A meeting of outcasts [Private]

Caisius glanced slowly around the area as he arrived within one of the many villages within the Northern area of the Forgotten Lands, his armor clanking softly as he rid a horse he had borrowed from a stable a few other villages over into the town. He would dismount the horse upon arriving at the village's main building which likely served as a court-house, meeting area, banquet hall among other things, tying the animal up carefully before then adjusting the bow on his back with a small grunt.


"By the Goddess, this place had better have something at least worth traveling for.." He muttered to himself with slight annoyance, having been on a search for the last few weeks after having heard rumors of the man who had betrayed him years ago and turned against his former companions. Rumor had it that the man had passed through here, or at least someone had seen him - and that he was apparently searching for one of the God Emperors that ruled the lands. But for what, Caisius was not certain.

Slowly pushing open the door to the town hall, Caisius entered the building and elicited a few stares from local villages before he spoke up in a voice that was perhaps equally as strange as his appearance to some:

"I'm Centurion Caisius Faril, formerly with the fifth company of Adarian Freedom Fighters - And I'm looking for information on a man named Solaris." He said, once again earning himself some long stares - although some of these seemed to be recognizing his title and name, though many seemed to be apprehensive to talk to him due to his strange appearance.

After a few moments of silence, one of the Humans in the hall would speak up, a gruff male voice that sounded somewhat older than Caisius himself: "He came through here a while ago, but no one saw where he went." the man said simply, causing Caisius to give a small nod in response before turning away with a sigh. So his target had been through here at least at some point in the recent past, though he had left and no one had a clue as to where - that did not bode well for the former soldier at all, he thought to himself.

rubbing the back of his own neck, Caisius finally opted to travel back outside of the hall and lean against a wall next to the door, wondering as to what he was to do now that he had no more leads on Solaris or his location - he knew that just traveling blindly would do little good, and that doing this by himself he was likely just to get himself killed . . . but the question remained, who would even speak to someone like himself openly, let alone travel with him?

Mulling over these thoughts in his mind, Caisius turned his gaze out to the main road which lead through the village thoughtfully, staring at it in search of answers that he hoped would simply materialize before his very eyes - no matter how unlikely he knew that to be.

Dania had returned to her once home-town. She was born here, raised here for a small part of her childhood, and left here before she had even become a teenager. She ran away from home due to her curse, forever being forced to kill or to willingly become weakened and ill. She holds off for as long as she can before killing, but eventually it is something that needs to be tended to. She sighed, she hadn't been returning for pleasantries. She was here on business - and that business was tied to her curse - unfortunately.

She wandered through the gate. She heard the the daily gossip that appears to have been going around, 'Did you see that thing?' seemed to be the main question slipping off people's tongues, alongside the children running to their parents asking about some great big monster. She was curious, though decided to tend to her business and leave. Nothing else needed her attention.

She approached the Great Hall, the hood of her cloak covering her head, keeping the sunlight off her face and casting a shadow to somewhat hide her identity. Her clothing consisted of nothing except what appeared to be dirty old rags that were fairly common among the poorest of the poor. She wore some rather flimsy flip-flops, something that would barely pass for shoes. She did this to not draw attention to herself, and mostly it worked.

She would wait there, sitting on a bench near the town hall. This was a high traffic road and she was waiting for a specific person to stop by. A man who was rather suspicious during the last time she was here. During her childhood she discovered her curse, and the abilities that came along with it. She forced people to commit crimes in this town for her. To kill and murder. These people had no reason to - eventually one man began to piece together this was apart of a magical curse - he wasn't entirely wrong. She didn't enjoy killing her fellow villagers, but the pain eventually becomes too unbearable. She continued to kill, until the man became too suspicious, or Dania became too paranoid. Now, she couldn't help it. Her paranoia became too unbearable, she was here to kill this man. She couldn't have any links, especially since right after she disappeared, the killings most likely ceased altogether.

The man eventually passed by. He didn't notice her presence. She sighed, as a man nearby her target unsheathed a knife and began to ruthlessly stab towards him. The man was murdered in cold blood. She stared, and would have been acting as if she were shocked. But that wasn't the case. She didn't need to act. Around the same time an alien like creature stepped outside of the town hall. She stared at it rather than the murder. This was the first time in a while she genuinely had felt shocked and surprised, as mostly she normally has to act when she kills. She glanced back at the man, who came out of his daze confused. Blood on the man's hands, he began to sob as the guards ran over to arrest him. She stood, and decided to try and slip away.

As Caisius gazed out at the road ahead of himself, he would witness a sudden murder before his eyes that caused him to straighten his posture and watch as the guards took the attacker away swiftly in order to face immediate punishment for his crimes. He did notice, however, that there was a rather poor yet somewhat peculiar seeming girl that had been staring at him during all of this and immediately seemed to begin slipping away once the guards had arrived, piquing the bestial man's curiosity as he gave a small grunt to himself before muttering:

"Sure, great idea Caisius - Go follow the creepy little Human.." He said to himself in a somewhat self-chastising manner before he then began to follow the young girl who had attempted to leave the scene of the murder, calling out to her once they were a fair distance from anyone that could be listening in - or at least, hopefully.

"Hey!" He began, raising a hand up in a sort of 'stop' or 'wait' gesture before continuing to speak. "What happened back there, huh? Why did you seem so eager to leave once the guards arrived?" He asked, giving the best curious expression that he was able due to his inhuman facial features. "Normally, people would want to stay behind as a witness for something like that - Unless they're trying to hide something." He added, giving a somewhat suspicious look towards the girl.

Caisius would fall silent for a moment, crossing his arms before he spoke again. "I'm not trying to accuse you of anything - But someone like yourself might know a bit more about what goes on around here than the rest of the locals I talked to, and I could definitely use the help of someone like that." He would then go on to explain his situation, given that girl was listening at this point or that she had even listened to him in the first place.

"I am looking for a man named Solaris, he and I were part of the same company when I served with the military - And, well, we kind of have a score to settle.." He said with a deep sigh, turning his gaze briefly to the side. "I know you have no reason to trust me - But if you could help, I would appreciate it." He added in a soft plea, his gaze returning to the girl as he waited for her response with a somewhat anxious expression - given that she had given him attention thus far to begin with.

An unfinished building sat in town as a group of men, all of varying race, appeared to be working together, still in the process of framing and beaming the structure. One of these men appeared to be a Dwarf, looking back and forth between a piece of parchment and the still unfinished frame of their project. "No, no, NO!' he'd shout out, running a hand through what hair he had left on his balding head.The Dwarf's fit of angered shouting didn't appear to phase the other men as they simply continue with their work. They all were clearly associated together with this project. Perhaps they had become used to such rage, specifically from the bearded individual, or maybe even deaf. The dwarf's head eventually stop moving so that his eyes could settle on the wooden frame of what was supposed to be a shop. "This looks nothing like any other building around here. It looks like something for a goblin, not some lanky, 12 foot tall elf!." he'd continue shouting, finally drawing some attention from the workers. They'd stop finally, but not until the dwarf had waved his hands in a gesture signifying for them to do so.

"Jacket!" He'd shout, catching the attention of a red-headed man, having what looked to be a letter man jacket tied around his waist. The dwarf motioned for him to come over, his expression and body language seeming to insinuate just how much rage and frustration he was holding in despite having boiled over. Richard listened, walking over to the dwarf and listened to his request. "I need you to go back into town and find the guy who commissioned us." he stated simply in a low, forcefully held back tone, as he held out the paper to the human. "Whatever unit of measurement he assumed we'd be using is clearly not what this backwards town uses. So please, go and find him, figure out what he wants and somehow get that into normal speak."

Richard simply nodded to him, taking the parchment as he'd speak in reply. "Yes sir.". With that, he'd begin his walk away from his coworkers and into town from its outskirts. As the human left, the dwarf turned to the other men still standing by the unfinished frame of the building they had been working on. "The rest of you! Get ready to tear this down to start over! There's no way this is even remotely right!." he'd exclaim his announcement, being given a collective groan from the others in response.

Richard himself had no idea where their customer was. He had only seen them once, and that was when they were pointed to the plot of land they were to work on. That didn't seem to stop him, or even make him hesitate as he continued in stride through town. His head scanned around as he'd search around, being drawn mostly towards elven individuals. It was this method of searching that cause him to stumble across what seemed to be the scene of a murder. He'd stop, seeing the guards crowding around a still bleeding corpse and detain a man who one could assume was the murderer. He couldn't seem to look away, something about the scene appeared to fascinate the red-head. It was almost distracting enough for him to not notice the reptile-looking man speaking with a small girl. He gave a curious look their way, seeming to find their activity of simply conversing somehow more curious than the fresh murder in the streets of town.

Dania continued to walk away from the large lizard man. She decided to not confront him, despite his attempt to communicate with her. She did it, the deed was done and now she could leave. She mocked herself in the back of her mind, saying she should have stocked up for her next journey before killing the man but, no. The pain she felt due to the curse had, in a way, forced her to speed up the process of having someone kill him.

Dania continued, adjusting the hood on her cloak to where it is down, less suspicious in a way. No one would recognize her now, she knew this much. He would have been the only one to recognize her, or so her now resting paranoia had told her, constantly.

Eventually, she ran into a man. Appearance wise, he was rather plain, looked like he was in shock. Whether that had been from the giant, walking, talking lizard that Dania had just ignored was a possibility, though more than likely it would have been the fresh, broad daylight murder that had just occurred. After briefly bumping shoulders with the man, she continued to walk for a few steps, then mumbled a half assed apology - "Sorry, I wasn't looking." - she continued.

It was a rather beautiful day in the eyes of the young kitsune known as Arisu, she had traveled all the way from her homeland of the Mystic Kingdom to this place on what was both a whim and a premonition of hers: The rather large sword that the kitsune lugged around - often keeping sheathed on her back in a horizontal fashion or otherwise simply resting on her shoulder - her intuition said that something was going on around here that was out of the ordinary.

Her suspicions were confirmed just after she had arrived within the town, as she witnessed a murder in broad daylight - along with a large, very strange looking man who seemed to follow after a young girl that had been leaving the scene of the murder before he attempted to speak with the girl and upon receiving no response left the area in frustration, as the kitsune then observed the girl bumping into another man - this one looking much more normal than the last, who seemed to be rather surprised by something, maybe the large man from before? or the cold-blooded murder? She was not really sure, but she would be damned if she were not curious from all of this and decided to carefully approach the girl and the man.

She would first decide to approach the man, as he looked to be the more willing one to speak and would subtly drape her tails around the man's side and began to speak to him in a whisper: "You don't mind telling me what's going on, do you?" She said in a gentle tone of voice that was meant to aide with her Charming Tails that she would use to loosen the man's tongue enough hopefully to allow her to gain some insight as to what was going on with this entire situation, though she had a feeling that the strange girl had something to do with it - though until she were entirely sure, she did not want to confront her and risk getting herself into a serious mess after just having arrived into the town moments ago.

Techniques Used:

((OOC: Caisius is no longer in this topic as of 2/19/17))

Richard moved out of the way as the young girl in a hood bumped into him with her shoulder, giving her a scowl as she'd simply go on after having done so. "Tch..."he'd scoff, beginning to turn around and continue on with his job. Pretty rude, if he were to take a guess, she probably wasn't sorry at all about having ran into him. It was then that the fox-girl would come up to him and wrap her tail around his waist. Immediately, he felt his mind quickly become fuzzy. He seemed to wince for a more and bring his free hand to his head, the one holding the contract falling to his side. His head turned, catching site of the woman with her tail wrapped around him, whispering gently to him. "Uh, yeah, sure..." he replied. His thoughts were escaping him, the only thing he could think of was just how much he wanted to answer this girl's questions. For whatever reason, he wanted to very much.

After the few seconds of being unable to think, images of what he saw of the crime. He seemed to have arrived late, only witnessing the murderer being arrested while catching only a glimpse of the deceased victim. All the while, one image that didn't fit from the rest came into his head. The tall, reptilian man trying to come up and talk to, or maybe question the young girl that had bumped into Richard himself. "Uh, murder, some guy killed someone else in broad daylight..." the words escaped the man seamlessly despite his disposition. He was answering questions just fine while seeming to be still in the process of collecting his own thoughts. "Some weird lizard man trying to talk to a girl, didn't look like he was from around here..."

Dania continued, noticing the small Kitsune-like girl. She had several tails, so she figured she was some sort of weird magical being. She paid no mind to her, originally. She continued walking - figuring it may be a strange day for the locals of the town. A murder, giant lizard person, and a Kitsune walking around on the same day? Definitely an odd occurrence, considering she used to live here most of her childhood, and the most that happened were the murders she reluctantly caused.

She now just needed to stock up and leave, a simple task. But for whatever reason, she looked back. She saw the man she had just bumped into talking with the Kitsune - while the Kitsune wrapped her tails around him. At first thought, she was going to ignore it. However, a sense of both dread and, ironically, a desire for justice decided to make her head towards the two.

Arisu smiled towards the man who had answered her questions, she admittedly did feel somewhat guilty for charming him with her magic in order to receive the information she wanted - but at the same time she knew that very few people would bother to give her more than a simple 'I don't know' in response, much less anything useful like the man had given her.

She would nod, carefully moving her tails off of the man's body and allowing him to clear his own thoughts as she said in the same soft voice as before: "Thank you." She said, before then noticing the girl whom she assumed to be the one previously mentioned coming towards them. Arisu would tilt her head to the side somewhat, giving the girl a look that seemed both curious and somewhat suspicious of her presence at the same time while a hand would move to idly rest on the horizontally worn blade on her back, it's aura of light not yet being revealed as she momentarily took her gaze away from the woman in order to speak towards the man again.

"I hope you're not too busy.." She said, giving him a hopeful look that seemed akin to that of a child's - and perhaps was, due to her apparent age and size. "I would really appreciate having someone tag along with me for a little bit - I'm actually a Guardian, from the Mystic Kingdom." She said, adding this last bit proudly and with a little perk of her fox-like ears. "So if you came with me, you could help a soon-to-be-famous hero!" She concluded excitedly, before her attention once again returned to the woman approaching them.

"Hey, You.." She said cautiously, her tails flowing around behind her body as if performing a dance or a show of the gracefulness of her kitsune tails as she continued to speak. "You don't happen to know anything about The Dark, do you?" She asked this nonchalantly, as if it were a casual question one would bring up in conversation, her emerald green hues fixated upon the girl as she simply offered a pleasant smile - waiting for a response as one of her tails idly rubbed up against the man to her side. Although, she was careful not to allow a second to do so, in order to prevent her charm from acting out upon the man again seeing as she no longer wished him to be foggy-minded, since he had cooperated so well and was of no apparent threat to her as of yet.

As the man found his thoughts returning to him, he'd bring his full attention to the fox-girl. He had no clue what that was all about, not being able to think coherently for a moment. It wasn't quite something he could explain, but it was probably some one time thing, just a moment of fog in his head. "Um, yeah, sure..." he'd reply simply to the girl's request that he accompanied her for the moment. He glanced down to the parchment in his hands for but a second before returning them to the young girl before him. Surely what he was doing could wait just a second. It's not like there was a rush or anything, and his friends would probably appreciate as much time as they could get.

Richard turned his head off in the direction the girl who had bumped into him walked off to, only to see her approaching towards him and the tailed girl.A hand came up to his neck, idly scratching at the side of it as his apparently now companion asked her question towards the other girl. What was she talking about when she said "The Dark"? Was it magic? He wasn't too familiar with that area himself, but it sounded pretty darn bad. But what could a little girl know about something like that?

Dania glanced up towards the woman who spoke. She had asked a rather strange question. "The 'Dark?'" she asked in response. She had a sort of clueless face as she asked. The question seemed to come from no-where, and had slightly worried her. Is this related to the murder that she just caused? Did the man have a way of knowing that Dania was somehow involved? She dismissed her worries, there was no way they could have known. There was no reason to let her paranoia take over again.

"I'm sorry, I don't know anything specifically about 'The Dark,'" she said "does it have anything to do with, maybe, the God's and Goddess'?" She continued, asking to get any sort of clarification. Perhaps the lady was on religious quest, to prove her standings with the God or Goddess she worshiped. Though, it could be for a number of other reasons. Why didn't she ask the man she was already questioning? Why ask Dania specifically? She was curious. "Why do you ask, by the way?" She asked, in a somewhat confused sounding voice.

Arisu's ears gave a little twitch as the young girl let out a small giggle in response to the other girl's words, as if amused by them somehow before then speaking up in a cheery tone of voice towards her that would come off as both friendly and seemingly suspicious of the other's motives:

"Oh, I was just curious." She said casually, a few of her tails moving out from behind her body and seeming to make a gesture towards the other girl as if they were attempting to grasp onto her yet were unable to reach due to the distance. "I am actually a Guardian, from the Mystic Kingdom." She explained just as she had to the other man, moving herself slightly closer to the other girl as she gave a wide smile as she explained her purpose for being here.

"It's my duty to travel the world and expel evil - And the fact that someone was just murdered when I came here is definitely a sign." She said, before then adding. "My first task will be here! - And I was hoping you would have known more about the Dark, because that would make this a whole lot easier.." She said with a small sigh, her tails idly swaying from side to side now behind herself as she spoke and seemed somewhat dejected from the fact that the other girl had apparently known nothing of The Dark which she questioned her on.

"The Dark is what the Goddess Pandora spreads around the world and tries to turn people against each-other with - It's in everyone, but some more than others.." Arisu would say, beginning to explain what she had meant moments ago by 'The Dark'. "And I can kind of feel it, being a Guardian and all - You have it." She said, then nodding towards Ricardo. "He has it, too." She further spoke, before turning her attention back fully onto the other girl before her.

"Thanks to Pandora, everyone has a little bit of Dark in them - But Guardians like me can help get rid of it, and one day I'll go straight to Pandora and make her regret what she did!" She said with a wide grin, her emerald green eyes shimmering with excitement at the idea of some day facing Pandora head-on and making her pay for what she had done to all the innocent people that had been affected by her Darkness.

"You know - I just asked Him to join me and he said he would." She said, gesturing briefly to Ricardo. "So if you want - You could join us too and together we can start fighting back against Pandora and free everyone from The Dark!" She said, her tails all flowing wildly in excitement as her ears were perked up as well while the Kitsune awaited a response to her offer from the other girl, and judging by her expression - she expected an affirmative answer, or at the very least an agreement towards her plight, though that would all be up to the other girl to decide.

The man's eyes seemed to widen a bit as the tailed-girl said that he would join her on her quest to eventually tackle the Goddess Pandora herself in some sort of effort to purge the darkness. "Woah, hey now." Richard spoke up, holding a hand out in front of him and making a 'no' motion by waving it left and right in small motions. He had a job, and one that kept him busy at that. He couldn't just drop everything to go out and train and junk just so he might be able to take on what some called the very source of all of this world's evil.

"I thought you meant come with you to talk to this girl, not on some journey." He explained, moving his hand to the side in a further gesture as he spoke. Fighting and junk wasn't for him anymore, he had enough of that back home. It was the very reason he left and decided to learn and come with the travelling guildies he was building a house with. Besides, how could one actually dream of fighting a god? That would take years of preparation, and for just three people to do it? It seemed like an impossible delusion.