From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
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Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
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Jigano paused to tilt his head at the young man who'd tagged along, a silver brow arched in silent disbelief. "Where on Caido did you get that? If you're in a mood to put words in my mouth we can part ways right here and now, Oliver." He could understand, viscerally, why the Naturals had been so frustrated with the Outlanders back in the days of the barrier. For someone who had been here so comparatively short a time to be advocating for the extinction of entire species because they occasionally killed a human instead of a deer was entirely exasperating, especially when Oliver hadn't even encountered a Land Shark before.
Gods least fortunate, it was enough to drive a man to drink.
"That would be good," he agreed more neutrally to the suggestion of a warning system, something he would have encouraged with far more enthusiasm had Oliver not just implied that he thought Aoife's death was 'fine' when he had been there the night of her birth, when Ronin had staggered into the Temple with Vanya's death still cold in his eyes and the star-eyed babe wrapped close against his chest.
"Ah, so it's a country, then?" That explained it, more or less. "Hmm... I wonder if you lived in an orphanage, then, and helped take care of the younger children?" the bard mused thoughtfully before a hint of something with potential caught his eye. He was off and moving briskly but not so fast that Oliver couldn't keep up. He wrote as he walked, a line jotted down between steps in cyptic shorthand as he marked the path and the buildings they passed. The ruined walls and crumbled stone grew broader and simpler, shifting from houses or shops to something else. The bard paused as he came to what once had been a crossroads with a shattered fountain at its center - a simple bowl, broad and shallow, and he padded forward to inspect it before looking around at the bare squares at the corners of the little plaza, grass poking up beneath rotting pavers.
"These were probably once storage buildings or warehouses," he explained to Oliver as he scanned the remains of tumbled stone walls and empty doorframes. "This fountain would have been used to water the horses or oxen used to pull carts of goods here to be stored until they could be sold later, or loaded onto caravans heading to other places."
A soft sigh escapes his lips and he shakes his head, realizing what he had said might've been...rude. He would've fought it, but right now he didn't have the energy to. "No- I'm sorry. That was super uncalled for...and incorrect of me to say." He made sure to try and maintain eyecontact with Jigano to hopefully show the man that he was being sincere enough. He hadn't intended on hurting the man or offending him, not at all. The words had escaped his mouth without giving it a second thought, something that was extremely childish of him to do. At least they were able to slightly change the subject?
"I could try to figure it out? Like...maybe we could figure out when the Landshark is most likely to eat and try to put some livestock there instead, that way it will eat that instead of us." Maybe the Landshark was too clever for that or maybe it didn't follow a pattern, but surely there was something available for them to do. A way to track when the beast was going to take its next victim.
An orphanage didn't quite feel right, at least not to Oliver. "I'm...not sure. I can give you a bit more detail to hopefully help," He thought for a moment, letting out a soft hum with a head tilt as he thought things over, contemplating what to say next. "I've told Loren about this, so sorry if I miss anything...but I know our house was two stories at least. I would play with the kids sometimes on the stairs with these carvings on our walls or we would play in this open room. There was a door that none of the kids were allowed to go into and I couldn't either...and I remember the day I could. I was so excited...but I cant remember what was on the other side, but I know I went there a lot after that day." An orphanage just didn't feel right with the context. Why would an orphanage have a fancy door? One that he had to wait to enter? It was a possibility and he'd bookmark it for later, considering it whenever he remembered anything new.
Peering into the fountain, he turned to look back towards Jigano. "Do you think there's anything of use within the homes? Maybe there's a cellar underneath them?" It was a bizarre assumption, but hey, maybe people had hidden cellars here with tons of wine or something.
It had escalated quickly, but just as quickly subsided as Oliver's apology soothed the bard's ruffled feathers. "Thank you for the apology," he said, a little gruff but also sincere. "It is appreciated and accepted." And with that, hopefully, moved past to more productive things. The warning system and stalking goat idea were better received, and Jigano pondered Oliver's suggestion for a moment before shaking his head regretfully. "There's more than one, I think. They only eat once a year, but we've had several rise in any given year, and they seem to treat the entire Outskirts as their hunting grounds, though especially the fields. But that's a lot of area to cover. Still, if there was a way to get an arrowhead or something embedded in one... a magical alarm tied into a stone arrow point, for instance, that had a counterpart up here that someone kept nearby and that would glow or make noise when the shark was active... at least we'd know to be on the lookout." The idea came from the warning system that Sam and Remi had once shared, though it would first require being in the right place and time to shoot a risen Landshark without getting eaten themselves, and as rarely as the sharks surfaced that was indeed a daunting prospect.
He listened to the younger man reveal more memories, simply nodding acceptance that an orphanage didn't feel right. Oliver would know what was right or not in his own memories better than Jigano ever could, so he trusted the clues that the blond had uncovered and focused on trying to make the puzzle pieces fit. "A door you could only enter when you reached a certain age?" he guessed from the context. "Perhaps a place with delicate or dangerous instruments that couldn't be trusted with younger children? Some sort of boarding school, perhaps?" He paused, feeling as though he was missing something important. "Do you remember how many children were with you, that you took care of?" Were there few enough to all be related? Or so many that it was more like a boarding house or school?
They paused by the dried-up old fountain and Jigano's quirked a wry grin at Oliver's curiosity. "Back there a ways, where the homes were? You can go check them out if you like! I've found things in the basements before... though that's where you also tend to find Stone Golems, hiding away from the light." He padded over to one of the empty warehouse plots, beginning to pace out the perimeter, sharp eyes noting how the grass grew and where the stones had tumbled. "I'm hoping we might find a cellar underneath one of these old places. This is where items would have been stored in bulk... especially useful things, like iron or coal or fabric, and wouldn't have owners to mind if we bring it back to the Settlement to share out. With the houses you tend to find smaller, more personal things, but it can feel more like looting the memories of the dead when you take from them... well. For some people it does, at least." He shrugged, a little uncomfortably. He could see both sides of the argument for and against pillaging those places, and he wasn't so saintly that he wasn't tempted by it, but today, at least, he had more benign intentions.
The conversation moves on safely without any more stress or anger from the either of them, which is an absolute relief. Being angry is not something Oliver enjoys and he doesn't want to turn this nice outing into a childish argument, even if he disagrees with Jigano. Fighting people just isn't fun and he doesn't want to waste his time, nor energy, doing it. A puzzled look does appear on his face, though, as the conversation continues on about the sharks. "Wait...so how do they travel exactly? Are there tunnels or something?" Yeah...he thought he understood it but turns out, he has absolutely no idea how it works. "Or do they like...enter a void where they just exist and can appear anywhere?" That last one was very out there and also kind of stupid, but Oliver was fine with saying it. Hopefully Jigano didn't mind some stupid questions.
Some of the suggestions did feel familiar. Possibly there was something dangerous behind the door, it made sense and felt like it was something he had heard before. While no memories came to mind immediately, he felt like it was correct. A soft hum escaped his lips and he tilted his head slightly. "I think....there were five children younger than me...yeah, that sounds accurate. Each about a couple of years difference in age? I think the one younger than me was a solid...five years younger? Maybe more?" It was a bit hard to think of, but it sounded right as well. He obviously wasn't stressed about remembering the kids, allowing his mind to work its magic in whatever way it needed to.
Oliver was more than ready to go exploring in the houses....until he found out about stone golems. Yeah, that's a for sure no from him. "I think....in a way, it's fine for us to use the things left behind... I wouldn't directly steal from someone, that just feels wrong... but I would want to make a good use of it. Find a new owner who will treat the object well or re-purpose it to help others." Okay, yeah, he did steal something from Remi's shop, but he had full intentions of properly handling the pendant. He wasn't going to keep it for himself, hell no. "Do you think the cellars could also have wine or spices? Maybe something super cool, like....something a specific tradesmen would keep."
Jigano could only shrug at the shark questions, for little was known and less was written about them. "I don't think there are tunnels, though I could be wrong. I think they have a kind of magic that lets them swim through the earth as if it were water, but that's only a guess." The Sparkbird which was constantly on fire was another example of an impossible creature that somehow still existed. Magic and biology were strongly intertwined on Caido, at least in some creatures.
He listened while he paced, pondering Oliver's memories while he searched for an entrance to what lay below. "Hmm... then they could have all been your siblings," he agreed thoughtfully, pausing as he reached a slight depression in the grass, a dip a few feet across. With a thoughtful hum he reached out with his earth magic to gently move the top layer of soil aside, and was greeted by the dirt-darkened patina of old wood. "Did any of them ever get to go in the special door once they were older?"
He tapped on the wood, which was soft on top and half-rotted, but clearing the rest of the dirt away revealed a latch and a lock that had rusted to scraps. The bard looked up at Oliver with a nod for his reasoning, but a wry grin at his guesses. "I can respect that way of thinking about it. But if these places have wine or spices we'll be very sad, indeed. After three hundred years the wine will be vinegar and the spices little better than tasteless dust, I'm afraid. But if these were warehouses like I think, then who knows what we might find down there. Finished goods and raw materials, either being sent to foreign places or having been imported here and awaiting delivery to the shops and tradesman that could make use of them. Minerals and metals are our best bets for having survived, though depending on the conditions down there we might get lucky with cloth; silk or wool, in particular." Food or drink, though, unless preserved by magic would have been long since spoiled. "Can you give me a hand with this door?" It was wedged in place after a few centuries of wood rot swelling the planks to the frame, but the wood was fragile enough that their combine strength should do the trick.
Interesting. It was an answer and honestly made quite a lot of sense in a way. Magic was a much easier thing to understand than a bunch of tunnels. "So wait...nobody has actually been able to do that much research? This is all hypothetical?" So while this answer was plausible, it certainly wasn't the end of it. "I think we should change that, if that's the case. Make it so we know the answer for sure." Of course, they'd have to be safe, but he absolutely wanted answers, that way people could be properly informed on how to stay safe around the sharks.
"Maybe...that sounds right but it also doesn't." It once again doesn't bother him, but this is an intriguing one. Part of it seems accurate and correct, like it's the answer, but he also feels like he's missing something. There is a missing piece to the puzzle that he just needs to find. "I know for sure that none of them ever went into the room, I was the only one who did." The answers aren't the best, but it's all that he could give. Hopefully he could tell Loren about this, seeing as Loren was always able to help him.
His eyes widened ever so slightly as he moved over to help Jigano with the door. Placing his hands on the wood, he'd work towards helping to pull it off. "So... wait. Three hundred years?" He let out a couple of huffs as he worked to get into the building. "Why is this abandoned? What happened?"
He chuckled at the surprised question, giving the younger man a wry smile. "How would you follow a shark beneath the earth? Even with mastered earth magic I can't do what they do. And they're rare creatures, from what I've read. We've probably had more sightings in the past year than the last fifty years combined." And half of them had been by him. "They're far more likely to eat an animal when they surface than a human, it seems like, and when that happens there wouldn't necessarily be people around to see or catalogue it, or at least there hasn't been before." Times, they were a-changing, though. "If you want to start a program for it, though, the Loreseekers would help you record your findings if you needed assistance with it."
Not a boarding house or orphanage, then. Siblings, but not. And no one else went into the special room, even though the next-oldest child had to have been fourteen or fifteen, if Oliver's youthful appearance was anything to go by. "I'll be curious to hear what was in that room, when you remember," he said with a smile, not having any ideas of what to ask next at the moment.
Luckily the cellar door had been found and offered a distraction. It took both of them to open, the door finally pulling loose with a breaking of planks as some of the edges crumbled away, but the broad wing of the door flew up and swung over to fall on broken hinges that had rusted there a hundred years ago. "Or close to it," Jigano admitted as he caught his balance, then unhooked the lantern he always carried at his belt. He lifted it forward and saw stone steps descending, still solid after all those years. He began to walk down them cautiously, the lantern's soft glow illuminating, but not very far. A shift to fox eyes gave him better sight, and he was relieved that nothing seemed to be moving in the darkness below ground. "This is just a guess on my part, but from the pattern of destruction, my guess is that when the barrier went up it created a shockwave - or perhaps the barrier itself expanded swiftly from the Spire's locus - that damaged or shattered many buildings. The stoutest, like the Atheneum and Temple, remained mostly standing, but those that were less sturdy, or made primarily of wood rather than stone, were knocked down. It must have been incredibly chaotic... and the survivors took shelter primarily in those homes and buildings which had survived mostly intact. They had their hands full repairing those, and the population has decreased since then, so there was little need to fix more buildings, at least until the Outlanders started showing up in force to bolster the numbers."
The lantern's steady white glow would reveal several large shapes in the shadows; a large moth-eaten tarp covering what looked like a stack of boxes, a dozen large casks stacked in the corner, and more crates at the lantern's edge.
The answer was...pretty much what he had asked for. Unfortunately, it also was a small deterrence for him to continue on with his original mission plan. "Would there be a way for me to track the sharks without endangering myself? Or anyone else?" Oliver had too many things left to do. So many plans and questions about the world. He didn't want to die because he got too close to a fucking landshark. It seemed like one of the worst ways to go out, especially seeing as he originally planned to seek them out. If he were going to die, which he knew he eventually would, he didn't want that to be the way. Dying alone in the belly of a shark was depressing as fuck. If he were to die, he would want it to be with someone he loved and cared about, to be held and-
Yeah. He really didn't want to be thinking about those thoughts, especially since he was now frowning and basically boiling over with negative feelings. Thank goodness he couldn't send those feelings accidentally to Jigano, seeing as he could only do that as a animal.
Once Jigano was inside the cellar, Oliver followed down after him. The more he learned about life in Caido, the worse he felt. These Naturals lived such harsh lives, which explained why so many of the naturals he knew hated the Outlanders. These people were coming in acting like they knew everything when they had hardly even suffered. It was unfair and honestly a shitty thing to deal with. "I'm...I'm glad people were able to move on...but I'm also sad that they had to leave so much behind... do you think that we could return some heirlooms? You know, since I'm sure that descendants of them exist."
It was a well-meant question, but Jigano could only smile wryly at it. "If we had a way to track them, they wouldn't be as much of a threat to people. The best idea I have at the moment is that one about the tracking stones shot by an arrow, but the trick will be being in the right time and place to get one into the shark... and making them in the first place." With Remi gone where are we at in the timeline now? there was only Deimos who might be able to make such a thing, and he had other concerns at hand in making his magical munitions for the militia.
The act of exploring and discovering new parts of the Ruins had cheered Jigano up from their initial falling out, and he didn't realize how upset Oliver had become over the subject of the Landshark. Perhaps they simply had different approaches to it; it was a force of nature to Jigano, like lightning that struck and killed people sometimes. It was tragic and you did what you could to avoid it, but there was no use getting mad at something that just followed its nature. And it was as much a Natural as Amalia or Sam, when it came right down to it.
But it had also killed Edrei, so while he wouldn't condone the genocide of an entire species he also wouldn't cry any tears if one was killed in self-defense, either.
The cellar basement had been untouched for a long time, if the thick layer of dust was anything to go by. Jigano headed towards the boxes covered by the tarp, tapping the corner of one thoughtfully before shifting his nails to claws and beginning to work on teasing out a slat of the old wood to see what was inside. "We could definitely try," he agreed approvingly to Oliver's suggestion. "It's a good idea. The Loreseekers have a good list of many of the families in the Settlement by now, at least, from when we've gone out to gather stories to preserve." The wood parted reluctantly, rusted nails resisting being pulled out. In the end it was the wood that splintered around them first until the plank came away and the lantern's light revealed the gleam of metal inside. "This one has... armor, it looks like," Jigano mused as he examined what he could see of it. "Maybe from the war that was going on before the Voice was trapped? What about you? Finding anything interesting?"
The frown was displayed on Oliver's face as Jigano explained that they didn't really have many options. "I guess we should just try our best...create tracking arrows so that we can protect the people of this place...as well, maybe we could hold classes? Specifically on educating people about the creatures here...maybe then we can minimize the deaths of civilians." Seeing as he didn't even know about a lot of these creatures. It would be wise for a natural to help educate them so that they wouldn't risk the death of another close friend. Killing the landsharks seemed to be out of the question, but that didn't mean they couldn't educate people on it.
It would be obvious that Jigano and Oliver had very different views on how wildlife should be treated. Oliver was under the belief that as long as people weren't brutally killed, it was fine. If it was easy to avoid, that was one thing, but when the landsharks seemingly stalked everywhere, ripping the lives away without people being able to protect themselves...it felt wrong. Horrifically wrong. Treading in the territory of an animal was one thing, but the moment it invaded so close to civilization? It should be stopped. Jigano, on the other hand, seemed to view that all animals should be allowed to live, no matter what. It would be hard for the two to truly agree when it came down to it, but at least he and Jigano could try to respect each other's opinions.
Wandering into the cellar, Oliver watched as Jigano made his way over to the crates before he followed in his lead. Ripping into one of the other crates, he glanced over as Jigano revealed all that he had found. Armor would come in handy...but what's this about a war? Pulling out stuff from his crate, he didn't find anything too exciting. "Just some bottles, jars, and...I think pottery? Pots, I think." He held up one of the glass vials, it was empty and dusty. "Can you tell me more about this war? What exactly happened?"
"I held a class on that very subject recently," he pointed out mildly. "There was an official notice on the noticeboard for it. Not many came, unfortunately, and most of those were Loreseekers and Naturals who were already familiar with many of the creatures and plants of the area. But there were a few newcomers who benefited from it, I hope. Libbs and Aonghas, at least, and perhaps Tarasha as well." The Provost shrugged lightly, but he was obviously disappointed at the low turnout. "Classes don't do much good if the people they are held for don't attend." He didn't mention that Oliver hadn't come, either, nor had he brought any of those he seemed so eager to think might benefit.
Perhaps because Jigano had not been human until recently, he had a different point of view on who was encroaching on who. It wasn't the landshark's fault that 'civilization' had been built in its territory, after all, and if people chose to take the risks of living there with it, that was on them, not the animals that had been there for centuries.
"Well, my guild can always use bottles and jars for storing specimens," he mused, pleased that Oliver had found something useful. He moved on to another box, opening it only to step back and sneeze as the dust within was stirred by the breeze, but gave no indication as to what it had been in the past. He moved on, smiling wryly at the question. "'Exactly' isn't going to happen unless you can get one of the gods to give you a straight answer - and those are hard to come by," he said with a chuckle, though whether he meant the gods themselves or the information they doled out wasn't clear. Both worked, really. "But it was the war between the Old Gods and the Voice - and the mortals who fought for them. The one that ended with the Voice and her followers being contained in the Barrier for the last three hundred years." A third crate revealed something fragile but lovely, and Jigano admired the play of the lantern light over the delicate sheen even beneath its layer of dust. He closed that crate up again carefully before looking to see what else Oliver had found.
That comment earned a very visible frown on Oliver's face. Did they actually hold a lesson? Damn. "I guess...if you do it again, let me know? I must've missed it... I know that it would be super helpful." He was ashamed in himself for missing it, seeing as it most likely happened while he was still here. "Is there a way we can mass produce books? Maybe we can give each person a little monster guide? Since some people don't like to come to classes." He wasn't sure if this civilization had a way to make multiple books. Maybe they did, Oliver wasn't sure.
Moving on over to another crate, Oliver worked on opening it up, struggling a small bit at first due to this one being particularly tricky. As he did so, he made sure to listen to what Jigano had to say. "So is that why people tend to not like Ascended?" That they were to blame for the barrier being created? The more Oliver heard about the voice, the far more he disliked her. She caused a war. She brought pain to tons of people and displaced families. Sounded like a shitty thing to do. "Where do the abandoned fall into this? Was the war part of the reason why the Old Gods don't like us?"
Riffling through his box, Oliver tilted his head. "I think I found...some metal? Like, metal supplies?" It looked like broken pieces of metal from different things. Possibly meant to be melted down? Oliver wasn't sure.
"If it happens again it will be posted on the Notice Board like last time," he assured the young man, not sure what else he could do to get the word out. On the matter of books Jigano merely shrugged. "No, not in the Hollowed Grounds at least. Not that we've found. Perhaps Remi and Deimos could with their magic... though I'm not sure the magic would be able to create a book full of words without the mage having memorized the whole thing before." Magic was strange, and lately it had been unstable enough that Jigano wasn't sure how much he could say for certain was possible or not anymore. He had written individual guides for those who had attended his class, but those had all needed to be done by hand.
"Yes, or at least, historically that's why, from what I've been able to gather. The descendants of those who were trapped in the Barrier blame the Voice and the Ascended who follow her for the punishment of the Old Gods. As for the Abandoned..." He shrugged and wandered over to check on Oliver's find, nodding in satisfaction. "This will be useful for the forges," he encouraged with a smile in the light of his lantern. "As for the Abandoned, I doubt it was all of the Abandoned who rebelled against the old gods, but it was certainly some of them. The Voice and her fellows were magic users before they discovered how to Ascend. The gods don't seem to be able to remove magic from those born with it, so they seem to remain wary that another like the Voice might arise at some point to challenge them and cause more strife." His smile turned sad as he went to check the last pile of crates, carefully lifting the lid on one. "It might not be fair to individuals without such ambitions, but... people can change. Just because you start out innocent doesn't mean you'll remain that way. And then there are those like Zariah and her Academy... naked ambition to gain even more powerful magic may only make the gods even more suspicious of Abandoned as a whole."
The gleam of metal within the box caught his eye; not the dull matte of iron or even the cold reflection of steel but softer colors of gold and silver. "Ah... this one has jewelry on it. Must have been a shipment in for the wealthy people of this city." Most of it was badly tarnished, but there was some quality workmanship beneath the grime.
The blonde crinkles his nose as he thinks. "That's....odd... do you guys not want to develop such a thing? One where we can make books without the use of magic?" It was simply second nature. It sounded so normal to Oliver, an idea of mass producing books through means that weren't magical. Surely, they could develop such a thing. It would be fantastic and would lead to books becoming far more available to people.
It felt as though he had been separated from his body. The abandoned became the ascended... and it sounded so wrong. To do such a thing. He was starting to understand why some people held a grudge against the Ascended. Oliver wouldn't be angry towards those who were forced to be Ascended, but he couldn't help feeling weird. "Jigano... do you think there's more of a reason as to why the Voice brought us here? Do you.... do you worry another war is going to happen?" He didn't want there to be another war and he didn't want to be the cause of it. "She's bringing us here and.... I'm afraid of what's going to happen. I want to know what she has planned." His voice softened and he was worried. Scared even.
His eyes traveled down to the crate that held the jewelry, as if he were a crow or a dragon spotting riches. "We should take that one back for sure."
