TEST DRIVE MEME!

[faderifting]

Guess.

go on, guess.

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.

Lately the Hinterlands have also been full of mages and templars and rifts, all threatening to turn once-peaceful countryside into a dangerous warzone. The Inquisition has set up several camps and sent personnel 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.

1. BEARIED ALIVE

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?

2. NICE PLACE FOR A SPOT OF CAMPING

If there were an inn, which there's not, there wouldn't be room for you in it. Traveling with the Inquisition means carrying your own bedrolls, putting up your own tents, and sleeping alongside whoever you've been told to share with--no matter how much you hate them or how loud they snore. If you really can't stand it, the alternative is sleeping outside. On the ground. With the bears.

3. A BIG CRAZY LIGHT IN THE SKY

Not everyone thinks the Breach was a bad thing. In the southeastern mountains, a burgeoning cult has taken up residence in Winterwatch Tower to wait patiently for the Maker to reach through the tears in the veil and gather the faithful to his bosom. They're a little kooky, maybe, but harmless, and they're happy enough to share their wine and lager with travelers in the area. The demon-spewing rift behind the Tower, on the other hand... Too bad the Herald didn't close that thing before she bit it. Watch your step.

4. TROUBLE IN THE DEEP

The Carta is everywhere, but it's here in force, occupying dwarven ruins in a chasm behind a waterfall. Inquisition forces have already cleared most of the smugglers out of the hold, but there's still a vault to break into, bodies to loot, and old texts to search through for anything worth adding to the Inquisition's growing archives. Also: darkspawn. Sorry.

5. 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

[aurelianzephyr]

"Thank you. I appreciate it."

At least he's fairly quiet after the exchange, other than taking the time to skin the carcass of the ram now with a small sharp knife. It was always best to do so while the kill was fresh. Bent over his work he doesn't seem to be keen on starting a conversation himself so early in the morning.

While friendly when the occasion called for it, Keith didn't know this man enough to try. But, he can appreciate he knows how to work and doesn't try to escape from it easily. He was used to working on his own but sometimes it was nice to have a little help now and again.

When he's done he carefully speared the meat and lifted it up onto the spit he'd crafted around the fire he'd made earlier, surveying his handiwork.

[fourscores]

The silence is unexpected, but he appreciates it. Far too many were so chatty when it came to the day to day, someone who wasn't was unexpected. It was pleasant, especially this early when quiet had been all he wanted.

Once the fire is started and the meat set, he stands. "Is that all you need?"

Certainly that was it.

[aurelianzephyr]

Normally he'd have let the man go on about his business, and yet there was something he couldn't quite place about his demeanor and the strange aura he felt radiating from the man's shoulders.

Keith wasn't trying to bother him but he can't help but be curious. After all, he's never seen Jhin within the Inquisition's expedition parties before.

"That depends...Are you new?"

Amusingly he was rather new himself, so it was within reason Keith wanted to ask about it. Still, as he cleanses his hands with some water from a basin and with some soap, or the equivalent there of for their world. He was...somewhat more hygienic than the average person perhaps, but that wasn't a Dalish thing so much as a personal quirk from living in the Wilds so long.

[fourscores]

He'd have sighed if it wouldn't come across as rude. Instead he keeps his expression polite, shrugging his shoulders. He was new enough to the Inquisition, but certainly not the newest. Did that make him new anyway?

"That would depend on what you consider new."

Why was it important anyway?

"New enough I suppose."