Zelphas

Perception (DC 30)

Torben Things seem to have settled down. Satisfied, Torben turned back to splitting wood, only to be interrupted by the burned human's surprisingly loud question. He froze, blunt claws crunching slightly into the wood in his hands. "W-well... it's a Glacier, not a mountain. Or are those the same thing, technically, only one's made of ice and the other stone?" He deflected nervously, trying to figure out what to say and how to say it. The new Abbot had told him not to reveal his connection to the monks, but Justin and Stephen had told him that something was wrong with the trial. He had hoped to just be able to get there without too much trouble, but that was before he knew how large and strange the world seemed to be. Things just kept getting complicated. Torben let the silence stretch for several moments as he thought. Blowing out a heavy breath, Torben decided that he can explain part of his mission now that it's been directly asked. "I need to... there's some sort of, creature, living on--or maybe in--the Glacier. Something with tentacles, and I'm pretty sure there's more than one of them. Anyways, I need to get one of those tentacles." It felt freeing, even explaining this much, though Torben knew he wasn't supposed to mention the rest. "I'm hoping that they shed them naturally, whatever they are," He commented instead to get his mind off of what he isn't willing to say. "I'd rather not hurt anything I don't have to--then again, it makes sense if they're dangerous, too, so then fighting them would be a good thing for the people nearby."

I built Torben to be very awkwardly placed; he's a bugbear, which causes some natural inclinations (he's an obligate carnivore, for one, and his tendency to emote physically is connected to his species as well), but he's been raised by monks who are almost exclusively human, and has never interacted with goblinoids before (aside from one very short run-in with goblins after leaving the monastery), let alone other bugbears. This means that even he doesn't know what sets him apart from others, not really, and he doesn't know what to expect from other people. Rillik's casual dismissal of his intelligence and antagonism was more of what I was expecting, to some extent; I was surprised when the majority of you went "oh a bugbear, that's not that weird" after meeting him the first time, but given the touchiness around race issues it's understandable. On Torben's part, he's been taught since he was young that, essentially, bad emotions are "wrong", and so he rarely expresses anger, frustration, or sadness directly, instead channeling them into something else or shutting them down. That's probably going to lead to a pressure cooker moment at some point down the line, but at the moment it means that he's somewhat avoidant towards hard topics and difficult conversations (as the last conversation showed fairly well). I agree that he and Rillik could complement each other pretty well, though it may take a bit before that happens. Torben is delaying a lot of angst by shoving it in the bag of "I haven't ever met a bugbear before, so I don't know what they're like". Actually meeting a bugbear, or especially a group, will probably force him to confront a lot of unpleasant feelings that he's delayed or ignored so far. I think I'll do the whole stats thing that a few others have done; it seems like a good way to lay out the character and get some ideas going.

Torben can't help it; his ears are too sharp.

Torben Listening to the odd conversation between the humans and the deep gnome, Torben was struck by the burned human's words. More specifically, he was struck by the way the words sounded... familiar, at least in comparison to some of the words he'd heard some of the older monks and the occasional priests talk about Ilmater and his will. And so, when D'Artegenon gathered them together and explained that he and Wyck were priests, Torben relaxed, smiling contentedly. "I thought that explanation sounded like priest things," he said simply, happy that his assumptions were proven correct this time. "Well, that makes things simpler. The gods know more than we do, so we may as well follow along with them." Torben knew that some people had trouble believing in the gods, or trusting in them, but that had never made much sense to him. In all the stories about the gods, trying to second-guess them only caused trouble for the mortal who tried, so he never saw why it was worth the effort. He felt like he should know the name Jergal, and "death gods" in general were some of the more worrying ones... but Wyck and D'Artegenon seemed nice enough, so any worries were fleeting in Torben's mind.

Eleanora nods to herself, stowing her now empty bottle neatly back into her pack. Accidentally, the motion carries her just out of reach of Cap'n Akimbold's spoon attack. "Ah, fresh'n'fit as a fine-tuned fiddle! Now, where were--hm?" A bright green object bumps into Eleanora's shoe, and she bends down to pick up the shiny apple stone the kobolds left behind earlier. Looking over at Tourna, she realizes what's happened; the stone fell out of its inventory, and the little bot was obviously looking for it! "Here it is, lil' fella; ya don't need ta--whoop!" The bottom of the bowl is still a cluttered mess, and Eleanora's robes catch on a bit of debris, sending her tripping. Her arms pinwheel, trying to keep her balance-- --and the Apple smacks straight towards the Ramenooze, who has floated closer! "Ah! Erm, s-sorry, big fella..." Blightrock Apple Melee attack (WLP+WLP) HR + 6 Poison Damage on a hit.

For the second time since her team has known her--and also the second time in the last few minutes--Fen's Screeching Raven falls out of her hands, dropping silently to the floor of the time machine. On her face, emotions chase each other, one after another. Disbelief. It had worked. It had actually worked. Shock. It had worked so, so much more easily than she had expected, the unassailable monsters of her memories transformed into a flock of Grimm, far from the worst thing she had faced in the eight years since. Denial, and something akin to rage, or sorrow. This isn't right. It was--it was supposed to be a trade. She had been sure of it. She doesn't--she doesn't deserve--- Suddenly, a sort of tremulous, hesitant, fearful happiness. And yet, here she is, and there they are. Fen looks at her brothers, calling out each name in turn. Her Semblance erases the sound, but she says them, names she never thought she'd speak again, not truly. She raises her arms to speak-- And freezes, as pure panic flashes across her face. Her brothers don't know sign language. Fen remains frozen, arms half-raised, face frozen in almost comical panic. Her eyes dart around, slipping to her team and away moment by moment. It seems, faced with the social interaction of a family reunion, Fen has found herself completely stymied by the very first obstacle.

For a long moment, the Screeching Raven remains obstinately pointed upwards. Then, begrudgingly (though still with enough trigger discipline to make sure that the barrel is never actually pointing at any of her brothers), Fen lowers the gun and steps into DELORES.

"You can enhance, but not create whole cloth, maybe?" Josef suggests about Heather's powers, seizing immediately on something other than his own predicament to think about. "If it doesn't have a solid basis, it becomes an illusion, but something solid you can make... more." "...Not sure about the 'stuff going boom' part, though." --- Josef found himself smiling, just slightly, at Lily's power when it was revealed. It was just, so... uniquely personal to the unknown girl, as far as he could tell, without any thought of others or the wider world. He felt a stab of envy, but he didn't know Lily well enough for such envy to turn to real dislike. Nodding to her, he said quietly "Nice," and left it at that. --- When Karl showed that his blood was reversible back into his body, Josef surprised himself by feeling relieved, first and foremost. "Oh! Good. That's... good." A moment later, where he was and who he was talking to reasserted itself. "I just wasn't sure if you knew what anemia was. I'm not planning to drag you with us when you pass out from a hemoglobin shortage on our Trial," he said with lofty detachment, inwardly sinking deeper into a sort of panicked depression. He was the only one whose Blessing went this badly. Well, in one way that's a good thing, but that didn't help him much.

Before "Take it." Josef handed his plate over to Gen without a second thought; everything tasted like ashes that morning anyways. He tried not to think of that as a bad sign. --- Josef returned Karl's reproachful look with one of cool dismissal; the other boy has his own life and made his own choices, so what does he have to be envious about? "You want him? He's yours," he hissed back at Heather; it was an old taunt, one he had said before he was old enough to understand how it might hurt, now brought back in the stress of the moment. Josef bit back the emotions upwelling in him a second later, returning to the blank mask he was holding for the ceremony itself. --- After Josef stared at Heather for a moment after she spoke, as if he didn't hear her. His mouth opened, ready to reveal the fact that he couldn't feel, that he wouldn't feel again, that he had messed up the ceremony and didn't know what to do-- But no. She was one of his oldest friends, and she was going next. He couldn't do that to her. "Right." He said instead, mastering himself with yet more difficulty. He struggled, trying to form the right words, and then gave a weak "Good luck" before he carefully, slowly took his seat. He was sitting on air, he felt, but there was a solid chair underneath him... wasn't there? --- Josef began to clap politely at Remy's display of power, before the alien sensation forced him to stop. Wind and flight; good, simple powers with lots of utility. Trust Remy to make the most of her Blessing, without any terrible side effects (that he could see). Desperate for a distraction (and inadvertently feeding into the idea that he was uncomfortable looking at Remy for too long), he started scanning the plants and flowers placed around the square, but he already knew their names and how they grew. He ended up looking at his hands again, as though making sure they were really there. --- The appearance of "Laurel" in the crowd caused Josef to jump, and he spent several moments making sure he was still on the chair as Heather returned to her seat. "It suits you," he commented once Heather was seated again; his distracted air and general flat affect might suggest that he was being sarcastic, but he meant it as a genuine compliment. --- Josef felt relieved when he saw that Gen didn't quite have full control of his speed; at least someone else was struggling. Immediately after, he felt ashamed, and tried to distract himself again. Was touch connected to hearing, somehow? Everything felt a bit... muted, or distorted, sitting up there on the stage. Partially out of guilt, and partially just to show support, Josef gave Gen a quick thumbs up when the other boy returned to his seat. No one noticed that he had to double-check his own hand to make sure he was actually making a thumbs up gesture, right? --- Karl's entrance caused Josef to feel a pang of... hope, strangely enough. The other boy was holding a spear made out of his own blood; there had to be some consequences for that, something like Josef was going through. But Karl was grinning, because of course he was, he had no notion of larger consequences but only immediate results... Josef cleared his throat (at least that still felt mostly normal). "Are you... is your body... all right?" he asked quietly and awkwardly once Karl took his seat again. He was desperate for any sort of commiseration; otherwise, he would be the only one who messed up his entire Blessing. That would be fitting, one part of him supposed, but the rest was still trying to get used to the lack of sensation.

Torben Torben stared as the gnome suggested standing in front of screaming villagers jumping at him with weapons and trying to calmly ask them how to help. It was... how could he explain it? He had walked into villages, carefully cloaked and gloved, and had calm, even pleasant conversations with the people there. He paid them for things he needed, simply asked for advice, even revealed his connection to Ilmater and tried to help. They had been suspicious, guarded, but eventually had been friendly enough... until the scarf slipped, or a glove came loose, or someone a little too perceptive looked at his eyes for too long. And then, everything he had done was meaningless, down to his holy symbol. The pitchforks came, and the screams, and the fire. Talking did nothing then, nor offers of help, nor anything else. The human woman's bit of... advice? Commentary? Just confused Torben more. He had no idea who this "Drizzt" person was supposed to be, but that wasn't his real issue. It revealed a second problem: he didn't know what "bugbears" were. He had still never even seen another person that looked like him, let alone met one, learned their history, understood their struggles. How was he supposed to represent a race he didn't even know? How could he decide right and wrong when he had, at most, half the story? All of it was too much. Torben didn't even know where to start. And so, he did what he had always done when asked a question or presented with a problem that he didn't understand; he let it pass over him. "I didn't think of it that way. Thank you for the advice." Usually, those two sentences were enough to slip away, and that was what Torben did a moment later, walking over to the pile of firewood for the night. He set about breaking down some of the larger pieces into more manageable sizes, using his hands to do so; the physical effort calmed him, and he didn't think anyone was in the mood to spar, with everything that was going on.

Hmm. Thinking about it, this could be fun, but feel free to ignore it if it doesn't actually matter. Deception to pretend like everything's fine after coming back from the Pool (-2 for Impaired)

"Whew!" Seeing that the ropes were cut and everyone seemed to be in fairly solid shape, Eleanora takes a breather, popping out a surprisingly standard-looking Mana Potion from her pack and drinking down the contents. She pauses just before drinking, taking in Cap'n Akimbold's words. "Now, hold on jest a moment. What d'ya mean, a dragon's servant? We ain't some sorta hitmen or fighters for grumpy ol' Hexenspargillis!" Drinking down her mana potion in one long pull, Eleanora's eyes flash, and she gives Cap'n Akimbold a big grin. "Naw, we're jest the cooks!" OOC Spending 3 IP to pull out an Elixir; Eleanora recovers 50 MP.