Open Chronicles A Fancy Type of Monster

[Shisha]

Shisha rolled her shoulders and gave the mage a look, wiping away her words. She had thought becoming a bodyguard was a fine vocation, thank you very much. But did two-legs not put stock in their own protection? She pursed her lips a bit and hesitated before writing again. What was so inglorious about being a bodyguard?

Why do you say that? We are told protecting and bonding with two-legs is a high calling. She wrote. Two-legs are vicious and warlike. Always killing each other. For no reason, sometimes. Devourers always have reason.

Shisha huffed a bit at the idea that Tess had never heard of them. She wiped away her words and lifted her chin pridefully for a moment. From Ixchtel Woods. Deep forests. Born of nature. Of trees and plenty. I am not surprised; two-legs know nothing of deep forests. Only axes.

Tess

 

[Tess]

"Okay, point," she stated after a moment. "But there's more to life than just that job. Maybe you could... Iunno, outsource it? I'm just throwing ideas out."

The next bit of writing caught her a little off guard. She'd travelled through the Ixchtel Woods on occasion, seen the panoramic vistas, even ran for her life from various species of local wildlife, but she'd never heard of or seen anything about Devourers.

"I've been to Ixchtel and the woods there, never heard of Devourers. I'm not entirely the most innate explorer, but I'd think I'd have heard of you guys before. Also," she stated plainly as her mind ran a mile a minute. "Why the hell are you so far west, of all places?"

Shisha

 

[Shisha]

Two-legs do not pay attention. Run at scary noises and spook like deer. Shisha pointed out. I will find a patron. It is an honor to have a purpose. What purpose do you have?

So far all she’d seen of this little mage was the typical two-leg panicking. For a supposedly powerful creature who could take care of herself, Tess was always getting into trouble. She huffed at the question. Told you, finding work. Why live in the woods with cold and wet when I could sleep here? Shisha was after more than just employment. She wanted glory. Glory and the creature comforts the two legs had invented.

Tess

 

[Tess]

That was an odd question and one which the answer both eluded her and terrified her. She'd not really thought that far ahead or that deeply, if she were honest. First, it had been to get away from home and escape a realm where men ran the kingdom, made the laws, and determined their destiny while women more or less tagged along at best or were dragged kicking and screaming at worst. That had been a more or less resounding success, but then the next step had happened and then the next and the next. She'd not known a great deal of the outside world until she landed feet - or, rather, head - first in the middle of it which meant she really didn't have any further plan or goal other than to simply survive. Thriving was something that just occasionally happened and only for a relatively short time.

Settling down usually meant finding a husband, moving into a cottage or apartment, and raising the next generation - something she was absolutely adamant against doing whatsoever. Half because she had no desire marry or have children and half because home ownership was absolutely horrifying. Shops were fine, she figured, because they weren't truly homes and most had a bed roll in the storeroom rather than actual living quarters. Plus they were, usually, insured against random acts of arson disguising accidental magical mishaps done out of boredom.

Half to drag her mind out of the depressing downward spiral of the rabbit hole that was her mind, half because the creature genuinely confused her, she shook her head to disperse the dark cobwebs clouding her thoughts to focus on the conversation at hand.

"Then why'd you come to Alliria? Yeah, you'll find some work, and some might even pay well, but if you want to make money fighting, you should head to Vel Amir. If you can get past the blatant racism and xenophobia, they pay a great deal more for sell swords, assassins, and hired muscle. The whole region's been on a war time footing more or less since the city was founded."

Shisha

 

[Shisha]

Shisha shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t really know human settlements or cities. She stared at Tess for a moment. Vel Anir? Two leggeds had all sorts of names for their giant nests, and they were often complex. Maps were something unique that showed all of these names, as though a god were looking at the world; Shisha wanted one. Maybe then she would know these sorts of things about Alliria and Vel Anir.

Or, maybe she just needed someone familiar with it. What do you know of these human towns? Two legs have different names for different nests...and each nest is different. It is hard to know where to go.

Tess

 

[Tess]

"Nests?" Tess said after a moment, her brow furrowing. "Oh, cities. Uh, this one is southwest. I think."

She opened her bag and started rummaging through the contents, muttering a choice few words of power under her breath. The words were crucial to how the bag worked, the enchantments within sorting the contents, keeping them stable, protected, and generally climate controlled barring severe damage, both physical and magical, to the bag itself. A few specific words and she could find all of her potion materials or chemical reagents. Another word or two and she could access her supplies or clothes. Unfortunately, the system was limited despite its complexity and her ability to sort ended at moderately narrow-ish categories rather than finding specific items.

Currently, she was digging and rummaging around the compartment that held her paperwork, books, notes, and at least one errant pouch of charcoal sticks that she wasn't entirely sure were hers. It took her a few moments longer than she had desired, but the item she sought rolled nicely into view after she shifted an encyclopedia in orcish runes out of the way and lifted up a tied bundle of dead ocean scrolls complete with seaweed ribbon.

"You can have this," she said, holding out the leather tube with attached copper cap. "I enchanted it to make it more durable. And fire proof. And water proof..."

She thought about it a moment longer, her face mildly scrunched in thought.

"And tear proof. And stain resistant. And I wanna say I made it glow in the dark, too. It comes out on its own if you knock on it three times then pause then knock two more times. It'll float so you can read it and when you're done, just tap the case twice."

Shisha