Back then, Jalak was rather more happy-go-lucky and rather less paranoid and jaded.
He wasn't in any more mortal peril than any ordinary bandit was any moment of every day, and he saw no reason not to celebrate his youth, daring, success and continued freedom to the fullest. The newcomers to the tavern weren't of much interested to him, focused as he was on the glass of [POPULAR LOCAL LIQUOR] on the table before him- and his dashing reflection in it.
He laughed along with his comrade, Maxos, then took another healthy swig and smiled. Life, contrary to all expectations, was actually pretty good.
For the time being, at least.
Remember happily boozing it up with my friends without a care in the world. Ponder Ronke's more popular alcoholic beverages, then and now.
Also recall considering whether mixing black lotus and booze was... well, not a good idea, but one that wouldn't kill me.
Sorry, can't think of any very interesting actions. I can't decide whether Jalak's black lotus habit should start in this flashback, already be ongoing, or not yet be a thing at all. Is mixing lotus with strong liquor the done thing? I also got the feeling this flashback was going to be focused more on boozing than tripping.
Jalak's relationship with black lotus is completely up to you, as is the significance of the role it plays during this memory. You're players on a stage running without a script; all I'm doing is setting the stage and assembling props. You can go full on
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas with this one if you want. Or you can do something completely different that has essentially nothing to do with what we've talked about so far, but it will influence the present in potentially unsubtle ways.
Jalak is ostensibly enjoying a glass of colocynth, a popular liquor endemic to Ronke. The liquor is made from the extremely bitter desert melons that grow from vines in nearby rocky canyons. It is traditionally served in a low, wide glass, and generally not served with meals, but there are really no hard social rules about it. It has an aggressively pungent taste, like a very over-spiced rum, but different; more alkaline. First time drinkers find it overpowering, but it's easy to get used to and quite popular. It is considered to be medicinal and protective against the venom of desert scorpions. Osuttasue-Uhasab is drinking a lot of this while eating heavily, which is sort of weird, but not particularly weird by his standards.
Beer is popular in Ronke. The lands to the east play host to many kingdoms, the closest and least of which is a small city state on a sprawling floodplain. The city of Zsh-au has a storied tradition of beer brewing, and casks of beer from Zsh-au are a common feature in virtually any tavern in Ronke. Beer from the city-state is generally light in color, sweet, watery, and with a great deal of suspended particulate matter. Beer is also brewed in Ronke itself, where it is very similar to Zsh-au beer but usually thicker and more alcoholic. Both are popular. Tumbleweed and Minos Maxos are drinking beer.
The people from the hills and mountains near Ronke have this weird drink made from yak's milk and vodka (vodka being a liquor made from potatoes, an exotic root vegetable from far off lands introduced to the region several centuries ago) that they like drinking. The mixture is acrid and curdles as you drink it. Tesen is from the hills, and this is what he's drinking.
Mixing black lotus and alcohol is generally considered to be more irresponsible than taking either alone, but it won't kill you. On the one hand, it can make the illusions more vivid and difficult to disbelieve, and it can impair judgement when it comes to knowing how to react to them. On the other hand, the alcohol makes you sort of uncoordinated and relaxed, so when you fall over screaming in your flight from some shrieking hideous cannibal giant that suddenly emerged into view from behind a corner, your body will probably be limp and you probably won't hurt yourself too badly. Overall, it's basically the done thing, especially among bandits.
Black lotus makes you better at fighting. Bandits are belligerent drunks.
There are some things that really shouldn't be mixed with black lotus. [3] Jalak doesn't know what they are, but he does know that some of them cause pretty much guaranteed psychosis when mixed, and there are rumors that some substances make the hallucinations real(?).
Drubjarred didn't like bandits, but he had heard rumors of some sort of cult. Cults tended to be bad news even for dwarves, due to the fanaticism that their members could muster. As such, he eyes the group of cultists suspiciously and keeps a firm grip on his sword, ready for the worst.
[5] Drubjarred watches warily as the leader reaches into his robes and withdraws a short scroll. One of his acolytes hands him a wavy, heavily ornamented sword that resembles a kris. The tall priest unfurls the scroll, holds it up in view of the assembled patrons, and bellows:
"Profligates! Forsaken dregs of this lost city! I am the envoy of the Great Winged Serpent, Eizkol Arb, praise be upon him! His coming is nigh, and I come in his looming shadow to liberate you from the shackles of your vices!" He raises the sword, and his acolytes brandish short staves of iron. "Cast away your debauched lives and join us willingly, or you will be forced!" Obviously, the bar by this point has fallen silent. The cultists seem to be waiting, observing the patrons to see if they will acquiesce or not. Drubjarred, Yao-bo, and Macthotho are off in an inconspicuous corner. Drubjarred can't see the hands of his friends, but it'd be a good bet that they're like his: on the hilt of a weapon, ready to draw and strike in a smooth single motion. A murmur rises in the crowd. Drubjarred can vaguely see the mouth of the bandit in the leather minotaur mask under the shadow of his visor. He has a gigantic toothy grin plastered across his face.
Jalak: The lotus is obviously potent. Minos Maxos is wearing a huge grin and looks like he's struggling to contain either laughter or some sort of paranoid outburst. The girl he's with has pupils like huge black datura seeds; shiny and massive and grotesquely irregular. Jalak can tell that Minos is about to do something loud and animated.
The atmosphere of the bar is suddenly incredibly tense. Only an instant has passed, what do both of you remember happening?
Also, you have friends; you can tell them to do stuff. Who you tell and how you tell them will influence their cooperativeness, and what happened to them here could influence your relationship with them in the present.
Wrap up the dolphin song and bask in the applause. Take several more bows than the situation calls for.
Scarlet bows deeply to thunderous adulation. A bouquet of kind of dried up looking roses soars out from a table right at her, and [2+3] she catches it gracefully. Basically all of her skills and aptitudes contribute heartily to her ability to catch bouquets of roses. She was born for this.
Various happy fans give her small amounts of money, and an extremely large man who is simultaneously towering and squat and is entirely encased in very thick, very grimy, very crudely designed plate armor approaches Scarlet. A quiver of sawed-down polearms bristles from over his shoulders. A colorfully painted porcelain shingle is affixed to his breastplate and reads, "Grundig, Proprietor." Scarlet can't exactly make out what he's shouting at her in his deep bass voice, muffled as it is by his ridiculously bevisored dome-like helmet and drowned out as it is by the loud tavern, but it's good and she's pretty sure as he hands her a pouch of coins that he'd be happy to have her perform in his bar any time, and also pretty sure as he grandiosely gesticulates with a sweeping (clattering, meaty) arm to the wall of armaments that he wants her to choose a free weapon.
Take a seat....check the seat first.
Laura pulls the chair out and looks, very obviously, at the seat. She looks up at the hooded, looming figure. She squints suspiciously at it, and then squints suspiciously at the seat, and then back at the hooded looming figure, who is by now looking at her hopefully, expectantly. She checks the seat again. There's nothing on it. It's just a chair. She sweeps her hand across the underside. No traps. No lethal contact poisons. She raps her knuckles on the legs of the chair to make sure they aren't hollow; drilled out and ready to collapse under her weight. The looming figure is looming particularly far over the table now, watching intently. There don't seem to be any traps. Hmm.
Finally satisfied, Laura takes a seat. The figure's wet eyes look relieved. The mysterious ragamuffin leans back and a ragged rag-wrapped claw raps rapaciously at the drawstrings of its purse before withdrawing a small silver coin and sliding it across the table. The shiny metallic disc comes to a stop inches away from Laura. [5] The coin is Bogorlalzschan. Very, very foreign. She recognizes it because the king of Asturia is an avid numismatist who loves to foist his hobbies on his family and his court. Bogorlalzsch is an incredibly distant country in a very far flung corner of the world, carpeted by snow and scoured by vicious cutting winds. The entire nation is based around the maintenance of vast stony prison camps, where all criminals are kept. Political dissent is a very serious crime. Thinking that there should be less prisons is political dissent. Basically everyone in the entire country is either a prisoner or works in a prison. The coin has a picture of a prison on it.
"That's for sitting down." The creature hisses. A silver piece is a pretty significant amount of money for sitting down on a chair. Laura could make an easy living sitting on chairs for money if this keeps up, but it won't. "There's more where that came from. I need mercenaries, adventurers," the creature lifts a ragged claw to gesticulate towards the axe that Laura openly carries, "Adventurers of your breed. Plural, and not in the royal pronoun way." The creature stops for a moment and waits for a reaction from Laura. She stares at it. It slides another silver coin, [4] this one of a different provenance, somewhere in the Eastern Kingdoms, across the table. "There's money behind this offer. Are you looking for this kind of work?"
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Topic: Turaco's Sellswords RTD: Turn 17: I Guess This Counts As Taking Casualties (Read 27903 times)