The Ballad of Adler Young, Canto 2.5

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SpoilerYARR there be pictures https://www.patreon.com/posts/42505952 or https://adleryoung.tumblr.com

>Adler: This pseudo conversation awkwardly patters forward for some time.
>Adler: Realize this will go on forever if you let it. Ask for a face-to-face meeting.

Ash Marten and I traded inanities via the Voice of the Forest for what seemed like hours.

"Tell him I said, That's what she said," I sighed, in reply to the meaningless tidbit that had just been relayed to me.

"Ash Marten says ROTFFLMFDTO," the trees rustled wearily a few minutes later.  "Incidentally, how long are you going to keep this going, sir?"

"Tell him I said, This is getting tedious, let's talk in person," I declared.

After an interval of rustling, the answer came back:  "Ash Marten says, Scry me."

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"I can't do that right now," I grumbled.  "Accessing the scry orb requires that I go into Faerie, and there's a time discrepancy between the worlds which might cause me to miss something important!  Once I figure out how to properly control the Gate, then I'll be able to scry, but not before!  Tell Ash I said ... uh ... just explain the situation to him."

There was an even longer interval while the trees parsed that message and relayed it.  I paced the circle while I waited.  Eventually a reply came rustling back:  "Ash Marten says Hey, no prob, I'll be around whenever your ready.  Meanwhile you can talk to Lysander.  C-ya!"

Lysander: You see the gold and are very enticed also when you see those cute bug creatures you grab your butterfly net to try and catch one.
Ixie: give this lowfolk scum a small zap but it was too much of one and knock him out.
Vernier: Proceed to drag the man all the way to the forest

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I jumped at the sudden sound of someone crashing through the bushes, and turned to behold Vernier dragging an unconscious person.

"Give me a hand with this guy, would you?" she grunted.

"Back so soon?" I babbled in astonishment.  "Who is that?"

"It's been several hours," Vernier grunted, dropping the monkey unceremoniously on the ground inside the circle.  "And this is Lysander.  You ordered me to fetch him, remember?"

"Is he drunk?" I asked suspiciously.

"He could be, for all I know - but that's not the reason he's passed out.  His eyes glinted when I showed him the gold, and they glinted even more when he spotted your bug-servants.  He tried to catch one with a butterfly net."

"We zapped the churl for his insolence," Typantronn reported.  "Twas meant to be a warning zap, but we did not properly co-ordinate our efforts, and the cumulative force rendered him unconscious."

"And heavy as a sack of bricks," Vernier added.