Thinslayer

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

"Why, would you have been jealous?"

Ruby raised an eyebrow. "I suppose that would depend on how much cleaning you did," she replied, restraining a smirk.

Kaath's subsequent question about the kite caught her attention. "Any of you...hold the string?"

Kite. String. Now there's an interesting connection - if only because it evokes the imagery from before. Perhaps my first inclination was correct: that creature there is the kite in the visions. If that's the case, who is the bird?

Ruby glanced at Kaath.

Could she be...?

She ground her teeth as she mulled over the possibility. What if this Kaath is just trying to get on our good side so we'll drop her guard and let her eat the kite? She may want to know who "pulls the string," so to speak, to find out who to snatch it from so she can drag it down. Even if I knew who that was, telling her might not be a good idea unless we're doing a bait plan or something. In fact, it might be better if I didn't know who that was, because with all this mind-fudgery going around, God only knows whether some hell-forsaken creature might drag it out of me. All this assumes, of course, she is the "bird" from the visions, which she may not be.

Speaking of hell... She turned her attention back to Violet, who was now apologizing for her earlier outburst. Ruby pinked a little, realizing she'd zoned out while Kaath and Walker talked the girl down. "Oh...um, I forgive you, Violet." She sat back down next to Walker and began pulling medical supplies out of her bag to treat his wound.

It was then Kaath said something that sent a shiver down her spine.

"So, the rest o'ye got names, eh? Ye humans love that kinda thing, I take it."

Ruby froze. Wait, what?

Violet said what everyone else was thinking: "Keepa said the same thing. Come to mention it, you know a lot about this place and you two almost talk the same...you both would be working-" Violet cut herself off with a curse and grabbed her head as she struggled to control her breathing.

Keepa had known Ruby's name, and lying about it seemed to just make things worse. What if Kaath was also...in...on this place, and knew her name as well? Ruby decided to test this.

"Call me Sapphire."

Violet, meanwhile, seemed to have collected her thoughts. "Speaking of plague surgeon, where is Kite?"

So that's the name we're going with. Fair enough. Ruby pointed. Violet rushed over to Kite and examined him. "Is the Nightmare Oil still affecting him? Is he still locked in the nightmare?" She checked his breathing and looked to Kaath. "What's happening to him? Do you know anything about this?"

"I washed it off as best I could..." Ruby murmured. She turned to Kaath. May as well throw the language back at her. "So, you must have some secrets, huh? You creatures seem to love that kinda thing." She smirked and leaned forward, adding, "Wanna trade?"

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Ruby listened to Violet's complaints, evaluating them against her own memories of recent events. Given the strangeness of their foe, she wouldn't have been completely surprised if he'd sent everyone through different timelines. But Ruby had experienced being in alternate timelines before, (no) thanks to the games Sargon sometimes played. Violet was most likely delusional. There were a few things that could have explained her delusions.

• The black stuff that D.F. sprayed on her. She'd screamed in agony from it.
• Hidden injuries from the long fall. Her brain may have damaged.
• Demon-harpy did something to her while they were unconscious.

Ruby furrowed her brow. "So we left you while that Keepa-thing did unspeakable things to you..." She took a moment to imagine it. She would have felt very alone, very scared, and probably angry at being left behind. Given who the enemy was, pain from being eaten alive. Vengeful. "That's horrifying," she murmured. "You were alone in an unfamiliar place, trapped by an invincible monster, toyed with, eaten, and put back together only to experience it all over again. And the people you thought were allies have the nerve to think they saved your life. Son of a harpy... that's a wretched place to be. Violet, I- I mean- no, that's just wretched. I'm sorry."

She glanced back at the demon-harpy and scowled. "You didn't do anything to her, did you?"

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Hearing Violet speak brought Ruby mixed feelings. She was glad Violet was still alive and speaking, but her words were angry and confused. Something wasn't adding up, and they needed to get to the bottom of it. Ruby got to her feet and put a staying hand on Walker's shoulder.

She said to Violet, "You feel like a traitor's slave, huh? It does seem like an extreme over-payment for a life-debt. What makes you believe we left you?"

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Ruby stirred. The fall, or whatever that was, had knocked her out cold, and she didn't much feel like getting up. But the nearby murmur of voices drew her curiosity. She opened her eyes a little to take in her surroundings. She beheld a fire, burning bright as if in apology for the crippling darkness earlier, and there were shadowy figures around it. As her eyes adjusted, one of the figures turned out to be Mr. Hero.

Just seeing him again made her feel a bit more secure. His strong back made a sharp silhouette against the fire, and the calm rumble of his voice reassured her that he perceived no imminent danger. If Mr. Hero didn't think Dingus Flamingus was coming back, then she was more than happy to rest under his protective shadow. Besides, a few more minutes couldn't hurt.

Thoughts of Kite, Hero's injuries, Violet's condition, and pending research forced her up. With a grumble, Ruby lifted herself to her feet and peered around for the birdface. When she spotted it, she stumbled over to its side and looked it over. Though she had zero knowledge of this magical kite's (magikite?) physiology, she observed that the creature was breathing, for what that was worth. Was it supposed to be breathing? There were stranger creatures on Aion designed with unconventional respiratory systems. But she didn't much feel like investigating that. Such things were better left to Grey. The mad doc would pester her for research subjects by the end of this mission anyway.

Ruby turned back toward the fire and nearly shrieked at the sight of the demon-harpy sitting just across from Mr. Hero. Nearly shrieked. She wasn't dumb enough to wake up the entire dungeon. She maintained laser-focus on the creature as she stepped her way over to Mr. Hero's side and sat next to him.

She risked a glance at his shoulder, and earning herself another shock at the highly unsanitary cloth stuffed in the wound. He shouldn't have even removed the arrow. Left untreated, the wound was likely to go septic. Ruby returned her gaze to the demon-harpy and slowly reached into her bag for her medical kit.

She opted to remain silent and let Mr. Hero - or Walker, as he'd introduced himself - do all the talking for the moment. She could ask who the H-E-double-hockey-sticks he was talking to later.

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Ruby watched with a resigned expression as the torch soared through the air. There's no way I'm catching that. To her surprise, she did catch it, albeit after a brief fumble and whispered curse. With her other arm, she picked up the kite and ran behind Walker as fast as her legs could carry her. Keepa's last words haunted her, and she wished (not for the last time) that she had the power to beat him. Fantasies of magic powers, martial arts, and hi-tech suits danced in her head until a few things occurred to her:

1. She had none of these things.
2. She had allies who did have these things.
3. Getting away safely was more important at the moment.

How narrow had been her brush with hell. If Keepa hadn't chosen to monologue, she would have been eaten, and then... she didn't even want to think about it. Twice she'd faced her end at the maw, and twice she'd been saved by the skin of her teeth. When Violet woke up, that girl deserved a hearty thanks.

That is, if she woke up. The poor girl had gotten a face-full of goo, giving her nightmares such as curled her in fetal agony. Her blood-curdling screams and bitter sobs made Ruby want to curl up herself. How Walker managed to carry her with a straight face, and with an arrow embedded in his shoulder no less, she'd never know. Dude was a walking hero.

The creature under her arm, however, was an enigma. His bird mask reminded her of a plague mask, but for some reason, the word "kite" came to mind when she looked at it. Why? While she knew "kite" was a type of bird, the mask didn't look like a kite's face. Perhaps it had been the vision from earlier.

She recalled the image of birds making nests in a tree. The birds tore into kites of fabric stuck in the tree, and used the material to build their nests. Even the sticks and strings of the kites seemed to become part of the tree. Assuming the content of the vision is symbolic, what if...what if birdface was the kite? That would make Keepa the bird. Fantasy fiction writers like to think of dungeons as being like living creatures, so if it's like that, this place could be the nest, or the tree, and it's sustaining itself by eating adventurers.

Ruby mulled it over.

She looked at birdface.

Using ths little guy to build a massive dungeon? Preposterous. Stupid theory.

Ruby lifted her eyes and scanned for possible exits. If they were to escape Keepa's grasp, they'd need to lose him somehow, whether through tricky maneuvering or locating a strong door.

Please guide us out of here... she prayed.

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Ruby and Walker both paled at the sight of the countless heads squirming within Keepa's body. "Jumpin' Jehoshaphat..." she murmured.

Keepa was less than thrilled. "Nawh...whay'd y'hafta go an do that? Y'all got no mannahs. Don'cha know ya ruin a good joke by shoutin' out tha punchline? Buh ifin its a scrappin yer lookin' foh..."

With that, he spat out the crossbow bolt and struck Walker in the shoulder. Though Walker was the one in pain, it was Ruby who cried out. She moved to help him, but Keepa blocked her path. She tripped and stumbled straight toward his gaping jaws. Eternal darkness loomed in his throat.

The head vanished in a crimson flash.

Violet.

Ruby clutched at her heart as a swell of relief broke over her. Thank you, Violet. The feeling soon turned to panic, however, when Kite released a gut-wrenching wail behind her. The color drained from Ruby's face, and she raced to Kite's side blasting shot after shot into Keepa's head. "NO! NO! GET AWAY FROM HIM!" she shrieked. Her head ached for mana loss with every shot. She grabbed Kite's writhing form by the arm and dragged him back down the hall, laying cover fire until her eyes became bloodshot and her nausea threatened her stomach.

When they'd got a good distance away, Ruby studied the writhing patient, eyes clouded over from her own pain. His agony likely came from the stinky stuff he was covered in. She swiped a sample into a vial and tucked it away before testing a little on her arm.

"Criminy, this stuff is nasty." She noted the symptoms and withdrew her canteen, proceeding to methodically wash the fluid off Kite until his writhing subsided. Satisfied he would live for now, she took a moment to survey the battle and take a swig from her canteen to allay her raging headache. Something caught her eye: the first of Keepa's destroyed heads, laying in a puddle of black ichor.

Aha! While Walker and Violet kept Keepa occupied, Ruby collected samples of the ichor and ash into vials, stuffed the head-flap in a container (which nearly made her retch), and put everything away in her bag. Maybe they couldn't stop Keepa yet, but with these supplies, she could concoct one - if only they could just get out alive and regroup.

Walker apparently had a similar thought. He barked out, "Delaying the inevitable here! Fighting withdraw is in order. You, light launcher, how many of those do you have left?"

Ruby held up a pair of flare shells and grinned. "I can spare two."

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

As Keepa loomed over her, drool leaking from between its teeth, Violet shouted, "Walter! Duck!" and a brilliant ball of flames slammed into the head. Ruby stumbled back and shielded her eyes. She risked a glance at Violet. Whoa, did that attack come from her? A flush of awe surged through her. Walker took everything in stride, his practiced strikes and efficient dodges betraying a level of skill well beyond par.

Ruby watched with her mouth hung open, bewitched. "Golly G. Whillikers...the kite sure knows how to pick 'em," she murmured.

Walker was a little less than impressed, though. "Remind me to talk to you three about element of sodding surprise after this!" he shrieked between attacks.

Ruby dove away to the wall and joked back, "I'd be surprised if you didn't!" Besides, she had a few surprises of her own. She armed her pistol and stuffed a flare shot down the barrel. If Keepa's dark body and the dungeon's light-snuffing habit were anything to go on:

"Eat this, Dingus Flamingus!"

She pulled the trigger.

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Ruby Redford

What little light there was vanished. Ruby rummaged through her bag for one of her torches and lit one just as the man in the group lit his. But as they lifted up their lights to see down the hallway, all illumination stopped beyond a certain point as if at a brick wall of darkness.

From that darkness emerged a grin.

"Oh, wah howdy!" it drawled.

Ruby did not much feel like greeting it back.

"Mah, this is certain-lay awkward," it continued. "Ah imagine you can sympathize. I have just been dyin' t'meetcha, and- well, I get so bashful. Lucky me, I still got my personality."

Still no one spoke. Ruby, for her part, noted that this thing was trying to sound conciliatory, in the way powerful beings do when trying to balance their pride with desire. She waited for the thing to tip its hand - which it did shortly thereafter.

"Now then, y'all got me got me up in a tizzy just wondering whatcha doin', making so much noise. See, we're here, gunna do our best, but it'd be rude of us to just start!"

Start what? Being creepy? Congratulations, you win the grand prize.

It got even creepier when the second head showed up.

"Jiminy Crickets..." Ruby muttered.

"Keepa, we'd prefer ya know me as. Just here to do what I can for such...enticing...individuals. C'mon, now, all y'all got names. You humans love that kinda thang." Keepa took one look at Kite and added, "Now, what's that one's problem? Wuzza mattah, Stardust? Cat gotcha tongue?" They snickered and turned to ask the man, "So, whadda they caaaalll ya, baby?"

One head looked over the rest of the group and said, "Now y'all don't feel so unincluded! We haven't forgotten all ya's."

The man, to his credit, stood his ground and answered boldly. "Call me Walker. It's a pleasure, Keepa. Apologies about the noise. Seems it travels rather uniquely in this lovely place you have here, and since we're just passing through, we can certainly be on our way and not causing anymore noise, if you'd be so kind? Save us all the trouble of being in each other's way."

Ruby mustered up the most sincere smile she could manage. Hey, perhaps they were nice and just didn't know how to look the part. But just in case they were like fey or something: "Hiya! I'm Sierra Sinclaire. It's a real pleasure to make your acquaintance. Walker and I were just about to check out the mess hall. Wanna come with? I brought some homemade snacks." She lifted a package of pemmican and grinned.

Unheroic: The Backwards Castle

Ruby Redford

Ruby Redford

Apparent Age: 25

"IS": Human

Features: Female, 5'9", brown eyes, cropped brown hair, light brown skin.

Role: Porter

Description: Ruby takes pride in her work as a Porter, and dresses in a smart, professional uniform, with her hair neatly cropped, nails clipped, eyebrows plucked, and - most importantly - teeth brushed. You won't find just another smelly adventurer here; this girl can Dress to Impress. The oral hygiene doesn't seem to work so well on her language, though, as she's steadily sassing her way through a library of cusswords every time she goes out.

Armaments:

• Porter Uniform: Resistant to shear, stain, fire, cold, and water. Grants +1 to Professionalism.
• Arcane Blaster: Magical flintlock pistol. When the flint strikes steel and sparks the magic circuit, it draws from the user's mana to fire a deadly bolt of energy. Can load and fire flares.
• Bag of Holding: Dimensional storage pack with infinite capacity. Stores everything listed below, in addition to client properties.
• Survival gear: rope, cooking pot, ladle, survival knife, matches, ferro rod (for sparking fire), compass, canteens, gill net (for fishing), charcoal water filters, a month's worth of pemmican, several changes of clothing, magic torches, first aid kits, 6 flares (used: 1)
• Crafting gear: tool box, sewing kit, chemistry supplies
• Hygiene kit: several bars of soap, toothbrushes, floss, tongue scraper, several tubes of toothpaste, tweezers, brushes, combs
• Office supplies: ledger, checkbook, notepad, sticky notes, box of pencils, eraser, sharpener, felt-tip pen

Teraterifficence:

• [REDACTED]
• Crazy-prepared, if the above Armaments list didn't give it away.
• Alchemic Crafting: Can use the "essence" of monster drops to enhance items. Requires construction of a magic circle for transmutation.

Original World: An interplanetary empire has conquered the entire galaxy. Their fleets are nigh-invincible, and rebel forces are powerless to stop them.

And they're the good guys.

Upon expanding their reach to the galactic edge, the seven immortals on the empire's ruling body, the Immortal Council, set out amongst the stars to create new worlds for their people to inhabit. Planets that were once desolate grew life, and systems plagued with disaster saw peace. Each world took on a life of its own. Some developed a rich fantasy life, while others created breathtaking marvels of science. There was a place for everyone.

That is, until all hell broke loose on a certain backwater world named Aion...

Backstory:
"You were adopted."

Just three words. Some think it's an insult, as if being pushed out of a body part is somehow superior. Some think it's an expression of love, from people who could have picked anyone they wanted and deliberately chose you.

I just munched on my cracker.

It wasn't exactly a revelation to 10-year-old me - I mean, when my dad stormed into the living room ten years prior and the first words out of his mouth were, "You went and bought that little chicken-fried f*cknugget from the agency?" it wasn't hard to put the pieces together. I was a baby, not deaf. Ironically, that old potbellied fart became my role model when I grew up, because Holy Smuckeroli, the adventurers here are dumber than ducks on Sara Lee white bread. Fire-breathing dragon captured the princess? Bring a wooden sword to the battle! Kraken tearing up your ship on the open sea? Oh, a lightning spell will do nicely. Vampire Lord threatening the country? Kill it with blood magic! They collect harems of psychopaths, waltz into traps, spare bloodthirsty monsters- I'm surprised there's anyone left in the Hero business to cuss at.

The sorts of people who think 101 Ways to Die is a guidebook are also the sorts of people you can make money on. If there's one thing every aspiring hero needs, it's a girl with a level head, plenty of Band-Aids, and just enough romance to keep him puffing to Season 2. That's where I come in. For only 2 cents an hour and 3% of the total loot, the Redford Porter Service will handle all your adventuring needs. Lost in the Forgotten Woods? I got a full-color topographic map. Broke your Master Blade cutting grass? No worries, I can make you two more. Whatever moronic puzzling predicament you find yourself in, I gotcha covered.

Swindle me, though, and I got a bullet with your name on it.

The Faraway Land: Knights vs Dragons (CLOSED)

@Rhiven Knight@AtomicNut
Rose had oftened imagined this moment to be filled with sunshine and rainbows, with gentle harps strumming somewhere in the distance as Prince Darvus Dragan walked into her life.

Instead, it was rather...quiet, dusty, and smelled of old books. Much like the library.

Rhayven hardly broke a sweat. "Ah, hello Prince Darvus! We werent expecting anyone to join us in our research." With that brief greeting, he resumed his conversation with Rose, as if she were more important to him than the Prince of Drakengard.

It felt nice.

"As to your question, Rose," he continued, "that is a treatise I wrote, and recently, on a ruin I explored, and the nature of the magical secrets I discovered within and its relation to our known history. That is what I do: I explore, mostly as a way to study magic, to deepen my understanding- our understanding- of the magic we use. It also helps further my research into the development of new forms of magic."

She touched her chin and nodded. His methods, while uncommon, were not wholly outlandish. After all, whether one studies magic from a book or from a ruin, they're still learning it from dead people, are they not? And, to learn the magical technology of a superior civilization from ages long past surely could not be inferior to learning from a book written only a few decades ago.

Rhayven attempted to loop Darvus into their conversation. "Still, it is a pleasure to have you join our research inquiry, Your Highness. What Rose and I have been researching is a confluence of historical detail and fictional writing. Which is to say, some of the presented fairy tales bare a striking resemblance to places of historical fact, and that appear to connect to the artifacts of legend. It is far from a settled matter, but our current theory is that the truth of the weapons lies somewhere between the truth of established history and the supposition of folk lore, and it should mean we have deciphered candidates for probable places to look for specific weapons. Further, I think (though Rose will need to look over that treatise I wrote), that I have been to a site linked to one of these sites and might be in possession of an artifact to facilitate gaining entry into the dungeon, in which is stored one of the so-called keys."

Rose paged through the treatise. His meticulous style made it easy to read, despite its dense content, which earned him some kudos in her view. Rhayven had visited numerous ruins in his time, some fruitful, some sparse, all of them interesting. Most ruins, he'd found, were found in desert regions, and grew less and less ruinous as they drew closer to the Haven towers- with the notable exception of Midhaven. Despite having no access to the immediate area around Midhaven Tower, thanks to the odd wall that cropped up around it in recent years, Rhayven found pieces of man-made materials all around the area, and in fairly dense scattering, which strongly suggested a previously inhabited area. He'd speculated, as other historians did, that the region was Ground Zero of the Apocalypse War.

Though the ruins of Ancient cities were endlessly interesting for a variety of reasons, of peculiar interest were the golems. Throughout his journeys, he kept finding them in all shapes and sizes- small golems, large golems, epic golems, battle golems, frail golems- humanoid constructs made by the Ancients for all kinds of functions. A few were in sufficiently good condition that he was able to confirm that they were, in essence, machines, and as an inventor, he knew full well that all machines need maintenance. And the biggest, baddest golems would need the biggest, baddest maintenance.

Which meant, of course, that they needed the biggest, baddest infrastructure to maintain them. That was how, over a year ago, Rhayven became the first man on Aion to discover an Ancint Stronghold. The place was a veritable treasure trove of Ancient engineering, with partially intact war golems, damaged magitech equipment, advanced materials and architecture, and even electronic systems resembling those created in modern sages' laboratories (albeit advanced to incomprehensibility).

The main problem was getting inside. While the advent of teleporting magic theoretically meant one could go inside whenever they wanted, there was no telling whether there was sufficient space to teleport into, since the vast majority of the structure had collapsed. The government whose territory it was in, Drakengard, was curiously reluctant to help clear it, so the stronghold's contents had yet to be explored.

Rose piped up. "The stronghold Sir Rhayven discovered is mostly obscured by debris, which the Crown has been unwilling to deal with. If I may be so bold, Your Highness, do you have any...pull? Can you...you know...get help with that?"