One Through Ten

If the Lords all check in via their Answer Stones first before physically arriving here, can you fend 'em off that way?

What we know about this Will:
"one of the lords would be the next ruler, and who it was was to be announced after all other parts of The Will were carried out."
" if any [Lords] attempted to threaten or harm The Lawyer or steal The Will to make the process go faster, they would be barred from receiving any of the gifts The Will would have bestowed upon them, including the potential kingship.""
some guy called Stumpus currently has the Will. The Lawyer was sent portions at a time to execute, so technically the Will is still in the process of getting the point where eventually an heir will be named.

Unless it's like, a magical Will where it won't unlock the later information before we resolve the earlier, then Stumpus (who holds the whole Will) should be able to skip to the end and just find out who it's supposed to be, barring whatever conditionals might have been laid out in earlier parts of the will? In conclusion,

>Seconding Wichtel's suggestion to get the scoop on Stumpus ASAP.

>Five, which of the lords and ladies is most likely to respond first to the Signal Stone
>And which is most trustworthy

wait a second who is Stumpus
If they are trustworthy enough for what The Lawyer was doing then they are trustworthy enough to contact first

>Contact this Stumpus at once!

>Contact this Stumpus at once!

wait a second who is Stumpus
If they are trustworthy enough for what The Lawyer was doing then they are trustworthy enough to contact first

>Seconding Wichtel's suggestion to get the scoop on Stumpus ASAP.

Wait, wait... who's Stumpus? Can we contact Stumpus? Maybe contacting Stumpus would be a good idea.

Or a very, very bad idea, depending on who they are.

They all simultaneously realize that they have no damn clue who Stumpus is. It's not a member of the castle staff, nor anyone who visits or corresponds with the castle regularly. They read and, if they can, answer, all letters that come into the castle to minimize the amount of work on The Lawyer, so a letter from some 'Stumpus' would have been seen. This means that they must have been communicating magically. The secrecy they could understand after all, The Will is incredibly important, but this certainly makes things more difficult.

... Maybe someone should prepare some defenses in case of attack.

Eight walks off.
"Ok, you guys, we all know I'm not the most...diplomatic soul."
The others agree.
"So, I'm gonna go rouse the guards and give 'em a summary of what's happened. Keep this place on lock down, and make sure if any of The Lords decide to show up without contacting first, we'll see 'em, and I'll try and give y'all some warning through the hivemind. Stay frosty, sibs."

She exits.

((Note: Remember, just because she's leaving doesn't mean you can't check in on what she's doing at the same time of the others.))



And then, almost as if on cue, five of the ten answer stones alight. The other five are either already on their way or haven't noticed yet. One quickly rushes over and casts a quick concealing charm on The Lawyer's body. They're going to have to answer soon, and it's going to take a while to clean up all that blood.

"Ok, so." Five says.
" Mr.Bartholomew, King Killabillun, Chief Penuri, Oracle Moira, and Elder Wythe aren't calling right now. We could call THEM if we wanted to, but... frankly, Bartholomew is the only one there that doesn't completely creep me out."

"High Mage Vera, Head Scientist Anna, Hosts Donny & Penny, Lady Paloma, and Captain Wisp ARE calling and we should probably get to them as soon as possible. We could take it one at a time, with any one of us, or all of us, talking to them, or open up the answer stones all at once and just have a group call if we just wanted to get it over with. However, that could easily result in them fighting. Out of all of them, I'd suspect Vera to be the most. Uh. Difficult. Captain Wisp is probably going to be the friendliest, but also the most patient. They might react differently depending on which one of us answers, too..."

So. Who will it be?

((Note: If you guys don't remember the descriptions of The Lords, I understand completely. There's some short summaries of them in this post. ))

Typos:
extra [\color] at the end of your post,
"((Note: Remember, just because she's leaving doesn't mean you can't check in on what she's doing at the same time of the others.))"

Let's not insult the Lords by making them wait. Answer the calls before making any. Remember that with the Lawyer dead, they are 100% allowed to commit violence against you (make sure not to bring this up while talking to them).

Vera should talk to One (easily slighted with level headed) or Six (Pushy with someone who isn't very active in conversation)
Anna should talk to Five (science with science)
Donny & Peeny should talk to Four (cool with cool)... except Four is dead so this is hard. Just as long as it's not One or Five. I think the two of them will count as boring/uninteresting and not do well. Sorry!
Paloma should talk to Two (sensitive with polite)
Wisp should talk to someone who is cheery, to match. (Looks like ideal would be Three but....)

Is it possible to answer all of them without them being able to hear each other? It would be ideal to answer every call as fast as possible. Too bad none of the alliances (that's what the green lines are, right?) are calling at the same time.

Were you each designed to have a counterpart lord? They seem like they would line up pretty neatly with the original 10 of you.

(typos corrected! Thank you!)

(And yes, the alliances are in green)

(...Ok and while I'm constantly editing this post to make clarifications, only one Lord can be answered at a time; they can hear and see any other answer stone projection in the room. Opening more than one would create a group call. Also, if you guys don't have any preference for which Lord to answer first, I'll just go from left to right, so, starting with Vera.)

I vote Paloma and wisp on conference call, as they're allies and we have to get through this queue of nobles fast

>Two should talk with the Head Scientist, that is sure

everybody just talk to the person who's the same color as you

I don't particularly care about order, but I guess start with Vera. If she's easily slighted, waiting is only going to make that conversation worse faster.

Sort of Typo: Panuri's orb is lit up, but he's not calling. The Hosts are calling, but their orb is not lit.

(Actually that IS the hosts orb- Penuri's is the brown one fifth from the left and The Host's one is the yellow one fourth from the right.)

I vote Paloma and wisp on conference call, as they're allies and we have to get through this queue of nobles fast

>for each call have the most generally neutral person answer
>ask them to wait for one of their allied nobles to also respond
>in other words to speak to each party they muse have an allied noble with them for transparency
>inform them that while the will has been read the formal announcements must be drafted, and that will take a bit longer
>how much longer is currently being worked at, but an estimate can be reached after every pair of nobles is spoken to
>couples do not count

The plan here is to stall as much as possible while having a reasonable reason.
If asked why they are in pairs it is to ensure that there are no lies about what was said, what was specified, and in general a sense of trust and transparency due to the fact that this is a will, and they are typically done in groups.
As such each "call" will be 'recorded' to avoid allied parties to try lying.

Also:
>At some point of each call state something along the lines of "stump us" and make it sound like stumpus. Gauge each person's reactions and scale them from least to most suspicious.
>Same thing goes for "toxic" or some variation to gauge each caller for potential guilt on poisoning

>ask them to wait for one of their allied nobles to also respond
>in other words to speak to each party they muse have an allied noble with them for transparency

What about Head Scientist Anna? She doesn't have any allies. And Lady Paloma is the only ally of both Elder Wythe and Captain Wisp, so she has to answer the phone twice.

> Call High Mage Vera first, then Paloma or Wisp and have the one we call tell the other personally about it.

>At some point of each call state something along the lines of "stump us" and make it sound like stumpus. Gauge each person's reactions and scale them from least to most suspicious.
>Same thing goes for "toxic" or some variation to gauge each caller for potential guilt on poisoning

>This is good plan. Do this.
>Which means whoever does the talking has to be clever, subtle, and good at social interactions.

For the record, I still believe we should be picking individuals to talk based on their persona rather than the same for each noble. People who the Hosts like to talk to, for example, probably wouldn't be well liked by Mr. Bartholomew.

One and her siblings weren't specifically created to work well with one noble; creating a Servant is hard enough, determining it's personality is near impossible. That being said though, they've managed to have friendly conversations with each of The Lords before.



One in particular has had more friendly interactions with Vera than most. The High Mage is also the most impatient of the callers', and so she thinks it'd be most important to answer her first. The stone is answered.





The answer stone fizzles before flaring to life.

"THERE you are, servant! Felt like you kept me waiting for over a WEEK!"
"I assure you, High Mage, you were the first one I answered. "
"Good! Who else is calling, anyway?"
"Not too many. Captain Wisp, The Hosts, Lady Palo-"
"Ugh, the rat. Don't even bother with that one, I say."
"...I'll keep that in mind, High Mage. As for the signal you just received, I'm afraid it was a...stumping fluke. Sheerly accidental, my deepest apologies for-"
"Oh, I doubt The Lawyer carking it was an accident, but whatever floats your boat."

There is a brief moment of silence.

"I'm sorry, High Mage, I'm afraid I don't- I don't-"
"Don't play stupid, Servant. I'm not allowed to HARM The Lawyer, but nobody said anything about a couple spying spells. I've been keeping tabs, and ya'll are in some hot water now."
"...I... yes. We were hoping to keep this situation under wraps, avoid causing unecessary panic until The Will could be properly completed."
"Ooh, keeping the word from spreading about The Lawyer's little... toxic accident? Sure, I'd be willing to help you with that!"



"You guys would just have to owe me a little favor."

((Sorry for the late update! I've been really busy with work lately.))

>As long as it doesn't go against the Lawyer's wishes of fair will executing, due respect must be given to parent sloths

>As long as it doesn't go against the Lawyer's wishes of fair will executing, due respect must be given to parent sloths

Lack of fairness is almost everything we have to offer. Perhaps making it so long as it doesn't go against the letter of the Will?

Also so long as the future favor isn't not doing a favor for someone else. (Asking for something that interferes with the utility of someone else's favor is fair game) We might find ourselves owing ten favors at the end of the day.

>Well, no harm in listening to her proposition.
>The favor turns out to be a strange one. She's planning something, but what?

we can hardly accept or refuse when we don't know what the favor is

I think High Mage Vera means the arbitrary future kind of favor, not the immediate kind. The kind where she can call us up fifty years later, call it in, and then we do it.
Unfortunately, fraud and breaches of confidentiality are all that we can trade in.

Examples of favors include pretending you don't notice what is happening on a given day, not [/i]looking into something, telling her next time some enemy of hers is granted a something before the enemy is informed, fudging numbers.

Considering what spreading the word entails, refusing is not an option.

We accept.

"Well, your offer certainly sounds... intriguing. What exactly did you need done?"


"Oh, well. It's not really a 'specific task I need done' so much as 'I'm blackmailing you, do whatever I say and I don't spill your little secret.' Make sense?"

"...Yes. And what sort of things did you have in mind for "whatever I say"?"

"Oooh, well. I'll want you to put in some... little extra things in the will for me. Oh, and take some for other people out! Can you do assassinations? And maybe send in one of your little 'siblings' to...help me with some things. Oh, and do you guys still have some of those winterfest macaroons in the pantry? I still can't get the recipe right and I have some cravings."

Tell her that manipulating the Will is a) probably impossible for you and the siblings and b) would count as tampering and blame would pretty squarely fall on the extortioner, excluding her from her share of the inheritance.

Let her know the proclamation of the Lawyer's death would be a huge headache, but that it won't throw the Kingdom into war+instability as she seems to be hankering for (wow, treasonous) as your master appears to have organised for this eventuality. Don't tell her any more about Stumpus (including how little you know about the guy) unless she offers information. Y'know, what with all these threats to the Will's safe execution their personal details (whereabouts, motivations, extancy) being a matter of utmost secrecy.

You'll have to hang up on the High Mage and address those other Lords, but she's welcome to call again if she can offer any assistance in regards to who killed the Lawyer with those rad divination+scrying magics of hers. Picking up a share of one Lord's lost inheritance has to be a better gain for Vera than whatever pieces she's hoping to pick up after the whole place has been ravaged by war, right?

Tell her that manipulating the Will is a) probably impossible for you and the siblings and b) would count as tampering and blame would pretty squarely fall on the extortioner, excluding her from her share of the inheritance.

Let her know the proclamation of the Lawyer's death would be a huge headache, but that it won't throw the Kingdom into war+instability as she seems to be hankering for (wow, treasonous) as your master appears to have organised for this eventuality. Don't tell her any more about Stumpus (including how little you know about the guy) unless she offers information. Y'know, what with all these threats to the Will's safe execution their personal details (whereabouts, motivations, extancy) being a matter of utmost secrecy.

You'll have to hang up on the High Mage and address those other Lords, but she's welcome to call again if she can offer any assistance in regards to who killed the Lawyer with those rad divination+scrying magics of hers. Picking up a share of one Lord's lost inheritance has to be a better gain for Vera than whatever pieces she's hoping to pick up after the whole place has been ravaged by war, right?

don't play the bolded angle. play the italicized one. we actually have the leverage here and she doesn't even realize it. the only reason she'd be trying this underhanded stuff is if she believes she has more to gain this way than in the ensuing instability. otherwise she would have gone ahead and run her mouth. "go ahead and blab," we say. "have fun with your empire of ashes." in a war of this scale, even the winner will lose.

as a back-up plan, is there some way we can cast doubt on her testimony with the others?