[center][h1][color=2bffbf]Renauld: Smoldering Firebrand[/color][/h1][/center]
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The task.

The pay.

The location.

It was all shit- possibly [i]literally[/i] shit this time- and Renauld was furious. At that moment he would have wagered the meager pay this mission was promising on this: That the anger boiling inside him at that moment was hotter than anything that the living candle in their group had been consumed by.

A group this powerful could be chasing down real leads on the great threats facing this politically backwards sham of a nation, not getting lost in a sewer that rivaled Paris’ to chase a few souls that were almost certainly already dead. There was a bigger picture being sketched in the background of this realm, and Renauld’s passions drove him to paint on such a canvas.

Still, while he was a passionate man, he was not- he hoped- a stupid one. He did not speak his objections out loud. This group had some of the few people that would still have his company on the road, and alienating them was not on his list of priorities. Not that alienating half of the Kingdom had been on his list of priorities either.

Yet.

Renauld turned his head towards the small body perched on his shoulder, and found its masked gaze turned towards him as well. Studying him? Judging him? The latter thought, strangely, filled him with a rare flush of shame. Gently he picked it up from his shoulder, eliciting a pop from its artificial joints, and held it in front of his face for a long moment, completely lost to the conversation happening in the sewer around him.

“[color=2bffbf][i]I’m here, aren’t I?[/i][/color]”

Came the softly spoken words in French. The two faced each other for a moment longer, before the creature pried his hand open with its surprising strength and scurried its way up his arm back to its perch. The…

Paladin?

Magi?

Warlock?

This place had many names for him, most of which were less polite than those three. The [i]revolutionary[/i] then turned to his companions, finally catching the tail end of a sentence.

“[color=D4C9C4]… better suited for being here than most either way.[/color]”

Suited for a sewer? Just what the hell had they been talking about? He knew plenty of people whom he would help to make a sewer their permanent residence, but most of them were in another world. And dead for over a hundred years, if he had understood some of the other Paladins properly. There was at least some justice in that.

“[color=2bffbf]Anything suited for being [i]here[/i] ought to be left here comrade.[/color]” 

He chimed in while placing a hand on Harlow’s shoulder in a gesture that was meant to be reassuring, after having completely missed the thrust of the conversation. The self-immolating Paladin unnerved Renauld like few others. As someone who had been stabbed to death and left to bleed out in a gutter, the thought of [i]voluntarily[/i] driving a blade into himself was madness. To be someone who could do that voluntarily and repeatedly was something he never wanted to become.

Finally, he turned his gaze to Thalorian taking up the rear. Renauld appreciated that his morals seemed to be in the right place most of the time, but there was something that didn’t sit right with the devoutly anti-Catholic about a man who embodied a sort of chivalric ideal. Frankly, he expected them to have a fruitful partnership up until the moment they had a single moral disagreement. After that, who knew? At a minimum the Frenchman would make sure to be out of sword reach when the time came.

Hopefully though it would never come up. Better still if it was never given a [i]chance[/i] to come up, preferably because this mission was going to end quickly. Then Renauld could go on to doing something more meaningful. And better paying. And not located in a sewer.