Forums » Fantasy Roleplay » In The Moongarden(Closed)

Chiara was currently sitting outside her quaint cabin, in her garden. Some of the flowers were still blooming, even though it was later in the season. Every single one of the blooms was white, and the garden itself was surrounded by birch trees. Whoever had planted this garden had certainly loved the color white.

It was warm outside, so Chi had her long, dark, wavy hair braided back and then twisted up into a bun to keep it off her neck. She was wearing a white sundress with a bow on the chest, and she wasn't wearing any makeup. She didn't have shoes on either, because she was sitting on the edge of her fountain with her feet in it. She was reading a book that had her very absorbed, and there was a very large, very fat grey cat on the edge of the fountain with her.

The place was pretty peaceful, and she didn't really seem to have a car in the world. Off in the distance, there was another building, but it was mostly hidden by trees.

Traveling was always the worst part about any trip. As the tall man in armor stepped up to the portal, he briefly wondered if perhaps there was someone else that could have taken on this responsibility; then he remembered that other than Varus, he had no one to entrust the task with. So, without any further delay, he entered the portal and the ether gripped at his body. His very existence was being disassembled, thrown about in the chaos, and finally reassembled just before he reached the other end of the portal. The entire process took less than a millisecond from start to finish, but it possessed that rare quality of unpleasantness that made time seem to stretch on much longer than it actually did.

Still, the portal had done its work and now the man was standing in a forest. Temperate, if he had to guess, and the local climate seemed to be habitable to most forms of life. Overall, it was better than most places the portals had taken him. But he had no time to reflect on his surroundings, there remained the matter of his trip here; therefore, the man removed a small satchel from the belt around his waist and pulled out a torn and stained parchment map which looked to be of the general area. According to the map, what he was looking for was to the west, so west he went. Then he saw the garden and stopped in his tracks.

While the local climate would certainly support birch trees, and he thought he had spied a few lurking in the distance when he first arrived, these birch trees were distinct in the number and arrangement of them. It was almost as though someone had planted them as a fence or barrier. He had known the map would be inaccurate from age, but he had not been expecting inhabitants this close to where he needed to go. He needed to make sure the locals hadn't touched the site, and to do so he would need to find a local; therefore, he walked up to the garden's edge with a slow gait, mostly from age but partly from caution.

Chiara felt the hairs on the back of her neck raise, and she felt someone watching her before she actually heard the man moving around behind her. She'd twist to see who it was, hoping for someone she knew. Instead, it was a very large man in a strange suit of armor. She didn't look as if she felt threatened by his presence at all, and she'd even greet him. "Hello." Hopefully he could understand what she was saying, because the only other languages she spoke were long dead.

The cat didn't seem concerned about the newcomer at all, he just stretched out on the lip of the fountain and closed his eyes again. Unless the strange man wanted to speak to her, she was probably going to go back to her book. She was a strange person, that was probably made clear by how far out from the rest of civilization she lived.

It always struck the Man in Gold how many alien races used languages that spoke similar to his. The humans had English, the Terisians had Larenysian, and there were countless more out in the galaxy. Still, the woman's greeting struck him as a relief. Usually he was greeted with weapons drawn and the local deities being invoked whenever he arrived on a new planet; clearly his reputation hadn't yet spread to this area. He placed his right arm over his chest, keeping his fingers clenched in a fist, and gave a stiff bow. The gesture was a variation on the show of respect for his people; this variation signified a grudging sort of respect, as he was unlikely to show respect to a stranger voluntarily. With the show of diplomacy out of the way, he began to speak in a very low rasp that almost possessed a guttural sort of tone.

"I am looking for an old cave near here, to the west. Do you know if there is such a cave around this area, or if anyone has mentioned a cave?"

Chiara arched a brow when he bowed to her, and she figured that must be some sort of formal greeting for him. She wasn't sure if she should return it, and so she's just watching him for a moment, before finally just spitting out the truth. "I'm not familiar with your...customs and I don't know what the proper response to that is." She honestly had no idea who he was, and she didn't really care. As long as he wasn't hurting her or any of her animal friends she was fine with him.

She'd finally turn to face him fully, and she's using her finger as a bookmark in her book. "I think I know of the cave you're speaking of. I haven't done any exploring inside of it, but I've seen it a few times on my walks." Well, there was a cave to the west, but that didn't necessarily mean it was the cave he was looking for. "Need help finding it?" She found nothing rude about his behavior, and his voice didn't seem to bother her in the least.

He was taken aback a little by her willingness to help, although his helmet didn't convey any of his emotions. Usually, he was greeted with insults, threats, or fear; either he wasn't the most out of the ordinary being around here, or else the woman possessed an especially unperturbed nature about her. Still, she had offered to take him to the cave, and it was very likely that nothing around him was old enough to be recorded on the map. He noticed, for the first time, that there was a cat beside her; The Man in Gold was reminded of the time when he had raised falcons, but those days had long since passed. He returned to the subject at hand.

"I have a map, but it will be unreliable. You live around here, I assume, or else you are familiar with this area. Take me to the cave, then."

Chiara gave her cat a pat on the head, "Alright." She's looking around for her actual bookmark, which she finds on the side of the fountain. She'll bookmark her book, and then she's looking around for her shoes. Silver flats that matched her outfit. Normally she wouldn't go hiking in such clothes, but this guy seemed to be in some sort of hurry.

Chi is planning on carrying her book with her, and she'll stand and head off towards the west, to what appeared to be a deer trail, "This way." She didn't really have an issue with showing this guy where the cave was. The sooner she did that, the sooner she could get back to her book!

So far, everything had been working out much better than the Man in Gold had planned. There were no terrified natives ready to attack him, no language barrier, no inhospitable climate, no warring factions trying to involve him on one side or the other of some pointless conflict, and no problems finding a guide to the cave. Clearly, something was about to go terribly, terribly wrong. His luck was a lot like a balance; the more good things that happened to him, the more bad things that would be lurking around the corner. He took a last look around him and was reminded of the gardens back...no, mustn't do to go thinking on that now.

He followed the woman to the deer trail and wondered what kind of condition the room would be in; surely, if this human knew about the cave, others had ventured inside of it? He braced himself for the worst and plodded along behind his guide.

Chiara isn't really one for a whole lot of talking, so she's probably just leading him on, without saying a single word. The cat had stayed behind, but Chi didn't seem too worried about it either. She doesn't even question why this strange man is looking for a cave in the middle of nowhere.

Hopefully MiG isn't going to be too weirded out by her silence, if he could sense such things, he'd sense no anger or hostility from her. She's just...quiet. After a few minutes of walking, she'd flinch and then have to pause to empty some rocks out of her flimsy flats. She really should have asked for a minute to change before coming out here with him!

The Man in Gold noticed that his guide had to stop and remove rocks from her shoes every so often. He briefly considered asking her if she needed to go back and get more comfortable shoes, but he quickly reasoned that she knew the trail and would have brought more appropriate footwear and dismissed the idea of asking if she was alright. It was strange how she had just led him along this path without so much as an introduction or even a reason why he wanted to go to the cave.

Perhaps this wasn't the first time someone had inquired about the cave, or perhaps this was all a trap set for him; personally, he found the former situation more unsettling than the latter. He had fought his way out of ambushes and deathtraps countless times before; he would be less successful in finding the group which had gone to the cave before him without any concrete evidence. He decided to break the silence when they were near their destination.

"Will you enter the cave, or are you going to leave after you have led me here? There may be artifacts inside which I will need someone's help to carry."

This was patently untrue; although there would likely be a plethora of artifacts left, he was more than capable of carrying them all out on his own, and his massive stature didn't help his lie.

It probably would have made more sense for Chiara to request a moment to change, but she seemed to have forgotten just how far away this cave was. She didn't particularly care why he wanted to go to this cave, and having a stranger ask her for directions to something was hardly the strangest thing she'd ever had happen to her.

Chiara seems surprised when he speaks to her again, and she'd tilt her head to look up at him, "Uh...sure. I can help. Should I wait...outside? Or follow you in?" Hopefully they weren't pulling anything dangerous out of the cave, though she figured someone would have warned her about it by now if that was the case. She still hadn't even offered up her name, which wasn't all that unusual for her. After answering his question, she'd just go quiet again until they came upon the cave.

They were at the cave now, and the Man in Gold's worries about the ease in which he had reached this place were displaced by his impatience to reach the room and inspect the condition of its contents. He realized that the woman had offered to go inside the cave as well; he might require further directions if the worst of his fears were realized. He placed his right hand on the cave entrance; although the cool dampness of the rock did not permeate his armor, he knew that the conditions inside would have likely disposed of any papers that he was hoping to find. There would be no more delays, he decided; it was time to enter the cave.

"Follow me closely, for the cave will be dark and I do not want to go looking for you. When we reach a certain area, you will have to give me a moment before we can proceed. In all estimations, the entire trip will not take more than thirty minutes, and we will have to carry a few things outside."

Chiara just watched him, this was getting a little weird. "...alright." She'd set her book down outside the mouth of the cave, and she'd look around at the forest. She knew these lands, and what lived on them, so she wasn't really afraid that he was going to hurt her, even if he did look like he could crush rocks with his bare hands.

"If I had known I was going in here, I would have brought a flashlight. Spelunking really isn't my thing." She's going to follow along behind him, straining to see in the dark. She was entirely human, so it's not like she had amazing vision in the dark. Hopefully he didn't rush, so she could keep track of his large form.

The Man in Gold was far too old to go dashing off into the cave, and his pace as the leader was scarcely faster than his pace following behind the woman. He extended his arms out to his sides to feel along the cave's walls and avoid losing his way to the room. The cave was actually very short, and it took only a couple of minutes of slowly shuffling through the darkness to reach the wall. The Man in Gold turned around to the woman and lowered his arms to his sides.

"We have reached the end. I need some time to get this wall open, and then we will begin to carry the items outside."

Chiara stopped when he did, "Alright..." Her brow furrowed and she tried to peek past him at the wall, but she didn't see anything but...wall. "You're not planning on blowing anything up are you?" Well, if he was, it wasn't like she could stop him. Still, she'd back up a couple of paces to let him have room to do whatever he was going to do. She had no idea what was on the other side of that wall, but hopefully whatever it was it wasn't dangerous.

She'll busy herself by looking around, though as far as she could tell, this was a normal cave, like any other in the area. It didn't even seem big enough to hold a dragon or anything like that, which was probably a relief. Perhaps one of her wolf friends had used it as a home at some point.

The woman's question was strangely ironic to him, but there would be time to appreciate the irony after he had recovered what he had come for. Still, he had gotten her cooperation so far so he saw no reason to leave the question unanswered.

"On the contrary, I am trying to prevent something from exploding. I'm almost done now, just a moment longer."

The spell was taking longer than usual; the wall should have disintegrated by now, revealing the room beyond. Instead, the rock face in front of them was just as solid as the walls around them. Clearly, someone had been inside the room already. The Man in Gold grunted in frustration, and drew back his right arm. After visually locating a good location, he threw a punch at the wall and smashed through the rock with a loud crash. From the new hole, cracks migrated out along the entire surface of the wall and the thing crumbled into dust. They were now staring into a dusty chamber with elaborate paintings on the carved stone walls and several stone tables lying about.

Well, that didn't sound too promising did it? Why had she gone with this guy again? She'll keep her distance when he tries to open the room, and when he does it by punching the wall, she makes a note to herself to not piss this guy off.

Chiara's going to stay outside the room for now, but when he enters, she'll creep closer and peek inside. Not that she could see a whole lot, because it was still the back of a cave, and it was still dark. She can't help her naturally curious nature though, and she starts asking questions. "How did you know this was here? And what is this place?" She's like a sponge, ready to absorb all the information he can give her.

Now, the bad luck was starting. The human was asking questions which the Man in Gold wasn't comfortable with answering at this time, and what's more: the room looked far too empty. Of course, after twelve millenniums, there was a very small, almost nonexistent, likelihood of the room being left untouched. He raised his right arm and channeled magic energy into a glowing orb which floated to the central brazier in the room and burst into flames. With the fire providing illumination, the Man in Gold stepped into the chamber and began moving around the rusted contents of the tables to see what was left. His worst fears were confirmed.

Grave robbers were a simple lot to predict; they would enter without concern of hiding their trail, grab hold of anything in plain sight that looked valuable or could be fenced quickly, and then they would destroy whatever was left and not too durable. The room hadn't been ransacked by grave robbers, though, because everything was neatly in place; of course, they were in the wrong places, but it was evident that someone had tried replacing anything that had been moved around after they entered. No, it was clear that the Man in Gold was dealing with his least favorite group: archaeologists. The only things left in the room were a few tools and instruments rusted to their stone tables, and even those bore signs of someone trying to pry them out of the rock. The item he had come here for would be stashed under a table, assuming it wasn't missing; but his knees were several thousand years past the point where he could bend down and look under things. The human would have to look for the item.

Chiara isn't getting any answers to her questions, and she peeks into the room as he lights it up. It didn't look like much of anything to her, and her eyes drifted to the nameless man. She didn't know that her help was needed, because he hadn't said anything to her. She'll hesitantly take a few steps into the room, and she's heading to whichever table is closest to her to look at it.

"Doesn't look like much of anything is here. What is it you need me to help you bring out?" She was feeling slightly better now that she could at least see, something about being in darkness was unnerving.

He turned to the woman, his cape brushing against the table he was next to as he did so.

"There is an item here which I need, but it's under this table. I can't bend down...it's my armor, you understand, and you'll have to pull it out for me. It will look like a stone box, about two-thirds...almost two feet wide," he said, remembering that his race's system of measurements was not used anywhere else in the galaxy, "and it will be somewhat heavy. Once you have found the box, place it on the table."

Around them, the paintings on the walls were slowly coming into view from the brazier's light. They featured faded but elaborate paintings of large blue people doing various activities such as plowing fields and casting spells. One painting in particular, near the spot where the man was, featured a tall figure dressed in armor that looked similar to the suit of armor the man was wearing.