TEST DRIVE MEME!

[faderifting]

fur: matted. belly: empty. claws: out.

i am forcibly removed from the hinterlands

Maybe the Inquisition sent you, maybe you came seeking the Inquisition. Maybe you fell out of a rift into this world last week and are still just trying to find your feet. However it happened, early fall finds you in the Hinterlands. Tucked between Ferelden's massive Lake Calenhad and the icy Frostback Mountains, the Hinterlands are a hilly region covered in patchy forests and small farms trying to eke out a living between the boulders. Though somewhat remote, the area is rich with game and minerals and home to Redcliffe, a bustling town on a busy trade route.

The Inquisition has set up several camps and sent personnel to try to restore order to the region, unwilling to let it slip into chaos. There's a lot to be done, some of it straightforward killing bad things, some of it weird and nebulous morale-building.

I. DRUFFY

How did you come to be here, trying to guide this druffalo across this river? You may have been ordered to -- even if it's beneath your talents, sometimes something just needs to get done and you're the only one there. Or maybe you passed the bereft farmer himself and were moved by his sadness to seek out his lost druffalo on your own. Or perhaps you were on another mission entirely when you came across the beast, beset by wolves, and made the very good guess that she belonged at the nearby farms instead of out in the wild. The end result of all three is that you are here, with a druffalo, trying to cross a river. And above that river is a rift. And you're about to learn that a druffalo is entirely capable of mowing down demons singlehoofedly. Maybe you can even ride her into battle.

II. CROSSROADS

In the year since the Inquisition's formation, the Crossroads have changed. Most of the refugees from the Mage/Templar War have moved on--if not back home, to new places--and there's been some progress rebuilding the homes and fortresses ruined by the war. Very few people are still living in caves. But rather than quieting down, the Crossroads have begun to bustle. Between the Inquisition's locally stationed forces and the increasing number of travelers and merchants now that the roads are safer, there's enough business to support a tavern with a few rooms for rent, and the Crossroads are becoming a trading post in their own right rather than a dot of houses on the path to Redcliffe--a great place to stop for a drink, to buy basic weaponry, or to unload all of the bear skins you've collected.

III. BEARS

You have turned the wrong corner, forded the wrong stream, crested the wrong hill, entered the wrong cave. Maybe you are far from camp. Maybe you are in camp. Whatever has happened, wherever you are: you are being chased by bears. Did you provoke the bears? Are they huge? Babies? Fade-touched? Mage-controlled? What are they chasing you away from? What are they chasing you into? What do you plan to make out of their hide if you kill them? What do you think they'll craft out of your hide if they kill you?

IV. CRYSTALS

Members and trusted agents of the Inquisition are given access to one of the Inquisition's stores of ancient, mysterious sending crystals, allowing them to communicate instantaneously by voice. It's magic. And a magical excuse to ask everyone what their favorite constellation is in the middle of the night.

Or to call for help because you've been treed by bears.

Either way.

V. MISCELLANEOUS

Choose your own adventure! Hunt game, kill demons, gather herbs, track bandits, haggle over the price of armor, fall off a deceptively tall rock, get lost circling the same hill ten times trying to find a way up to the weird glowing skull on a stick you can see is up there, climb trees or abandoned towers, rummage around in empty homes, run from a dragon, cry over how cute that fennec fox you just shot was, set up camp and chat around the fire, knock yourself out (figuratively, or even literally if that's more your speed)-- the Hinterlands are your Frostback Mountain oyster.

Comments

[limier]

Wren braces, tense, as the Rift expands — and finally dissipates. A moment longer, and she stows her sword.

"Terror. A small demon, but a bitter one. You did well."

Her grip tightens, prepared to hold him upright as he sags, but there’s no need. It’s not the boneless flop of a wounded man, instead,

"Come sit," There’s a log not far, half-buried in the midwinter slush. “Easy. That was a hard blow.”

One she has no idea how he's standing through. She wants to tell him that he owes her nothing, that the people of these hills will know the service he's done — but those are dying words, panicking words, and it doesn’t ever pay to start up with nonsense like that.

Wren doesn't believe in miracles. But if he’s lasted this long, they may get lucky yet.

"There’s an Inquisition camp, not far. They can send word to the town surgeon." A better shot than breaking directly for Redcliffe, all fifteen miles distant. A barber might be able to hold him over long enough to see a mage out. “But I need you to let me look."

[ashen_one]

She sounded... concerned. For a moment he's not sure how to respond, and so just stares at her in dumb silence, straightening with ease. And then, as the nature of her concerns became clear, he tucked his sword beneath his arm (it would need to be cleaned before it could be resheathed) to free his hands to gesture.

"Good and noble sir," he began, hands spread,

"Worry not for my sake; wounds may give me only pain. By divine will, my holy mission as lowly Unkindled ash liberates me from death." For all he understood, this knight, too, followed the strictures of the First Flame, and knew well the deeds of great Gwyn. The linking of the fire.

What unkindled even meant.

That, and the idea of anyone seeing his hateful, withered body made his stomach turn.

[limier]

Wellp.

Wren tosses her arm free, rounding on him in an instant.

The sword’s out again, and this time, a long parrying dagger leaps into her other hand. A poor time to have foregone her shield, poorer still to have shirked full plate. Templar armor calls undue attention in these hills, but what mail she has now won’t stand up to a concentrated assault.

Wren's stance tenses, shoulders arc up like a cat’s — but she doesn’t move to strike just yet. There are too many questions unanswered, even as she strains his words for meaning.

Holy mission, unkindled ash. Whatever manner of spirit this is, she can only guess it’s imprinted on the Chant.

"Your name," She demands. "Or on my honour as a Templar I will see you from this world."

What honour? It's only talk, cannot be allowed to come to that, she knows. One way or another, this — thing — must be returned to the Inquisition’s researches. The necromancers will want it. How in all the void has a possessed corpse gained a shard?

[ashen_one]

Dismay stunned him as she rounded away, drawing steel. All at once, he went to his knees, and drove the point of his sword into the thin soil. One hand gripped its pommel tightly.

Wren would not understand the significance of this; in Lothric, it was the image of a prostrated knight, but moments before cutting his own throat on the edge of his blade. But she would, at least, understand that he had become harmless.

"I am Gaultier de la Guerre! Prithee, sir, stay thy blade; I would not wish ill upon a brave comrade."

To emphasize the fervor of this request, he used his free hand to tip up the top of his visor, and let her see his eyes.

[limier]

It must remember a little of the man, must have glimpsed pieces of his life through the Fade.

A weaker spirit, perhaps, to not otherwise define its purpose. It may not even recall the full truth of its being, so desperate for life that it would press at even the imitation of it. Another might hold pity for the creature. Another, much younger woman would.

Wren is far from youth.

"Stand," She holds her voice steady, even. There’s a new blankness to her consideration, a wary distance kept between them. The sword lowers, but the knife does not stray. "Gaultier de la Guerre.”

Not a house she knows, but the wreckage of the civil war has seen the old lines splinter, reforge. To bestow a meaningless title — or sell one’s own — is hardly unheard of.

He doesn’t speak like an Orlesian, but death will wreak much havoc on a tongue. It may be the man Gaultier was a transplant, or in exile.

What’s apparent is that hostility will not ease this task. Against herself, Wren forces the grit from her jaw. It’s too late to fake a return to ease, but if the creature believes itself a knight, orders and hierarchy may be taken better.

"I am Knight-Lieutenant Luwenna Coupe, presently acting under authority of the Inquisition. You will return with me to them, that we might render sense of this situation."

She gestures with the knife to the valley beyond.

"It's a long walk. And you get three questions. Understood?"

[ashen_one]

He stood, re-collecting his shield. He didn't yet moved to pull his sword from where it stay... but he kept his hand upon it, and closed the visor of his helm with a clang. He did not want to put himself on display any more than he had need to --

And doing so hid his tight-lipped frown.

"You came yarely to my defense in battle, sir, for which I owe you a debt of honor and service. But I owe no allegiance or duty to the Inquisition you serve; I am Unkindled, and my duty is to the Flame, and to what knightly orders I have sworn myself to. There is no sense to render."

It was a great deal to speak, after so long in silence; he swallowed, exhaling slowly, watching to see if the knightess would make use of the knife she kept out.

Not that it would avail her aught.

[limier]

"You’ve a shard of the Fade," Or. Something like that. What was the Anchor, exactly? A mark? An artifact? She’s done the reading, but frankly there’s been little enough of it that agrees. "Embedded in your hand."

"That might at any moment tear open the Veil and unleash more demons onto the countryside." Unkindled again. A true name, perhaps? Worth remembering. There will be more reliable sources to consult than Gaulthier itself. "That creature would be the least of it. If you truly owe me service, then you shall not repay it by endangering the innocent."