Whether you received a mysterious message, stumbled into the Mist, or are in search of Ravenloft for revenge or self ambitions, it doesn’t take long before the path before you leads you from familiar roads onto a disused trail overgrown by weeds and roots of spindly trees. The scent of mold and vegetation hangs in the air. A light drizzle begins to fall as you travel further. As you approach a wooded crossroads, something in the distance moves. A cloaked figure.
Unbeknownst to you, you are not alone in seeing this ethereal shape.
The figure’s head snaps up, glaring with piercing red eyes. What you took for a cloak spreads around it, revealing itself to be a pair of mighty black wings. With one powerful motion and a blast of chill air, the wings sweep and the vague figure is gone.
"Wh...where am I?" Astraea mumbled, staggering for a moment, her mind still a bit...fuzzy...from whatever it was that had happened to her.
She recalled a strange dream, a dark figure moving above her, drawing itself close, and in her dream she seemed to welcome it. But now, she was fully dressed (albeit not in her normal garb), and in a strange place, lands she was not familiar with. How was this possible? Her train of thought was interrupted as a dark figure emerged from the fog, moving silently in a sinister manner. She grabbed her staff and held it up in a defensive position.
Though, the mysterious strange disappeared as they appeared. It only took a moment for Astraea to realize she was not alone. Tensing up, she did not like her odds as she spotted movement from multiple directions. However, as the forms became more visible, she began to realize they seemed just as confused about their situation as she was.
"Does anybody know where we are?" She asked, a sense of alertness and suspicion in her voice and body language.
Whiskey deftly ducked the armature attack of the brigand who was after his loot before he slammed his fist into the brute's left side, hearing a satisfying crack from the impact to his ribs followed by a sick groan. Just as the first man fell to the forest floor, Whiskey spun with his staff and blocked the sword strike from the second brigand. He pushed the attacking sword away and with words under his breath between his heavy breathing he sent a fireball from the palm of his left hand into the face of the second man. The second man screamed and fell clutching at his melting face!
Huffing and puffing Whiskey spun to one knee, his eyes darting all over to see the next attacking brigand but found none. He took a deep breath, calmly rising to his feet and then suddenly Crash!! "OOUUUPHPHPH!!" he exclaimed as the air was knocked out of him, and his body was flung into a strange cold mist around the forest of trees. He was able to regain control of his fall and rolled to a stop before quickly getting to one knee with his staff in his right hand and his fire ball in his left ready to fight back, but there was no one!
He looked around intently but only noticed a light misty rain dampening his leather armor pants and light silk merchant shirt. The misty rain clung to his cloths and his strong, athletic, muscular, male form. His medium length, chocolate brown, curly hair wetted down over his head and towards his eyes. He rose unharmed but confused and on high alert. Whiskey had been to many places in the world of Faerun, but he had never seen or smelled anything like where he was now. He looked back behind himself where the Brigands had attacked, but saw no one, not even those he had just fought. "This if fuckin' weird…" he mumbled under his breath before starting to walk deeper into the forest of mist and away from the attackers.
Then he saw the dark figure on the path. Whiskey clutched at his staff tighter and mentally got his fireball ready, but as soon as he saw the figure, the shadow was gone. Before he could analyze what, that figure could have been another figure of a stunningly beautiful blonde appeared a few yards away. He didn't say anything at first with his mind ready for anything crazy at that point, but soon he sensed she was as real as he and as confused as he.
Astraea see's an impressive male figure, 6 feet, 2 inches tall, broad shoulders, a strong build with athletic muscles. His confident stance melts with the flow of his joints promising the ability to dance well during battle or at the palace. His damp, matted, brown hair lays on his round head, a few drips running down from his bangs to the side of his cheeks. His full, but trimmed, beard has specks of gray that match his dark gray eyes. He's a handsome man with some rugged qualities. A dark purple silk shirt and leather pants with a staff in his right hand, and tough leather boots complete his high quality yet un-ostentatious traveling garb.
He see's Astraea first and after she asks, "Does anybody know where we are?" he can't help but smile to her with a small laugh from how strange his life is in this moment before he responded, "Not a fuckin' clue!" As he looked around, he saw other figures appearing. He clutches his staff tighter, but didn't motion an attack, "Did you see where the Brigands went?"
A dark figure with red eyes. Quinry thought it was so familiar already. The message she got had been so mystically alluring, she couldn't help but walk for days until she got to the spot. It was terribly foggy, and she even walked with her hands reaching out.
"Hello? Mister Red Eyes?" She called, but the figure didn't reappear. Instead, she saw other. Figures: a beautiful lady and a handsome were visible first.
What they saw was a 6'4" tall human (since she had hidden her horns, wings, and tail), of slightly tanned skin, amber-color eyes, and long, silver, braided hair. She was slim, and had impressive curves on the front and back. And she wore extremely revealing clothes, besides a purple cloak which very lazily hung from her arms, and which had golden embroidery which looked like tiny fairies.
"Hello, there, beautiful people! Why, yes, if I remem correctly, this place must be called Rave-loft! It sounds like they have killer parties!"
She definitely remembered incorrectly.
"The name is Quinry, a pleasure!" She said with the most theatrical of bows.
Finding herself on a disused trail overgrown by weeds and roots of spindly trees wasn't something new to Nimue. She still wrinkled her nose at the scent of mold. But she loved the smell of the vegetation and not even the light drizzle disturbed her. The crossroad came as a surprise, however, there wasn't supposed to be anything like that leading to the mansion she set out to explore.
The cloaked figure with the piercing red eyes was new, and the black wings definitely threw the elf for a loop, more so, when the other shapes of persons kind of shimmered into reality around her.
"Does anybody know where we are?" asked a suspicious and seemingly alert blonde woman with a staff, making Nimue keep silent from asking the same, and she even held back from giving a sharp tongued reply before any of the others could speak.
The strong, athletic, muscular, male with the chocolate brown, curly hair and the nice, if slightly whitening beard put it together a little more profane as Nimue would. "Not a fuckin' clue!" interestingly enough he also had a staff, and asked a question of his own "Did you see where the Brigands went?" which made the redhead elf lok around more alert too, brigands was never a good way to spend one's day...
The thrird, a very tall and very curvy woman sounded like she had one more drink than she should have "Hello, there, beautiful people! Why, yes, if I remem correctly, this place must be called Rave-loft! It sounds like they have killer parties!" but at least she was more open and less alert than the others, bowing and sharing her name "The name is Quinry, a pleasure!"
"The pleasure is all ours, Quinry... and you are right, if that winged person is any indication, we are indeed close to a raven's loft. I am sometimes called sleeping Nimue, which isn't really something I am used doing... I would say, we are at a crossroad, but you all seem to have already realized that. Even if there shouldn't be any crossroads here. I am looking for an empty mansion around here, some inheritance of mine could be left over after the disappearance of the owners... and any brigands should be bad news, unless they are you three... four? I do not mind sharing with clean, good looking and interesting people..."
She said nodding towards the fifth figure, a similarly tall but cloaked maybe woman who tried to keep hiding and was staying away as much from anyone else as she could, eyeing their surroundings, like she was fearing those brigands... even if she was looking for something less obvious and more dangerous, something that was haunting her.
(But seeing that I still have no idea how Ssnacky turned out, I can't tell how she looks like. - Maybe she isn't even there? Could be Theodore Naydasdy hiding from the sun...)
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