Re: The Great Belligerency [Round 3: Eternity Plateau]
08-11-2011, 03:06 AM
Originally posted on MSPA by MalkyTop.
Minotaurus gave no outward reaction, but Ambrose certainly did. Nothing should have really surprised her anymore, but a talking crow making a poor first impression on her crossed some sort of invisible line.
“What the hell is that?” she spluttered out. Some big test of strength, she could deal with. But this was just surreal.
“I’m right here,” the crow said crossly. “If you’re going to talk about someone behind their back, why not actually talk behind their back instead of in front of them?”
“Sorry,” Ambrose instinctively replied before realizing she was apologizing to a crow.
“Forget about it. I’m just a crow. Don’t really have much of a name. You gonna pick this up or what?” Neither of them moved as the crow hopped agitatedly on the hilt.
“Excuse me for hesitating,” rumbled Minotaurus, “but I’m a bit reluctant about grabbing an ancient, god-killing weapon inside a chamber with no obvious guardian or traps. Besides you, Crow.”
“What? Me?” Everything the crow squawked sounded vaguely insulting. “I’m no guardian! Or I guess I sort of am! But yeah, I wouldn’t put it past them to have some stupid trap right here, huh?”
“You don’t…actually…know?” Ambrose said skeptically.
“Birds have needs, even the ones that happen to be folktale heroes.” Here, the bird puffed out its chest in pride. “So, yeah, I left this place alone for a while. Wasn’t like I knew some surviving god’d come across it and get the brilliant idea of building this whole thing around it! Nobody wants to guard some ol’ sword forever and ever, y’know!”
“Do you at least know what would happen if we took the sword right now?” Minotaurus asked, sounding quite disgruntled.
“Nope!” the crow replied, much too cheerfully for comfort. “But hey, I know what y’all’re up to! You can just take this thing whenever you figure out what to do.”
The two glanced at each other briefly. It was a shared look of disbelief and annoyance.
“I don’t see what exactly is so special about this sword that it can kill gods,” Ambrose suddenly said.
“Well,” replied the crow, eyes glinting with humor. “If you stick around here, maybe you’ll see.”
“We’re wasting time,” Minotaurus grunted.
“I’ll say!” the crow added, though the two didn’t bother listening to him. It flapped away as the bull-headed man grasped the hilt. “Who even cares what’ll happen! That just makes things more exciting!”
The sword groaned out of its place, sliding roughly out of the slot. As soon as it was free, the whole room shook. The ornate pedestal itself rose, the floor beneath it breaking apart to reveal that the pedestal had in fact been connected to a giant snake-like beast wearing a fancy helmet.
“Thieves!” it screamed. “Trespassers and thieves!”
“Who’s the thief?!” the crow roared back in anger, swooping down to scratch at its eyes.
Minotaurus hefted the sword experimentally in one hand. “Perhaps we can see what’s so special about this sword now.”
“No!” the crow said, still blinding the snake-beast. “You can’t kill him! It involves the lore of the land and such—just leave him to me!”
There was the quite obvious problem that the snake-beast was a monstrous size while the crow was simply crow-sized. But any distraction was a welcome distraction, even if it was bound to be short, and Minotaurus ran out of the room, followed closely by Ambrose. The stone underneath their feet continued to shake as they rushed past all the obstacles they had overcome not too long ago.
As soon as they escaped the temple, it tilted halfway into the ground and collapsed. The two barely looked back. The crow hadn’t done much to endear them to it and though it acted as though it knew what they were doing, ultimately, they were about to give it to someone who, more likely than not, would not use it in the way the crow would want it to be used. In the end, the crow was just a foolish figure acting as a wise one.
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There was no other place to go besides the village to the east. It was preferable to get to an inhabited area full of people who probably didn’t want to kill him and he only knew of two inhabited areas, one of which that was full of assholes. So Cole really had no choice.
Still, he couldn’t help but notice how useless of a direction ‘east’ was when he didn’t know which way was east. And he couldn’t go back and ask the pompous asses which way to go. Not after walking out like that.
The sun was high enough in the sky that he couldn’t tell which way it was going and whether it was even rising or setting, so he couldn’t use that. And, tempting as it was, going off in a random direction in a place like this was a good way of getting lost.
He went in a random direction anyways.
If this were a movie, the scene would then pan out to show which direction the village really was, thus frustrating the viewers as they watched the protagonist blissfully head in the opposite direction. But it’s not. The closest thing to a movie it was would be the narrative running through Soft’s mind. And she was indeed quite frustrated. She might have even been tempted to shout ‘The other way, doofus,’ though nobody would have heard her.
At least the god-killing weapon was now in play, though.
Minotaurus gave no outward reaction, but Ambrose certainly did. Nothing should have really surprised her anymore, but a talking crow making a poor first impression on her crossed some sort of invisible line.
“What the hell is that?” she spluttered out. Some big test of strength, she could deal with. But this was just surreal.
“I’m right here,” the crow said crossly. “If you’re going to talk about someone behind their back, why not actually talk behind their back instead of in front of them?”
“Sorry,” Ambrose instinctively replied before realizing she was apologizing to a crow.
“Forget about it. I’m just a crow. Don’t really have much of a name. You gonna pick this up or what?” Neither of them moved as the crow hopped agitatedly on the hilt.
“Excuse me for hesitating,” rumbled Minotaurus, “but I’m a bit reluctant about grabbing an ancient, god-killing weapon inside a chamber with no obvious guardian or traps. Besides you, Crow.”
“What? Me?” Everything the crow squawked sounded vaguely insulting. “I’m no guardian! Or I guess I sort of am! But yeah, I wouldn’t put it past them to have some stupid trap right here, huh?”
“You don’t…actually…know?” Ambrose said skeptically.
“Birds have needs, even the ones that happen to be folktale heroes.” Here, the bird puffed out its chest in pride. “So, yeah, I left this place alone for a while. Wasn’t like I knew some surviving god’d come across it and get the brilliant idea of building this whole thing around it! Nobody wants to guard some ol’ sword forever and ever, y’know!”
“Do you at least know what would happen if we took the sword right now?” Minotaurus asked, sounding quite disgruntled.
“Nope!” the crow replied, much too cheerfully for comfort. “But hey, I know what y’all’re up to! You can just take this thing whenever you figure out what to do.”
The two glanced at each other briefly. It was a shared look of disbelief and annoyance.
“I don’t see what exactly is so special about this sword that it can kill gods,” Ambrose suddenly said.
“Well,” replied the crow, eyes glinting with humor. “If you stick around here, maybe you’ll see.”
“We’re wasting time,” Minotaurus grunted.
“I’ll say!” the crow added, though the two didn’t bother listening to him. It flapped away as the bull-headed man grasped the hilt. “Who even cares what’ll happen! That just makes things more exciting!”
The sword groaned out of its place, sliding roughly out of the slot. As soon as it was free, the whole room shook. The ornate pedestal itself rose, the floor beneath it breaking apart to reveal that the pedestal had in fact been connected to a giant snake-like beast wearing a fancy helmet.
“Thieves!” it screamed. “Trespassers and thieves!”
“Who’s the thief?!” the crow roared back in anger, swooping down to scratch at its eyes.
Minotaurus hefted the sword experimentally in one hand. “Perhaps we can see what’s so special about this sword now.”
“No!” the crow said, still blinding the snake-beast. “You can’t kill him! It involves the lore of the land and such—just leave him to me!”
There was the quite obvious problem that the snake-beast was a monstrous size while the crow was simply crow-sized. But any distraction was a welcome distraction, even if it was bound to be short, and Minotaurus ran out of the room, followed closely by Ambrose. The stone underneath their feet continued to shake as they rushed past all the obstacles they had overcome not too long ago.
As soon as they escaped the temple, it tilted halfway into the ground and collapsed. The two barely looked back. The crow hadn’t done much to endear them to it and though it acted as though it knew what they were doing, ultimately, they were about to give it to someone who, more likely than not, would not use it in the way the crow would want it to be used. In the end, the crow was just a foolish figure acting as a wise one.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There was no other place to go besides the village to the east. It was preferable to get to an inhabited area full of people who probably didn’t want to kill him and he only knew of two inhabited areas, one of which that was full of assholes. So Cole really had no choice.
Still, he couldn’t help but notice how useless of a direction ‘east’ was when he didn’t know which way was east. And he couldn’t go back and ask the pompous asses which way to go. Not after walking out like that.
The sun was high enough in the sky that he couldn’t tell which way it was going and whether it was even rising or setting, so he couldn’t use that. And, tempting as it was, going off in a random direction in a place like this was a good way of getting lost.
He went in a random direction anyways.
If this were a movie, the scene would then pan out to show which direction the village really was, thus frustrating the viewers as they watched the protagonist blissfully head in the opposite direction. But it’s not. The closest thing to a movie it was would be the narrative running through Soft’s mind. And she was indeed quite frustrated. She might have even been tempted to shout ‘The other way, doofus,’ though nobody would have heard her.
At least the god-killing weapon was now in play, though.