Nobody

[10:55] <Xi|Wrk> Heya Dark
[10:55] <Xi|Wrk> wanna help me carve up a political situation.
[10:56] <Darkened> Hmm?
[10:56] <Darkened> Sure
[10:57] <Xi|Wrk> Im only just starting this idea.
[10:57] <Darkened> Sure
[10:58] <Xi|Wrk> For a quest which Im making 'Nobody to Nightmare'
[10:58] <Darkened> Okay
[10:59] <Xi|Wrk> Basic idea is that the protagonist and his village are slaughtered as basically a statement by one noble and his army.
[10:59] <Darkened> Sure
[10:59] <Xi|Wrk> And Im trying to work up something interesting on the human front, for what that satement actually is and what it means across land and it's politics.
[11:00] <Darkened> Right
[11:00] <Darkened> Tech level?
[11:00] <Darkened> Culture?
[11:00] <Xi|Wrk> Any ideas would be welcome. Hmm... I'd say something like mild steampunk Magitech.
[11:00] <Xi|Wrk> Is now gaining a foothold.
[11:01] <Xi|Wrk> But mostly its middle ages type stuff supplimented with magic.
[11:02] <Xi|Wrk> Lower end stuff with some visible effects.
[11:02] <Xi|Wrk> mostly charms and such which make things more or less likely are the mainstay of magic.
[11:03] <Darkened> Where's the steampunk come in?
[11:03] <Darkened> Europeanish?
[11:03] <Xi|Wrk> Major kingdoms, yep.
[11:03] <Darkened> Why's there such a tech divide?
[11:03] <Xi|Wrk> Its basically, 'stuff too expensive for anyone but nobles to really have'
[11:04] <Darkened> Such as?
[11:04] <Xi|Wrk> Mainly the tech divide is a develpmental one, much of the tech is still things which arteficers who are noble sponsered are still figuring out even as they make them.
[11:05] <Xi|Wrk> Production and industrialization aren't really in place though its starting to emerge.
[11:07] <Xi|Wrk> The peasantry have access mostly to witches and hedge wizards for their magical needs. And learning hasn't been institutionalized at any levels.
[11:08] <Xi|Wrk> The sort of stuff which within a few years, maybe 30 to 50, would change pretty drastically.
[11:09] <Xi|Wrk> Any thoughts so far?
[11:22] <Darkened> The tech thing seems a bit odd.
[11:29] <Darkened> I mean it looks like you have full feudal order out in the hicks and then steampunk at the center?
[11:30] <Xi|Wrk> Kind. The steam punk is pretty much new.
[11:30] <Xi|Wrk> and uncommon
[11:31] <Xi|Wrk> Mostly enabled by nobles pouring efforts into weapon research, but there not being an effective over all production capability to support more than that.
[11:32] <Xi|Wrk> Kinda like the real world where you did have high quality guns for a long time... but they were uncommon and far and few between. Unique curiousities by skilled craftsmen, without any way of mass producing them.
[11:33] <Darkened> But you don't really get right from middle ages to Steampunk
[11:33] <Darkened> I mean, the romance had working steam engines, actual development and production requires infrastructure and supports and a lot comes between those two points.
[11:33] <Xi|Wrk> You dont without magic to add to the whole thing. Which Is why I said magitech.
[11:34] <Darkened> So magic requires someone with some ability to function?
[11:34] <Darkened> How does magic work in setting?
[11:34] <Xi|Wrk> At it's basis, you have 'Charms/Curses' which alter how easily something may happen
[11:35] <Xi|Wrk> So you can 'charm' a box shut by altering the event of 'the box being open' to near zero.
[11:36] <Xi|Wrk> the better the practitioner the more complex and less abstract the thing the charm can be placed on.
[11:37] <Xi|Wrk> So generic 'good luck' which is highly abstract would actually be easier than, 'this thing cant open'
[11:37] <Xi|Wrk> On the other hand you have 'outsider' magic which ignores such things and allows you to assert specific things into the world.
[11:38] <Xi|Wrk> Such magic would be 'Demon magic' and 'Holy magic'
[11:40] <Xi|Wrk> But then you have mixes inbetween where you get such magic as 'Necromancy' which is a kind of combination between charms and outsider stuff, Monstrology (The warping of things to serve your purposes) which is a kind of Outsider influenced Curse magic, and Enchanting, which is an advanced brance of Charm/curse magics without outsider influence.
[11:40] <Darkened> Assert specific things into the world?
[11:42] <Xi|Wrk> A demon may force the world to give you fire. But in doing so it causes something to be lost. Needs some kind of sacrifice to make what it's doing work.
[11:43] <Xi|Wrk> Demon's are basically 'stealing' from the world and in the process giving us the leftovers of that theft in a configuration which their summoner desires.
[11:44] <Xi|Wrk> When I say asserts specific things into the world I mean causing events, materializing things, destroying things.
[11:49] <Darkened> But the possibility of, say, spontaneous combustion exists.
[11:49] <Xi|Wrk> Yup
[11:50] <Darkened> So how is that different from charm?
[11:50] <Xi|Wrk> Effectively not from the front end of things other than how hard it is for a user to do.
[11:50] <Darkened> Ah
[11:51] <Darkened> And demonology/etc is banned?
[11:51] <Xi|Wrk> Demonic magic is cheap, easy... but nobody with any sense want's it around.
[11:51] <Xi|Wrk> Pretty much.
[11:51] <Xi|Wrk> Necromancy, and Monstrology are treated in similar ways.
[11:53] <Xi|Wrk> Quest wise what this means is that for the most part Demon magic has been stomped out of existence... for the most part. And there are hungry demons still lurking waiting to try to spread the knowledge of it to the right linch pin to get their ball rolling again.
[11:54] <Xi|Wrk> Because of 'charm' magic and probability manipulation being the big thing in this setting, demons can 'smell' the potential of their marks to make big changes.
[11:55] <Darkened> That seems like a good excuse for collective punishment.
[11:55] * Xi|Wrk nods.
[11:56] <Xi|Wrk> At the start of the quest it'll be a choice. Demonology, Necromancy, or Monstrology.
[11:56] <Xi|Wrk> All three motivated by a demon smelling the MC's potential for getting them what they want and making a bargain.
[11:57] <Xi|Wrk> Normally Monstrology would be beyond the MC's reach.
[11:58] <Xi|Wrk> It's got a big stigma on it though since Demons like giving it out, and using the results to create conflict which drives people to seek their power.
[12:00] <Xi|Wrk> though amusingly Monstrology as a branch of magic basically makes use of demonic, holy, and charm powers together to make it's results.
[12:01] <Darkened> I see
[12:02] <Xi|Wrk> Holy magic is basically 'overflow' from the realms of other beings connected to this world.
[12:03] <Xi|Wrk> Where demons are 'stealing' from the world, Gods are 'giving' to it.
[12:03] <Xi|Wrk> Whether they do so consciously or actively is up to the particular god.
[12:10] <Darkened> I see.
[12:11] <Xi|Wrk> Enchantment however is basically an advanced version of 'charm' magic, as scribed down and preserved. Essentially it's the end result of recorded efforts in working with charm magic.
[12:12] <Xi|Wrk> High Wizards and Arteficers work with enchantment. Which ultimately is a matter of magical engineering and educational access.
[12:13] <Xi|Wrk> Well, anyway, if you have any ideas feel free to toss them my way.
[12:14] <Darkened> Demon collaborator was the obvious.
[12:16] <Xi|Wrk> Hmm, it is. I kinda want to push that asside for more political directives.
[12:17] <Darkened> Refusing to pay taxes?
[12:17] <Xi|Wrk> It could work as a secondary underlying reason though.
[12:17] <Xi|Wrk> Hmm nay that doesn't quite fit into what I was thinking.
[12:17] <Xi|Wrk> Mostly I wanted the village to just be 'in the way'
[12:17] <Darkened> Is this torching someone else's village?
[12:18] <Darkened> Or just a military campaign passing through. Some war between two lords.
[12:18] <Darkened> Let the mercs pillage as they will.
[12:18] <Xi|Wrk> innocent otherwise. Yeah that sounds more like it.
[12:18] <Xi|Wrk> But I wanted it to have a bit more to it than just the passing pillagers.
[12:19] <Xi|Wrk> Hmm, the village as known loyalists to a particular noble maybe.
[12:21] <Xi|Wrk> A rival using the attack as an 'indirect' means of making a statement. 'Your assets are meaningless to me' kind of thing.
[12:21] <Xi|Wrk> Kinda letting the Noble know that he's going for the throat.
[12:22] <Darkened> Or just happens to be on his land.
[12:22] <Xi|Wrk> Im thinking now that the scenario would involve the Noble having known and manuvered his rival to go though the village as well. Maybe thinking that he would have captured it rather than burn it down, or just plain using it as a shield to get his men set up.
[12:22] <Darkened> Why?
[12:23] <Darkened> Apathy works as well as malice and isn't particularly contrived.
[12:23] <Xi|Wrk> True
[12:23] <Darkened> Village A is here.
[12:23] <Darkened> Noble B hates lord A
[12:23] <Darkened> So he invades in the night and puts Village A to the torch.
[12:23] <Xi|Wrk> Apathy's probably a much better directive here.
[12:23] <Darkened> Lord A doesn't particularly care beyond the lost revenue, but uses this as an excuse to retaliate.
[12:26] <Xi|Wrk> yep pretty much the entire point of it.










The day felt like a dream. Like any other as the warm sun poured down its bounty upon the land.

Summer time and wonder went hand in hand he felt, even as he gazed down upon the village with an appreciative eye.

This was a good place. He would raise his family here soon, he thought to himself.

“########, ########... come on, we’ll be late.” Her eyes sparkled in the sunlight, as he walked towards her with hand outstretched. Touch met touch, gentle and soft. He’d never want to let go if he could. A brush of tenderness crossed his eyes even as she tugged at him with her lesser strength. “Come on ya lump. I didn’t marry you just cause you’re good to look at.”

Her touch, her smile, they fill his heart up. Letting his mother, busy body that she is; arrange this marriage for you had been the best decision of your life. Love had bloomed with a rapidity which had been hard to believe. That she even hunted with him in the forests like they were both born to it, he could hardly believe that her parents had thought her unmarriageable; though she was a little short on the usual womanly virtues.

He’d learned not to actually say that to her face though.

“Yallie, it’s just another town meet. Nobody’s going to notice if we don’t show up. Not like nobles give a dam about anything like that. Two more faces in the crowd won’t be missed.” He smiles, taking her hand and pulling her close.

“But your mother…”

“My mother nothing, she’ll be glad to know that we were doing what couples were meant to. She’d been bugging me for grandkids from the time the ceremony ended.” He grinned, happily, nibbling lightly at her soft smooth lips.

“And yet she wouldn’t be happy to hear that we were caught shirking our duties to make those babies.” Yallie’s smile grew sly.

“Bah, whatever do you care anyway?” He continued to cover her neck in kisses, the woman he loved, treasured and adored.

She giggled sweetly. “I care because we’re still living under your mother’s roof until the cabin’s done.”

“I know, but there’s no hurry. Mother and Father like you, and we’ve got enough family that one more person isn’t an intrusion. Don’t worry.” Another kiss followed.

“Ha, alright. You know... let’s head back over to your place and grab our gear. I feel like bringing down something nice and big for your mom.”

He shakes his head with a wry grin. “I guess if you aren’t going to let it go.”

“Of course not. Come on, I’ll give you a treat if we manage to bring something back.” She winked slyly, already in the middle of bounding off.

For a moment he simply stood, watching her hips sway, then too sprang into motion to catch up. Even in their roughest spots he loved that woman like he loved life itself. Sure she wasn’t a traditional wife but his mother had known that such a woman would never satisfy her son, no instead she’d gone out of her way to find a suitable match for him, going so far as to have the local witch woman charm her search for the price of an entire cow.

They could afford to absorb such an extravagant cost though, while they weren’t land owners or anything like that, his Grand-father had left mother with a small stash of useful items from his own days as a soldier. One of which was the hunting spear which he used most of the time in the forest.

Father had taught him how to use the thing, and ever since he’s been the one bringing home meat to the table.

“All set, love?”

“When ever you’re ready.”

They stalked off into the woods together like ghosts.

He’d always loved the hunt, it was different to the usual nonsense of the farm, though that was where the family’s prosperity was sunk into. The freedom of stalking down the beasts, the challenge of finding them, bringing them down with his spear, the beauty of the darkened forest.

Its splendor overshadowed the town with its drab cobbles of torn wood and hobbled together stone. They barely even had a real road here, not like the city (Father had taken him there once, a pristine place with so many people…). No the greatness of the forest lay in opposing virtues. Where the city was pristine, the forest was messy and alive. Where the city was bright, the Forest gloried in darkness.

A true contrast from civilization, wilderness at its baser depths.

They couldn’t get enough of it.


+=[][][][][][][][]=+