RE: The Search for Santinal
06-25-2012, 01:43 PM
Despite the ignominious reputation of the city, Khagash had fairly robust economy. Although magical industrialization had some less-than-desirable effects (namely a small populace, high crime rates, really shitty beer), people still found enough motivation to set up various markets, boutiques, and whatnot – catering to every need to want from groceries, utility services, and less than legal arsenal. To sum it up sufficiently, Khagash had a lot of stores. Noctilucent loved stores. If the day was more casual, he would take his fine time to mosey around – see the sights and see the things.
“Sorry!” The streak of blue said he bumped into one very annoyed pedestrian. “Oh, I’m sorry!” He accidentally angled into a rather pudgy (and irritated) fisherman. “Sorry!” As though he was in a pinball machine, Noctilucent kept on smashing into random people and the more stationary objects retrospect, these frequent accidents (along with the apologies) could have been avoided all together if he would have slowed down and looked both ways. However, excitement had superseded common sense and polite sensibilities. He had to go to the bar. He had to know what the delicious surprise was.
You could say he was on a mission.
Namely, the mission to gain an Interesting Experience. The capitalization of his goal is symbolic of how much importance he placed on the apparent reward and the importance was there was for a reason. Noctilucent had hit a certain nodule of his indeterminate life span where everything he used to be okay with feels like a dead end – which was pretty much something considering he practically worshipped repetition and monotony. No joy. No progress. No excitement. Nothing ever happened and boy, was Noctilucent frazzled. He had to fix this and what the flyer had promised seemed to solve his apparent problems (especially with the treasure part).
“Oy.”
Noctilucent skidded to a violent halt. As he pulled himself together, the sentient phenomenon found a very voluminous beard focusing into his view. The texture (and the smell) was unmistakable. This was definitely the facial hair of a noble dwarf.
“Can’t you watch where you going,” the beard talked.
“Oh okay.” Noctilucent decided it would be rather prudent to lean back maybe a couple of inches or so. Feeling a bit embarrassed, the anomaly decided to busy himself by reading the flyer for the fiftieth time. It was not that difficult of an endeavor considering Noctilucent was a very speedy reader and the paper was not exactly a novella. “Sorry about that.”
“You don’t need to be sorry,” the dwarf sighed, making the physics-defying phenomenon jolt from high-strung nervousness. A heavy silence fell between the two as the awkwardness from the near-collision settled in. After about a few simple seconds, the dwarf decided to interrupt the silence. “So what are you looking for?”
“Oh,” Noctilucent piped from the flyer. “Something.”
“Well,” the dwarf leaned forward on his stand. “What are you looking for.”
“Something,” the dab of blue poked his head into the flyer again.
“You aren’t going to tell?”
“It’s nothing really.”
“Well, I am pretty sure this ‘Santinal’ is not exactly what you call ‘nothing.’”
“Holy crap,” Noctilucent darted from his flyer and made an expression (?) of pleasant surprise. “How did you know what I was looking for?”
“Well,” the dwarf grumbled as he crossed his arms and began to rub at his temples. Noticulent had no idea why he had done that. Perhaps, the dwarf was some sort of psychic, which would be pretty interesting. However from what he had read, bona-fide psychic dwarves had not existed in history before, but hey, this might be a first time happening! Which would be really interesting indeed. “Look at that.”
Noctilucent followed the dwarf’s finger to a colorful flyer stamped on the dwarf’s stand (judging from the goods the stall was offering, he was apparently some sort of butcher). The writing was clearly in elven hands – and rather similar to the tattered paper in his invisible hands. The dimensional entity decided to take a closer look at the nailed advertisement:
Well, it was the exact same message on the paper he had! What a pleasant (and redundant) surprise. The quest was closer to completion than Noctilucent had previously thought, especially since the dwarf pointed out directions. “Troll’s Head is up the road, that-a-away – if you want to know of course.”
“How do you know the answers before I ask the questions?” Noctilucent was awed by the dwarf’s courtesy. “Are you some sort of psychic?”
“No.” the dwarf sighed again. “It’s just that there was bit of hubbub about this ‘Santinal’ thing especially since a dragon came and asked for directions--”
“Wait, wait,” Noctilucent interrupted. “A dragon?”
“Yeah, a big one.” The dwarf stretched his arms to show how gargantuan the flying reptile was. “With wings wrapped all weird about his body like a blanket.”
“Holy crap,” the wavy blue smudge declared. “I need to see this. Thank you bye.”
Not even waiting for the dwarf to shake his head, Noctilucent practically bolted off to his destination. The roads were hazardously unlevel and incredibly ill-constructed, but that did not stall the speedy space-weirdo – especially since he had no legs (and “walking” to him was basically gliding along).
Eventually, he managed to reach the destination (along with the partially completed sign). Despite his high velocity, Noctilucent manage to slip in safely without any attention, especially since most eyes were on the colloquial elephant of the room – namely, the dragon in the bar.
“Sorry!” The streak of blue said he bumped into one very annoyed pedestrian. “Oh, I’m sorry!” He accidentally angled into a rather pudgy (and irritated) fisherman. “Sorry!” As though he was in a pinball machine, Noctilucent kept on smashing into random people and the more stationary objects retrospect, these frequent accidents (along with the apologies) could have been avoided all together if he would have slowed down and looked both ways. However, excitement had superseded common sense and polite sensibilities. He had to go to the bar. He had to know what the delicious surprise was.
You could say he was on a mission.
Namely, the mission to gain an Interesting Experience. The capitalization of his goal is symbolic of how much importance he placed on the apparent reward and the importance was there was for a reason. Noctilucent had hit a certain nodule of his indeterminate life span where everything he used to be okay with feels like a dead end – which was pretty much something considering he practically worshipped repetition and monotony. No joy. No progress. No excitement. Nothing ever happened and boy, was Noctilucent frazzled. He had to fix this and what the flyer had promised seemed to solve his apparent problems (especially with the treasure part).
“Oy.”
Noctilucent skidded to a violent halt. As he pulled himself together, the sentient phenomenon found a very voluminous beard focusing into his view. The texture (and the smell) was unmistakable. This was definitely the facial hair of a noble dwarf.
“Can’t you watch where you going,” the beard talked.
“Oh okay.” Noctilucent decided it would be rather prudent to lean back maybe a couple of inches or so. Feeling a bit embarrassed, the anomaly decided to busy himself by reading the flyer for the fiftieth time. It was not that difficult of an endeavor considering Noctilucent was a very speedy reader and the paper was not exactly a novella. “Sorry about that.”
“You don’t need to be sorry,” the dwarf sighed, making the physics-defying phenomenon jolt from high-strung nervousness. A heavy silence fell between the two as the awkwardness from the near-collision settled in. After about a few simple seconds, the dwarf decided to interrupt the silence. “So what are you looking for?”
“Oh,” Noctilucent piped from the flyer. “Something.”
“Well,” the dwarf leaned forward on his stand. “What are you looking for.”
“Something,” the dab of blue poked his head into the flyer again.
“You aren’t going to tell?”
“It’s nothing really.”
“Well, I am pretty sure this ‘Santinal’ is not exactly what you call ‘nothing.’”
“Holy crap,” Noctilucent darted from his flyer and made an expression (?) of pleasant surprise. “How did you know what I was looking for?”
“Well,” the dwarf grumbled as he crossed his arms and began to rub at his temples. Noticulent had no idea why he had done that. Perhaps, the dwarf was some sort of psychic, which would be pretty interesting. However from what he had read, bona-fide psychic dwarves had not existed in history before, but hey, this might be a first time happening! Which would be really interesting indeed. “Look at that.”
Noctilucent followed the dwarf’s finger to a colorful flyer stamped on the dwarf’s stand (judging from the goods the stall was offering, he was apparently some sort of butcher). The writing was clearly in elven hands – and rather similar to the tattered paper in his invisible hands. The dimensional entity decided to take a closer look at the nailed advertisement:
LOOKING FOR SANTINAL?
SO AM I.
If you want a good wizard on your side - and who doesn't? - come and see me, Quick Cloudmoon. I'll be waiting at the Troll's Head tavern.SO AM I.
Well, it was the exact same message on the paper he had! What a pleasant (and redundant) surprise. The quest was closer to completion than Noctilucent had previously thought, especially since the dwarf pointed out directions. “Troll’s Head is up the road, that-a-away – if you want to know of course.”
“How do you know the answers before I ask the questions?” Noctilucent was awed by the dwarf’s courtesy. “Are you some sort of psychic?”
“No.” the dwarf sighed again. “It’s just that there was bit of hubbub about this ‘Santinal’ thing especially since a dragon came and asked for directions--”
“Wait, wait,” Noctilucent interrupted. “A dragon?”
“Yeah, a big one.” The dwarf stretched his arms to show how gargantuan the flying reptile was. “With wings wrapped all weird about his body like a blanket.”
“Holy crap,” the wavy blue smudge declared. “I need to see this. Thank you bye.”
Not even waiting for the dwarf to shake his head, Noctilucent practically bolted off to his destination. The roads were hazardously unlevel and incredibly ill-constructed, but that did not stall the speedy space-weirdo – especially since he had no legs (and “walking” to him was basically gliding along).
Eventually, he managed to reach the destination (along with the partially completed sign). Despite his high velocity, Noctilucent manage to slip in safely without any attention, especially since most eyes were on the colloquial elephant of the room – namely, the dragon in the bar.