Llyarden

The camera drone bobs up and down slightly when Gen waves at it, kinda like it's waving back. By now you've probably noticed that the camera drones do sort of respond to you - their programming takes priority so you can't just tell them to go away and stop filming you (exceptions for changing, bathing, calls of nature, etc aside), but you can kinda direct them a little. For their part, the townsfolk can broadly be categorised into two groups as far as how they treat the camera drones: some of them notice them and just ignore them, while the rest notice them, and then try their best to pretend like they're ignoring them while they fix their hair, check their makeup is done right, and then do their best to make sure they appear in the background of some footage. They're not outright photobombing (videobombing?) you or anything, or even interacting with you or the drones any more than they normally would, but it does seem like a pretty popular idea to get in the background of passing Novices' footage so you can point yourself out to all and sundry when the Trial is complete and the footage starts to get released to the public.

[On my way,] Lily texts back.

Back at the town square, it turns out to be very easy to find the Mayor! This might be because he is currently walking towards the bulletin board, very obvious because he's dressed formally with his chain of office, and looking absolutely delighted about something, waving to and greeting the townsfolk he passes (who look right about as confused as you guys probably are at this display of cheer).

Following behind him is a man who's probably in his early thirties, dressed in sturdy, comfortable clothes - but with a vibrant red cloak on top of them, with...well you can't really see it very well because it's behind him and he's facing you, but there's obviously some kind of symbol on it. As he walks and his cloak moves, you might get a glimpse of a dragonblade hilt at his side. He looks somewhat embarrassed at the Mayor's antics.

Eventually the two do in fact notice you, and come to a halt.

"...well, this is awkward," the cloaked man mutters, kinda looking to the Mayor (who seems to be a little bewildered at having been dragged out of his own little world of happiness) before clearing his throat and stepping forwards. "Well met, Novices. I am Knight Arand of Shimmerholde, Knight of the Ruby Flame, C-Ranked Hunter of the Order of the Hunt."

"Ah, yes, and I am, ahem, Mayor Thorpe," the Mayor introduces himself belatedly. "I apologise, but Ser Arand had just been discussing with me the task I believe you may have been intending to take."

"Well...actually, Mr Mayor, I have a suggestion. Had our young friends been but five minutes later or earlier to the board, we would have missed them and the task would have gone to me without them ever having the chance to take it. A chance meeting like this is as though it were guided by the dragons themselves - and during the First Trial, no less. So, perhaps you would permit these Novices to take on the task as a part of their Trial?"

"Well, I, uh...I see, yes. Yes, well, I suppose there's, ahem, no problem with that." The Mayor adjusts his chain of office and kinda draws himself up a bit, turning...more to face one of the camera drones than actually any of you guys. "Uh, Novices, perhaps we should discuss this elsewhere?"

The White Buck turns out to be a pretty good recommendation from the gate guards, although while you guys aren't the only custom your party of six all showing up at once definitely does kinda catch the proprietors off guard. Nonetheless, they do have room for all of you - although Remy does have to pay for a slightly more expensive room if she wants a bath, the normal rooms just have showers - and in short order you are all assigned your keys (actual, physical keys) and directed up to your room by a guy who's probably a year or so younger than you and is evidently the proprietor's son, and while he does a decent job of keeping a professional demeanour is super excited to have actual Knights staying (he does know that you're not technically full-fledged Knights but if you ask him he just says that Novices are still a lot closer to Knights than almost anyone else in the village is.) Of course it almost certainly doesn't hurt that four of the six of you are very good-looking, and he probably ends up embarrassing himself a little when he offers to take one of your packs (for the walk of, you know, a whole staircase) and then probably regrets it if any of you actually give your packs to him to carry.

As Heather and Karl (and maybe Gen) head out to explore the village - Lily, who it has become quite apparent over the past couple weeks is not quite so comfortable with the wilderness travel as the rest of you, decides to stay in the hotel to relax now you're finally back to civilisation - you find yourselves...honestly kinda struggling to find things to do. I mean, don't get me wrong, this village is a bit bigger than Greenbrook and it's of course a completely new village to all of you, but it's honestly not massively different than Greenbrook.

Inevitably, therefore, you find yourselves gravitating to perhaps the one place in the village that might have something interesting in it: the village's bulletin board.

Very similar to Greenbrook's, Merryweather's bulletin board is a real, physical board, situated in the town square (which is also where the pharmacy Josef has found happens to be), and it's used for more normal village stuff, like announcements of village events, lost pets, and so on. Right in the centre of the bulletin board, though, is something of more interest to you.

'The Village of Merryweather humbly requests the aid of Knights to investigate suspicious behaviour and a potential bandit camp nearby. Signed, Mayor Thorpe.'

Sorin had not missed the way things seemed to be...changing...in the missions, so frankly, as far as he was concerned, he wasn't particularly going to complain about Wulf's habit of making the missions they went on consistently complete overwhelming victories.

Of course, the increasing volume of missions didn't mean that he hadn't had some free time to himself. And...honestly he'd used most of it to kinda act like everything was still like it had been when they'd first joined, when the biggest thing they had to worry about was surprise launches into the forest by Professor Montana. (I mean, to be fair, they had almost immediately run into a giant Grimm Pool when that had happened, so Sorin had sort of been looking at it with rose-tinted glasses.) He'd just kinda been hanging out with other students, both people in their class and in the other years (though he was a bit more cautious about interacting with Roxie's class, for fear of being accused of being an embarrassing big brother), and working on his paintings - and while he was of course still doing his pictures of the others being awesome Hunters and destroying Grimm left, right and centre, he'd actually spent a fair amount of time painting more peaceful situations. Oh, and he'd also tried to bring back the pizza parties...or, well, they'd probably not really stopped, but he was at least putting some effort into the work that Lin and Aeryn had started to make pizza a force for...diplomacy? Grimm destruction? Honestly he'd sort of lost track of what the actual goal was with the pizza thing, but it was a nice thing to do that could take his mind off everything else that was going on.

(He did also spend a bit of time with the Fable brothers, just to check in on them occasionally and make sure they were adjusting to their new lives, at least until they managed to pick up enough sign language that they could communicate directly with Fen.)

He didn't miss the fact that Chapi seemed to know the people they were walking past. But he absolutely did not put two and two together to get 'Chapi built a battlecruiser' until she opened the gate to reveal it.

"Um."

He...uh, he didn't actually have anything to follow that 'um' up with.

Now, of course, it wasn't like Chapi was the only person who'd wanted to try to change things after the Battle of Beacon. After encountering the difficulties in getting the SDC to deliver their Dust to Beacon's defenders, once they'd returned to Mistral Sorin had made a point of starting to make contacts all across the city, so if bureaucratic tangles happened here he'd know who to put in contact with who. And at this point he did have a pretty extensive list of people, and it had taken quite a lot of work, but it...wasn't exactly on par with building a whole flipping battlecruiser.

Perhaps if he was someone else, he might have been envious, or frustrated. Instead, though, Sorin just kinda stared at the battlecruiser for a few moments. "...yeah, that checks out."  He cleared his throat. "So, uh, how much extra credit does this get you with Professor Brown?"

"I'm good with either," Lily says, with an idle shrug, "but if I'm doin' my maths right, that's three votes in favour of the direct route, so even if I really wanted to go the long way and Remy did as well, all that'd do is tie the vote and that doesn't seem real useful. So I'll just go ahead and cast my vote for the wilderness as well."

With that decided (more or less), you break out the map that Karl had taken from Archivist Levont to figure out exactly where you're going. As it happens you guys are quite close to Lomorre, which means that heading as the crow flies would most likely take you little more than four or five weeks, putting your arrival in Lomorre somewhere around Mountain's Emerald at the latest. Since the deadline for the First Trial doesn't technically expire until Nobleday of Light (the day before the Summer Solstice) that gives you, like, an entire month and change to account for random pit stops and the like - and that's assuming a relatively relaxed progression. If you guys seriously wanted to push yourselves you could probably get there in three weeks, but as much as the First King's journey was very much rushed with him pushing himself as much as possible, the intent of the First Trial is to give you guys the chance to experience the kingdom you're (hopefully) going to be spending most of your lives serving.

In the end, you decide to travel by way of another small village in the county called Merryweather, in the county of Uptonshire - it's slightly bigger than Greenbrook and not quite on the direct path; the detour will probably add about a week to your journey, but that doesn't really mean a whole lot given the amount of time you guys have to play with, and it will give you the chance to pick up any extra supplies and the like, or check for any requests that can be handled by a group of recruits (to be fair, when there are six of you guys the subset of requests that could be handled by you is significantly larger than it would be for a normal-sized group of 3-4 recruits.)

With your route decided, you set off! Your departure from the village is a rote, solemn occasion, and even Dimitri restrains himself from yelling encouragement after Josef as you leave. It only takes quarter of an hour's walk or so before the road rounds a hill and your families are hidden from sight.

Barely two hours after that, Greenbrook itself would be impossible to pick out from your surroundings.

Shineday of Mountain's Topaz, 564 F.B.

Over the next three weeks, perhaps more than anything else, there is one thing that you had perhaps had hinted at during your training at Fort Naoth, but which is thoroughly driven into your minds now:

Hiking is really darn boring!

In all the tales of Knights venturing into the unknown wilderness, there are Demons to slay and people in need practically over every hill and behind every tree. Or perhaps the weather suddenly turns on them and forces them into an undiscovered ruin. Rare tales - usually the ones with some moral woven into them - even feature the Knight getting lost or struggling to find food.

You don't get any of that. By the time you reach Merryweather, you haven't so much as seen a Demon, never mind slain one, nor encountered anyone in need of help. (In fact you've barely encountered anyone at all, only occasionally running into the occasional traveller when your path crosses over with a road.) And with half the group being perfectly capable survivalists, you don't have any difficulty finding food - wild animals are pretty plentiful, perhaps owing to your proximity to the Forest of Harpa, and for people with Blessed speed and strength, taking down an animal or two to supplement your rations and foraged produce is pretty trivial.

You do run into a bear at one point! But, I mean, it isn't particularly interested in fighting, and also even just one of you could probably take it down without much difficulty. (Well, okay, maybe Heather or Lily might struggle a bit, but even then it'd be good odds on them winning.)

This all being the case, your arrival at Merryweather is probably pretty welcome. You are, of course, stopped at the gate by the village guards and asked your business, but 'novices on the First Trial' is a perfectly adequate explanation - and, indeed, one that gets you advice that the White Buck is better value-for-money than the Grey Stoat (because Merryweather is actually big enough that it has a whole two lodgings!)

So, about halfway through your journey for your First Trial, you find yourselves with a free evening. The world...or at least the village of Merryweather...is your oyster.

Tourna chirruped happily at the lick and reached out with one tendril to pat the Ramenooze on the...head? Body? It had made a friend! This was a good day!

Still, it had a mission to do, so after a few moments it waved good-bye to the Ramenooze and came scampering back to the rest of the party. Still pointedly ignoring the Kobold Krew, it whistled curiously at the mention of the apples changing their smell. Maybe it could make a smell-changing stew out of them!

If I can Routine the checks I can, otherwise...

Expertise (Current Events) + Eidetic Memory

Insight

"That is...probably a simpler way of describing it, yeah," Sorin nodded, with a small, embarrassed chuckle.

Agreed on checking on Chapi, he signed to Nicoale, but it might be better if I go with the Fables to catch up with Fen. I can use my Semblance to let them communicate without having to go through one of us as a translator. I mean, maybe they'd be fine with Fen just scribbling on pieces of paper, but if it was me I'd want to talk privately and directly. I figure I might as well offer.

...you know, if we can ever get them together without someone running off.  Fen's hastened signs were very practical and didn't leave an enormous amount of room for tone, so instead he gave a slight eye-roll. To the Fables it probably just seemed like he was rolling his eyes at the disparity between his and Nicoale's explanations.

Tourna let out a sharp whistle that sounded very much like a 'hmph!' at the glares from the Kobold Krew, but fundamentally it had other things on its mind, leaving the humans to talk about boring political things, scuttling over to the lakeshore and rummaging through its storage until it found some marshmallows that it definitely hadn't pilfered from the Kobold Krew. Something sweet wasn't exactly a perfect solution to nausea, but at least they had a relatively bland taste (helped by a few random herbs that Tourna had pulled out of its storage and crushed over them) that might make the unfortunate ooze feel a little better.

Of course, exactly how it was going to get the marshmallows over to the Ramenooze it hadn't quite worked out yet, so for now it was just sort of walking back and forth at the lakeside, occasionally pausing and chirruping to itself.

(The Kobold Krew were not going to get any apology snacks. They'd caused it to lose its precious triple-reduced wasabi!)

Downtime actions:

Grimm Artist with Expertise (Art) (DC20) 2 successes.

Everybody's Pal with Expertise (Cooking) (DC15) 3 successes

Networking with Expertise (Politics) (DC20) 3 successes.

For Pizza! And For Glory! with Expertise (Cooking) (DC20) 3 successes, which I think adds another classmate to the Shenanigans, so...let's add Ben.

Lily joins in with the sparring with any of you who'll take her on, although her win record is...probably about on par with Heather's, except she doesn't have the luxury of having a Blessing tailored around supporting others to explain it. "How the heck are you guys so dang strong?" she grumbles, on more than one occasion. It doesn't stop her taking part, though - and once or twice she does manage to catch someone off guard with her wild variety of bubblegum powers. She also discovers she can actually produce a 'flavour' of bubblegum that heals minor wounds, which pretty much immediately endears her to the villagers of Greenbrook on account of her being much more friendly than Doc Theo.

She, uh...does also accidentally glue herself in place with her bubblegum powers on one occasion, after which she (and probably the rest of you) takes care to avoid the sticky green gum.  But hey, that's why you have a week to train before heading out on your constantly-recorded First Trial.

***

The day of the First Trial itself comes with less ceremony and fanfare than your Blessing ceremony had. Partly this is because you are requested to assemble at the main gate of Greenbrook before dawn and that kind of time tends to put a dampener on celebrations, but also it's because the Blessing ceremony had, in part, been a celebration of Greenbrook as much as you guys (after all, you would be carrying Greenbrook's name for the rest of your days). The First Trial is much more personal. Only a few close friends and family show up to see you off...which, for you guys, means Dimitri (no longer wearing his goofy outfit), Remington and Ydrale...and also Karl's mother who, uh, doesn't seem to have a name defined, but she's here too, and definitely isn't here solely because they would've been the talk of the town if they hadn't gone to send off their own child on the First Trial. She does...kinda seem to be acting like she just sort of happened to be in the area and figured she'd stick around.

The net result of this is that until you guys arrive, the people are outnumbered by the camera drones - one for each of the six of you, plus one focused on Levont himself. For that matter the people are also outnumbered by the big backpacks that have been procured for each of you.

"Greetings, Novices."  Levont gives another bow to you. Dimitri sort of starts to mimic him, glances over and notices that the Dragomirs aren't following suit and tries to pass it off as just brushing some imaginary dirt off his trousers. "As you know, your First Trial will begin at dawn."  Watched by his camera drone, he retrieves a neatly folded map from his bag, unfolds it to show it to you all, before folding it up and handing it over to whoever steps forwards to take it (the camera drone rotates to watch you pick it up before returning to Levont once the map leaves his hand).

The map is a copy of an old-style map, pretty precise but obviously lacking functions like TNLTeratian Navigation Lines, aka GPS but not one of the words in the acronym makes sense in the setting. that your phones have...although leynet connectivity is not necessarily guaranteed given that you might well be marching through the wilderness at some points.

With the business of the map taken care of, Levont produces six small tokens from his bag and hands one to each of you. "Hold those for a few moments, if you please, while the camera drones grow accustomed to your prana."  You were never actually given any training in how to handle the camera drones at Fort Naoth, predominantly because they, uh...don't really need much handling. They have enough battery life for a year of activity, evasion protocols that let them stay out of the way in battles, a stable leynet link that lets them broadcast emergency signals even from the most remote parts of the kingdom and - as is being set up now - prana-tracking crystech. Their best feature as far as most Knights are concerned, though, is their onboard recording software that lets them maneuver to get the most dramatic shots for a given moment...something which, as you've discovered over the past week with the periodic use of the drones, can get kinda irritating because the drones care nothing for either distracting their subjects or getting right up in someone's face when they do.

(You aren't allowed to break the drones.)

In any event, after a few moments, Levont activates the camera drones and they start to move, flitting back and forth in kinda 'searching' patterns before hovering over each of your heads to show that they've found you and that the prana tracking is working right.

There are a few awkward minutes of silence, during which you have the opportunity to check the contents of your supply packs (tents, basic rations, a little money, and the like - the Knights aren't so cruel as to throw you completely unequipped into the wilderness), before the first rays of dawn begin to creep over the horizon, and Levont clears his throat and continues in a much more formal, ritualised tone as the camera drones (except his) spread out to start getting establishing shots. "Just as His Majesty the First King marched to Denaya to pray for the mercy of the Dragons, so too will you march to Lomorre. Only that which you fair gather or trade, or that the Dragons have graced you with, is yours to use. You will be conveyed by no beast of burden nor artifice, nor use the name of the Knights to unjustly gain more than you are owed. You will comport yourself as Knights, and serve this Kingdom with every step you take towards being named Knights in truth."  He pauses for a moment to look over the six of you. "Do you accept this charge?"

Once you have all confirmed your agreement, Levont looks back to the gate, waiting for the sunlight to hit the city wall. (One has to wonder what they do when it's cloudy or raining).

"Then your First Trial begins now."

Of course, that doesn't mean you actually have to immediately go anywhere. For one thing, there's one important decision you need to make: do you stick to the roads for a slightly longer and more roundabout journey, but one which will provide you with more options to rest in proper inns and the like (which you...probably don't quite have the money for if you stay in a settlement every night of your two-month hike)? Or do you travel as the crow flies and hike through the wilderness for a more direct path with probably the opportunity to hunt game and forage for food (and get plaudits for doing so), but put up with somewhat less comfortable travel?

Sorin had just started channelling his Semblance to boost Fen's Aura control when the brothers made a break for it.

And, I mean, he could've maintained the effect - he'd been practicing using the boosting aspects of his Semblance at range over the past few months - but since Fen's brothers evidently weren't quite in a state of mind to be patient enough to communicate with her right now, he let it lapse, and followed Fen out. Because it was him, he did stop to check Chapi was okay after being bulled past by the Fable brothers...which also meant he was close enough to notice that she was acting a little...un-Chapi-like.

Since it didn't seem like she particularly wanted to talk about it right now, though, he returned his attention to the Fables. "Yeah, um, it doesn't work the way you're thinking, sorry. I mean, I learned time travel exists today, so I'm not going to say for sure that there aren't parallel universes or alternate realities or anything like that, but time travel doesn't let us access them.

"This is a timeline where Fen never saw her brothers again after you guys told her to run. You guys can't just go back and help her at the time we took you from, because it didn't happen. If it did, she wouldn't have come to save you. From what Professor Brown said, the best case scenario there is that you guys get erased from time - potentially very painfully. The worst case is that Fen and the rest of us suffer the same fate for having some part in the time travel that led to that interference."

He fell quiet for a few moments before continuing. "The fact that she never saw you again means one of three things could've happened. First, you could've been devoured completely by those Nevermores we killed and digested before anyone destroyed them. Second, you could've been rescued - or abducted, if you prefer - by time travellers. And yes, I know that this makes a paradox, but it seems paradoxes are fine so long as they don't actually change what the people travelling through time experienced. Third, you guys survived the Nevermore attack and then chose to never interact with your little sister again, never so much as letting her catch a glimpse of you.

"So, hypothetically, yes, you could go back to your time so long as you never let Fen see you. But there are two problems with that. First, no offence to you guys, but Fen is an amazing Huntress and there is no way you would avoid getting seen by her for years - short of emigrating to Atlas or something, but I'm guessing you were more thinking of protecting her. And second, she just got her big brothers back and I'm like 90% sure she would just knock you guys the heck out to stop you putting yourselves in more danger for her sake."

For some reason, a hiccup with my internet just as I was trying to save one of my sheets gave me the good ol' 'Error logging into sheets system' message, and now I can't save the changes I was making to the sheet because it doesn't know it's me trying to do them (aka I get a 401 error.)

In practice I was only changing like two boxes so it's not like it's a big deal to just do them again, but it would be nice to be able to authenticate with the sheet system without having to leave an open sheet.

EDIT: Remembered the JSON downloader exists and that downloads the current state of the sheet and not its saved state, so that's an easy solution. Still would be nice to have a login button on the sheets.

Josef

Levont...kinda raises an eyebrow slightly at your comment. "I see. And these effects are...unwanted?"  He frowns for a few moments. "You are quite correct that there is nothing a conventional doctor will be able to do to assist you. When you arrive in Lomorre following your First Trial, go to Fort Naoth. The physicians there are trained and equipped to handle Knights with...unusual...physiologies, and will be able to give you more complete advice - and, by then, your soul will have adapted sufficiently to your Blessing that it would be safe for you to undergo a re-Blessing ritual should you decide to attempt to change your Blessing. In the interim...

"Not all injuries will break the skin and thus make themselves noticeable via your thorns, and while as a Blessed Knight you are more resistant to disease than most people, that does not necessarily mean completely immune, and if nothing else unnoticed injuries may hamper your capacity in combat. I suggest you make it a routine to check your body over for injuries you might have suffered without noticing, preferably with the aid of a mirror or your phone to examine areas you cannot normally see. Or, if your embarrassment does not preclude it, asking one of your companions to examine you for wounds."

Tourna let out an apologetic-sounding warble as the Ramenooze suffered the full effect of its wasabi paste. (I mean, one could argue that it was its fault for eating it, but to be fair Tourna had misplaced the stuff in the first place - and as far as it was concerned, the Ramenooze was suffering for its theft just plenty as it was).

After a few moments, it started mixing up another stew - this one milk, fruit, and other generally nice-tasting things, to hopefully take the edge off the poor ooze's...uh, heartburn? Did oozes have hearts? In any case, as it turned out, Tourna would not be needing to worry about such considerations, because the swinging kobolds thwacked it on the back with their harisen and the anti-heartburn stew went splat onto the floor of the boat.

Tourna whistled angrily and hopped up onto the edge of the boat. How impolite of the kobolds when it was trying to help! It washed its spoon off in the boiling water surrounding them - it wasn't going to waste so much as a drop of its milk 'stew' on the rude kobolds - and went to town, swinging at the kobolds like they were so many pinatas!

Spoon Bonk on the Kobold Krew, but angrier this time (WLP + WLP) (HR+6 physical damage)

Lily giggles a bit at the reaction to her Blessing when she meets back up with you. "It wasn't s'posed to just be bubblegum." She kinda leaves it at that for a moment or two before explaining. Back when I was preparing, I was thinking...what kinda knight did I want to be? And...you know, fightin' Demons and all that is great, it protects people, but sometimes it feels like folks just do it for the sake of it, for trophies on their wall and stuff. And I really don't care about all the hoity-toity nobility stuff - uh, no offence, Remy, it just isn't really somethin' I like having to do. So I was settlin' on protecting cities, towns, villages, whatever, but...then I started thinkin', it's not the places we want to protect, it's the people.

"So, that's what I was kinda aiming for. A 'knight of the people.' Even got a crystal tattoo sayin' that in runescript on my back. And for a tithe I took in...all kinds of stuff, everyday stuff. A phone, one of them official photos of the old King Arator, a takeout mug from Jack's Beans -" (the biggest coffee chain in Terat) "- a few newspaper clippings about knights...and yeah, some bubblegum. I figured everyone has habits, this just happens to be mine. Plus a moonstone, since if any Blessing was gonna cobble all that mess together into what I wanted it'd be a Blessing of the Stars.

"But I guess I ain't powerful enough to get the whole whack yet, so instead I just got bubblegum." She gives an idle shrug, apparently none too concerned about this turn of events. "I guess it might be a good thing, in a weird way. Page of the People sounds like a newspaper and Squire of the People makes it seem like I'd be at the beck an' call of the whole dang kingdom."

The groups' respective Blessings all get treated pretty equally by the villagers - which is to say, a lot of excited celebration (and also a lot of hypothesising about what you all used as Tithes). Heather's Blessing probably gets the most confused response, especially when the illusory Laurel pops up in the crowd, and honestly Gen's super-strength gets a slightly more muted reaction because, you know, he already had super-strength and super-speed and in comparison to the ordinary villagers it's a bit hard to tell the difference.

Nonetheless, the conclusion of the Blessing ceremonies is the signal for the celebration to seriously get started. Inevitably you will end up getting dragged into little contests, dances, and all manner of other festivities, but at least for now you're being left alone, giving Archivist Levont the chance to talk to you.

"Greetings, Novices." He gives you another bow, ever-so-subtly deeper than the one he'd done to greet you when you were merely recruits. "On behalf of the Grand Archives, I offer my congratulations to the six of you on your successful Blessing Ceremonies. Now, before you enjoy the celebrations, I will remind you that your First Trial will begin in one week's time. I suggest you use the time to master your Blessings." His eyes might...slightly...flick towards Gen at that. "I will remain in the village for the duration to observe your progress, and will do my best to answer any questions you may have.

"Lastly, I am obliged to reiterate that as Novices, you now represent the kingdom of Terat and its Knights. Your actions will often become a topic of conversation, to be dissected and oft criticised by those who know nothing of which they speak. In large part it is for that reason, to prepare you for when it begins for real, that you will be observed using camera drones for the duration of your First Trial. If you wish, you may borrow the camera drones to record your progress training with your Blessing. Some Novices believe that doing so shows willing to be open and demonstrate their increasing understanding of their powers. Others view it as arrogance or that it risks embarrassing the Knights by showing the fumblings of a new Novice trying to come to terms with their Blessing. Whether you elect to do so is up to you, but bear in mind that once recorded, anything you film cannot be rescinded, and will be released alongside the footage of your First Trial - with the usual caveats of removing irrelevant information and censoring the identities of unrelated civilians.

"With that all said...enjoy the celebrations."

By the power of retcons, another Alchemy pair!

Alchemy d20s

Tourna let out a whistling scream that, kinda sounded a lot like a kettle boiling, accompanied by a few loud honks, as it came tumbling back down and landed in the boat, waving its limbs around dazedly for a few moments before it finally righted itself.

There was a faint plop sound near the boat and it looked around with a quizzical beeping - and then its quizzical beeping suddenly got a lot more alarmed as it realised that as it had been snaffling snacks and storing them in its body, it hadn't had its lid locked when it had gone sailing through the air, leaving all manner of ingredients now raining down into the hot water.

Tourna was now busily rummaging through its body, pulling out a wild variety of ingredients before stuffing them back in with steadily-more-frustrated warblings. The subject of its frustration was its triple-reduced wasabi paste, which - unbeknownst to Tourna - had long since departed its storage and was now floating towards the Ramenooze.

"Thanks, DELORES," Sorin said, as the scene outside the frosted windows changed.

If he was honest, he'd kinda expected Fen to break out her Scroll and start texting like she had before she'd taught them all sign language. But since she was kinda floundering, he came back over to her, unslinging his shield and taking out one of the 'paint' canisters. Remember how I introduced myself when we first met? he signed (also in the new, discreet method). I didn't want to get your hopes up in advance because this'll take a chunk out of my Aura and I didn't know if I'd have enough left after we dealt with the Nevermores, but between Hard Light Dust that's ground this fine and my Semblance I can let you write in the air like that. Kinda like how you taught me to shape Aura feathers, just minus kicking people off of buildings. I figure if anyone's going to be able to convince them what's happened it's probably gonna be you.

Of course, this probably would seem a rather difficult to believe claim that Sorin could do that if you believed that Sorin's Semblance was just illusions and a very good control over his Aura. But Chapi wasn't the only person who hadn't been wholly forthcoming about their Semblance - and after he'd quashed Sorena's emotions during the battle with Apex, he was pretty sure most of the others had realised that there was more to Sorin's Semblance than he let on.

He set his shield down, resting against his leg, and held out both hands - one holding the canister of Hard Light Dust and the other for Fen herself to take, his Aura glinting gold.

Despite the pronouncement of fortune from Heather, Lily's speech doesn't exactly get off to a flying start, as Mayor Malencon peers at her name when it comes out of the tombola machine. "Lil...whoza-whatnow? Whosis?" After a few more random, rambling exclamations, he is eventually reminded that Lily Stria was using the Crystal Pool alongside Greenbrook's recruits and he had agreed to it at the time, which makes him all flustered. "Yes, well, yes, as I was saying, Lily Strael- uh, Strigel, uh..."

(Many of the villagers, who had not known that Lily was coming but who were very aware that the Mayor didn't do well at speeches when something unexpected happened in them like a whole person he'd not practiced for, were doing the polite social equivalent of facepalming, which mostly amounted to awkwardly looking around as though something else might capture attention.)

Nonetheless, Lily eventually does get a chance to give a speech, although she doesn't give much of one. "So, uh, I know you guys aren't here to see me or anything, so I'mma just get this over and done with as quick as Archivist Levont'll let me. (Her accent has gotten noticeably less upper-class since you first met her, presumably as she grew more comfortable with you.) "But what I do want to say is...I've only been here a few minutes and I can see how much you care for each other. Even if I din't have my own reasons for coming here...I'd want to get my Blessing in a place like this over all the fancy-pants picture-perfect ceremony in Strael. This is a good place, with good people, and I'll do you proud carryin' Greenbrook's name. And I'm sorry for buttin' in somewhere I ain't wan- uh, expected."

And whether because the crowd feel sorry for her after Mayor Malencon...kinda ruining her moment or whether something about Heather's Blessing is already working its magic (so to speak), she gets a much bigger round of applause than one might have expected for a total stranger, almost (but not quite) rivalling some of yours'.

When she emerges from the glade, some fifteen minutes later, she draws her dragonblade and ignites it, a beautiful rapier of pale blue, and brings it up in a salute to the crowd before tracing an elegant pattern in the air - and where the tip of her dragonblade passes, a bubbling liquid is left behind, starting to droop before she touches her rapier to the stage and it solidifies into some...slightly wonky writing reading 'Thank You GreenBrook.' It's a nice gesture, but honestly the first thing that any of you notice is the faint minty smell coming from it.

And, I mean, you'd noticed her chewing gum on the VTOL - you weren't allowed to chew gum or anything like that while 'on duty' training at Fort Naoth, but once you formally graduated and were being transported to receive your Blessing, most of the rules and regulations no longer applied - and in fact she'd been doing so more and more as you got closer, like it was a bit of a nervous tic. But there's no way she would've done something so wacky as using chewing gum as a Tithe...right?

Tourna raised its spoon again as it saw Akimbold closing in, with an alarmed warble - only for Santokumaru to leap in the way and block the attacks! The little stewbot capered and whistled for a few moments, before turning its attention to the other kobolds. Maybe it had decided that it shouldn't be interfering in a duel between two masters of culinary martial arts...or maybe it had just decided that Akimbold was too scary for it.

Either way, it scrabbled its way up to the platform where the kobolds were amassed, paused for a moment to grab a handful of the roasted nuts and marshmallows that were going around, chirruping happily - and then went whirling around just like some of the kobolds had been doing before, spoon at the ready - although it had the advantage that its shoulders could rotate the whole way around its body, so it didn't have to get dizzy. Somehow it seemed to end up mostly hitting the kobolds that hadn't given it food.

(Somewhere in the back of its mind, Tourna considered the fact that the kobolds didn't really seem to be on the dragon's side either. Unfortunately that fact immediately got buried under six new ideas for stew.)

Spoon Bonk on the Kobold Krew (WLP + WLP)

I definitely didn't think I'd already made one of these. Not at all.

As you emerge from the VTOL, you are...well, not exactly led through the town per se, there's no-one actually going ahead of you, but there's a pretty obvious path winding its way through the town, taking you past the town square - where you have all manner of foodstuffs and other assorted gifts thrust upon you with only a token consideration to whether or not said foodstuffs are actually portable - past Bill's - where you do not get foodstuffs thrust upon you, because Bill always says he has to make a living, but you do get some waves and a few raised flagons from the people who've started drinking already - past the town school - where you get probably the loudest and most excited cheers from the younger kids and somewhat quieter but probably more genuine cheers from those of your friends who aren't elsewhere along the route - and eventually through to the Crystal Pool.

In bigger settlements, the Crystal Pool is housed in an extravagant building that would rival any noble's estate (and indeed many nobles use the Crystal Pool as a way to flaunt their wealth and status without risking accusations of being tasteless and excessive by decorating their own buildings, because who would ever question paying homage to such a symbol of Terat?), with 24/7 guards preventing anyone from sneaking in. Of course, the Crystal Pool in Demaya is practically a settlement all its own (not that anyone's ever seen it other than the royal family), probably bigger than the entirety of Greenbrook and with a literal army guarding it.

Here, it is still sealed off from the outside, but only by a wooden fence, and it's only guarded when the town watch's patrol happens to take them past. The top of a gazebo that does its best to stave off rain, wind and the like can just about be seen from the outside.

Normally not many people go near the Crystal Pool; even - or perhaps especially - in a village like this, such is the reverence the people of Terat hold for the Pools. Today, though, a large stage is set up pretty much directly on the path, with the great and the good of Greenbrook assembled on seats and Mayor Malencon standing by a lectern with a battered old wooden tombola machine. Normally the families of the new recruits get to sit on the stage as well, but Karl's parents evidently haven't taken up that opportunity, leaving two seats awkwardly and obviously empty - Dimitri isn't there either, but that's because he evidently only got here just before you guys did. Even over the general noise you hear a loud "JOSEF! DRAGONS GUIDE YOU!" and see a waving hand pop up from somewhere in the middle of the crowd...is he wearing clothes styled a little bit to look like a burning club?

...yeah, he totally is.

It's a tradition in Greenbrook for soon-to-be novices to give little speeches before heading back to the Crystal Pool to receive their Blessing, and then show off their newfound power when they return. Originally the speeches were usually just used for people to thank their parents, guardians, teachers and anyone else, but in practice these days the speeches can basically be whatever because the real reason for the speech is for the Pool to be cleansed between recruits. Some particularly confident recruits even use them to announce what they're using as Tithes and what they want their Blessing to be, although for obvious reasons that's best done when you're using a reliable ritual.

Judging from the slightly bewildered, deer-in-headlights look Lily gives as the six of you are shepherded up onto the stage to each wait your turn, the Baron had not actually told her about this particular tradition.

Mayor Malencon rolls the tombola machine around a couple times, rummages in it, and produces a scrap of paper, holding it very close to his face so as to be able to read it (he refuses to wear his spectacles for public ceremonies because he thinks it makes him look old.) "Ahem-hem-hem! Josef Rossi."

***

Once you each give your respective speeches, you are led by Archivist Levont through to the Crystal Pool. It's the first time any of you have ever been there, or even seen a Crystal Pool in person - it's illegal to take photographs or film a Crystal Pool (other than to report a new-sprung one to the authorities), and even during your training you were never shown the one in Fort Naoth. The closest you got was a few sketches that had been done over the years by various Knights, and a dummy Crystal Pool to teach you the ritual of the ceremony.

Neither the sketches nor the stand-in 'pool' can really prepare you for it, though.

The Crystal Pool is often described as being like liquid - that is, after all, where the name comes from - but it's clear even from a momentary glimpse that it's like no mundane liquid. Glittering in a hundred different colours it doesn't just flow or ripple, but dances, intricate, infinite fractal patterns forming across the surface, sometimes raising up a good foot in height or dropping just as far in depth - somehow never spilling a drop over the crude stones that were laid centuries ago to hold the Pool in place. Tiny motes of glimmering light flit around and above the pool like hundreds of insects, and they react to your arrival, spinning and whirling in apparent excitement.

Weaving their way around the gazebo, and growing hither and yon across the unkempt grass around the Crystal Pool, are ley-crystals, pure and unadulterated. Gathering such is one of the privileges of becoming a Novice, though while you're allowed to use them to forge dragonsteel equipment to replace the generic stuff you were given by the Archives, you aren't allowed to sell them until you are officially Knighted.

By the time each of you enters, Archivist Levont has left a ritually purified robe neatly folded on a tree stump (which is almost completely coated in a crystal sheen). Some Novices change back into their normal clothes before leaving the Crystal Pool's glade, others stay in their robes (especially if they're concerned about damaging their clothes with their new powers); there's no real requirement either way other than not leaving anything behind in the glade.

The procedure is for you to change into the robe (okay technically you can also just wear nothing at all, but while it's not much different to a ritual robe from a mystical perspective, that option is even less common than people choosing to stay in their non-purified, mundane clothes), and then either cast your Tithes into the Crystal Pool or - more uncommonly - place them on a ley-crystal plant and allow them to be absorbed before entering yourself. The Blessing itself begins as soon as you fully submerge yourself. There are dozens of rumours about specific permutations resulting in better Blessings - should you throw the Tithes in as hard as you can, or just gently place them? Should you walk gently into the pool or dive in? And so on - but the official position of the Archives is that there's no difference.

Once each of you touches the Crystal Pool, it takes hold of you. Not with any serious force - you could easily get free if you wanted to - but there's a definite physical pull trying to gently tow you into the centre of the Pool, and the more you submerge yourself, the stronger the pull gets. The Pool is much, much steeper than you might have thought from its appearance, and by the time you're barely halfway to the centre you could easily be fully submerged, though the Pool doesn't actually try to pull you under. If anything it keeps you afloat, and you have to actively submerge yourself to have anything above your neck go below the surface of the Pool.

Once you do, though, you sink - incredibly fast, and somehow it feels like the Pool is a dozen, maybe a hundred times bigger than it was a moment earlier. You can still breathe just fine...although if you think about it carefully, you might come to realise that you simply aren't needing to breathe, oxygen being supplied to your body through some means far more ethereal than mere lungs.

And then your consciousnesses drift away as the Blessing begins. The entire ceremony is swathed to some extent in secrecy, but the Blessing itself even more so. Nobody ever speaks about what they experience during the Blessing, so as little prepared as you were to see a Crystal Pool in person...the Blessing is a more unearthly experience still.

It's impossible to tell how long the Blessing ceremony takes - at least, to its participants. Those of you on the outside can tell that each of you spends about twenty minutes in the glade, which would translate roughly to about ten minutes in the Pool proper plus time to change, harvest the ley-crystals with the new strength your Blessing gives you (if Gen tries beforehand he discovers that as powerful as his Oleimian blood makes him, the ley-crystals don't yield to it any more than they would mundane human strength), and generally spend at least a minute or so figuring out the general basics of your powers - which are, fortunately, for the most part quite instinctual - before you return.

Sorin let out a sigh of relief as the Nevermores faded. "Well, that went pretty -" *fwip* "...and I'm in here now. Okay then."

He paused for a moment in confusion as he saw Fen aiming above her brothers' heads with her rifle. Leaving aside the fact that your brothers have probably had plenty of weapons pointed at them for one day - he still needed to apologise for that, but that could come later - maybe we should check with Dr Brown and that weird egg thing before we leave that this has actually worked and we haven't destabilised time by leaving Dust-weapon damage all over the forest?

He wasn't sure there was a...massive amount of point in actually trying to trick the Fables, especially since one of them had already recognised the present-day (or was it future?) Fen. But he wasn't going to start disagreeing about it right now.

Sorin hopped off Delores and flitted over to Nicoale with a beat of his golden wings, raising his shield in time to repel the feathers that were coming her way with a pulse of Wind Dust before landing on whatever the toughest-looking branches were. "Right, then. Let's...try...this."

His golden Aura feathers vanished, the golden light flowing into his weapon like it was running down a plughole as, with his free hand, he activated one after another of his Dust reservoirs. Fire, Water, Electric, Hard Light...it all fused into a single ball of energy that seemed barely contained by Sorin's aura, not entirely unlike a form he'd used a long time ago - and then he unleashed it, firing a single beam of brilliant light at the worse-damaged Nevermore before letting the recoil spin him into place to fire at the second.

"You are quite welcome," Archivist Levont says to Heather, once he's stopped the drone recording. Other than that, though, he doesn't respond to any of your other comments (he does take note of Remy's surname, but he knew who was coming so it's not like it's a surprise.)

"Yep, that's me," Lily nods, with an embarrassed little chuckle. "Recruit Lily Stria, at least for one more day. And, uh, you know...sorry for intruding on your village and all. I got, uh...let's say family problems."

"And no, I've never been. Baron Gerente told me a little bit, but that's it." After a moment, she looks over to Karl. "Is, um...is he okay?" she asks, quietly.

***

Something as minor as a recruit's wooziness, however, isn't enough to stop the regimented logistics of the Knights, and so once you've each received and confirmed your Tithes, you climb back aboard the VTOL and soar into the sky, landing at the Baron's estate late at night - nonetheless, and probably much to the anemic Karl's relief, you get a sizeable meal courtesy of the Baron, and spaces in the barracks to rest (which are, I mean, still just barracks, but are nonetheless a little better quality than what you'd been dealing with for the past year or thereabouts at Fort Naoth.) You only briefly see the Baron himself, when he arrives to see you off in the morning - and do a few last formalities around Lily undergoing the Blessing ritual at Greenbrook.

You guys can't actually see out of the VTOL (it does have big doors that can slide open for combat landings and such, but they aren't open for journeys like this), so the only way you have of tracking your progress is a small map on a screen at one end of the VTOL's interior - and the occasional announcements from the pilot. "We'll be coming into land at Greenbrook shortly," crackles over the intercom.

Of course, the VTOLs are combat vehicles. They can practically fall out of the sky to land if needed. In this case, though, the pilot banks the VTOL around in what is clearly a dramatic circle around the village before touching down so smoothly it's almost impossible to notice the landing.

And then, after a dozen seconds or so (perhaps to allow you to make sure you're presentable for your arrival) the doors slide open, revealing a riot of colour and noise from the Blessing-day celebrations - and the cheers of the villagers greeting the five successful Recruits, an unprecedented number from such a small village.

Thus, just before midday on Darkday of Star's Opal, almost a year since the five of you had left Greenbrook, you return home.