[Lendria, Day 1] [You're in a town in the Empire, just off the border from the Kingdom of Alcarest. Actually you're heading towards said border, intending to follow prince Maril as he leads some knights to rescue a damsel in distress.] [No sooner do you leave the town's borders than Billie complains of a headache, followed by an abrupt case of vanishing into thin air.] [Start!] * Logan looks around, alarmed. "Erm... guys? Where did Billie go?" Probably another divine benefit of some sort. ... Either she's taking that ninja thing waaay to seriously, or something just went weird. * Chess keeps moving forward. "Maybe she got summoned back?" [Thanks to Chess and Logan, you're able to follow the prince's troop. The problem is they got horses. You don't. * Josh snorts. "Good to know that bosses everywhere are compleatly arbitrary about what they want you to be ding." * Raxa half-smiles. "It's always good to be given explicit instructions." * Logan looks skeptical, but nods. "Well, hopefully she catches up with us. We've got to hustle if we want to catch up with those knights. Unless you think we can borrow a horse? Or 6?" * Logan blinks, and recounts. "Five." * Chess shifts her balance from foot to foot nervously. "I guess I could go all cat and catch up with them, but then I risk getting seen. I dunno." I suppose we could turn around and liberate a few, definatly can't just wish them out of the air. * Yoshiko holds Yuki and glances at the others. "I can't say I'm fast enough to outrun a horse." * Raxa shakes her head. "It is so strange you ride on those monster animals." She runs her claw along her chin. * Logan looks around at the others. "So...who here knows how to ride?" * Yoshiko shrugs. "I don't ride one of those anyways. I just fly." ... You know, that's probably something I should have thought about before trying to summon one. But I've read in books they did ride horses in other lands. I've never ridden a horse in my entire life. * Logan sighs and turns back down the trail. "That's what I was afraid of. I guess we better start walking. Step lively." * Chess walks with a lively step. ... So, how far away do you think he is. [And so you walk! Some time around Sundown, with the town still in sight behind you, you see the cavalry returning in the distance.] "Well, that solves one problem." Logan peers off into the distance, trying to make out which rider is the Prince. Right, next time we steal horses. [He's the one in the lead, of course. There's a girl riding on the horse behind him. Since she's not wearing armor, she's probably the missing daughter.] "that might end up being more humorous than useful. I personally only know as much about riding as I've gleaned from watching classic Western tri-vids." "Ah good. Two problems solved." * Raxa mms and shrugs. "It can't be that hard to learn. It still seems odd." I forsee it becoming a valuable skill. Looks uncomfortable. It can't be that bad. I mean, they have hair, and they're really big. You'd need a cushy seat, though. 'Swhat the saddles are for and those I seem to be able to get. [And eventually the battalion approaches. The prince himself pulls up besides you. "You're a long way from the village."] * Logan hails the prince as the knights ride up. "Sir! I'm glad we caught up with you. This note was found wrapped 'round the leg of a bird in the town, probably killed by a stray cat. It's addressed to you, I believe." [He raises an eyebrow, then holds out a mailed hand. "Let me see."] * Logan hands over the note. * Josh starts to say something, and then just tries to look like slightly bewildered and thick. It's not a hard act at the moment. * Yuki twitches her nose. * Yoshiko tries to look innocent. She isn't doing a half-bad job, either, as she really hasn't done anything wrong. * Raxa looks over the soldiers with a slight smile on her face, finger to her chin. * Chess chirps cheerfully, "First time seeing a prince in person!" [Many of the knights, mostly men, look Raxa over before turning their heads, trying not to stare in her direction.] [The prince takes the note whilst casting a bewildered look at Chess. "Really? What part of the Empire do you hail from, that you've never seen me before?"] [One of the prince's men rides up, a hand on his sword. He's got to be 50 something, with a beard and an eyepatch, yet he still looks strikingly handsome. "Careful, my prince. We don't know that they're from the Empire."] I'm from reeeally far off. Do you usually visit every town in person? That's pretty cool of you. We're travelers in service to Ziphi. It's a bit of a long story. * Raxa winks at a few of the not-staring knights, but as Chess gets into the Q&A she steps up and says, "Besides, we make terrible half-naked marauders." [He rubs the back of his head. "Well, not every town. Though I do try to visit them all. It's important for my people to know that their future emperor will protect the interests of all the Empire's..." he trails off as he reads the note, frowning.] [The eyepatch knight frowns at Josh. "Oh really? Where are your priestly habits?"] To, not of at the moment. [The eyepatch knight looks skeptical at Josh, but notices the prince's pause. "My prince...?"] Is something wrong? * Logan raises his eyebrows at Josh's subtle word play. [The prince sighs and shakes his head, stuffing the note in a saddle bag. "It's nothing. Another love letter from a swooning lass." Some of the knights murmer to each other, as if this happens fairly often. The girl on the back of Maril's horse looks distraught, too. The prince smiles. "I fear at this rate I'll never marry, lest I alienate every young woman in the land."] * Logan nods slowly. "Well.. glad we could be of service." A terrible situation to be in. [He raises a hand. "Come, we must get the young lady home before nightfall." Then he looks to you. "Do you need a ride back to town?"] I wouldn't turn it down. * Logan raises a hand, obviously about to do exactly that, but stops and shrugs. * Chess turns to the rest of the disciples. "I vote we head straight for one of the main temples. I mean, is there anything else we wanted to do in that town?" * Yoshiko looks at the others. * Logan nods. "I say we head for the next temple." He turns to the Prince. "Thank you kindly for the offer, but we are fine on the road. You should get that girl back to her family." [The eyepatch man speaks up again. "Next temple! But the only thing beyond here is the borders of Alcarest!"] And I thought my grasp of geography was bad. It is back that way, isn't it? * Josh points back at the town. So accpting the ride would get us there that much sooner. * Raxa looks at Chess strangely, then sighs and looks up to the prince with a slight smile. "Then of course we would like a ride from you and your soldiers, if it was no trouble. Our feet are good otherwise." * Logan shakes his head and chuckles. "Yes, what the lady said." ["It's no trouble at all. He nods to his troops, and three men and two woman ride up to you and wait for you to get on.] * Yoshiko nods. "A ride would be appreciated." * Yoshiko gets on one of the horses, after being instructed how to sit in one, and holds tight. * Chess walks up to one of the horses, watches Yoshiko get on one, then copies her. * Josh clambers, poorly, up on to the nearest horse. First time riding a horse, too. * Raxa licks her lips as she looks up to the horse, and then clambers on as well. If it weren't for natural agility, she'd probably look about as bad as Josh. She then brushes her hair back and holds on tightly to the female soldier in front. [And so you make it back to town much faster than it took you to get out that far. They didn't make it back before sundown, but now you can see that the town is brightly lit thanks to those street lights that apparently don't require electricity.] [No sooner do you enter the perimiter than the crazy old man shouts. "HAY GUYS! THE PRINCE IS BACK!"] [And people rush from their homes, whispering things like "He's done it!" "Prince Maril and the Imperial Knights saved the girl!" "I wish I was the prince."] [The girls mother comes rushing forward from the crowd, and the daughter slips off the prince's horse and runs into her arms. "Oh, thank you, your highness. Thank you!"] * Logan slides off of his horse, stiffly, and gives the knight he was riding with a lazy salute. "Thanks for the ride." Saved us a bit of our walk. * Chess slides down the horse, stumbles, and lands on her butt. "Oww," she complains as she gets back to her feet. * Yoshiko slides off the horse, stumbling forward a couple steps, then turns and curtsies. "Thank you." And now to make a fool of myself, excuse me. Left leg off and ... * Josh manages not to pratfall as he slides off the horse. "Or not." [The Prince raises his hand. "My people! Fear not! Every one of the Empire's subjects is equal in its eyes! While I live, no town shall be menaced by bandits for long!" They cheer. * Raxa has a much easier time getting off the horse, mainly because she just slides off onto her feet lightly. She pats the woman on the armor and then looks over at the Prince as she walks to the gathering group. "He wears royalty well." [The woman looks mildly annoyed at being patted like some kind of animal.] So... we can go now? [Anyway, the eyepatch man rides over to Josh. "If you truely are pilgrims, I would reccommend visiting the Grand Temple at the Imperial Capital before anywhere else. It's got.... qualifications other temples lack." Before anyone can respond, he joins the prince, who's still making speeches about how great the Empire will be under his rule. People seem to believe it, too.] * Josh nods to himself. "Uh, yeah, thanks." He says to the departing man's back. Then he turns to the others. "All right, shall we off around the corner and then head off to the capital?" * Raxa watches him walk back and then she replies, "Do we want to leave someone to watch the Prince? He may be a target." He probably is, and back to the shack. I personally think the prince can take care of himself. He's been doing this for a while, right? * Yoshiko sticks with the rest. "Would he let someone stay behind?" * Logan shakes his head. "We have no way of communicating with each other, and we're still getting used to working as a team. Splitting up is probably not a great idea." * Chess raises one hand while they walk to the shack. "So, I have an opinion! We should have priestly uniforms!" "That's.... not a bad idea, actually." That is a brilliant idea, what do they look like? My opinion has not quite gotten that far. Didn't you go the local temple? Yeah, but those are Ziphi's uniforms. Zomegar should have his own. * Raxa sighs and starts walking with them for a moment, but as they start talking about uniforms she says, "I'll... join you shortly. I can teleport to the other temple myself, yes?" "No, right now we're pretending to be Ziphi's followers. Remember, most people don't know about Zomegar." Oh, as a long term thing... That's not going to work well with the whole people turning into cats thing. To Raxa: "...Yes? But... splitting up..." He sighs. "All right, whatever, meet us at the temple. You should tell us if you're doing anything relevant to our interests here." But we could coordinate outfits while we're human. We just look sort of motley and silly when we're all in the other forms. * Yoshiko smiles. "I'm sure she'll do what's right." * Raxa half-smiles. "I am, don't worry." Oh! If it comes up, one of us could transform, and the rest can be all uniformed and present a unified front of belief and awe-inspiring-ness. * Raxa then twirls on one foot and heads back towards the soldiers. Luck, Raxa! See you! Hold on Raxa. * Yoshiko holds Yuki out to Raxa to pet. "For good luck." "I think once we transform, the blending in bit stops being so much of a concern. Until then, we should get ourselves some priestly habits." He concentrates for a moment, and is suddenly wearing robes and a skull-cap very similar to the priest at the temple. "What do you think?" * Raxa stops, looking over at the rabbit. It takes her a few moments before she reaches out and rubs a hand along the rabbit's fur. "Is that good enough?" Yup. I am lucky, after all. ( Raxa to #MCDC2 ) * Raxa nods and says, "Well, ah... well." She pauses a moment, then turns and heads out anyway. * Josh shrugs. "I'll take your word for it." "Well, how about the rest of you? We should all have the same outfits, it'll make us look a lot more convincing." Is that the outfit the priestess wear too? * Logan shrugs. "We didn't see a priestess. But if someone gives you a strange look, we can say your robes were lost in a terrible fire and you had to borrow Josh and my spares. You know, until we see a priestess, and then you can copy hers." It's already a dress, I can't think that the women's version would be much different. However, I want to say one thing. We are not followers of Ziphi. We're being loaned out. If someone sees us wearing her robes and we don't know all the stuff her priests should know, we could get in a lot of trouble. * Chess folds her arms and frowns. "I'm stuck in the service of one god already. I'm not going to pretend I belong to another one that I know even less about, and I won't say otherwise." That's a very very good point. It is much easier to remember the truth than a lie anyway. We're on a pilgrimage, it's important to Ziphi so we're going to the capital. * Yoshiko nods. "I'm with Chess and Josh here." So, let's get this over with. * Logan nods. "Fair enough." "So, everyone try to picture the temple in the capital?" * Josh nods. "And rememer to arrive with clothes." -Normal- clothes. For here. Well, yes. * Chess closes her eyes and tries to send herself to the Imperial capital's temple. A secluded room, preferably. * Logan does the same, but for an empty back alley. * Josh is mostly concentrating on arriving where the others are and with his brown clothes on. * Yoshiko tries to head to a secluded corner of the room, as does Yuki. [Having no idea where the temple actually is in the capital, you don't end up there :P But luckily for you, you do end up in a narrow alley between two buildings. They appear to be concrete. The roads are cobble stone. Buildings range from two to as much as five stories high. And the city is brightly lit with those street lamps you saw in the other town.]] * Chess leans against the wall and tries not to throw up. "Ugh..." * Logan promptly leans back against one of the walls and slides down to a sitting position. "At least they're no screaming this time..." Don't jinx us... That... was a bit better when you're expecting it. [You feel vertigo! And also tired compared to before.] * Yoshiko steadies herself against a wall, when Yuki teleports right onto her head. Yuki doesn't seem worse for the wear, but Yoshiko is experiencing the same vertigo most of you have. "Uuuugh." ( All of you have :P ) Now to wait for the world to stop spinning so we can find where we are. * Chess looks up for a temple dome once the vertigo stops. [Being in an alley, you see nothing!] * Yoshiko motions, and Yuki bounces down and peeks out of the alley. Yoshiko follows her and walks torwards one of the alley ends to peek out. * Josh moves out of the allyway and looks up for a shiny roof, or failing that, someone who doesn't look like a begger. * Chess moves out and looks up, then. :P * Logan peers out of the alleyway, looking for clothes to imitate. [After exiting the alley you see, at the end of this very road, a hill that leads up to a grand Disney-esque castle. At the base of the hill is what looks like a European cathedral, complete with stained glass windows. The only thing missing are any crosses.] Five'll get you ten that's where we're going. Good aim whoever picked the ally. * Yoshiko looks for any people hanging around. * Yoshiko actually looks for ANY natives, to see how they're dressed around here. [There's tons! Capital clothing doesn't seem much different from townsman clothing, except the women are wearing tiny hats shaped like cones.] * Josh has no need for a conehat and bravely steps out into civilization! * Yoshiko will make a tiny hat for herself then! Hats are very important. * Chess thinks a conehat onto her head and follows Josh out. Hey Yuki, like my hat? And then not so heroicly starts to walk up the street. * Yuki looks at Yoshiko, and as they're out in the public, just kinda looks at Yoshiko. I do NOT look like her. No way. * Chess pats Josh on the shoulder. "It's okay. We'll be heroic eventually. Maybe even have theme music." * Logan sighs and goes back to his "normal" clothes. * Logan then follows the others out onto the street. [Yoshiko and Logan are lucky enough to spot a priestess in the crowd. Apparently she looks like the priests, except her robe is shortened and ends above the knee.] * Logan pokes Chess and points out the priestess. "Just in case." * Josh is mad oblivious, yo. I won't wear it. But I gotta say, it makes sense that the men's are longer. No one wants to see icky man legs on a religious figure. * Logan stifles a laugh. * Yoshiko giggles. [Eventually, you get to the temple, where the session ends.]