The faintest of appreciative smiles turned up the corners of Vesper's mouth as the boy made his choice. It was a considerate choice, a promising start to their cave expedition together.
Proceeding after him, she considered his question a moment before answering. "I've seen a few before." One small hand gestured vaguely. "Here and there. From a distance. But you're the first I've actually talked with. Is it the same with you?"
Vy rolled 1 100-sided dice:
5Total: 5 (1-100)
Posted: Sat May 23, 2015 5:38 am
[Rolled dice in this post, but will respond to the roll in the next post.]
As Alionse moved forward, he noticed the tunnel was getting even smaller and he ended up having to get on his hands and knees to crawl. Suddenly he was very grateful that he was in front. If it had been Vesper...and since she was wearing a dress...A blush darkened his skin at the thought. Now he was really glad he was in front since there was no chance she could see the blush and guess what he was thinking.
"Uh," he cleared his throat and kept his voice steady. "I actually never met an Oblivionite or even seen one except for drawings in books." He frowned, realizing just how sheltered that made him, but he had met one now so that was good enough. "Until now. You're not as bad as they say."
He realized how that might sound and quickly tried to correct himself. "I mean, you're nice and pretty, even if you have no eyes..." And that sounded worst. Alionse figured he was only making things worst and clamped his mouth shut.
Deciding to ignore the side tunnel, you continue on-wards. It seems a long time passes as you crawl forward, hands and knees hurting from the rocky ground and back cramping. Suddenly the dim air lightens; a gleam appears in front of you. As you crawl towards the light.....
Please roll a d100! A) 1-10:: you tumble off the cliff edge. The fall will not kill you, but it will hurt! Go to "A1: Fall!". B) 11-100:: you notice the floor suddenly dropping away and stop in time to not fall. Go to "A2:: Aware of Surroundings"
Crawling behind Alionse (and mentally bemoaning the mess her hands and knees and dress were surely incurring), Vesper let the silence draw out to an likely discomfiting length.
It had not surprised her that he had not previously encountered another Oblivionite, or even that Orderite accounts of her race were biased. What troubled her was his quick self-correction. Still, his compliments made some progress towards mollifying her.
"Is it really so bad, having no eyes?" She had never missed them; neither had any other Oblivionites, as far as she could tell. But then again, they hardly had any basis for comparison. "I can still see. And read. And find my way in the dark." That seemed, to her, to cover all the uses.
Posted: Sat May 23, 2015 7:56 am
As the quiet stretched out between them, Alionse silently bereted himself. He didn't usually get so nervous around people. And yes, he could be blunt, but he never felt the need to really apologize for it. And by the way it had gotten so quiet he was sure he had offended her, which bothered him. He chewed on his bottom lip trying to search for something to say, but his mind went was completely blank.
Then her voice broke the silent and he tried to twist around, but realized there just wasn't enough room to do that. So he turned his head, looking over his shoulder. "No!" He winced and then took a deep breath tried again. "I mean, I've never seen anyone with no eyes before, but it's just different. Not bad."
His brow furrowed in though and he wondered if he should continued with his thought. "I think it fits you," He said softly. "You're actually very pr-"
Suddenly the ground gave from under his hand and whatever he been about to say was caught off as he went tumbling over the edge of the tunnel, down until he slammed hard on the ground. Air rushed from his lips as the wind was knocked out of him. He just laid there stunned.
While you are engaged in following the light, as you crawl you can feel the ground start to slope. Taking your eyes off the light, you see that in front of you the ground abruptly falls away! Good thing you were paying attention! As you crawl to the edge and look you see a small cavern light up from a hole in the ceiling. Tree roots have forced their way into this cave and opened up a path for light and water. A small pond has formed beneath the opening. In the middle of it you see a tiny island. It is covered in junk; apparently a small creature has been stock piling stolen goods in this cave. Perhaps the sparkle that led you here was that same creature coming to drop off more shiny items. Some rags, broken bottles and broken jewelry appear to make up the majority of the pile. But amidst the pile you can spot something sparkling in the light, it looks different from the rest of it. You can see a tunnel leading into the cavern across from you.
What do you do? A) Fly down? Go to "Cavern Room" B) Climb down? Roll a d100, » 1-50: you make it down successfully, Go to "Cavern Room" » 51-100: you slip and fall, but still make it into the cavern. Go to "Cavern Room" C) Go back and try the side tunnel? Go to "Side Tunnel" D) Leave the tunnels and cavern? Go to "Quit"
As Alionse turned his head to answer, Vesper took advantage of the opportunity to study his expression. He seemed nervous, but why, she couldn't tell. She was curious to know what he thought, curious enough not to interrupt with a warning she deemed obvious anyway. Too late she remembered that he might have a harder time seeing the danger just ahead. Her lips had just parted to call out when the boy tumbled out of sight.
Maybe she should have been the one to go ahead, after all. Hopefully he wouldn't hold it against her. She hurried forward, stopping short of the edge and peering down. "Are you badly hurt?" she asked, hoping the answer was no.
Small hands felt along the edge of the cliff for a handhold. Once she found one, she held on and swung herself down, landing neatly on her feet. One hand brushed reflexively over her dress as she drew close to the fallen Orderite.
Posted: Sat May 23, 2015 10:02 am
He heard Vesper call from the edge. He groaned a little and then tried to check. His back was sore fall, but nothing was broken from what he could tell. If anything was bad, it was mostly his pride. He sat up, letting his eyes adjust.
"I think I'm fine," he called back. That's when he saw Vesper neatly climbed from the edge, landing gracefully. He felt even more pathetic, but mentally shook it off. There was no point feeling sorry for himself when he should have been paying more attention.
He pushed himself to his feet, dusting the seat of his pants off from the dirt. Right now he rather forget how embarrassing he was acting. He took a look around to see where he had fallen. His eyes light up at the sight. Light pouring down from the ceiling through tree roots and landing on a tiny island.
"Wow," Alionse said, his eyes lighting up. "I would have never imagined something like this here." The island looked like it was covered with junk, but it didn't change the fact that they had somehow stumbled upon a secret underground island.
"Want to take a look?" He asked, turning to her with a half smile, his own fall forgotten in the excitement of the moment.
Vy
Sparkly Hunter
Offline
Rhodonea
Offline
Posted: Sat May 23, 2015 10:28 am
Cavern Room/Loot!
Looking around at your surroundings you see a small cavern light up from a hole in the ceiling. Tree roots have forced their way into this cave and opened up a path for light and water. A small pond has formed beneath the opening. In the middle of it you see a tiny island. It is covered in junk. Some rags, broken bottles and broken jewelry. Also amid the pile you can spot something sparkling in the light. The only openings that you can leave or enter this room from are from a tunnel that comes out half way up the wall or a tunnel that leads off into the dark again.
What do you do? What are your character's thoughts? Do you: A) Approach the pond and its pile? Go to "Loot" B) Leave? Go to "Leaving B" if you wish go out the tunnel halfway up the cavern wall or "Leaving A" if you wish to go out the tunnel in the wall.
Approaching the pile, you wade through the cold pond waters. It is not deep and you can see small fish swim away from your noisy intrusion. As you reach the pile, you can see it is mostly rocks and trash gathered by some small creature, but amidst the trash you find an Ayrala and Peisio Dragon Orb! (one for each participant)
The groan worried Vesper. Still, Alionse was able to sit up and stand on his own, so she decided to trust his reassurance. To a point. She was still darting the occasional sidelong, assessing glances at him when she noticed that his eyes had lit up at some sight past her.
She turned and stared in amazement at the little island until his question brought her back to the present. "Of course!" she answered with a half smile of her own. "It's not every day that we find an island, right?" She picked her way across the pool, choosing the shallowest places to step. No splashing around for this girl.
Tugging out a handkerchief, she used it to pick through rocks and debris in search of a glimmer further down. What she found was not her stepmother's lost bauble, but rather a dragon orb. "Alionse, look!" she called out. "How many of these do you think there are here?"
Posted: Sat May 23, 2015 5:16 pm
Water splashed across Alionse's boots as he followed Vesper across teh water and to the miniature island. He started to look around when he noticed Vesper take out a handkerchief and pick up the debris. He blinked in surprised and then a grin spread across his lips.
"You really don't like getting dirty," he muffled a laugh as he began to dig through the junk, he caught of something else in the pile. As he reached for it he was distracted by Vesper's excited call. He turned towards her in surprise. "A Dragon Orb!" He leaned over, getting a closer look before smiling widely and looking up to meet here gaze.
"I don't know, but why don't we find out. I thought I saw something over there," He walked to the place he had been before and began shoving away stuff until a shiny orb glinted up at him. He took it and raised it triumphantly.
Vy
Sparkly Hunter
Offline
Rhodonea
Offline
Posted: Sat May 23, 2015 6:17 pm
No point in denying her fastidious nature, but Vesper tried anyway. "Come on, would someone who didn't like getting dirty crawl through a tunnel after you?" she asked with a soft laugh.
She nodded to Alionse's announcement of her find as she worked to free the orb from the surrounding debris. Then she trailed after Alionse as he returned to his former spot and found another orb for good measure. She flashed a beaming smile at him, then continued poking through the pile. "I wonder what kind of creature brought these here." A brief pause. "Think it'll mind our digging?"
Posted: Mon May 25, 2015 6:25 pm
She had a point. Despite her using a handkerchief to did through the junk, she had just crawled through a tunnel in a dress. He tried to figure out why crawling through a dark tunnel might be better than searching through junk with your bare hand, but he couldn't tell the difference. Maybe it was simply a girl thing.
His attention was drawn back to Vesper's question. He stared down at all the junk. When he thought about it, it sort of did look like a horde. a horde of junk, but one nonetheless. On top of that, they had found the dragon souls as well. He felt suddenly uneasy. What if they were intruding on a dragon's nest?
"It could be a dragon." He stared hard at the junk. How much time did they have before the creature returned? "If it is a dragon, then it'll definitely mind our digging." He considered suggesting they go back, but he didn't want to seem like he was afraid, and he wasn't, just...cautious. His run in with dragons hadn't been the most successful.
To get here you must climb or fly to the tunnel. Roll a d100 » 70-100 means you successfully climb to it and may leave this way. » 1-69 means you fail to climb up. You may try again at a 5 point penalty (now 1-74 fails) as you are hurt from your fall. Or you may leave through the other tunnel. Go to "Leaving A".
This tunnel is a tight fit, but at least it is lite by the sunlight seeping in through small crevices in the roof and walls. While the ground is rough, you aren't hurt by any sharp rocks as you travel along it. After a long time, you reach another tunnel. Looking down you can see the tracks that you made earlier. Following them out, you squeeze out back onto the surface. The sun is now on the horizon.
[ Leaving the actual climbing for the next post. ]
Vesper froze. When she made her flippant remark, she had in mind some creature considerably smaller and easier to evade. But now the boy raised an unsettling possibility. If she was not equipped to fight an Orderite her age, she was certainly not equipped to fight off a dragon raging over its plundered hoard.
"Well, a dragon would have a hard time fitting through the tunnels, right?" she said, more to reassure herself than anything else. It wasn't all that reassuring, really. There could well be other routes into the cave. She found herself staring into the water surrounding the tiny island. It had seemed shallow enough during their crossing, but perhaps it had hidden depths.
Shaking off the momentary paralysis, she leaned down to retrieve a second orb. Greed reared its head for a moment (how many more orbs could be found here, anyway?), but she quelled it. It would be hard enough to climb with two. She waved a hand in invitation at the tunnel they had arrived from. "Let's go before it comes back," she suggested with a smile, as nonchalant as she could manage.
Vy rolled 1 100-sided dice:
85Total: 85 (1-100)
Posted: Tue May 26, 2015 1:46 am
Alionse felt a wave of relief when Vesper suggested they go back. Even if there was no dragon, it worried him what sort of beast would collect dragon souls. Either a sneaky one who managed to steal them or one who was very good at killing dragons, which showed even more with how Vesper managed to find another one in the junk. Though the sight excited him, it worried him as well.
As vesper pulled her second dragon soul from the pile, Alionse saw the glint of another. It must have been sitting right next to hers. Debating with himself, e reached down and took it, then turned around to follow after her, glancing back at the tunnel they had used before. He gazed at it with some trepidation. He might be able to do a jump glide up to it, but after his fall he was still a little sore from his previous fall, so he wasn't sure if that would work. Still it was worth a try.
"All right." He glanced at the wall. "Do you think you'll be able to climb up it okay?"
Vy
Sparkly Hunter
Offline
Rhodonea
Offline
Posted: Tue May 26, 2015 9:14 pm
Vesper wrapped the two orbs in her dirtied handkerchief and tied the ends of the cloth securely around her left arm. Once the bundled-up orbs were properly secured, she tilted her head to consider the climb up to the tunnel.
"I'll be fine," she assured Alionse, pouring more confidence than she actually felt. Her arms might be a bit sore later on, but she didn't feel like playing the damsel in distress, not here, not now.
Even in the darkness, she could spot a few promising handholds and footholds along the cliff. Once she figured out a path to her destination, she started climbing. Her progress was slower than she liked, but steady. "I've heard that Orderites can fly. Are you going to?" she wondered, her voice a bit muffled against the cavern wall.
Posted: Thu May 28, 2015 11:35 am
Alionse eyed the wall. "Yeah, we can fly. Well most of us. With the wings I have now, I can mostly just glide." He was pretty sure that he couldn't glide all the way to the top, so at some point he would need his hands. Besides...
He untucked his shirt and then took the globes and put them in it, typing it around them. Once he had them secured, he bounced a little, seeing if the globes would stay put. Luckily they did, though he wasn't sure for how long. He walked forward. They were clunky and a bit heavy, but not too much that they would seriously weigh him down..at least he hoped.
Satisfied, Alionse released his pink wings There was something freeing about having them out. He gave them a long stretch before jumping a little. The wings gave him extra lift, letting him catch on to a handhold. He grinned as he began climbing.
"Race you to the top!"
Vy
Sparkly Hunter
Offline
Rhodonea
Offline
Posted: Fri May 29, 2015 10:45 pm
Vesper paused in her climbing to regard Alionse as his wings emerged. They looked... softer than the ones she was used to seeing on older Oblivionites. She considered reaching out to brush her fingers over the unfamiliar feathers, but no, not now. There was a race to win.
"Of course!" she called back, never one to back down from a challenge. Then she put her all into the climb, speeding up her ascent. Not enough to win, perhaps, but enough that she wouldn't feel too sheepish about losing. "Have a prize in mind?"
Reply
