This Quest is for Liira who is striving to become a Archer.
OOC ||. The quest prompt must be answered with a 2000 word reply (can be more). ||. Respond to the prompt given with an adventure of your own creation as long as it meets the requirements of the specific tasks. ||. NPCs may be used as long as they advance the quest in an interesting manner. ||. You cannot include any playable characters other than the quest taker. ||. Your responses will be graded with a Pass or Fail. Those who fail will have to continue with assistance from the staff. ||. Questions about quests can be asked here.
IC Coeld; one of two cities considered to be the throat of Zena. It is a hub for trade into and out of Zena and is the perfect place for an inn. Of course with the increased and the income that followed, the inn could be seen as somewhat of a target in an otherwise desolate land.
As of late the inn has fallen victim to minor vandalism, but the straw that broke the capramel’s back was stolen furs. The furs were a crucial part to keeping the inn running; without the income from the furs the inn will suffer greatly. Seeing this as an opportunity to develop her tracking skills Liira developed began developing a plan to recover the furs and stop the vandalism.
Quest Tasks ||. This quest is to test Liira’s hunting abilities. ||. Somehow Liira should track the vandals to wherever they are taking the furs. ||. Once the vandals have been cornered she must confront them and make them stop vandalizing the inn; one way or another. ||. The recovery of the furs is not imperative to your quest.
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 1:43 pm
The past few weeks in Coeld had been increasingly busy and irritating for Liira. More and more people were passing through on their way to safer ground from the war, which meant that more and more people were flooding into Coeld… and into their inn. Mother had been hounding her for a while now about stepping in on the duties that she was required to fulfill as the daughter of the owners of the inn. Keeping the guests content, helping in the kitchen, cleaning the linens, the list was just getting longer and longer and Liira had already had it to about her limit with the nagging. Then on top of it all was her father, who would nag at her mother to let Liira out to hunt and trap, who in turn nagged at her, about what a cruel woman her mother could be and that he was losing business. Like she cared, to be honest. She just wanted to be alone.
She was already dirty from the duties of that day; her clothes stank of dirty dish water, her hands were raw from scrubbing at the floors, and her ears were aching from hearing her mother’s voice all day. Night had already fallen and she had a new load of linens in her arms, ready for washing and scrubbing out the previous night’s stains and smears, when she heard something. It was a crashing noise, and when she finally realized what it was, she stopped in her tracks. It was a window breaking. She dropped the laundry basket to the floor and ran for her bow. The sound was from the fur shed. Her brows furrowed with irritation and question. She hoped it was just an animal, even if it was a weywa, that had broken the window, but she already knew better. She was just waiting to see whom it was she was going to have to pummel into the ground for stealing her furs. It seemed to Liira that with the flood of people that were coming into Coeld, they were bringing little acts of nastiness with them. Every night something small was happening: eggs against the walls, windows opened in the dead of night to have the guests freeze in their sleep. Liira was nearly fuming when she reached the shed, and began to spew curses and the damning of souls as soon as she saw the damage. They had taken over half of the furs before she could have gotten out there.
It wasn’t long before her father joined her; she was still in a fiery rage and turned on him. ”Easy there, Killer.” Her father cut her off before she could even start. He had seen that look plenty of times before, and seen the rants that could go on for the rest of the night. She snapped her mouth shut and fumed, her eyes throwing darts at her father. ”That’s it. I’m done with this crap.” It was the only thing she said before she turned and stalked away, stomping through the night’s fresh snow and away from her father, the shed, and the inn. She had had enough of these people. She would find them, and she would stop them. And she would get her furs back. She would be damned if they were just going to walk away with months’ worth of hunting and work with them.
She ran through the night, following the tracks that someone had left in their escape. It was hard to tell just how many were with them, but she could clearly see at least three sets of feet in the snow. They were dragging their catch behind them, she could see that from the scraped marks of a sled in the ground and it only made Liira even angrier. They would ruin the furs before they would even be able to hawk them.
(Part 1: 649/2,000 words)
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kaname423 Crew
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Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2014 2:11 pm
Liira stopped when the tracks lightened in the snow. She was heading towards the mountains and the earth was peeking through the white powder, trying to resist settling and gathering under her feet. It would be harder now, but these buffoons didn’t seem to be too focused on hiding. She could see other marks of their lumbering through the forest with her furs. There were twigs from bushes bent and snapped, little plods of snow that had been stepped in, scratches from the sled on the rocky ground; Liira stood straight with her hands on her hips. Yep; these guys were idiots. They might as well have hung a banner on the side of the mountain that said ’This way!’ And it looked like they had been hiding out here for some time now. There were old marks and trampled plants the closer to the mountain side she got. All of the signs pointed to a large crack in the mountain’s base. It was more than wide enough for two to three people to slip in at once, and when she knocked a pebble in, seemed to be deep enough to support a person’s height while in. She couldn’t guess whether it was burrowed out further to make it appropriate for a person, or if it had just been found that way, but she could only guess however many people they had with them were all in there somewhere.
She got down on her hands and slid herself into the crevice feet first. It wasn’t too far of a drop before she hit the hard mountain earth under her, but even with her arms stretched upwards she could see that she just couldn’t quite reach the lip again. They must have had some way to get in and out, and Liira wasn’t dumb enough to just march into some unknown lair without knowing how to get out of the hole she literally jumped into. She felt around on the dark wall for something, the dim moonlight not helping in the least. Her palms scraped against the rocks, some sharp enough to make her wince and pull back, but eventually she found it. Hidden in the darkness was a ladder built into the wall. She guessed that that answered her question about whether it had been purposely shaped by man, and just to be sure, she pulled herself up to the lip and then let herself quietly find her way back down again. She couldn’t see any light coming from the cavern, which to her meant that it was a long tunnel – possibly even a system of tunnels – and that she had a ways to go.
Liira turned to face the only source of light one more time before starting down the dark tunnel. She kept her hand on the right wall; testing her reach, she reached out to the left to see if she could touch both sides – something that would make it much easier to know if there was a turn in the dark – but it didn’t seem like it was going to happen. She could feel nothing but air. Great. She had been in such a rush to run out and catch the guys who broke in that she hadn’t packed a single thing besides the bow and quiver she had already had with her. It looked like she was stuck in the dark.
She sighed in irritation. These guys didn’t seem like they were all that smart, or all that careful, so maybe she could just count on going straight and she would eventually hear some sort of sound, or maybe see some shimmer of light. She stepped lightly through the tunnel, her feet tapping quick paces on the ground. The opening behind her was fading and soon she was in complete darkness. She blinked, wanting her eyes to adjust, but knowing they wouldn’t – and then she could see again. It was dim, but it was there: a warm-toned flickering light. A fire. Liira stooped lower, knowing she was getting close and quietly closed the gap between her and the source of the flames. She peaked around a bend in the wall and could see the torches lining the wall in addition to a larger flame in the center of the rounded room. Five men – if she could even call them that – were gathered around the fire, cooking some sort of meat and lying back cushioned by what looked like it could only be her furs. She felt her body puff up with rage and her mouth set itself firm. How was she going to be able to do anything with those after she got them back? The men in the center looked like they were hardly men at all, scrawny, gangly things with barely enough stubble on their chins to scratch at.
She seemed to have almost no doubt she could take them and make them understand the terrible mistake of what they had done that night.
(Part 2: 1,480/2,000 words)
Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2014 2:49 pm
Liira stood from her crouch and removed her bow from her shoulders. She notched an arrow and side stepped into a clear shot at one of the thieves – one that wasn’t on her furs - and pulled the bow back taught. One sharp intake of breath and the arrow was in his thigh, his brain finally registering what had happened with a curling shriek. The room turned into what seemed to be a frenzy of motion and sound. The four men that could still walk charged to whatever area of the room they could, some going for Liira, some running the other way. Liira used her bow to bat away one of them, taking the precious moment to notch another arrow and letting it fly. It missed its target and the man came hurdling at her. Skinny and scrawny as he might have been, he was still bigger than Liira. The man she had knocked down with her bow as a club seemed to have regained his feet and both took a grab at Liira. She wiggled out of one’s grasp, but couldn’t manage to get out of the way of the other. His grip was deceivingly strong.
Liira scowled as she was stopped short and held captive, though her bow was still left in her hand. It looked to her like they didn’t seem to think she was a threat, even though she had managed to get an arrow into a now sniveling heap’s leg. ”Help! What are you waiting for?!” He called out in pain, the snot running down his face. Those who ran to the edges of the room came out of their holes and crowded around him, though the idiots didn’t seem to know what they were going to do about it. Maybe they should have stolen some medical supplies while they were at it; Liira scowled deeper. The hand grasping her arm tightened before dragging her into the inner circle of the room and throwing her to the ground, the guy putting a foot over her hand that still clutched the bow and pressed his weight on it. Liira winced, but looked up to make eye contact with her captor, her scowl steady. ”And what do we have here?” It seemed that her captor was the leader of the group. The only one that seemed like he had any brains in him as well as the largest one of the group.
”What, you’ve got nothing to say? It seems to me like you owe someone an apology.” He smirked and dug his foot a little harder into her hand. Liira couldn’t help but to think that they thought they had nothing to worry about from her. That this was all almost over with. Liira wasn’t about to let them think they were right. ”Mmmm… I would say this is almost an eye for an eye. You ruin my pelts, I need new ones to replace them. Earthling leather works.” Liira shrugged from her position on the floor. The guy’s eyes narrowed. ”I think you might have some sort of… misconception here as to how this is going to work out.” He started to tell her. Before he could finish Liira was already letting her body do its thing. She grabbed hold of an arrow from behind and launched herself forward, jamming the shaft so deep into his leg it broke off and the end stayed in her hand. The guy screamed and lost his balance, falling to the floor and grabbing his leg. Liira rolled to her feet and began shooting off arrows one by one. She took out the first couple of guys, hitting them in the chest and throat before the last one standing began to run for the exit. She let him go. He would know better than to steal from her again. She looked at the one she had shot first, before looking to the leader who was still on the ground. She let one more arrow into his chest, stopping his cursing and raging. The other on the floor was whimpering at this point, waiting for his.
Liira stood to her feet and put her bow away. She snarled and went to gather her furs, only to find that they had had food, beverage, and some other liquids she didn’t even want to know about, whether it be snot or drool all over them – not to mention the dirt and ripping that had happened during their trip into the cave. ”Useless. All of them.” She spit on the dirt floor and walked up to the remaining guy. ”I’ll be taking this back.” She pulled the arrow out of the guy’s leg with a yank and rubbed it off on his own shirt. ”If I ever see you near my home again… I’ll finish the job.” She put the arrow back in the quiver and turned on her heel, leaving the man behind. She could really care less if he lived through the wound or even made it out of the cave, but she knew that she had left enough alive to know not to go back to the inn. She pursed her lips and jogged down the dark cave, ready to be home.
OOC 
