A Band of Merry Men [CYOA]

Then faint.

"You did a good job fighting in there, Miss Aurhart. Almost like you've done this sort of thing before."

Your response comes brimming with snaps and fingerguns that you can't help but imagine look cool.

"Oh, sure. I go exploring like this aaaall the time."

..But why did you say that? You're pretty certain you've never explored probably ancient ruins and fought living rocks before, and given the unimpressed, one eyebrow-raised expression Nikolas sends your way you're pretty certain he knows that too. And thus, sheepishly letting yourself down from the perch of false confidence, you amend your statement. Of course, still with an appropriate amount of coolness for what you've managed to do with no training whatsoever.

"...Probably. I'm not sure if I have or haven't, if I'm being honest."

Nikolas' doubting expression, sadly, doesn't quite die away with that addition. Neither does his natural sarcasm.
"Oh, really. So explain why you were unconscious in there if you don't know that you're an explorer."

"I don't know."

"You don't know."

"I, um... Don't remember much before I woke up."

The warrior merely continues to look unimpressed(Or is that his normal expression?), but Alaster can't quite seem to help but laugh.
"Then I suppose that just makes your performance in there that much more impressive!"

Nikolas folds his arms in traditional grump fashion, though you spy a gentle smile growing on his face as well.
"I suppose it does."

"..Thanks?"

"Don't get used to it."

...

Asshole.

Tetra comes up from behind, slapping a hand on the shoulder not still occupied by Alaster.
"So, we got the loot. What now, Alaster?"

"Head back to base, naturally. I was thinking perhaps we could bring Miss Aurhart along, especially if she's missing her memory."

"Well I think perhaps you should ask the woman herself?"

And like that, you've been put on the spot. But, honestly... The choice doesn't seem that hard to you. You're missing your memory, yeah, and you should most likely work on finding it again at some point. Maybe you hid it from yourself behind the couch. Probably not. But memory aside, you have to admit to yourself..that was all actually kind of cool. Like those stories that you read in books about bands of brave adventurers conquering dangers unknown to find hidden treasures. You mean, how cool is that?

Though...It seems dangerous too. But these three look to be pretty strong. And maybe if you came with them, they'd be willing to train you. Maybe even let you join. And if you get some training, maybe a proper weapon, hey. Maybe you can stand against stuff like that on your own, eventually?

And so, you give the tweed wonder a simple nod to indicate your willingness. He beams.

"And there you go, Tetra. Your confirmation from the woman herself?"

Nikolas, naturally, is having none of it even as he slightly mirrors the leader's smile.
"Great, that mean we can head home?"

"Of course."

---

As the party walks, Tetra once again leading with surety behind her steps, you consider something. As you were fighting, you felt your perception of things seem to speed up. From what you know about how time works, that's probably not normal. It's kind of...incredible, actually, being able to make it almost feel as though time is moving slower for you. You wonder how it actually works. Well, some sort of magic of course. Maybe even time magic. Does that mean you're some kind of time-controlling witch? Probably not. Though that could be an interesting name for it. "Witch Time."

Well, it'll work until you eventually figure out what it's actually called.


And then you sneeze.

---

At length, though probably not as much length as it seems, you begin to notice the environment around you almost seem to slowly melt away. Where there was before desert sand, you find yourself walking into a forest. And where those trees were, you find... More trees. But different trees, you suppose. Thinner trees, more decorative than anything. And finally, even the trees make way, more naturally, into some sort of garden path. Or a trail, maybe. It's hard to tell. The important thing is that you find yourself suddenly in the middle of some town you're sure you can't have entered normally, walking a path by... Something. You find it strangely hard to keep your eyes from...sliding off it, though you can tell it's a building of some sort.

Alaster takes the lead now, taking the four of you off the path and towards the building-shaped something. And, as you draw past some invisible line, you feel an odd tingle run through your body and almost make your hair stand on end. None of the others seem to notice, but as you look forwards to see their reactions you realize something. You can see the building properly now.

It's fairly large. Maybe large enough to be a warehouse. But otherwise, it ultimately seems rather unassuming. There's a nice lawn around it, and the roof is painted a beautiful shade of Cobalt Blue, but those are the only things that seem to stand out. Until you go inside, at least.

You head through a by all means ordinary door, and find that the inside of the building is brightly lit. You're in a smaller room, almost an entrance foyer of sorts. It seems quite comfortable, with a couple nice couches, a tea table, and a grandfather clock standing along a wall. You can't help but get the feeling that the tweed wonder himself had a hand in designing this room, as the whole place managed to feel just as old fashioned and comfortably worn out as his coat. In fact, the only remarkable thing to be seen here is near the tea table, a large brass globe of sorts. It seems newer than the rest of the room, and you can see magic lights glowing along the surface that might just represent cities, but could also be something else entirely.

Off this entrance foyer is a simple but wide hall that Nikolas immediately heads down without saying a word, disappearing through a door a short ways along. Alaster, meanwhile, simply but proudly gestures to the room in general. Yes, he definitely had a hand in it.
"Welcome to our humble base, Miss Aurhart. If you're interested we have a guest room set up down the hall you can rest in for the moment, given the adventure we just had."

"..Rest, huh. Rest seems nice."

"Fourth door down on the right. We'll fetch you once we've settled things and decided what to do."


And so, but a minute later, you find yourself in a oddly comfortably furnished(if a bit "cozy") bedroom, pondering on the general strangeness of Alaster in giving everything here this homey, and almost dull in that sense, aesthetic. Before you know it you've closed your eyes, and....

Woken again to the sound of knocking on the door, Tetra's voice coming from the other side of the wood.
"Wake up call!"

Seconded.

With appropriate Pillar Men BGM.

Xeno gets it. Xeno always gets it.

Hearing the all-too effective wakeup call (How long did you sleep?), your first thought turns to the cliche line of "Five more minutes." But considering you're currently acting as these people's guest you don't know that responding like that is the best idea, even in a joking sense. Might give the wrong impression, and you certainly don't want that. Especially since you don't actually know what sort of impression you ought to be making. So, instead, you just respond with a simpler call.

"Alright, one minute."

"Better just be one minute."

Heh. Amazing how she managed to be slightly rude while still saying that with a perfect grain of humor.

So. What sort of impression should you be making, anyways? You suppose you want these people to think that you're cool, right? What's the best way to look cool?

...You should do a backflip.

Off the wall.

And then strike a pose.

Yes, that sounds about right.

And so, the appropriate music playing in your head, you stand up on the bed, wind up, and get ready to flip.
In three...
Two...
One...
ACHOO!

Just as you're about to jump, you find yourself suddenly gripped by the tyrannical, and possibly iron, fist of the evil sneeze lords. And, losing your balance in the tucked, pre-flip position, you find yourself instead falling with a loud scream into the room's bedside table and into the lamp positioned atop it. Your own loud and shrill sound combined with the crash of metal and glass proves enough for Tetra to throw the door open, some sort of seemingly explosive orb held in her hand and at the ready. She watches the scene inside of this room for a moment, clearly expecting some sort of intruder rather than you crashed into a table, and you can feel your cheeks redden as she slowly relaxes from her guard into a slightly concerned, but mostly irritated, stance.

"What were you doing?"

"...Trying to look cool?"

"..Right, well. You'll have plenty of opportunity to look cool soon enough."

And without a word, she turns and heads out the doorway with a motion for you to follow her.

..Which you do. Hopefully you haven't annoyed her too much.


<('u'< >'u')> <('u'< >'u')> <('u'< >'u')> <('u'< /)//(\ <('u'< >'u')> <('u'< >'u')> <('u'< >'u')> <('u'< >'u')>


Heading out after Tetra and back into the hallway, you glance off left towards the entrance hall and notice Nikolas, walking towards the exit door while putting on some sort of heavy black cloak.

"..Hey, where's he going?"

Tetra just shrugs.
"Some other job he has, higher up in the guild. He keeps refusing to tell any of us about it."

"Guild?"

"What, you didn't think we just wander around and look for places we might see treasure, do you? There's a whole guild set up for folks like us that helps keep jobs straight."

"So that compass..."

"Was a payload to collect. Alaster'll send it off next time we visit the guild hall, and we'll receive our pay for the job."

"..Huh."

Tetra stops, standing in front of a larger double door, nicely framed with wood.
"Hey, it's a living. And it's not like we don't get to keep some fun stuff ourselves. But, enough on that. We've reached our destination."

As she pushes open the doors, you find yourself treated to a view that's hard to describe. Immediately in front of the doorway is a wooden platform, but it soon drops off a height of a good ten feet into a rather large room. Down on the lower floor you can see a few racks of weapons and some targets and training dummies, and it seems that portions of the floor are made of different surfaces; Ordinary wood, concrete, sand, and even one covered in some snow-like substance. Above that, standing periodically through the room, are wooden pillars. Around these pillars, all sorts of things to climb around. Ropes, ladders, platforms leading together in some sort of sequence, and a handful of poles sticking out. Presumably to swing on.

...Actually, that view wasn't hard to describe at all.

And, as you step out onto the platform of the doorway to see all of this, Tetra simply leans on the frame and folds her arms like a coolkid.

"Not bad, huh?"

Looks like it's time to hit the gyms eh? We're certainly game!

Inquire about whether the training will begin with stretches or light cardio, that way they know how serious you are about getting FIT.

There should also be a smoothie bar, or maybe potions given the setting, don't forget to restock on that after a hearty yet moderate workout.

Okay, but then we should totally make two more snowmen and act out the support conversations of Chrom and F!Robin, famously known for its place in Alexander Hamilton: the Play: the Movie: the Game: the Exprience (GONE WRONG) (GONE SEXUAL) (POLICE CALLED)

Get a flail. Those are kinda cool.

Get a hammer!

Throw one of your swords at her face.

"I'll let you take the first shot."

Your first instinct is to throw the hammer at her.

You're not entirely sure why, since everything you know about fighting says that abandoning your weapon is a terrible idea, but you still find the need to catch yourself before you manage to embarrass yourself in front of Tetra more than you already have. Instead, you start thinking it out. You have on you a weapon that doesn't exactly have the most reach in the world, but it still has three times the length of Tetra's dagger. That's good. In a hammer, you want all the force on the end. Just like if you're trying to drive down a nail, it's just that instead you're trying to hit a significantly larger target.

Hoping that you're doing this right, you decide to open with a simple swing, coming down from the side and aiming for Tetra's head. The rogue, however, simply counters this by ducking to the side. Right under the hammer.
If this were more than a practice session and a test, you suspect, this would be where Tetra would push some advantage on you. But she doesn't seem as though she's going to immediately attack, and so you run mostly off of instinct and take your swing, already heading off to the side because of your follow-through, and you turn it into a 360° spin to bring it back around.

Tetra raises her dagger to block the strike by catching the shaft of the hammer on her blade, something that you can't help but hope would be harder with weapons that aren't made of wood, and immediately dashes forwards. Everything slows in the increasingly familiar feeling of "witch time", and as the rogue lines up a downwards slash across your chest you fall backwards, narrowly managing to avoid the strike but also proceeding to land on your butt. Not the smoothest dodge ever.

Looking at you with an expression that somehow manages to simultaneously cover surprise, disappointment, and smugness, Tetra extends a hand to you.
"Your strength is good, but unless you can overpower someone with it trying to spin around like that isn't going to do a whole lot against an opponent who's watching for openings."

You accept the hand up with an incomprehensible mutter that began life as a protest and died somewhere before it managed to be vocalized, and Tetra gives you a gentle smile before falling back into place and stance.
"Think about openings and possibilities. Imagine how I might react, and make sure that you're able to react in turn"



>>Solya: 35/35

Tetra: 40/40