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Here, There Be Dragons

New arrivals: The dream you wake from is an unsettling one that feels like a memory. It sits out of place and too far forward in your mind, yet feels as real and clear as any other could be. It's the shadow of a massive creature blocking out the sun, skyline, or similar entity. A roar that shakes you to the core and and a feeling of dread and loss weighing heavy on you. Whatever the feeling or vision that comes across, it brings with it a sense that your world is no more. A voice, reassuring and almost motherly in nature urges you gently to wake from your sleep. Rise from the ashes, little one, The voice calls in a whisper of wind and crackling fire, There is need of you, yet. As the voice fades and the world of the waking returns to you, you are greeted with the sounds of faint bustling and the bounce of wooden wheels on stone or the sight of Upper Nuren's winding streets and open squares. A cloud passes by slowly near one of the stone pathway ledges and the sounds of nearby Touched and Remnants at work or leisure filter through the calm, cool air. Whatever you had previously been wearing or carrying has been replaced. You might now find yourself garbed in a cloth tunic, pants or shorts, robe, dress or skirt, and sandals or boots if you wore clothing. A sash around your shoulders or a belt at your waist contains a small but weighted purse of gold coins, enough to acquire some materials, new clothing or food from the market and craftsmen in the city. Current Scions: Concern over the mild Winter has begun to spread through the city. The chill air should have come with the nearing end of the harvest, and so far the weather remains only pleasantly cool. The air barely passes the gentle cool of Autumn. Nuren's citizens are spreading rumors that mountaintop ice and snow have begun to thaw, causing mudslides in the mountains. The thaw has displaced the Ice and mountain creatures, leaving them irritable and unpredictable. The sailors mention that the Frozen Shore has also begun to melt, and the waters around the Frozen Shore and the mountain areas have grown treacherous and unseasonably cold. Throughout the city, activity springs to more vibrant life, with Scholars of the Cycle of Life and Scholars of Knowledge claiming that Benra has blessed the city again, bringing more Scions to help protect the great city. The rumors put the city's citizens into higher spirits, and music fills the cool air, spreading from Lower Nuren both up and down the mountain.

The Heart of Nuren

After waking, a pull starts from within your chest, growing stronger with each passing moment until it becomes the only focus. It tugs insistently once, then twice. A need to follow the pull curls around and through you, urging you toward a wide and torch lit staircase that leads down into the heart of the mountain. The steps are wide and sturdy, and the further down them you travel, the clearer the call becomes until you can almost hear it. At the bottom of the steps, the large cavern beneath the city is revealed. The floor beneath your feet is warm to the touch, and the magic in the air calms your mind and fills you with a strange sense of safety and peace. No magic or harm can be done within the cavern. The cavern's floor is covered in circles of runes carved into the stone that surround small depressions in varying sizes, from a coffee cup's rim to that of a small circular table. Some of the depressions contain dormant dragon eggs of various colors, shapes and sizes. The runes surrounding them glow faintly with a magical light. Only the Scion who is bonded to the dragon within the egg can pass the runes.

Upper and Lower Nuren

Once you emerge from the cavern, the strange spell that fell over you fades. The bond between you and your egg or hatchling remains but your command of your own decisions and actions return and you are now free to explore, question and move about. The streets of Upper Nuren are sparsely populated with Remnants, Touched and other scions with their eggs or dragons. Questioning any of the citizens leads to a variety of answers. You are a Scion of the Great Beasts. You were brought to the city from the ashes of time and space by the Great Phoenix known as Benra and the Great Serpent known as Mouros. Pressing for more information will reveal that there are five Great Beasts. They are Benra the Phoenix, Chelba the Stone Giant, Renzu the Griffin, Mouros the Serpent, and Lysheu the Chimera. They are said to represent Mortality, Order, Knowledge, Time and Chaos. You are in the great Mountain City known as Nuren, and its people are the last remaining vestige of civilization on this wild and dangerous planet. The Touched and the Remnants share an alliance and work together to keep the city protected and its citizens alive and fed. According to these citizens of Nuren, you are here to help them defend the city, unite the remaining races and restore balance to the elements. Soon after the first Scions awake, the city begins to buzz with the news and gossip that more scions have arrived. The curious and braver citizens make their way to Upper Nuren to get a look, and the rumors spread like wildfire through the city that Benra has come again.

Outer Nuren

Although those rumors make their way to Outer Nuren, the citizens there show far less interest in making the long trek up to Upper Nuren. The unseasonably warm winter has done wonders for the fishing in the bay, and the docks are alive with intrepid fishermen and ship crews interested in making extra gold while the fishing is still good. The taverns fill with activity and the markets are livelier than ever in the hopes of selling more of their wares and merchandise before Winter's chill catches up with the passing seasons.

Evening

When night settles on the city, the taverns, inns and squares fill with curious citizens hoping to meet the new Scions or catch a glimpse of the Scions they have already managed to glimpse a few times before. Food is offered freely, as well as blankets to guard against the cool night air. The night sky fills with beautiful displays of magic from the Fire, Light and Energy Mages, the Osaaru equivalent of fireworks, though far quieter. Several Scholars in bright and colorful robes can be found approaching the new scions and older ones alike, offering to tell them more about the city, Osaaru and the Great Beasts. Mages of similar garb guide scions to the cavern homes, and help where they can in making the scions more comfortable. Small comforts of food, pillows, decorative crafts and other small tokens are offered to visible Scions by the citizens of Nuren in hopes of earning their favor and friendship.

Notes

Please direct Introduction questions to the Plotting Post Q&A As a Reminder: Bahemait is not one of the Great Beasts openly discussed or mentioned by the Citizens of Nuren who believe the Great Dragon is little more than an old legend. We would also like to emphasize that the Spirit energy within every resurrected character is required to use all magic in Osaaru, even that which is brought from their own world. The drain of powerful or excessive use of magic will lead to exhaustion.

Comments

[lullabytes]

Helping to fight a world-destroyer...I'm not sure any sort of reward would be needed for me to do that much, although I'm still not sure how much help I'll be.

[ a sigh. even if sync has taught her staff basics by now SHE'S NOT REALLY...A FIGHTER... ]

...Oh, but I will be getting some more water magic lessons from a priest of Mouros.

[fifthreplacement]

[He shrugs a little]

Most people would say something like it's the thought that counts or whatever. Every little bit adds up eventually.

[Sync isn't sure how much he believes that, but eh. Whatever worked, he supposed. It was how things sometimes won through force of numbers]

A priest of Mouros?

[lullabytes]

Yes. His domain is water and the like...although I'm not sure if all his followers are water-aligned? But Farron, the man I spoke with, is a water mage and offered to teach me.

[ so she'll do her Best so she can be the best healer slash water mage she can be! hopefully. ]

I'm not sure which of the great beasts is most associated with wind...

[fifthreplacement]

Huh. That's interesting. He's the serpent, if I remember right...

[Learning something about the Great Beasts had been high on his priority list]

Wind...probably Renzu, the griffin. The phoenix would be my other thought, but it seems to be pretty clearly fire and light.

[lullabytes]

That sounds about right...then maybe the priests of Renzu would be more useful for learning wind magic from, if you wanted to look into that?

[ though it's hard to say if sync...cares...chiaki wants to learn the magic system of nuren to the best of her abilities. ]

[fifthreplacement]

Maybe. I have my own abilities that I can use, but it might be worth it if Gale starts trying to use it.

[Sync...really doesn't care too much right now though once he learns some of what wind magic can do but he knows Gale kind of is, so for her it might be worth at least figuring out, even if he doesn't use it much himself]

[lullabytes]

If they can use our magic...then training in it and training with them is definitely gonna be important.

[ she hasn't really tried to cast with landia yet, but maybe she should...? ]

...I wonder if that's part of why they need Scions, and not just dragons.

[fifthreplacement]

It would make sense, otherwise they wouldn't have been saying that we share an element with our dragon. Dunno how much they can do when they're young, but as they get older, who knows?

[He shrugs a little, unsure about that]

If it's magic that's what they supposedly need, and the dragons alone can't do it, then maybe. Either that or having a Scion as well just doubles the amount of magic, so it boosts how fast they get the magic amount up.

[lullabytes]

...I guess it's something that doesn't matter too much just yet.

[ since their dragons are still Tiny. chiaki tips her head back to watch the fireworks more. ]

Hm...beyond all of that, the only other thing that happened today was hearing people worry about the winter.

[fifthreplacement]

Not yet, but worth keeping in mind, perhaps.

[He watches the fireworks as well, absently petting Gale as his dragon curls up on his lap, starting to doze off]

I heard about that as well. The winter being late, and the fishermen have been talking about ice melting that shouldn't be. Like the cold has gone out of the world somehow.

[lullabytes]

Do you think that's something we'll be able to help with...? I was thinking of asking the scholars about ice magic. Maybe if we tried to learn it, that could help...balance things, or something.

[ she's not sure how magic works here overall, still. ]

...Or we can try to free the winter spirit.

[ stop making up video game shit that doesn't apply, chiaki. ]

[fifthreplacement]

Maybe...Auldrant was supposedly going to have less fonons with the Planet Storm stopped. Perhaps, if we're being brought here to bring the magic back, that there wasn't enough ice.

[It's a puzzle, and despite not caring much about the world, Sync is intrigued. Puzzles are curious, tricky to work out, and usually resulted in more information obtained. Though Chiaki's getting a confused look at that last part]

Winter spirit?

[lullabytes]

You mean not enough of us use ice magic? So...if that were the case, maybe learning it would help...

[ chiaki nods, about to launch into one of her patented confusing video game references that her classmates just kind of Live With. ]

Right. There's always elemental spirits, and when one of them gets trapped by the big bad guy in their temple, the only way to fix things is to go in and free them...but I don't know where the ice temple is. It's too bad we can't consult the oracle...

[fifthreplacement]

Maybe. There's no real way to tell without asking everyone what their element is, and I am not doing that.

[Way too much talking to people. Also congrats Chiaki, you just confused him some. What are video games]

What are you talking about?

[lullabytes]

I've played that sort of game a lot before.

[ ... ]

Where I'm from, there are stories that you can play through like you're a part of them called "video games". The images of them pop up on a screen, and you can move a character on the screen around as an avatar of your will, kinda. It's just like a more interactive book...I guess.

[fifthreplacement]

Uh-huh...never heard of anything like that before.

[Auldrant was weird in its technology. Giant landships, sure, computers? Incredibly basic]

[lullabytes]

They're really cool. But...it doesn't look like it's something that'll ever be a thing here...'cause they don't even have electricity.

[ ALAS...she looks legitimately put out about that. ]

[fifthreplacement]

[Only slightly awkward, because what is he really supposed to say to that? Sync...really does not know, so he stays quiet. He doesn't really care enough to say much to it, but at the same time...awkward pause]

[lullabytes]

[ chiaki is fine with letting the silence last for a while, simply watching the fireworks, although she eventually asks: ]

So did you meet anyone interesting today...?

[fifthreplacement]

Hm? Ah...not overly. A few people. One of them was a dragon, which I guess makes sense. Bring a dragon to take care of a dragon.

[That had been an odd conversation]

[lullabytes]

I met two dragons, too. I wonder if their partners will ever get bigger than them, or if they'll stay smaller?

[ they probably can't ride them... ]

[fifthreplacement]

Who knows, but with how big the one I met was, if their partner gets any bigger than she is, they're not going to fit inside the city that well.

[At least the caves had rooms that were large enough, but still]

[lullabytes]

...We'll hope for smaller, then. Not that it's too important either way.

[ she lapses into quiet again. but honestly he might wanna say something or she will literally just doze off after a few minutes, probably against his shoulder. fight your end as a pillow, sync. ]

[fifthreplacement]

Mm.

[He sees that drowsiness and glances at her. No desire to be a pillow, though at least no one would know him well enough to ruin his reputation]

Should you still be up? You're falling asleep.

[lullabytes]

...Maybe not...it's been a pretty long day.

[ but also: she has the "talent" of being able to fall asleep anywhere. even in the middle of her sentences. ]

...I should probably head back home sooner rather than later. I'm not sure what time my classmates were planning to head back there, but probably they won't stay out all night...