Welcome to Gaia! ::

Bix. Aria couldn’t hide the grin as she shook her head in wonder. “Good job, Bix. Keep it up,” she complimented. He was certainly a trainee to keep her eye on; a pity he was a member of the Sun faction and not the Mist. The Mist trainees could certainly learn a lot from him, Aria thought.

As Jordan stepped up, Aria couldn’t hide the wince at the pitch of his voice. “While it’s true that in Halloween there’s some females that sound like males and vice versa,” she said, handing him a seed. “When in doubt, keep your voice low and claim you’re sick. If you can pull a convincing fake cough, then go for it but don’t go too overboard.”

At his second question, Aria patted her own leg. “It’s weird at first, but you get used to it. To me, this feels just like my own body. Then again, it might be because it’s a higher untested type,” she grinned, adding, “If you’re ever feeling brave, try volunteering for a golem sometime. Just be careful when you do -- I’ve gotten myself stuck in one for an entire week and had to eek out a living here. I don’t recommend it until you get more experience under your belt when it comes to espionage.”

To Leon, Aria nodded. “This is just one cultish celebration, mind. They certainly have... odder holidays. Be glad that you are present for one of the tame ones.” She stopped as he asked a question she already answered, shaking her head. “In addition, you need to learn how to talk to your weapon quietly. Right now, you were talking to yourself and asking about something I already covered. Do try to pay attention next time -- and to start, bring me back not one but two different types of minipets. You got that?” She handed him only one seed though, making a note of what his voice sounded like.

As Marcus approached, Aria openly stared at him-her. “You... You may want to say that your voice is hoarse from breathing fire,” she suggested, reaching out before poking one of Marcus’ wings. “And from what I can tell, these are far too tiny to fly with. At most, you’d probably break one it you tried. And who’s to say that after breaking one the rest of the golem won’t fall apart? I lose a squad-made that way.” She paused, shaking her head sadly. “He botched the mission at the same time, too. He had it coming.” Nothing more was elaborated on as she gave him a seed.

To Hanna, Aria nodded approvingly. “Here you are. Let’s see... hooves? Not too bad, think of it as walking on your tip-toes. Good luck.”

Everyone was HUGE. More HUGE than Before could ever imagine they could be! He also failed to recognize the others, up until they started speaking, that is and as much as he would have wanted to just CLING THE s**t OUT OF THEM, they were all heading out to fulfill this mission.

"B-but, I! This! Me. WE HAVE BOOBIES!" oAo!!!!?!?!? He flailed about, then heard Bix calling for Tika to join them and and and and... where was everyone going?!?!?!

A sigh, They are leaving for a festival. I don't believe I remember what kind this is... Vanna hmph'd, But you should do as your friend, ah, the one in the yeti body said. Ask for your seed and come up with a name. A DECENT ONE AT THAT!

Before-in-Imp's clothing awkwardly wobbled on her tiny legs as he made his way towards their Hunter superior. "Ah, oh, I am so totes glad you aren't in a skirt because um, uh, yeaaaaah," he was suddenly looking at her shoes instead. "Uh uh uh lemme get my Oliver Twist on and ask can I have my seed, please?"

Who is this Oliver and who twisted him?

"Oh! Olive Twist is this orphan dude who ends up being a pick-pockety kid and he gets into all sorts of s**t!" Before explained, not realizing he probably should be doing this explaining IN HIS HEAD and not, you know, OUT LOUD. "And anyway, oooh! Um, Lady-Ma'am-Boss, is Twist a name that will keep me from getting gutted and stuff?"

((un: randonimity))

Bix made his way back to the meeting point. He'd woven in and out of the crowd and did his best to try and make sure that none of the students he'd met would follow him. He didn't know why they would, but he tried to be stealthy anyway.

Being out of the hustle and bustle he finally slumped. For some reason he had been fine, surprisingly, amongst the monster and freaks of the festival. Only now, heading back, did it all hit him and his heart started to thud in his chest.

Oh Bixy.. you are so charming. You did wonderfully in there.
I can't believe I did that. Those were reeeeal monsters and stuff. I might be living vicariously through this golem but.. .. they are real full blooded killers and monsters and freaks. He shuddered when he remembered the butchered looking igor who had a knife in his head.

He clutched his purse closely and took a deep breath. It was time to turn in his assignment to the instructors. He approached Aria since she'd seemed kind of impressed by him when he first left. She'd also smacked him in the head on her first mission meeting. Something about that was kind of hot.

Ggggrrrr yes. She isssssss sexy.

The interjection caused him to blush and choke a little just as he was about to speak.

"Ahrrk *cough* urgh.. uh.." Bix tried to clear his throat. "I.. uh finished. I'm back." He felt like it was a little early. "I got a few things.. I stole a fish egg from a booth. Honestly I didn't see them hold a single game there. I think the idea was to steal."

He pulled out his ghost floresce egg and presented it to her.


"I also went to this dunk tank thing and a dunked a hobo in a pit of crazy fish. When he crawled out he gave me this.



"They seem to be having their student council elections soon." He sounded slightly bewildered by the very normal way that sounded.

"I won a game system thing at a ghoul's election booth.. oh and she gave me this. Umm.." He looked around. "Can I keep the lantern? For my dorm? It's only made of paper.." The dorm walls were so ..... white.

"But umm.." He'd just heard Jude give his report so he mimicked it. "I met 3 reapers.. one was a fairy, one was a grim reaper, and one was a sorceror. He had a scary looking magical book.. OH And apparently he's the brother of the PLANT teacher.. or gardening class... or whatever."

He went over his actions while at the festival. "I also met a girl who was undead but her body was like.. backwards. She was running for Public Relations and she told me about all the teachers and classes they had. Someone named Red teaches gym and Professor Maximillion? Maxwell?"

Malcolm

"Malcolm. He does the minipet class. And someone named Savage teaches them about humans but I'm not really sure if they're teaching them the right things. There was a boat involved in the class description... OH! And apparently they have a sex-ed class."

Tell them about Christmas Town!

"OH YEAH. This is weird.. she told me that one of the school trips was to Christmas Town. And also ... the island. Is that our island? But umm Christmas town. She said there were ninja-elves and monsters and fire. She was emphatic about the fire. She can't be serious.. .. can she?"

He went to scratch his head as he thought of anything he'd missed. Mina also wasn't interjecting anything else so he figured he was done. "I think that's all."

Jeremy returned as nonchalantly as he could. Even when he knew that being followed was not going to happen he continued to slouch and shuffle like the Sloth Demon he probably was. So far, it had been the only time to date where Elsie had been useful. By the time he arrived back he was not only still covered in fish guts and looking more exhausted than the golem started out to be, but Judy and Bix had returned as well, and he caught the tail ends of their reports.

"There were an awful lot of stealing-type booths. I managed to get a---"



A ghost? Err, it had been an egg when he put it in his pocket! Somehow, he could hold it?! WHAT. "...Uhh well this one seems dead but still good?" He shrugged, then produced one more egg and some sort of crystal thing to set it down as well. Now came the rest of his, ugh, adventure. "I'll confirm the student council thing...If you weren't stealing fish you were being convinced to eat disgusting things or talk to people in the name of voting." Now he put down the rest of his prizes, though the tentacle-hat-thing was a little harder to pry off.



"And this thing...one of the Natives, a, uh, Male Fire Dragon, I guess? Incubated it from an egg like this." He pointed at the speckled egg he had already put down.



"Outside of that...I met a Sloth Demon I think, some sort of weird chick with bear ears, a hunchback like Quasimodo, some girl in a kimono who I was pretty sure was as animated as emotes, and just...some really, really ******** up s**t." The irritation was coming back, and Jeremy grit his teeth. He did not, however, willingly expand on why he was covered in fishguts, or why the urge to kill was splattered all across his face. There was a chance he would a little later, right after he was done seething.

It was time to go, or at least it felt like it. Even though their karaoke performance had been unexpectedly amazing, Madison was getting edgy. They'd been at the festival for what felt like a really long time, and she'd gotten her fish and... really, she'd had enough of this whole thing.

She wasn't sure what to think. It had been fun... and yet these were the enemies. Were you supposed to have fun while being surrounded by monsters? They seemed so... tame. But that was probably just because the golems worked. If they'd been here and human...

You would explode, I think.

Oh, thanks. Thanks for that, Kouki, she muttered mentally, padding along. Yeah, she'd be glad to get out of here, and especially glad to get out of this golem. At least she hadn't ended up like Robert, but... no. She was done.

She tried, at least, to be a bit stealthy about it, zigging and zagging and angling around, taking a circuitous route back. When she reached the clearing, she relaxed with a small sigh, then squared her shoulders and walked over to the rest to give her report. "Mission accomplished, ma'am," she said, saluting inexpertly. "I obtained this egg."



"I, um, stole it actually, but I did not get caught at any point, ma'am! And Phoenix Squad made a thorough reconnaissance of the karaoke booth! Our performance was well received, speaking to our ability to blend with the natives!" She held out the other two weird objects she'd obtained.



"And, um, I observed, ma'am! I am ready to give a full report if requested!"

...

She wasn't sure what else to say or do, so she just saluted again.


((the scareon emeraldback was mine, won from Karaoke, but I gave it to Frig since I already had one. XD;;; then I realized I should post it here. oops.))

Ennéa waited for Jerry to finish his report before stepping up and proudly presenting her own floresce fish. "Ta-dah!" She beamed. The fish egg looked pathetically small as it swirled about in the water-filled plastic bag, but it was undoubtedly a floresce egg.



"I got this at this one booth with all the tanks." she said, jiggling the bag around and making the egg swirl about even more. "It took a couple tries but I finally managed to grab one!"

"Oh yeah! I also got," Ennéa handed the fish over before digging around in her pocket, "THIS!" She brandished the safety charm. "I picked it up from a treasure chest at this picnic area with a ton of tables you can flip over." She turned the charm over in her hand. "I'm not sure what it is exactly -- Robert thinks it might be bubble gum, but I don't think he's right; I mean, I've never heard of tasteless gum before. It might be useful though? It's a protection charm; being protected is good, right?" She looked hopefully at Aria.

"I also think I might have won a prize from the karaoke booth. Oh man, I wish you could have seen it!" she gushed. "It was awesome!!" She spun around on one foot, hugging herself in glee.

But then Ennéa remembered who she was talking to and quickly sobered. "Er, um." She cast about for something more professional to say. "I saw a guy who looked like he might have been part dragon. He kicked Robert really far and then threatened to set us on fire." She scowled at the memory. "He was a jerk."

"And I saw that tentacled haired creature too." she said, jerking her thumb at Jerry's plushie. "There was a birdfaced creature with it and it had metal hands. And there was a horse person too." Ennéa paused and thought about it. "There were a lot of animal-human/not-quite-humans, actually."

"I guess it's kind of like how they have a lot of stuff that seems a lot like ours but not quite. They have crane games, and election booths, and karaoke and stuff. It's like an alternate dimension out of a scifi movie." She tilted her head as she pondered, "Though I guess it would be more like a horror movie, huh? With all the monsters and ghosts and stuff."

"Erm." Ennéa lamely cleared her throat and quickly stepped away to make room for the next person to give their report.

When Jordan returned, he did so from a different angle than the one from which he'd departed; if a steady stream of strangers was seen coming in and out of the festival from the same point, it would seem suspicious. So he'd made his way to another spot at the edge of the grounds from which to depart, as casually as he could manage. Although casual was a little harder to pull off while carrying a half-dead undead gnome. He put Robert down at the edge of the staging area, hoping that that hadn't been seen by too many people - it'd be a blow to the guy's pride, probably.

When the previous trainee had stepped away, he moved up to speak to Aria, pulling the eggs he'd acquired out of his pocket. "Though these eggs are of a type I saw nowhere else in the festival, they were in an unguarded tank. It's possible that they were set out as a deliberate invitation to steal. I was able to get two without being seen."



He offered up another pair of egglike objects. "I'm not entirely sure what this is; I visited the booth from which I won it towards the end of our time here, and didn't have time to ask or otherwise find out." He huffed a sigh, irritated with himself. Better time management skills, please! "It was a karaeoke game with audience participation, score and potential prize decided by the onlookers. That was the only game of its type that I saw. "



He thought for a moment about the rest of his observations. "Ferros mentioned that these fish are used for food as well as pets. Some of the foods being offered also bore a resemblance to minipets. I'm guessing that it's not unusual for some types of minipets to be used for food."

"I also observed the student council booths," he added. "It seems that elections will be held soon at the school this festival is associated with."

Oh man. Cass felt underwhelming compared to those who had been able to go above and beyond what they'd been requested to do, scratching the back of her head and looking about read to have another nervous breakdown sometime in the near future. It probably would have helped if it wasn't Aria she needed to turn this stuff in to.

She looked at the three possessions in her hands. She turned them over in her hands cautiously, carefully, before she finally approached to hand her three over. She again looked to the other hunters who had managed more and more easily than she had. The idea of being a failure was still weighing on her.

Heavily on her. She made a note to hit up the library when she got back and start reading.



"I stole this one." she said, careful in her choice in words, though she noticed she wasn't the only one to have done that. She tried her best to not frown as the anxiety built up. "From what I can tell there are quite a few absent minded creatures here..." she left out the part where she was nearly caught.

Twice.

"Absent minded enough to leave too many openings for it."

She turned a second one over in her hand, before offering it out as well.



"Red Dragons get very hot headed if you insult their treasure." she said as she handed the egg over. "If you play nice with them they'll play nice back, but they are easily wound up in less than a minute if you keep at it. However, they have nice stuff if you can get them to leave it alone for you to have. They also associate with purple skinned things..." she paused, looking at herself and frowning "with..things...all over their heads.. tentacles I think? She didn't have a mouth..I think it was female...ittouchedmeanditwasgross....."

Cass made a point to not mention Marcus had actually been the one to steal the egg. She wasn't lying, she just...wasn't relinquishing the information either. Oh, she hoped Aria wouldn't leer down at her disapprovingly and decide to make her an example of what happened when you broke your golem.

Ohh, Cass didn't want to go out like that.

She hoped the last thing was unique enough to warrant some forgiveness. She turned the glowing crystal-esque thing over in her hand before she held it out.



"This is what the seed you gave me went to. It seems like in our world, these creatures have a desire to wish for things in wells by throwing money into it. I wonder if it would be possible to raid such things to steal funding in the future..."

She seemed to consider this thought heavily. She relaxed as she spoke, seeming reassured in being the only person who had the particular shiny she held out at that moment.

Once she'd handed them over, Cass made a point to get the hell out of the way so that other people could turn in their own goodies.


** No Minipets I have won have been sent to my account yet so I have linked where they were won and put into the possession of Cass.