Shards of Rage - RPLOG
From Rusted Promises
Participants
Date
13/8/475
Log
It's a fine thursday evening. The side of the castle has signs directing soulless that way, where three guards and a scholarly mouse stands to welcome all. The mouse is recognizable enough. Mione, resident scholar and scribe. "The King is very pleased you've responded to our request."
Walking along, following the directions she had been given at the inn, Monique looks a little nervous as she hears the rodent, "I... I am glad to be able to help." she says, holding one paw up in greeting to the woman.
Bite slithers along the well guided path and bows respectfully to Mione and the guards. She tilts her head and smiles sweetly, saying "I'm glad to help out royalty, it must be of great importance." She looks over the three guards, judging if they're body guards, or for some greater saftey having to do with this discussion.
Kilsa smiles and takes her seats, watching the rest of soulless enter. She is very intrigued about this invite, the Good King seems very set on this soul gem research. While her own soulgem is nice Kilsa can't help but feel more skills would better help her in the field. "I'm happy to hear that our King is interested in the furthering of Soulless. Its nice to know the higher ups don't think of us as tools or monsters to be stuffed in a corner." She nods to Mione in a friendly guesture.
"Monsters?" says Mione, "Creators, no. You are all very talented individuals." He leads the way inside and to a small room with available seats as he moves behind a small writing desk and pulls out a gem, familiar to Bite and Kilsa as the rock they retrieved, "With the consent of some of you, I've been trying to discern how to replicate this, for the good of the kingdom, and I think I may be close at hand. It's not a very pure sample, I'm afraid," he explains, "There's a lot of emotional taint that would make it impractical to use directly."
Sitting down, Monique watches the presentation of the stone, tilting her head at it until she murmurs, softly, "A soul stone?" under her breath, not really sure what it is she is looking at.
Bite as a shudder goes down Bite's spine her body writhes, she can't imagine what sort of feelings would enter ones body if they just tried to use it as is. It could be pure bliss and contentment or an absolute nightmare, but it's not worth dealing with, that was a poor wretch of a creature. She looks it over, and sits down with a nod. "It's probably... full of love." she manages and tilts her head the other way from before, not sure if that makes it any better to the mouse.
Kilsa chest puffs up at the thought of her and her snake friend being the ones that single handly found the stone. "Love and insanity, maybe". she smirks thinking of the horrid effect that might have on any souless directly using the stone.
"I couldn't say for certain," agrees the mouse hesitantly, "I dare not surrender it for use as it is, but..." He reaches under the desk and pulls out a handful of smaller soul gems, much closer to the standard size of soul gem than the larger monstrosity, "These are some the Freesword artisans have managed. It's been a challenge, coming as it is from a monster, instead of the honored fallen."
"Wait, we are expected to wear them? Have they been tested?" Monique asks out loud, since from her compatriots it seems this is an open meeting, "Or are we..." she adds, pondering if they are meant to be the testers.
Bite smirks and looks over the gems, reaching out towards one she feels the urge to and looking to Monique for the okay. "I'm sure it's safe, there are guards her to help if someone gets out of hand. So did they really all develop from that same gem?" she hisses curiously.
Kilsa smiles and nods to Mione, "I would be willing to test it. No progess could be made without a little trial and error." She looks at monique, "Wouldn't you want to be the first to have power unyielding? To learn skills no other soulless might know?" She looks to Bite. "My friend here seems to already feel the pull of the unknown." She chuckles a little.
"Each is a little different," explains Mione, "They're sailing in unknown winds, as it were. So they tried different techniques to purify the gem to usefulness." He nudges them forward, each a slightly different color, "We are hoping one of them is right. If we can find it, then they will know what to do, and do it again." A snap of fingers, "And we'll have a new soul gem. Pardon that they are so large. These are not meant to be worn for long. The size allows them to be studied more easily, and copied, if it works well."
Biting her lip and approaching, Monique looks down at the gems. Then it catches her eye, red, blood red. The girl's heart beats a little faster as her paw reaches out to touch the stone, seemingly quite focused on just it.
Bite picks up the one that she felt a draw to and begins the process of applying it, swapping her mage adept for it. "How long will we have to test them?" she asks, watching the mouse with curiosity.
Kilsa moves near Monique and finds a gem that seems to be a cross of white with deep silver streaks in it. "This feels similar some how." She waves her hand over it but does not touch it. "I feel keen on having this one if that ok? I would love to test it." She doesn't know why this particular gem makes her feel so at ease but she knows it doesn't feel as tainted as the one that came from a monster.
Purified or not, these gems are much 'hotter' than the perfected models for sale at the Freeswords. Emotion flows thick. From Monique's, rage, from Bite's, sorrow, and from Kilsa's, loneliness. A bit troublingly overwhelming at first adorning, but it does start to die off quickly, the existing emotions and personality pushing aside the artificial intruder. "How do you feel?" asks Mione.
Blinking, her paws itching to take up her axes, Monique fights back the anger and promise of violence with the light meditation that she has picked up. Taking a deep breath, she says, "Hot, strong... wow." she says, her voice almost growling until she focuses more on narrowing her thoughts away from the rage.
Bite shakes her head. "Oddly... sad? A little better?" she hisses and clears her head. "I feel interesting, that's certain. She stretches out and looks slightly distant before snapping to with a smirk. "I feel fine." she hisses with satisifaction. She knows she can do this. She begins to try and figure out what this gem has brought to her, what's special about it.
Kilsa blinks back a few tears, "I feel warm but at the same times I feel an overwhelmingly lonely feeling, like I'm a sitting at the playground alone as a kid again and not one wants to be friends with the fat badger." She blinks back a few more tears. "I'm not sure if I feel anything important yet." She tries not to think on the loneliness as it slowly fades.
There seems to be little real power in the downturned emotions. Faint hints of small promises. Surely not worth the effort of attuning oneself fully to their workings. The angry rock, on the other hand, is happy to shout about the glories of battle, of bathing in the blood of defeated enemies, protected only by the need to be victorious.
Mione looks between the three cautiously, as if they could fly off the handle at any moment, which they could, considering.
Struggling to keep the rage down, Monique tries to find a hint of actual skill in the gem and, to her dismay, finds none. "It's... it's empty of..." then it hits her, or rather, it occurs to her. If this gem is based on the rage, maybe it's skills will only be apparent when she does get angry. Looking around, the girl reaches to her weapon belt and undoes it, tossing it over just in front of a guard, she doesn't want to pull her weapons on one of these people.
