[hider= Val+Coco]So these were the news. Coco had managed to find the Rune Master, but just as she began moving towards the female dwarf, another thing caught her attention. Another half-snake person... But this one didn't actually smell like snake, or person. Sure, she could imagine its shape due to its noises, and it was like the half-snake woman called Mar, but its scent was so much different. 

Instead of snake, it smelled like fish, as if it came from the sea, but that's just it, that's what confused her. Snakes didn't come from the sea, right? If so, then why did this snake person smell like he did? The two snake persons then moved towards each other, and began discussing over something she didn't fully understand. All the talk about Yarosmere, sea depths and Myrmidons was enough to spark her interest, and soon enough many, many questions started flooding into her mind. Some were simple, like what a fish-smelling snake person ate, all the way to how they had seeds if they were half snake. 

But it wasn't the time to ask questions. When the two finally broke their argument, and the female dwarf was freed from them, she was reminded of her most important objective- Getting her artifact fixed. 

So with no delay, she started after the dwarf, attempting to speak once she was right behind her, "BZZT - Master, I -BZZT- repaired, Xiah t -BZZT- please!" she said, then once she noticed the woman's difficulty at understanding her broken sentences, she began making symbols with her hands. The symbols shown to her by Xiah, her favorite Goddess (or at least her favorite voice in her head). As she understood, the symbols meant 'Rune Master'. Once finished making the symbols, she pointed the artifact hanging around her neck a few times.

Val's boot trampled off to the direction of her forge, each step seemed to show the huff the small Rune Master was in. She had runes, new and repaired, waiting on her and these reptiles had the nerve to fight right in front of her! The pair didn't have the common sense of river rocks in her opinion. Just hissing and and spitting, the two might as well been dancing for all the good it did them. Her ears caught a familar sound of buzzing a broken rune translator made. Val's attention ensnared, her walking came to a sudden halt before she turned on heel to face the strangest sight she had ever seen: A walking, half talking shrub! 

Val took a minute to blink the shock from her eyes, for the first time in her life she was actually speechless. Shaking away the surpise when the shrubbery started to wave her leafy hands about in signs she started to note were a form of sign lanuage used underground, when sounds and high pitches made talking ill adviced or risk a cave in. One of the flaws about living underground sadly. 

"Now hold it a minite! Give me a moment, yer cuttin' in and out. And yer signs ain't that good." Her eyes drifted down to her belt, her thick hand shifted into a pocket and several items seemed to shuffle about within it. After several seconds, Val smirked triumphly and withdrew a small stone. It had a gooved sign, meaning translate, cut into the stone itself as well as a vibrate purple ink marking Val's unique signature within her master piece. 

"Try this and see how it does." The Dwarf said and looped the rune upon the Foreas's necklace used for the artifact. 

Coco stood quietly as the woman gave her the rune and aided her in putting it on. She felt the rune with her fingers, then once she was satisfied and felt she knew enough about the rune's form and material, she let it go and let it rest around her neck. Then she stretched her fingers and attempted to speak...

"Coco," She began, her leaves puffing out slightly in excitement at not hearing the annoying buzzing sound, "Coco Bean is my name, I can scare Syphis thanks to Xiah." She said i na soft yet energetic voice, her leaves now fully puffed out before she jumped a little on the spot and gave the woman dwarf a quick hug.

"Thank you, Rune Master! You're the best!" She said, then released the embrace, hoping in some part to not have creeped or grossed her out. Most sentients that she had met and weren't part of the Foreas usually felt uncomfortable when in physical contact with them.

"How did you know, though? Do dwarves have psychic powers when it comes to fixing Speech Artifacts? Why didn't we try talking to Dwarves before? Do I have to talk to someone to point me in the right direction for Mageblood training? Is my sudden mageblood given to me by Xiah linked to appearance of the huge beasts that eat us whole in seconds?"

Val immediately decided she liked the small, feminine (guessing from the shape, appearance and slight light tone) talking shrub. The creature seemed to study the rune, rotating and feeling it in her hand, until she finally satisfied her curiosity before she set it back down. The rune was a mix of Chantment and Psychomancy, the prior created the voice used to translate while the later linked it with the creature’s mental procession making it able to filter many different languages from almost any species in Tiien into one universal one. No matter whom it attached to. Though with some objects, there wasn’t much activity going on up there anyway to be of any interest knowing. There it rested as the female then moved her fingers, the rune glowed slightly blue with each motion, scent and more to translate the language into a universal one understood by Val. Coco Bean the creature introduced herself, the dwarven woman cautiously eyed the Foreas when her leaves puffed up and wondered if she had upset the poor thing. The Naga were bad enough but she didn’t need a shrub ready to whack her about too today! 
 
However the tone indicated otherwise causing Val to relax a bit. Her ears listened while Coco continued, going about something called a Syphis and Xiah, the later seemed to ring alarm bells in her head. Val had a rune, similar to the one a student gave to the Healer of late, so the Rune Master knew the little shrub hadn’t been lying about Xiah. The thing about Goddesses and Gods, even Ren, was they didn’t interfere without some grander idea in mind. Mostly not in a way that ended up well as in the current Necromancer teacher, Uicle, case. Still Val made mental note to talk to Khan later about it, her thoughts distracted when she was quickly wrapped in Coco’s leafy embraced and tightly hugged. Val again blinked and smiled. 
 
“Ye just be callin’ me Val, everyone does et.” She said simply before Coco began shooting more questions again. Chuckling a bit, she shook her head and raised her hands to slow the little one down. “Aye, slow it down ‘ittle one. I’m only a Rune Master, no mageblood what so ever so I merely took a guess at what’cha needed. Nothing more, seems like I was right. Now, iffin’ ye be wantin’ mage trainnin’ then come wit’ me and we’ll git ye settled. I think Lucilia helps Khan wit’ the registry seein’ the Headmaster is busy.” 
 
Val took note of the current stone wolf, rather odd since she hadn’t constructed it, but never the less gorgeous workmanship down on the statue. Kindly she warped her arm about the young shrub’s shoulders then began to lead her towards Lucilia’s office, where Val hoped the vampire might be right now, and continued the idle chatter. “So, never seen the likes of ye here before. What’cha race called?” 

"My race?" Coco asked, letting Val lead her to wherever this Lucilia was. "I'm a Foreas. And in case you're wondering, no, I don't actually produce beans of any kind, and you can't make chocolate out of me." She explained in a soft voice. 

"Who is this Lucilia? Is it a female? Why does it smell like bat right that way?" She asked, pointing roughly at the direction of Lucilia's office. For all she knew, bats were strange and funny at the same time, so she wanted to have the opportunity to pet one. 

"Is there a bat around? Can we go pet it? Is it docile or is it the kind that eats your leaves?" She kept asking, starting to rub her fingers together in anticipation at the possibility of getting a pet bat. She had always wanted one! Well... Not always, but now that she was reminded of their scent, she could swear she liked bats. 

"If it tries to eat my leaves I might accidentally shock the creature! I don't want to hurt a fluffly little bat, that would be bad, Val." 

"Easy there, Coco, I cannea answer all yer questions if ye shootin' off like sparks from a Rune." Val chuckled, trying to slow the Foreas's fountian of questions while minding her path. The dwarf seemed to enjoy curious students and in some small way wished the Foreas had been a Rune student. Her arms held a firm grip but not enough to smash the tender leaves, her hair tied back in a messy way and keeping her distance from the retreating Naga female. Last thing the dwarf needed was to deal with another hissy fit.

At the mention of Lucilia, Val answered the best she could and in her normal, blunt way. "Yes, Lucilia is a female and well, I donnea smell anything out of the normal. It could because she's a vampire and can turn into bats? As for pettin' one, I thinkin' that's not for the best dearie. They tend to bite when a stranger tries to pet 'em 'cause they ain't use to ye." 

Turning about and guided the pair to the castle part of the College, where the classrooms and offices were, Val attempted to piece what she knew about Coco's endless conversation. Namely what she mentioned about shock and things before they got derailed in the mess of questions. On a hunch she then added, "I take take it from yer shock remark, yer a Electromancer then?"

Coco was surprised by Val. How come she couldn't keep up with her questions? She didn't even ask that many things! 'I guess meat baggies can't listen as good as plants...' She thought, then listened as Val continued speaking. 

"Bummer... I really wanted to pet a bat." She said, this time slower than before, forcing herself to keep things more manageable for Val to fully understand.

"Electromancer? Is that how it's called? I know I can shock things because I scared these huge creatures called Syphis with Mageblood. It was exhausting to scare them and hurt them like that!"

"Wait... A vampire? What is that? Is that something special? How can she turn into a bat? Could I turn into a bat like Lucilia? Is it a fruit bat or a blood bat? If it's a fruit bat, then it's very creepy." She mentioned with a shiver, having forgotten to force her questions down once more.

"Maybe after they git to know ye... I donnea think ye can pet Lucilia's bats. Electromancy is a magic that uses electrical currents and from the sounds of it, yep that's ye mageblood," Val said as she noted they had drawn nearer to the Herbamancy teacher's office. In a short time they would be there and hopefully most the Foreas's curiosity would've been staturated. Something Val actually doubted was possible."Likely vampire bats, ones that drink blood I would imagine. And vampire is a curse human that has to drink blood from others, fast and strong enough its best not to get on their bad side."

"Wow, that's awesome. Also, sorry if I speak too much, it's been a few months since I could speak without it all breaking apart." Coco said in a sheepish tone, shrugging. The rest of the way went fairly calm and quiet, Coco drawing herself to silence, forcefully. Val seemed to be getting tired of her voice, just by the ways her tones subtly changed. 

Eventually they arrived at the office's door, and Coco turned towards Val, snapping her right hand's fingers to get a quick layout of her surroundings. "I thought you said something about having to do things in a Forge a few minutes ago? Well, I think I can handle a few cute bats on my own. Though be careful, I might find you and ask more questions!"

Val merely shook her head, "Cannea blame ye or mind it, I always like the chatter while I work in the Forge. Keeps me grounded though I might not reply quickly if at all. As for a few cute bats, it's likely to be a swarm ye get." 

The dwarf's steps came closer as she stopped, her arms around Coco alway s prevented the Foreas from walking farther. The Rune Master seemed a bit depress, her tone clearly rather chest fallen at demparting her but swallowed the feelings down. "Tis here is Lucilia's office. Hopefully she's in thar. If nea, then come find me and ye'll get ye settled in n' look for her together. I best be gittin' to Xyden's room request before dark edges too close for me to be gittin' it done."

Waving a little to the small novice the Rune master waddled off to her forge before the Opening Feast. It would be a night to remember certainly. [/hider]

[i][b]Coco Bean[/i][/b]

It had been minutes. After speaking with the Rune Master and having her help her with her speech problem and lead her to this Lucilia female, she felt like she was stepping into something she couldn't quite fathom. The memory of the Goddess' voice was still present in her mind, and she could not shake the words she told her. Sure, alone they did not mean much at all, but every time Coco spun the words around for any kind of deeper meaning or plan, she came up with a different explanation. 

Why did this Goddess Xiah have to be so impatient? Why didn't she herself, Coco, ask questions when she could? She could have even asked for something cute, like a bat! But no... She was scared, terrified and shaken after the Syphis' attack. Her fellow Foreas were dead, killed by these... Creatures of heat. 

She clapped her hands once and stood still for a few moments, relaxing enough to look her best. And when she felt her leaves follow her desires and lay down, she knocked on the door. Hopefully this Lucilia was present and could answer a couple of her questions. And even though the nice Rune Master Val told her not to expect to be able to pet a bat while near Lucilia, she still hoped she would be able to do it!