In the land of Virnastia, where such things as healing potions and bags of holding exist, there was a little town fondly called Burbof by its inhabitants. The tiny little kingdom, more of a village really, is set atop green shallow hills surrounded by colorful flowers and low level monsters. Slimes, mice, and PiPi’s present little danger, they’re pests at worst and cute at best. Burbof has a couple small farms, a couple little shops, a few cozy homes, and a modest fence around its border that fails to keep anything out (but is rather stylish). The gate guard, an old man with a grey beard, spends more time napping than guarding. He often mumbles nonsense like “press A to talk” and “don’t forget to save often” in his sleep.

Burbof is sometimes called the heart of Virnastia, because it lies in its center, between eight big kingdoms. No bigger than usual, but bigger than quaint little Burbof. When the kingdoms did as kingdoms do and went to war, Burbof became quite popular. The kingdoms fought for its strategic location at Virnastia’s core. Poor little Burbof had no way to defend itself. Every week a different kingdom’s troops stomped, romped, and occupied Burbof. And then, the king’s mysterious adviser came up with a plan. Mysterious not because she wore a mask or hides her presence, but because no one knows where she came from or how she became the king’s adviser. Her plan was simple: to show the other kingdoms how tough Burbof can be, they’d kidnap all the princesses!

Thru word of mouth, hand fulls of fliers, and a well placed ad in “Swords & Sorcery Monthly”, Burbof called upon the brave, the daring, and the adventurous to go on their quest of princess-napping. Rewards include: a hefty sum of coin, plots of land in Burbof, the title of Burboffian Noble, and the Burboffian princess’s hand in marriage!!! a holographic Princess Trading Card signed by the Burboffian princess. All those interested will meet in Burbof at sunset in the town hall, snacks will be provided.

During the day, the Burboffians have become accustomed to ways of war. Many things were the same, but when another army came charging in they would hide in their homes and hope nothing gets destroyed. Of course, something always breaks. And when the fight was over, there would be a different flag waving above them as they cleaned up the mess they didn’t make. But this day was a little different. This day, a good number of strangers came to visit. Everyone knew why, but acted as if they didn’t. The villagers were more distractingly kind to the occupying troops than usual, and put up a sign saying “Town Hall Closed” outside the town hall.

When the sun grew tired and fell asleep, so did all the little homes in Burbof, except the town hall. Inside, the king’s adviser waited for all the quest-takers to arrive. She appeared to be a young woman, much too young to be an adviser. Her cloths are rather revealing and outlandish, but stylishly so. On her chest was a strange emblem, unlike any in Virnastia:



In the back of the room was a table littered with chips, dip, punch, and other snacks. The adviser waited for everyone to arrive so she could address everyone at once.

“Hello and welcome! I am surprised by how many of you came! If you are here, you must be interested in Burbof’s quest listing! If not, please leave or be decapitated” she said in a frighteningly serious tone. “Hehehe, just kidding~ but seriously, it you don’t have business here get out. To those who are interested in the job, my name is Miri: the king’s number one adviser. The king would be here, but a he can’t afford to get his hands dirty with a quest like this one, heheh. Anywho, I should warn you what you’re getting into. It’s not that bad really. In most of the kingdoms the punishment for kidnapping a princess is torture, or death, or something like that. No big deal. If you’re a scardey-cat then leave now, otherwise let’s get down to business.” She stood up and pulled a sheet off the object beside her, revealing a sign with several rules listed on it:

1) No killing the princesses.
2) No harming the princesses.
3) No thinking naughty thoughts about the princesses.
4) No nyan-nyan with the princesses.
5) No making googly eyes at the princesses.

“The rules are simple enough. They’re princesses, treat them like it.” Next, Miri pulls out a large tome out of nowhere, bound in lavish leather. On the cover, in gold leaf the title reads “Miri’s Book, By Miri”, it looks like it costed a pretty penny. With speedy and precise finger work she found a page and placed it on the table before her, allowing everyone to gather around and observe. On the page was a map of Virnastia, with all the kingdoms and caricatures of each princess next to her kingdom. The ink on the page seemed to almost move, like it wasn’t ink at all but some kind of magic. Miri’s book was undoubtedly magical in some way.

“We are here” she said, pointing to Burbof at the center of the map. “The three closest kingdoms are Ellorn (Normal Kingdom), Nekronia (Undead Kingdom), and Niy-an (Warrior’s Kingdom). We’ll split into two teams, each team will go after a different princess. Nekronia is in the middle of a deadly desert, pack lots of water if you go there. If you go to Niy-an, prepare for a climb. That kingdom is hidden in the mountains. And don’t forget they’re full of warriors, so yeah, there’s that. Ellorn may seem the easiest, but their lack of natural defenses means they’ve built mighty walls and moats to protect their kingdom. And besides, the one that looks the easiest never is.” Taking a moment to sip some water, Miri looked around at the unconventional crew that has come together. “If you have any questions, the library is that way. Or ask me, if you really must. Otherwise, mingle, find your teams, and vote on which princess you want to go after.” Grabbing two hats, she placed them both on the table along with several pieces of paper. “Team Pouty Super-Awesome-the-Best votes go here, and Team Better-than-theirs votes goes here. Let us make haste. The faster we organize the faster we can get to business.”

Team Signups Here

Team Super-Awesome-the-Best votes here.
Team Better-than-theirs votes here.

Malakaus Ralthavar Marchosias

Malakaus had a bit of difficulty balancing his double axe as he read the papers given to him. Still he read them over, eating some of those small wiener dogs with bacon wrapped around them skewered on a toothpick. he had a plate with like, twenty or so on them. Very tasty. Seemed like he was on Team Super-Awesome-the-Best, an adapt name for any team with him on it. Of course he won't be so arrogant in person, and in fact was a bit meek. Everyone here seemed really strong, even though he himself is a fairly intimidating orc warrior in full armor using what amounts to two battleaxes attached to one another. Most other adventurers don't pay him too much mind, either due to looking down on him or simply because they were scared of him. He never bothered to figure it out.

Personally, he wanted to go to Niy-an the Warrior Kingdom. It sounded like just the right place for someone like him, a place where he could prove his worth as a fighter. Granted, his family ran away from Niy-an a long time ago due to it's constant fighting, but he wanted to prove to them that it wasn't out of cowardice, but simply because they wanted a peaceful life. Beating up their strongest warriors and taking their princess seems to be the best way to go about it. He heard she was an orc, like him, though he's never seen her himself. For all he knew she could be a human who's really good at fighting. Either way, he couldn't help but already feel a bit attracted to her. Sure the rules said don't go all googly-eyes and stuff, but he swears, it's entirely platonic. He imagined though that in order for him to ever really get a chance with her, he'd need to fight her in one-on-one combat, or hunt a great beast. Maybe it would a good idea not to try to fall for them after all; for all he knew, the Warrior Princess might only be willing to go out with him if he conquered the entire world for her. Than he'd go from adventurer to Overlord. "Hmm.... Overlord Malakaus... Not too shabby."

Either way the orc found himself a seat as he ate his plate of bacon-wieners. He wondered who else on his team would he see, and wondered if they would be interested in talking to him. Or sort of hoped so, he's kind of awkward trying to start conversations himself.

Yuga No.107

Yuda didn't hear a word of what Miri was saying, as she was completely engrossed with the snack table. Rarely did she ever get to have meat, her favorite food. She specifically likes chicken skin, especially when it's fried. Still, any meat was rare and hard to get back at the Training Home, and they only had it during special celebrations. That and most androids like herself don't really get much essential energies from meat, so her handlers never bothered to get it for them. But it was still delicious. She took an entire bowl of bacon-wieners for herself, eating each one whole, toothpick and all.

Yuga herself had heard of this mission when she left Clockwork Kingdom and got into Normal Kingdom. She saw the add that promised snacks, and her curiosity brought her the rest of the way there. She remembered one time where she was walking along when she was attacked by bandits. However, these bandits were only wearing basic fur armor, worse than most adventurer's starting gear. Even their weapons weren't more than sticks or kitchen knives. Yuga didn't even need to use the MF Hyperbreeder Alpha, and just beat them down with her baton. When she got to a small village to buy supplies, she was randomly awarded money for taking out those bandits. This made her wonder who saw her take out those bandits and why they didn't help her, but she figured that it didn't really matter anyways.

Back to the eating. Yuga just ate all the bacon-wieners and had her sights set on the chicken nuggets. How she missed those golden bits of love and joy, she wasn't sure, but she was about to solve her chicken nugget shortage very soon.

The things Miri was saying was no doubt very important. After all, she was talking at length, that usually meant there was something of worth being said, right? Unfortunately, the fairy fluttering above the table stopped paying attention to what she was saying around the time that the book was placed on the table. That had to be valuable! People liked books! Especially the picture books that were always stored at the bottom of piles, or inside treasure chests! And this book had a picture of a... a... shape! Just think of how awesome that would look, stored next to that chalice she found the week before! The items had nothing in common with each, but they were clearly meant to be a pair.

The blonde fairy known as Morgana floated closer to the book, eyes sparkling with delight, though hearing the word 'princess' gave her pause. She had come to this place in order to steal some of those, after all. Hm... Princesses were probably more valuable, and thus demanded more effort, but the book was right there!

"Hey, Book Person!" Morgana called to Miri cheerfully, landing softly upon the table, between the hats, "how many picture books is a Princess worth? Also, I'm not a thief! And lastly, when I steal a Princess, what's the best place to hide one?"

Well, at the very least, storing a Princess for safe-keeping technically wasn't breaking rules, right?

Richard had seemed to be unnoticed when he hopped in with the horde of others. I mean come on how often do you see a crown on a frog? Oh well, this Miri chick seemed like she was legitimate to Richard. Even though the snack table seemed appetizing Richard had eaten quite a few flies on the way there. So Richard gave his full attention to what the woman said. He had no problems whatsoever, except with the rules that is. I mean he was a Prince after all how could he not seduce a princess? After all seducing her would make the kidnapping process A LOT easier. Well maybe they can bend the rules for him, either way nothing was stopping him from doing what he was trained to do.

He hopped up on to the table with the book for sign-ups after the speech and was the first to put his name on Team Super-Awesome-the-Best. Because that was clearly the better team, then Richard glanced down and saw Team Better-than-theirs. He quickly erased his name and put it on the later, that was clearly going to be better than the other team. Personally Richard wanted to go for the warrior castle, because who doesn't like a princess who's a bit fierce? Either way Richard just didn't want to go to the undead castle. That was not his cup of tea at all, he was not one with a strong stomach and would likely vomit at the sight of his foes.

Richard then hopped closer to Miri who was dressed, well let's just say Richard didn't want to be a frog at the moment.
"Excuse me madame?" He said finishing with a croak. " I know I don't look like much, but if you wouldn't mind kissing me I can explain my predicament with these rules a bit better." He croaked.

Before the start of the meeting a box had been delivered to the doorstep of Burbof Town Hall. It was just a normal box, no super valuable and magical loots inside it at all. Obviously a normal box like this one wouldn't have two holes in the bottom covered up by cloth that seemed big enough for a dog to stick its legs through. Why are you asking me these questions anyway? You didn't? Then shut up!

...Anyway, the perfectly average box was not picked up by anyone inside the building, a sign of rude hosts to not accept deliveries during a super secret conspiracy meeting. So the box had to step inside for them quickly, a thing these normal boxes do nowadays. During the course of the briefing the box sat patiently in the empty, shadowy, lonely corner, trying to maintain it's box-like manners in the presence of the 'nice' would-be kidnappers. The briefing was over, people began to shuffle about between the sign-up table and the snackbar happily. Still no attention on boxie ol' boy, beginning to feel a bit left out.

"What does a package need to do to get delivered in this town? No wonder why the postmen go on insane murder sprees around here." were the words that began echoing in the hall. "Or do I need to use my booming voice?"

When the others began to look around for the location of the intruder, the box said, "I'm the square-ish fellow in the corner here. Am I intruding on the shady festivities?" Inside the box sat Trakel, laid out like a pile of jade coins. Would he be opened, he'd change form into the head of whatever weapon the individual was carrying to show off his main skillset for the campaign.

From the back of the room, a rather loud noise was heard that and sounded very much like a dog growling angrily at something. Iris, the growls owner sat in the back of the room with a rather distant expression donning her face. She was here, after all, and she had willingly signed up for this venture, but she had only wanted the free food. Now, she was stuck with waiting on some girl talking, who barely had the Demons attention as she looked at the food table.

Hello and welcome! I am surprised by how many of you came! If you are here, you must be interested in Burbof’s quest listing! If not, please leave or be decapitated. Hehehe, just kidding~ but seriously, it you don’t have business here get out. To those who are interested in the job, my name is Miri: the king’s number one adviser. The king would be here, but a he can’t afford to get his hands dirty with a quest like this one, heheh. Anywho, I should warn you what you’re getting into. It’s not that bad really. In most of the kingdoms the punishment for kidnapping a princess is torture, or death, or something like that. No big deal. If you’re a scardey-cat...”

And she lost her again. Now, she was busy thinking about how a cat would taste. She was certainly hungry enough to give it a try. She gave the group a small look over. Sadly, there didn't seem to be any cats around, or anything remotely cat like. Oh, if only there was some cat-person she could nom on. She was a jackal after all, so there should be cat people for her to chase and chew on, right? Oh wait no, she wasn't a jackal. No, she was a demon...that liked chasing cats...that had jackal a ears and tail. That was normal for a demon right? All demons obviously liked chasing cats. Yep, no doubt about it...

She was interrupted from continuing down that line of thought as a loud voice echoed from across the room, one of her ears twitching to the source of it. A box? A box couldn't talk. Why was a box talking? Was it...a magic box!?...like one of those magic hats a magician could pull rabbits from?! Her mouth watered slightly as she looked at the box. If they could pull a rabbit out of a magic hat, then why not pull a cat out of a magic box! Standing up, the jackal/demon/thing went over to the box, and proceeded to poke it with her staff.

"Come on out little Kitty. I'm not an evil jackal demon who wants a quick snack! I just wanna be your best friend." With that, the box popped open, and she proceeded to check its contents. Jade...coins? Well, that was disappointing. Her stomach growled loudly again, saddened as well by the fact they would not be getting any food.

'Kitty? Well, that's far more entertaining than a tiny mage staff' Trakel thought. If she tries to eat him though... Well he'd probably laugh even more if that happened. He proceeded to shift over, letting a few of his coins fly to mask the process. When he was done, the coins snapped back to form the paw of a green cat sitting upright, licking its wrist that was brought upward to the mouth. "Don't eat the wittle ol' kitty cat, missy. I won't bite, I pwomise." Trakel said, flashing bright glowing emerald eyes at the starving doggie. "I just wanna steal a pwincess or thwee."

Burbof wasn't the most lavish kingdom she's ever worked in. Hardly a kingdom really, more like a quirky little village with a king instead of a mayor. Still, they did need some help with the whole war going on in the lands, and while The Chief maid always called the Salty Kingdom her home, she did believe that this silly war needs to be put to rest. Kidnapping the princesses all over the world was a bit extreme, but maybe it could convince them all to live peacefully. Didn't really matter too much to The Chief maid; she was always expected to clean up after everyone.

The Chief maid stood silently as Miri briefed them all on their mission and rules of engagement. Soon after Miri put out two hats for the separate teams to vote on which princess the teams would go after. The Chief maid herself would like to try to nab the princess from the Normal Kingdom, simply because it was... Well, the simplest. At least The Chief maid thinks it'll be. She cast her vote and looked at who else was on Team Better-than-their's. They were very quirky, to say the least. The one that caught her attention the most was the frog wearing a crown. If she didn't know better, she might have said that she recognized him from somewhere. But all frogs looks the same to her, so she didn't address it. The Chief maid slithered her tentacles away and noticed a talking box. The Chief maid wasn't the only one though, and soon enough a member of Team Better-than-theirs went to go check it out. The Chief maid watched silently as the scene unfolded, as another strange member of her group introduced him or herself (Kind of hard to gauge the gender of floating magical objects).

"Karin" had only wanted to get information while in this strange place, but with a war going on and all this other weirdness, things had only become more difficult to deal with. She hadn't even intended to be here at this meeting; it had been a complete accident that she had gotten caught in a group of people walking in. Upon hearing what the lady at the front was saying - Miri, was it? That's what that emblem said...what a weird emblem... - she suddenly became interested. Kidnapping princesses? That would be pretty funny, actually. And hey, if there was a reward offered along with this quest, that would make things even better! Maybe she could even find what she was looking for somehow!

At any rate, this war was making things difficult for her in her journey, anyway. A huge prank like this would be the best passive-aggressive statement ever! Without any more hesitation, Karin stepped up to the front of the room and took a look at the sign up sheets for the teams. Let's see... Team Better-Than-Theirs... No, sounds too much like I'm begging for attention... Aha! Awesome-The-Best sounds perfect! After signing "her" name, she turned quickly to vote for which princess to go after. Now I just wait for the announcements, and the worlds best act of mischief can finally begin! Snickering, she moved away from the front of the room before spying the snacks.

...Well, a couple couldn't hurt. Abductions are not easy on an empty stomach, after all!

Everything's satisfactory.

That was the only thing that went through Vivien's head as he listened to the rather inappropriately dressed woman speak. The various penalties for kidnapping, or attempting to kidnap, a princess Miri listed did not exactly faze Vivien too much. True, he did feel rather apprehensive about performing a task where failure meant certain death, but upon thinking about it just ever-so-slightly more, Vivien realized that just about every job he had taken on in the past worked on the same principle. Success meant earning money and other assorted good stuff while failure earned you a ditch, and not even a deep one, mind you. Besides, Vivien had the feeling that if he declined the offer, he would be kicking himself every time the thought of a missed opportunity crossed his mind.

Now, the only issue he had was simply deciding on which team he wanted to join. Both had odd names, and neither seemed to be any better than the other. He tapped his lower lip with a finger as he looked between the sign-up sheets for both teams. Eventually, he decided on the best course of action, which was to just wind it and hope for the best. 'Awesome-The-Best' seemed to have lesser members than the other team, and so Vivien decided that, out of fairness, he would join 'Awesome-The-Best'. After signing his name and feeling rather relieved that he had passed that little hurdle, he looked to the hats where he would have to vote on which princess to go after. With a slight shake of his head, he decided not to vote; whichever princess they went after was of no concern to Vivien, he was pretty sure he would be able to adapt.

With all the administrative stuff done, Vivien turned his attention to the food. He had only just landed in Virnastia a few weeks ago, and throughout his two week-long voyage, he had nothing to eat but fish, dried meats of curious origins and biscuits that were the residences of some unknown insect. Adjusting his hood to shade more of his face and pulling up his scarf to cover more of his face - both habits which he had picked up during the sea voyage; the scarf and hood did wonders to protect him from the annoying sea sprays - he moved towards the tables where the snacks were laid out in all their tasty and probably unhealthy glory.

Yes, everything was satisfactory.

Most people probably would have been surprised by the fact that the jade coins were talking. If Iris was though, it was impossible to tell. Aside from an ear twitch, her face wore a neutral expression. It was a talking...cat? A magic talking green cat made out of jade coins. Well...it was what she wanted after all. But she couldn't eat stone, could she? Better late than never to find out! She picked up the talking cat and gave it a hungry look. She wondered if jade tasted like chicken? Or maybe it tasted like jello. She really could go for some of Nekronia's jello right now. But for now, this jade cat would have to do. She proceeded to chomp down on one of the cats legs.

She noticed two things right away. Jade most definitely did not taste like jello, and she was pretty sure she may have cracked a tooth. With a small wince of pain, she immediately threw the cat as hard as she could across the room. She was not doing that again.

Aki had managed to block out whatever the woman at the front was saying, until she mentioned princesses and kidnapping. Sure enough, that's when her interest had peeked as she made her way over to sign up for a team. Based on the luck she felt, she writ her name on team 'Better-Than-Theirs' sign up list and moved back to where she was before, taking her time to scan the other people there, before what looked to be a cat was hurled across from one side of the room to the other. Aki, now slightly startled and much more interested, watched what would happen next patiently as she leaned against a wall.

The Chief Maid wasn't sure if this person was feral or just dumb (It's not that they're mutually exclusive) when she watched the stranger try to eat what looked like a jade cat. Seeing that endeavor fail, the stranger threw the jade cat far away. The Chief Maid was right on it however, shooting out one of her tentacles to out to snatch her out of the air. Bringing the statue of precious gems back to her, The Chief Maid did give it an inquisitive look. It was obviously no mere jade statue, as moments before it looked like a handful of jade coins, and spoke. Another member of their ever so quirky team? "Greetings. I am The Chief Maid. To whom do I hold the honor of speaking to?" The Chief Maid put on her professional smile as she greeted the newest member of her team. Strange as they were, she felt that their brand of eccentricities might just be able to pull off this silly quest they're on.

Theodyn looked around. Many of the strangers gathered in the town hall were at the snack table, eating. He would probably join in on that, the punch looked somewhat good to him anyway. For now, he would 'stand', and think. He was hanging upside-down from a chandelier on the ceiling by his feet. How it had managed to support his weight for so long eluded even him, but it would likely do so for a while longer. Theodyn's blank expression suggested that what he was doing was routine and common, and he could be considered true.

In the meantime, Theodyn could consider which kingdom he would vote to go to, as he had already chosen to join Team Better-than-theirs on the quest to capture princesses. Prior to his arrival in Burbof, the guards of Ellorn had thrown Theodyn out of the city, for 'causing a disturbance'. Which was true in a way. He had been sneaking around and ended up being apart of a rumour that someone was going to be assassinated. Why the city guards would simply throw a 'assassin' out of their city rather than imprison them didn't make too much sense to Theodyn, but he was still glad it happened in such a way. Besides, he was a Shadow Knight, which was obviously much different than an assassin. Probably.

Not only that, but Ellorn was the closest kingdom to Burbof, and Theodyn didn't want to have to walk for ages.

Arn was fatigued after the long journey from his village to the central village known as Burbof . It wasn’t the distance that had made the trek last two weeks, but terrain that threw obstacles in his path. The heavy winter caused several floods to knock out some of the nearest bridges making river crossing impossible on foot. The nearest ferry crossing nearly took him outside of Virnastia’s boarders and added a trip through the northern forest which took time to navigate.

When he finally reached Burbof preparations for the mission at hand were already underway. He had been asked to arrive a few days earlier to go over the possible offer of leading one of the two teams for this pursuit. He had accepted the offer on the condition that he would be allowed to return to his former life upon completion. He had little in the way of interest in military affairs and had volunteered at the opportunity so as to protect his village, not in a hope to seek out violence.

He arrived to the meeting looking tired but at the same point rested. He was alive and well, but the trip had caused him a mild bit of wear and tear. Ready and able he felt the food and drink work wonders on his body and soon enough he was fully awake and listening to the mission as it was presented to the group. He also took some time to look at what could only be described as a rag tag group pulled from a kaleidoscope.

With its central location Virnastia has become a true melting pot for cultures and groups. This is especially true since it is the only place where trade can happen at a global scale. With the large wars merchants have taken to setting up shops in the country so as to avoid strict taxes and closed boarders. The economic boost has been felt as far as Arn’s home village; however, the danger is high that several of these traders are spies.

Arn’s opinion on the mission was high. He liked that it played to their countries abilities having a small army of nearly 1,000 strong meant any engagement would be quickly silenced by the massive armies of the surrounding kingdoms. He also liked it because it was a plan that in its truest form had no goals of killing. He was capable of the act, but had yet to do so from a position of control. He had only committed the act as one of self defense.

The road ahead was a long one, but Arn felt up to the challenge. He wouldn’t have accepted the offer he felt otherwise. The next part would be meeting the team he would be leading. He wrote down on his parchment the desired first target and then dropped it in the hat that would be his team. He had watched a few of the people also vote and began looking them over one by one trying to learn as much as he could from their attire and body language.

Colours blurred into long streaks of light, the air whizzed by like a tidal wave, then the sudden force of halted motion. The flight reminded Trakel of his time in a bar where he rigged dart games by replacing the darts. Back then he used to laugh at the accusations of cheating and the ensuing brawls from his little corner in the wall. Though he left when someone tried to use his body as a knife during one of the fights.

Back in reality, Trakel noticed that his jaunt was stopped short not by a wall but by a hand. A very slippery, un-fingered hand. He looked back to see the lovely lady looking back at him, with a few tentacles joining parallel to her gaze. Trakel pushed a bit to loosen the grasp but when he was met with failure his body split into a long, cat shaped ribbon which uncoiled out of her grip and reformed the feline statue laying against her arm. He sat there staring up at her with a kitten smile and holding his head up with his front paws. "My name is Trakel and I'd shake your hand but I don't believe I can quite meet your proportion." he said, remarking his petite figure at the moment. "Though you look like you would prefer a few knives in your palms rather than fingers."

As Trakel's head turned round toward Iris he hopped off the pink appendage. He sat about halfway between the two before shifting into a jackal. "And you look about hungry enough to roast a dog. If the chips and dip don't cut it then perhaps you should check the box again." Trakel referred to the two large turkey legs he left in there. Originally he shipped himself as a minifridge in case the meeting he was interrupting was filled with the typically frustrated rabble hired for kidnappings. He considered them the kind that mommy probably didn't nurse long enough to be normal, non-kidnapping members of society. But who was he to judge when he volunteered for this job?

Malakaus Ralthavar Marchosias

The orc finished his snacks a long time ago, and now he was just watching others go about their business. Seems like some people from team Better than theirs were playing a game with a jade cat or something. He saw a frog talking to Miri, and what might be a little fairy. Aside from that there wasn't a lot that caught his attention until he heard someone take a seat at his table. It was a pretty looking human girl, and seeing her made his heart skip a beat. He's seen lots of pretty girls over his time as an adventurer, a lot of them nice, but a few of them who were tricky. But this girl didn't seem to be one of those types, not that Malakaus would be able to tell anyways. When she finally noticed him however, she stood up and apologized for sitting there. He didn't even tell her anything yet.

"Ah, no, it's alright. You don't need to say sorry. Um..." Well, this was an odd way to start a conversation. But it was something. Go on, tell her your name! Oh, right. I'm Malakaus. You can call me Mal, for short. Nice to meet you, miss...?"

Oh great, the cat wasn't edible. The jackal demon made a little whimpering noise as her stomach complained once again. Now where was she going to get some food from? This kidnapping princess group promised free food! Chips and dip wasn't food. Where was the meat? The big, thick, juicy, glorious, meat. It felt like ages since she last sank her teeth into some juicy meat.

Her train of thought was interrupted by the magical talking cat. She briefly turned to face him, she had thought she had chucked the useless thing out the window, but it seems that something had prevented it from doing so. That something....was a giant squid. She looked at it hungrily, thinking of many different ways that one could cook a fish. Thankfully for the giant squid, it wouldn't be made into sushi anytime soon. The little jade cat, had interrupted her train of thought once again, something about a turkey leg in the box it was in.

Immediately, she looked back inside the box and pulled out the large legs of turkey. It would probably have been enough food for two people, judging from the size of them. Iris didn't seem to care much about their size though. She picked one up and almost ate it in one bite, finishing it off in the second. The second one, went down almost as easily. Iris gave small smile as she continued to chew on one of the bones. If she was happy or content it was hard to tell, but at least she had stopped trying to eat everything that wasn't human.

Vivien considered himself to be a well-mannered person. After all, the Duke he had served under often punished him by having him sleep in the stables with the horses for simply having poor table manners. However, when he saw the beautiful young woman enter the hall - the one who was now conversing with the orc - it was all Vivien could do to prevent himself from staring at her for an uncomfortable period of time. On one hand, Vivien supposed that he could not be blamed; he was, after all, still a man and he had the capacity to admire beauty. On the other, he felt a certain sense of shame for having such a strong reaction. It was all he could do to thank the Gods above and below for his scarf and hood.

Shaking his head, Vivien returned to piling his plate with various confections. After living on dried meats and biscuits, all the sweet pastries were simply too difficult for him to resist. For a brief moment, he stood still as he weighed the pros and cons of introducing himself to someone at random. It would be the best course of action, seeing as how he was going to be working with them for the foreseeable future, but at the same time, it was something that Vivien wanted to put off for as long as possible. What should he say? Would it not seem weird if he were to simply walk up to someone and tell them his name? What if they did not appreciate his sudden intrusion?

No, it would be far easier, and less risky, for him to just stand in one corner and hope that someone approached him. He quietly slipped away and stood in a corner of the room, knowing full well that he looked either incredibly weird or creepy for looking at everyone socialize while he ate his food, pulling down his scarf to take a bite out of whatever he had in his hand before pulling it back up to cover his face.