Simple and direct, an answer similar to Kai’s questions, and Jigano chuckled, finding some of his annoyance at the mud slipping by the wayside. The young man’s boundless curiosity tickled something in the bard’s spiky little heart, and he relaxed a little in spite of his stolen boot. ”’The social structure of the community?’” he repeated, brow arched in amusement. ”That’s an unusual way to phrase it. I’m the leader because I founded them, and because … well, because no one else wants the responsibility, I suppose.” Explaining how Amalia had been in charge for a while but had returned the mantle seemed a bit deeper than this conversation had time for given how quickly the topics moved on. ”And we serve the community by gathering information from various sources into a more easily searchable collection and serve as a repository of knowledge for people to come and ask questions of. Hopefully we can find their answers within our own records, or by conducting research within the Atheneum’s substantial collection, but we also undertake finding answers in distant or dangerous places that people don’t want to go.” A task made more difficult when one was missing a boot.
Another name to file away, but mention of Rae had the bard blinking in surprise at Kai’s casual confidence in dropping one of the Big Three gods. While it was possible the young man was lying or simply addled, it wasn’t like the gods didn’t ask stranger things of their supplicants. And the other man’s manner of speech was certainly outlandish enough to give him away as no natural of the barrierlands.
The lapse in concentration had caused the tilted earth to collapse and the boot to slosh further away again. Jigano blew out an annoyed sigh at it before he flexed his fingers into the ground and started again – though this time the mud seemed to resist sliding down the small hill that was growing on the far side of its puddle, somehow managing to flow uphill against all laws of physics.
”Mm? Yes, I was, yes, there was, and yes, I did,” he answered distractedly, eyes narrowing as he pushed an overhanging crest over his own small construct of non-sentient earth, trying to curl the mud back on itself and herd it towards himself. ”What do you want to know about first?”
Another name to file away, but mention of Rae had the bard blinking in surprise at Kai’s casual confidence in dropping one of the Big Three gods. While it was possible the young man was lying or simply addled, it wasn’t like the gods didn’t ask stranger things of their supplicants. And the other man’s manner of speech was certainly outlandish enough to give him away as no natural of the barrierlands.
The lapse in concentration had caused the tilted earth to collapse and the boot to slosh further away again. Jigano blew out an annoyed sigh at it before he flexed his fingers into the ground and started again – though this time the mud seemed to resist sliding down the small hill that was growing on the far side of its puddle, somehow managing to flow uphill against all laws of physics.
”Mm? Yes, I was, yes, there was, and yes, I did,” he answered distractedly, eyes narrowing as he pushed an overhanging crest over his own small construct of non-sentient earth, trying to curl the mud back on itself and herd it towards himself. ”What do you want to know about first?”
