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You equip Blue Cloak of Feather Fall.
With your thirst for knowledge quenched for now, you exit the museum, and ask your friends where they would like to go next.
Honourshine: "Hm... we don't have any leads on the Elves so far, and the monk seemed to believe that demons could help you. How do you suppose we can meet them?"
Tsu-Ko: "Don't count on it; you'd have to leave the trigon for that, and you're neither warriors nor wealthy enough to hire anyone who is."
Honourshine: "And how wealthy would that have to be?"
Tsu-Ko: "The cheapest warriors — the kinds of greens to chat your ears off — typically start at one thousand zen per day. To leave the trigon, you need at least one warrior per ward. That's at least three thousand zen per day."
Honourshine: "... Hm."
You recall Vermillion Sear mentioning that one could prove themselves in order to become a guardian. You ask if it would be possible for you to do so.
Tsu-Ko: "With your spellcasting ability? Eh. Well, maybe you've got the brute strength to make up for it. There's a training hall in Shui-Ti if you want to try your luck."
You nod, and say that you will consider it.
Moonflower: "Ooh! What's that over there?"
Guided by Moonflower's nose, you stop by a streetside food stand for an appetizing snack. You each get a skewer of sweet dumplings, paid for by the ever-generous Honourshine, then walk over to a nearby park to have a seat and enjoy your treats.
While you eat, you decide to ask Tsu-Ko if she can explain why so much of the Underworld seems to be spilling all over this island.
Tsu-Ko: "To anyone born here, that's simply the way it's always been. But according to the Emperor, there was a calamity that happened long before recorded history, and the consequences of that shifted the world's ether toward darkness.
There just so happened to be a rift to the Underworld on this island. Since demons are innately bound to dark magic the same way we are to arcane, they became more powerful here in the Overworld. You could say power is as good a reason as any for a bunch of them to come and live here uninvited."
Honourshine: "And you said the Emperor is meant to keep the balance between light and dark?"
Tsu-Ko: "That takes time. For now, he decreed that peace between the Kirin and demons is the highest priority — even if that means living separately. And to his credit, this is by far the most peaceful it's ever been."
You remark that the Emperor seems to receive a lot of praise, not unlike Princess Celestia. You ask Tsu-Ko if she has ever met him in person.
Tsu-Ko: "Not me. Technically, we sprites aren't subjects of the Empire, but we do enjoy the changes it brought; the island is a much happier place now than it used to be.
Plenty of monks and pilgrims visit the Emperor for one mortal reason or another, though, I'm sure."
Moonflower: "They go to the sun?"
Tsu-Ko: "Yes, and the gate to Shinzo is at Fuyajo of all places. Only the most devout or desperate make the trip through the scorching ashlands — they call it Hui-Hua, or the Tempering, for a reason. Personally, I prefer tree shade and cool water."
Enter a comment
I'm also tempted to have our group go to the training hall. It has been a while since we had some combat practice. But I don't want to return to Shui-Ti if people still want to do things in this town.
We also haven't made any local friends unfortunately. Maybe we meet somekirin itching for adventure at the training hall.
After that, we should engage in our "favorite" part of adventuring: the paperwork! Let's send a report to our guildmaster and update our journal.
The Emperor does actually sound like he's doing good. And he is actually visitable, rather than completely absent. I can forsee a future where we make the trek through the scorching ashlands, and many will saves, if it's the only path forward we see in our quest(s) to learn about souls and elves. It seems like the painful kind of heat rather than the pleasant kind, so I would even be inclined to go alone.
Is the Underworld related to Svartalfheim or Helheim (2016-04-19), or a physically lower space in our realm? makes me think the former, but I'm not that confident. Actually, I wonder where exactly the dwarf kingdom is now (Muspelheim?).
I was kind of expecting us to fit the bill as a warrior, but maybe some more introspection is warranted. Then again, Tsu-Ko doesn't know a lot about our combat chops and how we've gotten along just fine as an earth pony. (Don't forget good old Dispel Strike!) How far are we from reaching a combat-effective understanding of magic? I wish we'd gone for the shield for our last spell, to be honest, but maybe Camouflage will be useful for attacking opponents while invisible. Moonflower definitely fits the Rogue archetype more, so it's unclear whether she would qualify. But hey, she is dangerous with a dagger (2015-08-21)! I wonder how much effect a few days of last-minute training and magic-learning would have. It might be nice to buy a naginata, katana, nodachi, or the like, though that sounds expensive, hehe. (Maybe there's a forgotten chest of equipment on the ship we can open, just like old times? 😛)
- I figure the small hours are a worse time than midnight to visit Taihon Nonchan, so I'm falling back to writing the letter before we kill more time.
- Yep, this is the "write a letter to Twilight" command. We can include things like: a description of what we've been up to (like a good employee) and what we've learned about Dirt, some requests for more information (I have some potential questions in 2025-02-10), maybe a summary of what we've learned about the Kirin which should be of interest to Twilight from an equinological perspective, and flirting 😘. I'm not sure what the best strategy is, but securing some time to hang out with her might be nice.
But actually, how do people feel about attempting to make a move on Twilight? I feel like the response was more on the tepid side the last time I brought it up. It isn't out of nowhere; we can only wonder what would've happened if we'd rolled a nat 20 on 2016-03-04, and that was before we became an alicorn. (One could say a princess would be a fitting match for a prince, hehe.)
I think maybe "settling down" or starting a family could be an epilogue thing, and I feel there's some natural symmetry between us and Twilight as adventurers, experts in friendship, and ponies who were granted the gift of alicornhood, but we need to make inroads first. Although in that area, Moondancer might have an opinion on that 😅.