Story Topic

[Cuaiir he/him]

Gods of the Wild Magic.... I halt five steps in from the door, already feeling the power emanating from over forty Spheremorphs in such a relatively tiny area. I doubt this many Morphs have ever been in such close proximity before. You wouldn't think that would make much of an impact, but this place seems like it's warping somehow. I don't think this place is natural, let alone really close to where we came in.

Where is that voice coming from? I look around, trying to find the source of it. My gaze passes over one of the groups to my left, and I see a familiar style of dress, a Warrior's mantle, on one of the Spheremorphs. Another Shaman from the Machine Desert? I thought there were only a few of us...

[Emeralis00 she/her]

All spheremorphs. Every one of them.Ambro scans the crowd, looking for either the distinctive frost capes of Frozen foothills or anyone who looked familiar.

Not that I expect anyone to be, but you never know.

Ambro walks over to Jay'el.

"So. What do you think will happen? There are enough spheremorphs in this room to rival any city in the world."

Ambro looks over his companions and the stranger.

I wonder. If I had to choose...who would I kill first?

[Cuaiir he/him]

"I really don't know. We're here for this tournament, which we're all supposed to compete in. Somehow, I don't think we'll get out the same way we came in."

I also really doubt I'm at the same level as some of these Morphs. I've had this thing a year and have yet to find a fourth Sphere, have barely enough stored health for a true prolonged battle, and this Amalgam thing feels like it has some nasty drawbacks. I haven't had it long enough to work out ways around them yet.

I look over the people who entered with me. Eerongal - tactician, champion, unknown others. slow, strong, tough to take down. Ambro - geass, some kind of misting, unknown other capabilities. too many variables. the ever mysterious 'Adolin' - completely unknown capabilities. x-factor. Realistically, if I ended up in a fight with these guys, I'd probably lose. I think the only advantage I have right now is range, and even that's up in the air. Without any kind of cover, there's no way Gunner, Engineer, or even Primal Gunner are going to last long. I hate being helpless like this. No information, and no way to get more...

[Comatose he/him]

River:

The decor does not impress me. Any noble house worth the gold in their purse could set up such a room if they wanted to. They might even do it with more style. No, what impresses me is the Spheremorphs. Forty of them, enough to double the defenders of even lake city. Their pulses crash into me. I've not sensed this many since my time with the Riverheart defenders, and I'm sure less than half of the men and women in this room are shifted.

I give a cursory glance through the crowd, wondering if I shall see Artur. Small chance of that. The man would never abandon his duty to participate in something as frivolous as a tournament. Such a shame, I would have enjoyed watching his eyes grow dim. I close my eyes and listen to the pulses, deciding which dead body I'd most like to pry the spheres off of.

[Eerongal he/him]

Quickly scanning the room, I take in the situation. Letting out a brief sigh, i mutter, "I don't like this one bit...."

At this point I have to consider all of these spheremorphs hostile, regardless of their situations. The three of us likely don't stand a chance alone......

Looking toward the newcomer, i speak plainly to him,

"Adolin, alone we're obviously no match as a whole when it comes to this tournament. Obviously we don't know you, and you don't know us, but surely you agree that a mutual understanding at least until the danger has passed is better than a potential unknown threat, yes? Work with us, and I'll do my best to see everyone gets out of this alive."

Having said this, I turn to the other two. "All right, guys, we need to find out everything we can about this tournament, and prepare ourselves. Ears spread all over have a better chance to hear choice info, so I say we spread out and find out what we can."

Discreetly, I move in close towards Ambro, and whisper in a hushed tone, "Ambro, I'm not entirely sure I trust this Adolin guy."

Glancing around the room quickly, i continue a bit quieter, "I hate what I'm about to ask of you, but we're potentially in a lot of danger right now and I believe you can handle it. Would you be able to follow and observe him, and if need be 'do what needs to be done'". I finish the last part with emphasis hoping Ambro gets my meaning.

If this guy is a liability to us, we need to know and get rid of him as soon as possible, but i hope Ambro is up for some dirty work. A disgusting thing to ask, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

Grimacing, I take a deep breath and turn to look at everyone.

[Emeralis00 she/her]

Ambro smiles. So, even Eero is willing to use dirty tactics if nessesary.

"I understand. It shall be done, if nessesary."

Ambro moves just offset of 'Adolin'. Then starts burning atium.

With this I should be able to track his movements without actual staring at him, and he cannot

try anything without me knowing.

[Comatose he/him]

River:

I smile, even though inwardly I am groaning. The leader of the group is a little too much like Artur for my taste. Nontheless, if they are willing to trust me so easily, that's their mistake. He begins to speak softly to the others in his group. While I can't hear what they are saying, I keep an eye on the bronze pulses, and watch for any sudden moves.

When the leader is finished speaking with the man who cast that strange sort of magic at me before, I answer him. "I would be happy to work with you," I say. "It's nice to see someone here is honorable enough to put suspicion and back stabbing aside. I really am sorry about before. I feel like we got off on the wrong track, and so I'm glad you are willing to put it behind us." I extend my hand for him to shake. "You already know my name, but I haven't had the chance to be introduced to any of you. Might I ask the names of the people I will be working with."

As I finish speaking, I notice a new pulse. The magic user seems to be burning atium Ah, I think, remembering the leader's hushed words, Perhaps these three are not as trusting as they seem. Atium burners are difficult opponents to face, and to keep away from. I resolve to watch all three of these men very closely. I let none of my suspicion leak out, and keep my facial expression bright and charismatic.

[Cuaiir he/him]

'Adolin,' what is your game? "I'm Jay'el. Now then, I'm gong to go talk to one of these groups. I'll catch up with all of you in a bit." With that, I make my way over to the group that I noted had the Warrior's mantle in it. I move at a moderate pace, trying to seem non-threatening.

[Comatose he/him]

River:

I raise an eyebrow at Jay-El's terse introduction and hasty departure. It seems this lot is a suspicious group after all. Not that it will do them much good. Life with my sisters taught me to read social situations very well. If that was the best Jay-El could do at hiding his true thoughts, I don't think he would last three days in the courts of Riverheart. I shouldn't have any problems with him. At least, not in terms of subterfuge. He is still a spheremorph, and with a spheremount even the most naive can be dangerous killing machines.

His departure makes me wonder, however. Aside from my hasty reaction to the trio's arrival at the cross, I don't think I have done anything to arouse so much suspicion. Did I slip in my expression, or say anything offensive? I have not travelled to all of the major cities, but I have seen many of them, and as far as I know I have broken no cultural codes. Have I lost my touch perhaps? Or is this group more discerning than they appear? Using blatant suspicion and distrust to cover up savvy seems like a stretch, for false naivety would work much better, but I keep it in mind anyway. It always pays to be careful.

Unlike Jay-El, I try to keep my troubled thoughts hidden behind a mask of polite interest, and wait for the other two to introduce themselves.

[Silus - Shard of Flame he/him]

Ambrosius - Conquered Cave, West Plain

A hand falls on your shoulder from behind, and a strange thing happens. From the point of contact, it feels as though a cloud, a gas, is filling you from the inside out, cold as ice yet without tangible feeling. Your Atium shadows flicker and vanish, the warmth of burning metal in your stomach freezes.

"None of that. Trickery outside of the matches is forbidden if you want to retain our hospitality."

Jay'el

The other Shaman is part of a group of five. They laugh in reaction to something said, but it seems calculated, lacking a real sense of enjoyment. The Shaman's mantle is a sandy blue color, marking him as being from the Coral Spider, one of the largest walking villages, practically a city in its own right, or at least from one of the hanger on villages that follow it.

Looking around at the group, none of the others appear to be in a Form. In fact, a closer look at the Spheremorphs around the cavern shows that very few are in Form. There is definite tension, but more of an anticipatory kind than an about-to-become-a-brawl kind.

One of the men next to the Shaman notices you and taps the Shaman on the shoulder, then gestures toward you. The Shaman turns to face you and looks you over.

"Well, another Shaman," she says, "I wasn't expecting that, though your mantle is different than any I know. Where do you hail from? And don't be shy, we're just chatting. Getting to know the competition." She winks at you with a grin and turns back to the group.

[Emeralis00 she/her]

Ambrosius - Conquered Cave, West Plain

A hand falls on your shoulder from behind, and a strange thing happens. From the point of contact, it feels as though a cloud, a gas, is filling you from the inside out, cold as ice yet without tangible feeling. Your Atium shadows flicker and vanish, the warmth of burning metal in your stomach freezes.

"None of that. Trickery outside of the matches is forbidden if you want to retain our hospitality."

Ambro calmly releases his form, then turns to face whoever was behind him. I seem to have lost my sense of shock. Spheremorphs are a lot more dangerous than I expected. Ambro smiles, though there is no warmth in it.

"Just following orders."

[Silus - Shard of Flame he/him]

Ambrosius

She smiles at you, blue grey eyes as cold and dull as mist. Her long robe trails on the ground, the swirls of various dark reds shimmering in the flickering light.

"I spent twenty years of my life discerning truth from lies." She leans in closer to you. "And that was a lie."

[Emeralis00 she/her]

Ambrosius

She smiles at you, blue grey eyes as cold and dull as mist. Her long robe trails on the ground, the swirls of various dark reds shimmering in the flickering light.

"I spent twenty years of my life discerning truth from lies." She leans in closer to you. "And that was a lie."

I suppose that was a lie, but only in that I didn't have to follow Eero's request.

"Really? That doesn't seem interesting. May I ask your name?"

Ambro looks for a spheremount, while waiting for an answer.

Tricky skill she had there, and I didn't even see her coming.

[Silus - Shard of Flame he/him]

She turns to go, and you can see a round outline between her shoulder blades.

"Don't mind me. You'll find out who I am soon enough."

She leaves and is met by your guide, the armored man, and the two walk off together.

[Comatose he/him]

River:

I am still waiting for that introduction when a woman approaches the magic user from behind. She touches him lightly, and suddenly, the atium pulses wink out. Interesting. I wonder if she's a Chromium misting, but then I notice I feel no pulses coming from her. Or rather, I do, but they are strange to me, definately not allomantic. They fade soon after she uses her strange ability. I listen in as she speaks to the magic user. Twenty years huh? Very Interesting. I watch out of the corner of my eye as she walks away with our mysterious guide.

I continue to wait expectantly to be introduced. Honestly, I'm becoming a little miffed it is taking so long to get something as simple as a name out of them. True, I gave them a fake name, but then, they have no reason to suspect it is not my own. And if they do, who cares? What is a name other than something to call someone by? Their continued hesitance to give me any name at all makes me suspicious. What are they hiding that they fear to even use a pseudonym?

"Magic user," I say, trying my best to catch the man's attention. "Forgive me, but before you depart, might I ask your name. I've been introduced to your Shaman friend Jay-El, but not to you or your lord. I'd like to know what to call you, in case I need to get your attention quickly."

[Emeralis00 she/her]

"Magic user," I say, trying my best to catch the man's attention. "Forgive me, but before you depart, might I ask your name. I've been introduced to your Shaman friend Jay-El, but not to you or your lord. I'd like to know what to call you, in case I need to get your attention quickly."

Well that was interesting...

Ambro hears 'Adolin' trying to get his attention.

So. The man wishes me to name myself despite giving us a false name. Nameless ghosts do not deserve my name.

"Call me Varius."

It was my fool brother's name, and what I said is not a lie because I never said it was my name.

"and what I used on you before was not a spell, I am no magic user."

[Comatose he/him]

"Apologies Varius," I say with a smile. "I did not mean to offend you. But, if what you did is not magic, what is it?" I try to sound friendly, but yet again I feel hostility in the words of these others. I get their message loud and clear: I am not welcome here. I glance out at the crowd. As soon as I am done here, I make a note to begin mingling. Whatever the pretenses, it seems I have already made three enemies, and I must make sure they don't poison the rest of the herd against me.

[Emeralis00 she/her]

"Apologies Varius," I say with a smile. "I did not mean to offend you. But, if what you did is not magic, what is it?" I try to sound friendly, but yet again I feel hostility in the words of these others. I get their message loud and clear: I am not welcome here. I glance out at the crowd. As soon as I am done here, I make a note to begin mingling. Whatever the pretenses, it seems I have already made three enemies, and I must make sure they don't poison the rest of the herd against me.

First, some misdirection.

Ambro smiles then replies, "I simply asked a question and you answered it. That form simply allows two beings to communicate efficiently."

Ambro tilts his head in thought. I am under no obligation to keep secrets.

"I guess I could tell the truth about one thing. That old man asked me to keep an eye on you, so I will be following you until this tournament or whatever starts." Ambro leaves the obvious addition to that statement unsaid.

EDIT: referred to the wrong person

Edited May 27, 2011 by Emeralis00

[Eerongal he/him]

Seeing the others head off to their own whims, i set myself about attempting to mingle and gathering information, but do my best to keep both Ambro and Jay'el in my sight.

It seems i've led us right into a sticky situation.....But I'll be damned if I'm going to allow them to fall under my command.

Noticing that most spheremorphs are in baseline, I go ahead and drop my tactician form so as to be able to blend into the crowd better.

[Comatose he/him]

I eye Varius with appraisal. Perhaps this is the sort of man I can use. I decide a different approach is in order now that we are alone. "Well, since your going to be hanging around anyways, why not be useful? Since he didn't bother to introduce himself, why don't you tell me who this old man is? And don't go spouting off about loyalty and what not. You've made it painfully obvious you don't trust me, but you also don't seem to be the type to be at another person's beck and call. What's strong and stoic over there's story, and what's he got over you to make you call him 'm'lord'?"

[Emeralis00 she/her]

I eye Varius with appraisal. Perhaps this is the sort of man I can use. I decide a different approach is in order now that we are alone. "Well, since your going to be hanging around anyways, why not be useful? Since he didn't bother to introduce himself, why don't you tell me who this old man is? And don't go spouting off about loyalty and what not. You've made it painfully obvious you don't trust me, but you also don't seem to be the type to be at another person's beck and call. What's strong and stoic over there's story, and what's he got over you to make you call him 'm'lord'?"

Ambro laughs slightly, "You haven't figured it out? All that lord stuff was acting for your benefit, at least on their part. My intention was to pretend he was the leader and therefore have him be targeted by any attacker first.."

Ambro suddenly frowns, contemplating his companion. "His name is Eerongal. I don't know much about him, we were kinda forced into traveling together, but he is the sort of person who believes that honor, trust, and loyalty are more than tools." Ambro shakes his head at the foolishness of it.

[Comatose he/him]

I nod thoughtfully, and then take a moment to power down. It seems I won't be needing any forms right now, and I want them to be fresh when I do. "I assure you Varius, " I say when the light has faded. "You will find none of that nonsense with me." Now that I have a better idea of what type of man Varius is, I can speak his language. Perhaps that was the problem. Speaking to rogues in the tongue of paladins is never a good idea.

"So why travel with him if he's so foolish?" I ask, keeping my voice low, and keeping my peripherals focused on the crowd. "Or is that part of your plan too? A man who sees you as a servant, even subconsciously, will likely not suspect the knife aiming for his back."

[Emeralis00 she/her]

"Why?" Ambro thinks for a moment. "Have you ever heard of the apostles of Hell?"

Not waiting for an answer, Ambro continues, "They were the seven children of a powerful demon of the Western Nothing. They had the job of tempting humans to sin, for each of them represented one of the seven sins. They did their job well, until he came; he was a spheremorph, one of those stock paladin types." Ambro looks at his spheremount, strapped to his arm.

"Many of the apostles were killed outright when they confronted the spheremorph, two, Greed and Lust, fled with mortal wounds. Upon the road they discovered a traveler, who was an ancestor of mine. My ancestor was tempted with greed and lust for the power of spheremorphs and snuck into the city...then stole the spheremount and formspheres of the spheremorph."

Ambro gestures at his partially scaled skin and half black half red hair.

"But the demonic influence has never left my bloodline, and I still feel hatred at those like that paladin spheremorph. I only wait for the proper moment."

[Cuaiir he/him]

Jay'el

The other Shaman is part of a group of five. They laugh in reaction to something said, but it seems calculated, lacking a real sense of enjoyment. The Shaman's mantle is a sandy blue color, marking him as being from the Coral Spider, one of the largest walking villages, practically a city in its own right, or at least from one of the hanger on villages that follow it.

Looking around at the group, none of the others appear to be in a Form. In fact, a closer look at the Spheremorphs around the cavern shows that very few are in Form. There is definite tension, but more of an anticipatory kind than an about-to-become-a-brawl kind.

One of the men next to the Shaman notices you and taps the Shaman on the shoulder, then gestures toward you. The Shaman turns to face you and looks you over.

"Well, another Shaman," she says, "I wasn't expecting that, though your mantle is different than any I know. Where do you hail from? And don't be shy, we're just chatting. Getting to know the competition." She winks at you with a grin and turns back to the group.

Noting that very few Morphs are in Form, I shift back to baseline. "I'm not terribly surprised," I say to the lady Shaman. "Amber Aphid is fairly tiny and a ways off the beaten path for the Spider. A nice place, but not one a Shaman wants to stay in too long. I visited Sanguine Boar about a week ago, but a tigerplane cut my visit there short." I laugh briefly, as if a tigerplane were no serious threat. "Call me Jay. I kind of got dragooned into this tournament, but it seems promising. How about the rest of you?"

[Silus - Shard of Flame he/him]

"Call me Burly, me and my group-" she gestures to a guy and a girl on her left, "-heard about the tournament while passing through Spiral Falls, figured we should check it out." She's a slim girl, with skin a shade darker than yours, with blonde hair of a tone showing that it had been tinged by the sun. Her hair is mainly on the right side of her face, almost covering one of her grey eyes.

The man standing next to Burly, the one who had alerted them to your presence, introduces himself. "I'm Gregory. The three of us have been here, what, a week?" He's probably the oldest in the group, but still no older than twenty five. He wears a simple black t-shirt under a stiff leather vest, matched by the various other bits of armor on his arms, shoulders and on his legs over the business khakis.

"That sounds right, but time is hard to keep track of down here. I'd never know if I didn't have my omni-tool." The girl on Gregory's other side nods to you. "Veronica." She's a bit thicker than Burly, slightly rounder, but also a hair shorter. Her skin is paler and her hair dark with a blue streak through it on one side, all of it pulled back in a ponytail. She wears bell-bottom jeans and a dark green green sleeveless top.

The girl next to you, who had been standing next to Burly, speaks next. "We found out about in Bridge Town."

"Desert's Edge," corrects the man next to her.

"Right, sorry, Desert's Edge, two weeks ago?"

"Two days."

"Yeah. I'm Kara, by the way, and this is my brother, Adam."

Adam tips his head toward you, not quite looking you in the eye.

These two are obviously related, probably even twins. Their build is practically identical, with Adam being just a touch stockier than his sister and Kara a little shorter than him. But it is their bearing that really separates them. Kara almost bounces with sheer energy, while Adam stands still well enough to pass himself off as a statue. They have green eyes flecked with gold and curly brown hair.

Eerongal

You get the peculiar feeling that someone is watching you, different from the normal sensation that accompanies large groups of people. Scanning the crowd you see a face staring at you. Dark eyes under dark hair, and a wicked smile. Seeing you notice him, the face grins and turns away, vanishing almost instantly. You catch a glimpse of a Spheremount on his shoulder, the grid pattern is vividly detailed in the shape of an eye.