything can really be done a little later, other than this. We have shown that we can survive the terrain safely, so now its time to map it out, find things of interest, and start getting established.
Relaxing is a valid choice too, if we are exhausted, but we do not seem that weak yet.
Black Noise
Curious
- Location
- About 1AU from Sol
[X] Meditate on memories
Camellia's in a pretty shit headspace right now. Mediation actions to hopefully begin addressing that, then either relaxing a bit or learning from Az to establish a working relationship that isn't based on primal terror.
Camellia's in a pretty shit headspace right now. Mediation actions to hopefully begin addressing that, then either relaxing a bit or learning from Az to establish a working relationship that isn't based on primal terror.
- Location
- Brazil
[X] Meditate on memories
[X] Meditate on memories
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Also, just so it is all clear, Az can and occasionally will veto decisions, but they are important for laying out character foundations. Camilla is emerging as being cautious, which will flavour her character for this arc, better enabling me to write a number of decisions without requiring a full vote.
During these early votes, decisions will also determine certain "revealed" skills.
During these early votes, decisions will also determine certain "revealed" skills.
