Talk:Team Alfa Forty-Fourth Session

chatlog:

INVIS GUY: [Revealed by Faerie Fire spell]

Thola: Oh that's pretty, Wolf!

Gorra: Hello my glowing friend.

Invisible Man: We are already friends? That's good. I might have been nervous about the appearance of an armed mob climbing up my mountain.

Invisible Man stands up. It speaks with a soft, raspy voice.

Thola: Your mountain?

Invisible Man: The mountain that bore me.

Wolf: We should definitely be friends.

Invisible Man: You are novel creatures. I am not familiar with your smell.

Invisible Man gestures to Wolf.

Invisible Man: That one is familiar to me, though... off, somehow.

Thola: Wolf's smell is certainly... unique

Wolf: Oh uh, week old toad and horse?

Wolf: Sorry, it's a bit chilly for bath up here

Invisible Man walks over to the party, passing by you each one by one.

Invisible Man: What manner of beasts are you?

Thola: We are curious creatures

Thola: wanderers

Thola: helping folks out where we can

Invisible Man: Wander is not a category of creature, it is a descriptor of a creature's behavior.

Sid (pointing to dig site): we're scavengers at the moment

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing: Hm.

Thola: Is behaviour not the mark of a creature, though?

Sid: Though if you lay claim to these remains we assure you our intentions were not theft

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing: So, whatever manner of creature you are is evasive by nature.

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing: That means untrustworthy.

Wolf: Oh, you mean like, am I a horse or a dog or whatever?

Wolf: I am half orc half human

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing: I have enough experience to recognize that.

Wolf: It's uh, not very common

Wolf: But my name is Wolf

Wolf: and I'm not a Wolf

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing turns as if to walk away. With Wolf's answer, it stops and turns back around.

Wolf: But Wolves are cool

Thola: I mean.. you sneak up on us and ask us personal probing questions without even introducing yourself. Most folk would be evasive

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing: I am aware of wolves. You have chosen their identity to represent you to other creatures. I understand this.

Invisible Towering Humanoid Thing: You may call me Emissary.

Wolf: Hi!

Emissary: It is both my signifier and my descriptor.

Gorra: Greetings, then, Emissary.

Thola: Greetings emissary. Whom do you represent?

Emissary: I am the Emissary of the mountain, the mother that birthed me. I protect and serve her.

Wolf: That's a boring question Thola, why have you never seen humans and dwarves and elves before?

Emissary: Do you strange, evasive creatures represent the beings at the foot of the mountain?

Thola: What does a mountain need protection for? it's a mountain!

Wolf: We don't represent anyone but ourselves.

Wolf: Get into too much trouble otherwise.

Emissary: Of what does a forest need protection? Or a group of scavengers whom death with take tomorrow or ten years from now?

Emissary: You do not seem troublesome so far.

Wolf: Oh, is this a riddle? I'm not very good at them. Sid, do the riddle!

Emissary: I am learning quite a bit from this conversation. It is always good to learn new things.

Thola: Forests and scavengers aren't mountains. Moutains abide.

Gorra: Is the mountain under threat somehow?

Emissary: Mountains are not so static. The rumble. The erupt.

Thola: Erupting mountains? I've heard of those, but never seen one - those aren't common!

Emissary: I do not know. An army marched upon it where you now stand.

Emissary: Are armies considered threats among your kind?

Thola: Not to mountains

Wolf: But otherwise, yes definitely.

Thola: Is extracting wealth under threat of death considered.. threats? among your kind?

Emissary: The mountain is protective of its wealth.

Wolf: It can, talk?

Thola: What use does the mountain have for wealth?

Emissary: What use do you have of it?

Gorra: What does a mountain value?

Emissary: The mountain values order. Power. Loyalty and obedience.

Wolf frowns

Wolf: So, how do you do obedience to a mountain?

Wolf: And like, how do you figure out what it wants?

Thola: How do you know you're being loyal?

Emissary: I mean, the mountain tells me.

Emissary: It is my mother. do you not speak to your mother?

Wolf: It can talk!

Thola: How? Does it talk to others?

Thola: Or just you?

Wolf: Um, I don't. I was taken from my mother.

Thola: Would... would we ge able to talk to her?

Emissary: No. Perhaps should you prove yourself to be faithful and loyal servants of Her power.

Emissary: I am Emissary. I am the Mountain's voice in the world.

Gorra: Mountains are long-lived. Our lives must be a blink to them.

Wolf: Ha! Now you know how I feel.

Emissary: Yes. and, in time, to me, as well.

Wolf: Tell me more about this order that your mountain mother wants?

Thola: What use does a mountain have for wealth?

Emissary: I am only the pen, not the hand.

Thola: For tribute?

Emissary gives the faintest shrug.

Gorra: Does the mountain want value extracted from other mountains, then? Are you an engine of mountain conflict with other mountains?

Emissary: She is the mountain, absolute soverign of the world. Her demands are the voice of the inevitable.

Emissary: Indeed.

Wolf: Whoa

Emissary: My mother took this place after demonstrating her prowess.

Thola: we are talking about.. mountains here, right?

Emissary: Drove away the lesser mountain.

Thola: like.. those things?

Thola: points

Thola: big fucking piles of rocks

Thola: generally mute

Thola: snowy tips

Emissary: The mountain is more than the rock.

Thola: if it's talking i'd fucking hope so

Emissary: It is the fire that burns in the heart of the mountain. The spewer of magma, the shaker of earth.

Emissary: The snow is the mountain, as is the lava.

Wolf crouches down and brushes snow from the surface to put his hand on the rock below

Emissary: The air. It is all the mountain. It is all her because it is all hers.

Thola: Ok so I think we agree on what a mountain is

Thola: So your mother is a cannibal then

Wolf: What is power to a mountain?

Emissary: I mean, what is power to one such as yourself?

Emissary: The mountain is eternal and inevitable. The mountain is ancient and eternal.

Wolf frowns thinking really hard

Emissary: The mountain was here long before the cities and townships, before the first of your kind

Gorra: But every year - every day - the wind and rain wear away at it, making it less.

Thola: If that is true, what need does it have for power? it will abide regardless

Emissary: On the other hand, who is the mountain to answer to a goat clinging to its side?

Emissary: The goat should be thankful the rocks are held in abayance, that the mountain provides a place for protection and comfort

Thola: Why does the mountain even care about the goat?

Emissary: I mean, what is a mountain without goats

Thola: It's not like it can go shopping in the goat shops

Wolf: WAIT I HAVENT FINISHED THE 1st RIDDLE

Emissary: So, you seem simple and harmless enough creatures.

Thola: Cetainly feel very simple rn

Wolf sketching goats in the snow

Emissary: So long as you are not here to bring conflict, I see no reason to oppose your time here. I might continue to observe you from time to time. I find I can learn a lot from watching your kind interact.

Wolf: Ok, but goats don't eat gold

Thola: What sort of things have you learned?

Emissary: It is important to my growth and development to better serve My Lady.

Thola: queitly, to herself the moutain is a lady too?

Emissary: I have learned that your kind is aggressive even in conversation.

Wolf: That hardly seems... I mean, you have all the tricky words

Thola: honestly at this point it's les agression and more aggressively confused

Emissary: I'm sorry I could not be of more help.

Wolf: Oh!

Thola: you were trying to help?

Thola: interesting

Wolf: What would your mother find helpful from, er goats?

Emissary: so long as you are not coming to settle or cause mischief, you I will not hinder you.

Emissary: I warn you, should you tarry too long, I might return to extort wealth from you for to help fulfill the mountain's power and glory.

Emissary: My mother finds goats delicious.

Thola: Mountains eat?

Thola: I would think they'd eat rocks, not goats

Gorra: Are there particular mountains you would want us to dig out to extract their wealth for you?

Emissary: Mountains eat. Mountains clash. Mountains reign and ruin. Mountains birth. But - mountains do not ide.

Emissary: Yes. There is a small settlement of creatures at the foot of this mountain by a lake.

Thola: If mountains don't die, how can one be defeated?

Gorra: What mountains would you want them to destroy to glorify you?

Thola: (or rather, how can one defeat another)

Emissary: They are angry and resistant to the calls to give glory to the mountain. If you could convince them to drop their resistant, my mother would consider that a great boon

Emissary laughs. After so much soft and raspy talk and awkward silences, the explosive burst of sound is jarring.

Thola: what does the mountain give in return?

Emissary: One such as my mother does not abide the presence of another in her domain. Their clash was titanic and left it's mark across the countryside. She drove her away, far to the east.

Emissary: The mountain gives order. stability. protection. purpose.

Thola: how many.. mountains.. are there?

Emissary: Anyway, you should not tangle with my Mother and her kin. They would anihillate you, best not to seek out that conflict even to appease my mother.

Emissary: Very few.

Thola: protection from what?

Emissary: Protection from the chaos and cruelties of the world that your kind have built.

Thola: Ok, we won't pick a fight with the mountain

Gorra: Could she protect us from other mountains somehow?

Wolf: That.. is a tempting sort of protection

Emissary: I am glad to hear it. You seem harmless and interesting enough. I would not presently wish for your annihilation.

Thola: How are the mountains protection anyone, though?

Thola: there's cruelty and chaos throughout the land

Thola: i'm not seeing anyone dropping rocks in the way to stop it

Emissary: My mother is the greatest and oldest of her kind. She fears nothing.

Gorra: Or causing mountain storms to stop it.

Emissary: The sun is far past its peak. I must return home. If you are still here, perhaps we will speak again soon.

Emissary flies straight up at 120' of movement.

Wolf waves

Thola waits a few moments

Thola: ....

Thola: ....ok what the fuck

Gorra: Okay. That was not what I expected. I don't know what I expected, but that was not it.