We've launched the announced Talent and Lore Update! All characters are granted one free RP talent and race change. Update Log.
Updates to Talents and Monsters: Read the specifics in the Update Log
08/01/'21
Gaia Reborn
Gaia Reborn, the hottest MMORPG of the last decade, has seen millions of players experience its unique world - a combination of fantasy and reality. When Gaia Reborn was a game, one goal was to make the game world a one-half scale model of the real world. This pursuit was known as the Half-Gaia Project, and it is one of the aspects which led to Gaia Reborn becoming such a popular virtual world. With regional servers having unique areas, quests, cities, and monsters, it wasn't uncommon for people to create alternate characters on other servers to experience what felt like an entirely new game.
Ten years after the game's launch, millions of players have joined and created countless characters across the many servers. Now, with the release of the latest expansion, Pioneers of Arcadia, many are getting ready to begin new adventures in the new Italian server, exploring the new region corresponding to Italy, known in Gaia as Italia. Characters would have to start from fresh in this new world, but Italy would finally get its own piece of this world.
Countless players created their characters, logged in with excitement fueling their hands as the cursor swept across the screen, and then... darkness... Everything was black, and as their eyes opened, the players found themselves in the streets of an unfamiliar city. Looking around to survey their surroundings, many players realized this city was not so new after all. While desolate and ruined, the architecture conquered by vines and greenery, this city was unmistakably Rome, but at the same time, it was not. Finding themselves in the bodies of their characters, trapped in the world of Gaia Reborn, players are left to adapt to their new reality in this fantasy world.
Alma, master of walking around at a lazy pace, tried to make the most of her time in town by taking in the local sights. Or was it a city? The place was massive for sure and more of a pain to take in as her hours dwindled away with each step. Straying off the main roads has been confirmed to be a bad idea on several accounts. Shady people watched uncomfortably in the shade skulking for prey while others chose to walk in small groups. She held her arms loosely after failing to pocket them due to lacking a jacket outwear. Heads above most to be part of the tall people crowd in Clair's mind was the deer woman about to see for danger coming her way. Odd noises had her elf-like ears wiggling and head tilting slightly in a lazy daze when something sounded to be approaching her way. They turn out to be nothing, in the end, leaving her to soak in the populated ruins and wallow in the mild loneliness. Money was small but her appetite was even smaller thanks to the rise and fall of her mental stress so for now, just basic water and a snack have kept her going. Not the more healthy of diets but the negatives were all there as Clair fumed a grocery list of needs once bodily needs became a serious thing.
Much of these necessities accumulated in the form of money. Money is needed for food and basic needs to live, gear to fight monsters and so forth. Money was also needed to have somewhere to sleep. That unfortunate storeroom has been a hideaway so far but that's got to end at some point before a week comes to past yet there was so much to this city that demanded attention. Unrealistically, earning enough money to buy a place to graduate from the storeroom in less than a weak would be trying and even worse, Alma has yet to come across a singular amount to base her goals. Around here the roads and buildings looked maze-like to her while their buildings were squashed and squares. Finding one of the many stone benches preserved from being strangled by the overgrowth did the deer woman take a break on the stone. Its surface was warmed from the sunlight which felt to ease her muscles. In front of her ran an impressive river which ran through the city. From this break did she close her eyes and hung her head a little to listen to the breeze as it flowed through her pixie cut hair and shirt and the water churning under a local bridge.
Around her in murmurs did the voices fade out and gradually clear up into sentences of their daily lives. Merchants looking to find a spot to hawk their wares, women gossiping and men shooting the breeze over what smells like red wine, the fading steps of probable clergymen as they talked of visiting the gardens around the local basilica, and the creak of a wooden rudder as a boat ran down the river. So mundane these were that it was easy to lose herself a little. Having her eyes shut eased off the tension the walk had built up. Being part animal may have been an utterly poor choice in the beginning but again it has hardly been a week to truly adjust to these circumstances. Not having to see the bright sun blinding the world and the different styled people leveled her head as the woman meditated. Eventually, one of these days, being in this populated world long enough would filter out the noises that were too natural for the more important matters.
Slow calculated breaths were drawn as the Clair in her mind laid in bed to take a mental break. A few things were learned in the early days of being in Gaia Reborn so that wasn't to say Clair was being lazy in her own lethargy. Parents and home were a circumstance that would have to wait. Unless there was a way to contact each other at all then what good would that do? Clair came to the conclusion to treat them like they had gone on an extended vacation. The usual remarks entailed even. They'll be fine. Their plane ride was a good one. They're being well-fed at the nicest Mexican steak out and are having a good time. Put in perspective that her own family would be doing better off than worry tucked that issue in a neat box. Hell, they barely checked on her while house-sitting for the old couple thanks to the fridge being stocked up. Yeah... why would they reach out. They'll assume just the same that Clair was doing fine. No way could she bungle up watching a house.
With her family matters out of the current picture did her mind return to another topic. Her first-day scare and subsequent days following it weren't spent the most progressively. Relying on memory would only get her so far thus a map would be required following the use of making her skills more practical. Thinking of the world in gaming terms only went so far once putting in mind the absentee aspects which kept rooting this Italian world in the setting. No tutorial. Not once has a prompt came to her or in a cheesy greeting of 'Welcome to Gaia-Reborn' in her menus. Now and then Clair brought up the interface to click around for anything missed but unless it was a keyword prompt, all the windows found were the ones she had access to. That's about as convenient as making a character, finishing the tutorial, then taking a six-month college break just to return forgetting everything. No recycling a toon or drafting up a new one here.
At this moment, and even before this, Alma never heard of anything similar to in-game background music. Games always had this where even the most atmospheric of titles had some chimes playing in the distance. Filling her ears was nothing but ambiance noise with the occasional minstrel working their craft but it wasn't anywhere close to the constant hum of strings or cascading piano keys. No way Cair would have accidentally muted the sound so that was that so guess it's listening to other people. Speaking of listening, were there any veterans around?
Her head raised to look around the streets after her reprieve. If there were any veterans around where exactly would they be? What would a good meeting place for them to be? This world seems to constantly produce more questions than Alma would have liked answers from and worse yet was all this placing her in a position that's disadvantageous; inside her mind. Inside her mind was Clair and just Clair. Finding someone else to rebound ideas off of would be a far better task than wandering the city over on her lonesome. Of course, there are a plethora of bars and shops scattered about and, come to think of it, this section of the city has a touch more human-looking characters and fewer alternative races. Where exactly am I in this city to be near a church? Alma's ears lowered a bit. Until she gets her hands on a solid map of the city, she only has her tracks to follow back to the storehouse and a few other businesses along the way. Her legs swept over the bench as she turned to look around in search of someone approachable to ask her inquires; a fellow player or even a city folk who looked nice to talk to. Anything to get out of her headspace trap. TWC: 1280 Comments: Open thread stuff down by the river. Anyone wanna walk and chat?
It had only been a few days since the adventurers had appeared all over Romalia. On that fateful day, Velia had gained a small ring that when placed on her hand, let her see all sorts of strange information. From earlier days, she had gathered that these strange newcomers to the world also had the ability to see these odd pieces of information. Just what was a health point? Nevermind that, what was a mana point? Housekeeper? Talent?
She kept playing with the strange blue display over her hand as she wandered the streets of Romalia, seeming to mutter to herself in the process. "Talent: Housekeeper? Well... I do keep the house so that isn't too far off... Oh! What's this? Ranger?" She poked the air a few more times. "I've got this weird thingy called Triage... it says it can heal people, whatever that means. But uh, this poison thing kind of scares me." She talked aloud a few more times before noticing that the words she was saying seemed to be peaking the interests of other landers nearby.
"O-oh! It's nothing. Just... err... fantasizing about this old child's game! Yeah!" She laughed lightly with a wide smile and a wave before, pausing to watch their reactions as people shrugged and went their merry ways. "Wow that was easy..." she muttered to herself once more as she turned and ran off.
Only then had she realized just what area she was in. This was near her where she had lived the past... 15 years of her life. Just a few streets further south and she'd find the orphanage that she has been helping keep running the past few years. Interesting that I'd end up so close to home, huh? Still, Velia needed to find more adventurers so she could learn how to be more like them. She had already found a few on the start of her 'journey' around the time she found her ring... but they all saw her as a native. You can't learn anything super-duper secret if people think you are foreign to them! Besides, each new person she met so far was completely different from the last. All she needed to do was pretend she had no idea where she was when she met one and... easy.
Boom. Right there, right in front of her. She'd never seen this person wandering Romalia before; speak of the devil and they shall arrive! A rather tall beautiful looking woman with long antlers was resting on a nearby bench. She looked completely out of place compared to the rest of the natives of Romalia; it had to be another adventurer. From what she could see, however, was this woman simply scanned the crowd; that won't do.
Pulling her hat further over her head, she ducked over to the side. A building stood behind the girl, and that would be how she would begin her approach. Creeping along the side of the architecture itself, she tried her damndest to stay out of the girl's peripheral vision, walking like some sort of goofy pink panther; she needed to walk as goofy as possible so if she did get confronted, she could laugh it off and not get in nearly as much trouble. She'd do this until she got right up next to the girl, or until the girl noticed her which would cause her to freeze, grow a wide smile, before running over.
"Hey! I finally found someone!" She'd shout with a wide smile. "Man, I thought I was the only one brave enough to step this far into town. Do you happen to know anywhere I could sleep around here? I'm beat..." As if she had practiced this act a thousand times before, her expression shifted as she spoke to one that appeared exhausted as she hunched over in a dramatic fashion.
Focusing on any one person before her was no easy task as the deer woman assumed things to be. This world, this city, was to be the half version of Italy or so the understanding of the project went. The blurb on the website was brief and short when distracted by the different character art in the game trailer. Shows what Clair really knew about Italy anyway. The stereotypes from cartoons and movies were nothing like the busy people that roamed the streets. Adding in the character made players into the mix and it's a slew of colors in their daily lives. Almost like a Disney movie in a way that at any given moment someone would break into song and a dance number was go off. Ah, but who was Clair trying to fool here. Saying something stupid like that would garner confused looks from the city folks and dumber ones from players that would know what she was talking about. Better off not mentioning a thing about home.
With her head turning up the road from a direction less crowded than what laid out before her, the presence of a red-capped face made the woman reel back in surprise of someone approaching so closely before. Suddenly even! Her teal hair and elf like ears stood on ends. 'Where did this person come from!?' Unbeknownst to the deer was she looking at this person the whole time till they slipped past her usually vision. Their red cap must have had blended in with the other moving colors of the scenery that by the time they did exit her view like with many others on the road, Alma had assumed they had moved on. To think someone approaching her like this was too surreal. 'Argh!! How'd she get that close! Man that's so close! Why didn't I notice at all!? Please God tell me I don't look stupid right now.' Quickly she scooted a few inches away from the youthful looking girl before taking her time in forming a response that didn't sound like a frog's croak.
"Erm, yes?" Alma blinked like a skittish deer in the gaze of this kid's energetic headlights. The very nature of their question rapidly slipped through her fingers. "I'm...sorry? What was it that you were asking?" Again did Alma scoot along the warm bench more and carefully patted the open space with her fingertips. "Why not sit here a bit and explain to me again on what you're looking for." Interested but still overcoming the moment of shock earlier, Alma tilted her head at this new person while Clair was flopping in her mind to avoid going crazy just now.
As this stranger made themselves comfortable, at least Alma hoped so, she got a better look at them now which intrigued her. This girl in the red coat and cap must have been sweating under those layers but looked as young as they were active. Nothing about them looked out of the ordinary as far as Alma could tell. No strange figures or status. The overly friendly approach they took was odd and very interpersonal. Could she be another player? Sure. They must be. Although oddly less depressed about the circumstances nor confused. Guess they're taking all this in stride better than the dregs that lay in alley ways. Silently the woman prayed to not become that despite her current living condition is, shamefully, a storage room.
"Um, right, well, it's nice to meet you. I'm Clalm--," her tongue clicked and drew back her real name. Alma may be on the pale side but hints of an embarrassed red start to flush her cheeks from this blunder. Something that'll need to be practiced better when introducing herself. "Alma. Sorry, a bug caught my throat. I am Alma." She spoke with a hand resting against the center of her chest as though both politely introducing herself while also reassuring herself that this was her name. The woman then lowered her arm and held both hands in her lap daintily. Meanwhile her mind was racing on what to do in ever being close to someone before. WC: 690 TWC: 1970 Comments: Minor deer heart attack.
Notes: Feel free to decide where her tail slaps. It's not a heavy slap; kinda like how a short-haired cat flicks and hits something with enough force to just push it off the table.
Velia's worried clicks across her face started vanishing more and more like the girl in front of her seemed to buy her oh so far-fetched acting as she fell backward, feigning exhaustion on the bench. With a small thud sound, her brown backpack landed on the ground next to the bench on the other side away from Alma herself. Velia couldn't help but laugh to herself mentally; this deer lady was completely spooked by her. She hadn't been able to surprise anyone for what felt like years!
Just as she started to relax, her cat tail swished around from underneath her coat, sliding between the gap in the 'bench' and swatting side to side. She wasn't exhausted at all, but her entire focus was pretending to be, which meant her tail just started doing its thing. It was a cat-like reflex, to swish one's tail side to side, not caring what it hit, and it betrayed her true emotion. Most cats would do this when nervous, and she certainly one; such close proximity to another adventurer meant that she could be discovered as not an adventurer; she couldn't let that happen too much.
Introductions; the girl next to her seemed to catch a bug in her throat as a strange phrase popped out; Clalm. Alma sounded like a much better name than Clalm; she had to make a joke at her about this. "Sounds more like a cat got your tongue for a moment, Clalm!" she started laughing for a bit, seemingly rejuvenated with energy for a moment as her tail collided directly with something in Alma's direction. She didn't know if it was Alma herself that she just accidentally tail whipped, or the bench, but the sudden jolt caused her to jump up in surprise.
"EEP" her voice jumped out and her hat seemed to lift itself a few centimeters further off her head as two points poked up. Her tail could be seen whip itself around a bit, before vanishing underneath her red coat in a black blur. Quickly looking back behind her, she made sure nothing surprising was back there, before calming back down.
"Nice to meet you, Alma. I'm Velia!" She held a leather-gloved left-hand to the deer Faunri as her right hand pulled her hat down onto her head again. "I'm a..." she paused thinking back to the information she saw on her ring. Ranger, housekeeper, pharmacist; which one should she say she was? "...Ranger!" smiling widely she stiffened her handshake. She was used to a different style of greeting, but she had seen so many others do this before so she assumed it was just a normal introduction. "What about you?"
She would continue to scan Alma's face; her cheeks seemed to start to turn a nice rosy color. Was she embarrassed? This was going to be easier than she thought. Her feigned exhaustion from before was all but gone as it was replaced by an eager excitement to meet someone new. "I don't suppose you've been able to find a place to sleep that isn't an alleyway? I can't stand another day on the floor."
Ah, yes, not exactly the most elegant of introductions. A meek smile was returned for the cheap laughs that got out of the stranger. "Apologies. Just a bit nervous I assure you," the woman replied as it somewhat dawned on her that those words didn't feel natural at all. That bit of dialog sounding something a bit too uptight. If they were going to try and keep up a conversation then Clair had to think up better ways to not suddenly kill the meeting. Even when telling herself one thing and sticking to it did Alma end up doing the opposite in maintaining this facade. 'Was that what came out? Clalm? That sounds so sickly. I can't introduce myself like that again. Please don't stick. Pleaaase!' The internal begging commenced as the jovial girl made her move.
Alma watched with candy red eyes as this fellow player character dropped a hefty looking backpack of the side and took to the open seat. She's never seen a large supply bag before and wondered if that was something extra to gain or if that's how the bag looks like when full of stuff. Lightly she patted the buckled flaps of her own bag which rested small and at her hip side like some kind of fanny pack in conscientious comparison. Maybe they're carrying too much and some weight limits started to take effect like a packrat. If she had started doing the same then who knows what sort of items would be littering in the confines of that inventory. Small rocks, grass, a twig; pointless junk that would never make any real money to sell to a store. Now, what the people around the city were far more lifelike to be human would there be no anonymity to sell that stuff for a cheap coin. Even worse, they'll remember the person who tried it! Clair had rolled off the bed and into a spiral of woes despite there being no need to suffer through that in the first place. She woke up here after all so there would have never been a chance to make such a stupid move! No embarrassment! The inner workings of her easily flustered mind were about to go flying off the rails just as much as Alma now jumped into her own panic of something touching her.
"Nnh mn!" A fumbled yell behind clenched teeth as the deer got up from something foreign brush against her thigh. Her arms clung to the sides of her shirt in a clutched raise, hair-like static frizzles as she looked back at the bench in fear if a lizard or snake had just run by. 'Ugh! Those sudden buggers!' The South Carolinian got back to the bed from the lucky distraction to snap back on track as she looked. "There's nothing back there, is there?" She asked seeing as the girl in the red coat acted the same way meaning something was there that nearly got them both. The pair looked high, low, and around the bench but whatever it was gone or crawled its way down the walls past the rails. During this search was it a matter of slow seconds for her eyes hastily skimmed, there was no lizard or snake around but something long and black did hold her attention from its wiggling and curved flicks. "You...have a tail?" Alma dumbly asked. With a small pull of her shirt would it also be apparent that a turned upward of the white undersides of a deer tail also peeking out from the cloth folds. By now she should be aware as a fellow Faunri that tails do exist for the race chosen like the other examples she went through of various fox, cats, dogs, goats, and so forth but it didn't cross her mind that this girl here was one too when several others with such obvious features were passed by on the streets. An impulsive urge inside her did cross her mind of wanting to touch the sleek black fur to see how soft and real it really was as with any other animal-like person. Perhaps this time around that mystery could be put to rest; with their consent of course!
With her dumb words hanging in the air did her face deepen in redness as she uttered quick apologies while straightening her shirt down, tail tucking behind her now that the danger of a reptile didn't exist. There was no going back on her words now. 'Slightly nervous' indeed with that reaction! Alma groaned quietly to allow in her self made shame to crawl back into a dark corner as Velia introduced herself like the little sun this cat has turned out to be. Hard to tell if Velia here was doing this out of spite or obliviousness so it was up to Alma to pick up the pieces as it came. One question tossed to her after another like a professional juggler handing off a pedestrian one of their pins and inviting them to join in on the act. One-two, one-two. First came the job as the first pin was sent her way.
"M-Monk!" Alma caught onto her first question and saw the offered handshake. Reflexively did her left hand started to move before immediately switching for the right in proper form. She gave the feline a hearty three handshakes and maybe a few more till their fingers slipped away. Without given time to announce the fact that she hasn't exactly gone out fighting any monsters yet, her faun raised in the familiarity of her latest inquiry. Her eyes sheepishly gazed off to the side while relying on that desire, "Of course. Who would think to sleep in an open alley like that?" A storehouse isn't an alleyway but no sense in ratting herself out! The standards of having a roof over your head! When her eyes turned back to Velia's was there an uneasy feeling that she could be swiftly found out based on her behaviors. Hope to be quick on the draw this time, the woman clasped her hands together to send her hope to the wind with this announcement. "How about we look together?"
So far this girl has been nice and hasn't kicked her to the curb yet unless all that was going to come crashing down at this moment. Clair didn't want to risk losing the first person she's had a somewhat real conversation within this city. The bid was sheer grasping as straws. "I mean if you want to. I have yet to fully explore all of the city yet. Mostly seen shops and more remains of cars and storefronts but surely with our combined knowledge we can pick out an Inn on the main streets. H-how about I help carry your bag to make up for...what has happened so far? It looks like you've done pretty well on finding things and keeping busy than hanging around in slums." Alma climbed with a knee on the bench and reached over in an attempt to make good on her word by grabbing for one of the backpack straps. "We could start by heading down the road a bit along the river. An inn could be around to boast scenic views through their windows."WC: 1212 TWC: 3182 Comments: Heart rates Alma-- *nervous sweat at 120* Clair:-- *dizzy panic* 210
Notes: Velia is possessive of her bag. The inn she mentions is alongside the river, is rather small and not too easy to see.
Did she have a tail? Nope. No tail. Not at all. Didn't have ears either, nope. She'd shake her head quickly, keeping one hand on her hat to make sure it didn't fall off and reveal her ears. Velia did, of course, have a tail; she just didn't like others knowing that she was a Faunri. It was something that stuck with her even as a small child; the young humans would always poke and grab her tail at the orphanage so she just became so accustomed to keeping it hidden. Knowing full well that this fellow Faunri saw her tail, however, put her slightly on edge.
She didn't know where these people came from. For all she knew, they hated cat-folk; but that didn't make too much sense as she'd seen plenty of new cat-Faunri wandering around. Perhaps they were adventurers? Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if she knew what she was. No. She needed to keep it as hidden as possible. A quick look of defiance popped on her face but changed immediately to a confused smile as the girl grabbed her hand, shaking, with a single word.
Monk. What the heck was a monk? You mean, one of those religious people? Oh no... Velia you did it now. Not once in the past did you get along too well with the religious; they always told you to just stay home and tend to the orphanage when all I just wanted to do was run around and frolic in the meadows. At first, she thought this person could have been someone super interesting, but now was worried that she would be another one of those boring old priests. Still, she shouldn't be so harsh on the girl; perhaps they weren't as boring from where they were from.
Velia's expression had started to change from a cheery smile to dull, flat and emotionless as Alma had said the name of her class, but as the girls shook hands it clicked in Velia's mind. This was just like those times people would clasp each other's wrists in town! Grinning widely as they shook, they finally released their hands from one another, except Velia's hand kept flailing for a moment before pausing entirely. 'So this is how they greet each other where the foreigners are from!' A curious look would come from the red-hatted girl as the other seemed to avert her gaze.
Sleeping on the street wasn't fun; certainly. "Yeah... who would sleep in an open alley..." she repeated the question aloud under her breath. It was a great question, but why did so many of the foreigners sleep outside? Surely there were enough ruined buildings they could sleep in; after all, that's where she spent the last few nights even though the orphanage let her sleep there for free. With clasped hands and prayer, her newfound companion for the day offered to look for a place together. It was a nice offer, one that Velia had to take up in stride.
Velia would have answered immediately, but the girl in front of her kept talking. She hadn't explored the city yet, that was fine, but what did she mean by cars? Were those the strange small round structures littered around in the ruined part of Romalia? Oh! Did she offer to help carry her bag? No. It's hers. She can't let anyone carry it other than herself. It is a hurt burden to bear! Maybe she was just asking due to her acting earlier? Did she go too far?
"Yeah! I've done pretty well for myself the past few days." She proudly puffed her chest out a bit, proudly; no sign of the exhaustion from before was showing on her anymore. "But my bag stays with me!" With quick hands, she reached over, grabbed the large rucksack and held it close. With how it shifted as she squeezed it would be easy to see that it was mostly empty. Her grip on the backpack was quite strong, and if Alma continued pulling on the strap she'd illicit a little hiss from Velia as she would be pulled with the bag itself.
"An inn alongside the river? That's a good idea." She noted aloud, pulling the bag back before standing up, and throwing the loops over her shoulder. "So, the river should be just a bit south..." she looked directly toward where the river was, just around the corner. Earlier she came from that same direction, just across the river itself actually; Velia had spent that last night inside one of those strange 'cars' that Alma had mentioned. It was a small cramped overgrown structure that barely fit her, but it kept her out of sight of others wandering the ruins. "I actually spent the last night in a car over there. It wasn't as comfortable as I remembered it." Not as comfortable as she remembered; it was a blatant lie. Velia had no idea what a car even was, just that Alma had used the word and that Velia herself had no idea what to actually call those small metallic buildings she had seen.
"I don't remember seeing an Inn though... maybe it was further along the river?" She knew full well there was an inn there. She had slept there a few times before people started appearing in the streets. The owner most likely recognized her, which would be bad. That would be an issue she needed to remedy later if they even found that inn.
"But," Alma attempted to rebuttal on a few things. The bag, the cattail she saw, and even a silent one at the strange hissing made when trying to get the bag. 'But that last one was reallly cat-like though. I better stop before I get clawed in the face.' Her hand left the bag strap and waited until both of them were set and ready. "Fine fine. Maybe next time." In this time Alma straightened up her shirt to smoothing it out to brush against the five-inch long teal and white underside deer tail. 'Oh, right,' she meekly thought and began to feel a bit bad. Her own character did have a tail on her as well. Subconsciously discounting it for the appeal of having a much longer tail similar to what Velia was sporting.
'It's not that I am ashamed of having a shorter tail. It's more of how short it is that it seems weird to be rubbing around my butt.' Something longer would neatly curl around the side and act as a cute blanket to snuggle into for comfort. Alma tried to smile some and started on their search for an inn by the riverfront due south. It should lie a few streets over based on how close the water sounded in their Faunri ears. For now the two chatted a bit on what they had seen and done to pass the time. Sleeping inside a car sure wasn't a thought Alma would have tried to do.
"Ah, I guess they wouldn't be," the deer woman nodded. Her mind quick fast forward over several problems of her own, compared to her smaller companion. "Leather would dry out and crack from the constant sunbathing and the seats wouldn't be as flexible from rust. I've noticed a few models covered in rust while also remember how small European cars are. I'd be lucky to find a bus but not sure if my horns would make it work out. I... don't know if tetanus is a thing here." Oh, now that's a really scary thought. Would they need vaccinations here? But the game was designed more fantasy-like so sterilized shots may not exist anymore. "Ah, nevermind. I'm scared of needles, so hopefully, a cure-all like a panacea can take care of it." The wonder drug of all fantasy games--panacea! Who needs needles when you got that! It'll likely taste bad out of being made from the compounds of herbs and animal parts but it did the job before so it can't be bad.
Their street soon ended and sloped to join another like the angles of a roof. Building rows build into wall-like structures of rosy and mustard yellow stone peeking out from behind a thin layer of moss. Well beaten paths revealed the stone pathways they traveled. For a few minutes, Alma grew quiet as their earlier excitements died down till their path converged to another larger road. Her mind seemed elsewhere as she held her arms loosely to a gradually tightening grip on her elbows. No sense in searching for the inn yet without coming to the river.
Rome was always made out to be some beautiful far off place in Italy. Ancient and full of wonder but cramped living. Home of wonderful herbs, pasta, cheese, cured meats to try all in the company of large Italian families who seem to run the place for generations. What she has seen felt like a far cry of most of that. Not many large gatherings of people who weren't merchants or lonesome Adventurers seeking to form group guilds to survive. A verdant maze with pockets of large farmer markets and commerce on top of, apparently, her cultural confusion of mixing up Rome and Greece.
"Ahm...so, what have you been doing since being here?" Alma attempted to break the ice again until realizing that maybe this wasn't the best question to ask. "I mean, if you don't wanna share then that's okay. It's been a rough few days for so many of us. Not saying I've been doing any better but, um, nevermind." The deer sighed and looked ahead. 'I don't know what to say without making this meeting all depressing. Ugh... thinking about it all is making me depressed more though! And it's hard not to be so... so... how does she stay chipper?'
Velia certainly had a way about her. Being able to be somewhat frank and in the moment. Alma had a feeling this girl really took the world as it is to have adjusted so easily. Maybe hanging around her and taking a few notes from them would help that gloomy outlook of hers. Further, up by a few meters did the green walls began to open up and some rails came into view. Raising a slender arm upon seeing a low rise in the road. "I think that's our bridge. The Inn can't be far from here now. Wonder if they give those places quaint names like 'Goose Down Inn'."
Their bridge offered a wider space to breathe and start a base check if the Inn wasn't any further from here. Alma went to the side stone barriers and checked the south side for any signs. However, with the way the buildings were made, it would be near impossible for Alma to notice the inn right away. Not many signs stuck out into the already narrow streets so, by amateur venturing choices, the woman honestly had little idea of what to look for.
"Do we go back north or further south from here? Oh, once we do find it, I got some basic money on me to handle two rooms." Alma again volunteered since carrying the bag was a no go. Tag: Velia WC: 955 TWC: 4,137 Comments: The sliding scale of positive and negative. Alma: ^_^;;; Just wanna help Clair: =.=;; Crap, I'm going to scare her away any moment now.
Notes: Guidobaldo is a large, aged man. Will create an NPC profile for him later. The Not Quite Inn looks like one of those houses someone got ripped off for a plot of land and decided to build a small half-house there, but also decided to make an inn out of it. It is about large enough that one could put circular stairs inside while still having side rooms, but traditional stairs... nope.
Velia would make a few purring noises when Alma released her bag before she had pulled away. It seemed as though the deer folk near her had really wanted to just help ease her burden, but it was a burden that Velia needed to bear. Besides, she saw other adventurers earlier be so overprotective of their own bag; this would be a trait she needed to duplicate to the best of her ability. It had only been a few days, and the girl had already built such a connection with her completely normal, mundane rucksack.
Still, this girl she was walking with was saying some strange things. Most of it made little sense, but she must have been talking to her about the place that they all came from; Wherever that may be. It sounded like it was really far away with the strange words they were using. From what she gathered, the girl was talking about cars and how they had leather seats that, if exposed to the sun for too long would crack and harden. These car objects had to have been made by some form of metal as she knew that was what rust was, but whatever a model of car was she couldn't understand. European? Was that the name of a people, just like how Romalian Pie was Romalian? Did that mean those small structures she saw on the outskirts of the city were cars, and there were special ones from a place called Europea? Like Romalia, right?
For some reason, the girl started going on about a thing called Tetanus. It was such a foreign word that at first, she thought the girl had maybe sneezed, but a quick look showed that she was still talking perfectly fine. It sounded scary, like some form of a giant monster that would just eat everyone; the thought sent a shiver down her spine. Whatever it was, this Tetanus thing somehow involved needles, and needles were scary? Needles were needed to make clothes, they couldn't be scary but... why was panacea brought up?
"Oh yeah, Panacea. Isn't that just a myth though?" She commented, completely forgetting that the person she was walking with wasn't a lander like herself, but an adventurer. Lander is what they called us, right? She'd dart her eyes to look at the girl's reaction, before continuing. "Not that they might not have it here. Just... that it'd be cool to have something that could cure all diseases and poisons." Turning away to continue pretending to look for an inn and inspect the buildings they passed, she tried playing it cool.
As the streets themselves merged around, Velia's own expression always seemed a bit more calm than normal; as if she had been in this area before. She tried disguising this by making as little eye contact with Alma as possible, only looking at signs and in the windows of structures to pretend to see if it could potentially look like an inn. The place around then, while beautiful to adventurers, looked the exact same to Velia; she grew up here and the city was starting to bore her. She knew a few great places to go and lay down to watch the sunset, or to rest along the riverbank in peace away from the hustle and bustle of the town square, but she longed for something far, far away; something unique and mysterious.
A crack formed in her mind, almost hearing the ice break as Alma started to speak; as if she actually knew what ice cracking sounded like. She didn't remember the last time it snowed, but she had only ever seen ice form in the region maybe once or twice in her lifetime; perhaps it was more like the shattering of a tree trunk as it broke? Nonetheless, the girl's words popped into her head as she asked a question. Just what had she been doing since being here; a question she expected an adventurer who didn't know the terrain to ask another adventurer. 'I'm in.' she thought to herself.
Spinning on her heel, and holding up one hand and pointing it along her face as if making a point, she spoke cheerfully. "I've been practicing archery! You know, being a Ranger I need to learn how to use a bow!" She'd wink at Alma but internally, she was worried such a topic would oust her. Ranger, just what was a ranger? Was Ranger called ranger because they focused on being at a good range from people? Was it that they traveled over long ranges? The concept was very foreign to her, but a man once told her; you have to fake it until you make it.
It seemed that her compatriot in walking seemed to be worried about something, as she had sighed after her question and started looking forward once more, towards the bridge. Quick, Velia, you need to ask her some things too. "Why bother asking about what I've been doing the past few days, what about yourself? What'd you do before ending up here?" She followed the girl's eyes after the question to see the bridge.
"Yeah, that's a bridge." She couldn't acknowledge it as 'our' bridge, especially considering that she was indeed correct. Across the bridge, there would be another line of buildings, but one stood out just slightly. The 'Not Quite Inn,' a strange place that she couldn't get out of her mind. Not just because it was a hilarious name that the owner Guidobaldo thought of when he was quite drunk, but because of how the building looked when he made it. She was actually there for when he named it and was a good friend of the owner for quite a long time; in fact, if he had met her longer than just three years ago he might have straight adopted her. Wait just a second, oh no... if they go there then... Alma would probably find out about her origins.
"Or what about something like... the Drunken Huntsman?" She had to hide her own thoughts, throwing out the first name that came to her head. "Pft... nevermind!" She started laughing uncontrollably. "That's a better tavern name than an inn name!" Oh, how Guidobaldo would have loved that name. Still, her new friend seemed to offer to handle both rooms for the two of them which was quite kind of her; a quick inquiry about their directions would also be asked as well.
"S...south.. hahh..." She'd recuperate from her fit of laughter before throwing her straightened hand over her brow to block the sun, throwing back her right leg behind her as she imitated a scout looking over a hill. "Right over there! I see what looks like it could be an inn!" She'd shift her weight again and point right across the bridge, right to the large half-building that seemed smooshed between two other spots. It looked literally like half of a building, but still full as it had little to no room to be built, and left no room to go to either side of it to reach the street opposite of it. A large flattened sign was posted where the lower window would be instead, showing what appeared to be a large flagon of ale, and the words 'INN' strapped across it. Right above the word INN, would be two words in a much smaller font labeled 'Not Quite.' Oh, Guidobaldo, you funny old man.
She'd jump a bit, spinning to face Alma, before rushing off to the Not Quite Inn before her. She absolutely needed to get inside the building before Alma had a chance to talk to the innkeeper. "Race you there!"
Her ruby eyes blinked and a brow was raised. Panacea a myth? Oh, that's concerning. Maybe such an item doesn't exist in this game. Sure panacea is a wonder drug and a near stable to most fantasy settings with different appearances from pills to a box of herbs, but if such a thing isn't in Gaia Reborn then it's likely some other method was used. Clair sighed and took a backseat to occupy her own thoughts for what did apply to Gaia Reborn. Regrettably, she should have done more research before joining the game. A wiki article or something would have been out ages ago of everything and anything needed but, of course, there's no finding one here. Maybe there's a library somewhere...
In the meantime of her concerns, Alma's deer ears kept low while trying to discern how this cat girl managed to be in this world. She watched her spin around like a schoolgirl as she announced rather proudly of the training done as a Ranger. "Oh? Was it easier than actual hunting?" She asked given how archery required a fair amount of arm strength behind it. "Lucky. A bow seems more straight forward and safer to snipe from afar. I must have been crazy to have picked monk. I haven't really practiced yet though so maybe I should at least try to get a feel for it. Never did any real martial arts before." The immortal words of a famous martial artist came to mind; Don't think. Feel. There's no guide to being a monk here and she's only seen punches and kicks out of ranger shows and cartoons. Maybe trying to emulate that would prove something but as of right now, Alma put that into something to try later tonight if unable to sleep. There's a lot of things she wasn't sure to be able to do with this body.
The woman's hands clenched and relaxed in hesitance to say what has she been doing so far. To sum it up rightly would be hardly much at all. Slowly learning to purchase small things like water and food then going back to sleep in a storehouse in the cold evenings. That's so shameful to say. "Um, mostly exploring. Not used to a big city place. Been also reading a lot of what the signs around me say although I don't understand most of their meanings. Trying to find all the important places and map them by memory. Although a real map would be nice but I've yet to find any when checking the various markets." A journal would be nice too. It'd be easier to keep so many notes down than going off memory of landmarks and how far felt too far for the nearest market. "I'd rather have a sense of where I am than being further lost." Not that there was ever a bar of how lost can a single person be when there was the horrible human habit to dig deeper. If not careful, they'd end up digging their own graves. Her expression grew solemn in this self-reflection that Alma wasn't aware of how much she was openly sulking around the youthful kitten.
For all her sulking the older appearing deer had done, it did cause a minor smile to appear to make them laugh. Well, actually, they weren't laughing at something Alma has done but it was a pleasant sound to hear to work a brief chuckle out of her. "If it turns out to be a tavern then I hope there is an inn with it to sleep off the noise." Alma never tried drinking herself into a stupor before but since this was a game world then surely her liver can take the beating. She now turned and moved alongside Velia to see where they were pointing at. Following their hand was it no surprise that Alma didn't notice it. The building itself was that unassuming to her compared to hotel estates far more recognizable back home. "Wow. Rangers do get the better eyesight," she mused. Alma assumed it was based on that trait was how Velia could spot it so quickly despite the large INN names on the signage. In a split second the girl was off, nearly crossing the bridge in full and gleefully declaring a race to the inn. What a kid. "A warning would be nice!" Alma called after and started off into a light jog after them. No chance of winning this race after a sneaky head start like that.
Alma's running pace truly was a mocking one and... surprisingly not as winded as Alma thought it would be. If it was her previous body, Clair would be a bit out of breath and heart racing to reach the end of the bridge in a sudden dead sprint. Instead, Alma felt rather fine to which if she took the race much more seriously would she have been able to run the whole length without breaking a sweat. Still wouldn't have won though but that wasn't the point here. Pressing a hand under her breast for a minute then checking her pulse on her wrist for another count. Both of these showed that her heart rate elevated only slightly. Nothing hurt, nothing felt out of place, and no pulled muscles. "That's weird," the woman muttered and felt up her horns from the base and halfway up. Not even having these on her head felt strange or heavily straining her neck either. A puzzling discovery.
By the time she had arrived at the other side of the bridge and completed all of this would Velia had far and more than enough time to scamper inside the building and shut the do behind her. 'Oh, she better not be holding that thing shut on me,' Alma thought being as something she'd do with her sisters when they were younger. After playing along with that farce of a race would the deer take her time approaching the building to read the sign more closely. Velia's Ranger class must have made it easy to read the sign from a glance that it wasn't till Alma came up to it would she now be able to read the smaller text above. "Not...quite? What a weird thing to put above Inn." She stood there for a few minutes rubbing the back of her neck in figuring out why was the Inn named that way. The two girls did talk about taverns earlier so was this Inn more tavern-like? On the outside, the place looks more or less like the other buildings around Romalia with a few actions toward a fixer-upper. "Don't smell like it reeks of alcohol or wine."
Alma came up to the door and pushed it, then pulled lightly, and opened it before setting inside. Despite the height of the door easily allowing her figure and antlers to clear the entryway unscathed, Alma still dipped her head slightly upon entry. The interior took Alma even more by surprise to realize how much higher the ceiling was and well kept. A shame this level of care wasn't taken to the face of the building but there might be no helping it. Rome was an old-looking place and here was Rome with hundreds of years for plant life and no humans to interrupt that before coming back again. That or someone gave their chia pets fantastic fertilizer. For now, the deer Faunri continued to marvel at the interior in silent awe such as the quaint spiral staircase before bringing to attention the large elderly man in the room with Velia. 'Ah. That would explain why the door was made so large.' Not wanting to interrupt what conversation the two were having once Alma came into the Inn, she waited a bit before waving shyly in greeting to him.
"Afternoon, sir. We would like two rooms here." Tag: Velia TW: 1307 TWC: 5,445 Comments: Got more than enough of a head start here lol
SKILLS - None Active - - None Active - - None Active -
Words: 814 Tags: None yet.
Notes: Building is 9 feet wide; there are three wooden stools next to a small shelf along the wall and a sliding glass window half way through leading to where Guidobaldo is. He's an aged man looking about 80 years old with a huge beard and almost no hair atop his head.
The girl behind her called out as Velia sprinted to the inn itself. She knew she'd get there first, but she wanted to make sure she had as much time as she could to talk to Guidobaldo. One leg in front of the other, she ran and ran; if she hadn't been used to running around from when she was younger, this would have winded her dramatically. Slamming into the door, she whipped it open before practically spinning inside, closing it again with a slam as she did so.
"Geeeeeeeed!" She called out lightly, knowing full well that the man was behind the counter. Prancing over to the window she'd peek around the corner, seeing the man completely asleep in his chair. 'Damnit Geed. Why are you asleep.' her voice was damning in her mind, but she coo'd out a loud shout. "Geed!"
"HUH?" The man's eyes shot open as he jumped out of his chair. "What! Who's there?" He'd shoot his eyes around and lock right onto the girl. "Nona? Nona! You sneaky little... whatcha want!" He'd walk over to the window as he pushed aside a few pieces of paper and coins on his desk, keeping it out of her view.
"Listen to me Geed. I'm not Nona, I'm Velia; an adventurer. No questions. My friend is coming in soon, when she enters, pretend we never met." Velia's expression went from happiness to pure seriousness. No smile was on her face, and her eyes glared like daggers at the man. It was an expression he had only seen once, and that was after he broke a vase in the orphanage that she had personally restored. This expression was one that Guidobaldo knew to take very, very seriously.
"A...alright, Nona. B-but..." he paused, looking down at the desk in front of him before looking up. "Fine fine, no questions now. But I will ask later, alright?" They'd nod to each other before Velia moved over to sit in one of the chairs in the small lobby, waiting for Alma to enter.
The building was extremely small, being only about 9 feet in width; it barely came to 2.8 meters in width. Velia would be seated comfortably right in front of a small table about six inches long attached to the wall, with herself turned slightly to face the door. Such a door was rather large, especially for a building this size, and the door to the backroom as just as big. This was simply due to how big the owner of the establishment used to be; Guidobaldo has shrunk half a foot since he was much younger and is no longer capable of traveling as far as he used to. Such was the life of growing old.
Smiling widely, Velia would wave to Alma as she entered. "Hey, Clalm! What took you so long? The old geezer here and I were almost getting acquainted." She'd smirk to Guidobaldo who's own expression shot daggers back at the girl.
"You little..." His expression changed from anger to that of a normal happy old man, silver beard and all with a balding head. Such a wide smile caused his beard to shift as he looked up to the girl. His eyes opened wide as he saw her, before sparkling. "O-ohhoh! Two rooms eh?" Money signs popped in his eyes as he pulled out a small roll of paper, unfolding it. "Sorry to say, but we only have three rooms and two of them are full." He'd caress his beard a bit with a worried expression before a glint came to his eye. "But the one room we do have has two beds. One atop the other." His eyes would shoot at Velia, who now had a worried look on her face. Sliding open the window between them, he placed a roll of paper down on the table and unrolled it.
"For you... five gold." He knew he was putting it down for a low, low price; but the real price is what he would make Velia do for it.
'Oh no, he's gonna make me pay for it behind the scenes isn't he.' Velia panicked, and jumped up, pulling out ten gold pieces from her backpack. These were saved from the time she was a housekeeper back at the orphanage and was sadly starting to run low herself. "H-Here! I'll add 10." A quick guilty look to Guidobaldo, then a wide smile to Alma would follow. "5 gold seems too little, right? Since we can fight, it makes sense to pay the Landers well, right?" She'd try to make up for her insult to Geed earlier, calling him an old man, but at the same time she shot daggers back at him. He used to be quite a fighter when he was young, but now can't, and she knows he absolutely hates having that pointed out.
Alma's deer ears tilted downward in taking a moment to sigh in full regret for earlier. "It's Alma," she corrected in hopes that the old man in the room has yet to take a shine to Clalm yet. The name came out icky feeling and clams. Who would name a deer after seafood? In her preoccupation with unfortunate names did the old man's own begrudged mood toward Velia was overlooked before business resumed. She approached the grandfather looking man as money swiftly brightened his mood. Slow business in keeping this tiny place which is all fine and dandy. If the night went over well then Alma would rather stop by this place again. Good customer service can be its own reward.
"Oh? This place only has three rooms?" Her eyes widened for how small this inn really was. Was that all the space this place could offer? And who might be in the other two rooms? Her head tilted upwards in wonderment. Hopefully, the other guests won't be so noisy. "First come, first serve around here." Her arms folded gently over her stomach on what to do for the last room. Space being an issue then the last room could have only one bed.
"But the one room we do have has two beds. One atop the other."
"Oh," Alma reacted with her ears raising a little in peaked interest. "A bunk bed style. Those are a fun design." She began to smile in fond memories of once playing around with a set. Something about stacked beds had a fun appeal to them while also compact. If she ever got the funds to have her own place, having one of those would be the go-to items on a list of 'Must Have's. "The room sounds to have just what we need, thank you."
Fast sold on the room offer, not that there were any other options to take, Alma started reaching for her bag. Her deer ears twitching with glee that the cost was cheap too! Very good game design to have easy income locations that transferred over. Her hand-counted out the five gold needed before producing them from her inventory to pay on the spot when Velia's small hand swiftly patted the counter with a metallic clink under her palm.
"Huh?"
"H-Here! I'll add 10."
"Ten? But he said five will do for the room."
Not understanding what was going on between Velia and the old man, Alma was at a loss of why the sudden bargaining. After a moment of reconsidering what the old man meant, Alma smiled some and carried on in the assumption that he meant it was five gold per head than five for the whole room. That did sound more logical. "Ten is a bit much but I think I understand what you mean. But we really only just met today so you don't have to cover the costs for both of us. How about I pay five and you pay five." Again, Alma couldn't tell that Velia was trying to pay back for an insult since taking her time outside. She set her own five gold on the counter anyway.
"Well, if you want to pay him that way, sure. We should go check out the rooms and figure out who takes the top bunk," Alma waved and pointed to the spiral staircase. "Which floor will be our room?"
"Second floor, miss," the man answered as he gleefully swept the fifteen coins into his calloused hands and exchanged it with a room key. Toward Velia he gave a smug grin for the extra coin while hanging a sec.
Meanwhile, Alma went on to check the room first. The spiral stairs came up exactly to the floor of the room with the room taking up that whole floor space. She slid the key and undid the lock with a welcomed click, opening up to, what at best can be seen as, a room and two beds. A window faced out toward the bridge the two ran across. The streets as quiet as they left them. Both beds were stacked in an interesting arrangement. Rather than directly on top of one another were they staggered in a way with the head rested without obstruction. Likely for people like Alma that had additional head ornaments. One look at the ceiling though was enough to make the woman change her mind and take the staggered lower bed instead.
Plotting herself on the bed, Alma took the time to appreciate what real bed sheets felt like. They felt a little on the thin side but will no doubt be warm to bundle up in. With little else to the room though would it be a matter of going to sleep or not. With that in mind, she did want to thank Velia in some way for finding this Inn. Money seemed a little on the cheap side if rooms cost a handful of gold. Easy enough to make up with chore tasks around the city. "Has to be something else to do," she fumed and folded her arms while searching her inventory and skill lists. She lacked materials to make anything so that's a no. Her eyes half-closed at how low and fast her options dropped down. Clicking and hovering the mental cursor around to read information texts of her abilities, one stood out that was longer than others. The woman hunched over in the curious interest of this skill that is Sigilmaking.
Sigilmaking was an act using runes in various ways. If she was reading this correctly then this might be a way to help out. Who wouldn't want to have a buff to their gear? As a first attempt, it'll be free. When making Alma, she debated between several role talents. Several would have complimented her Scribe better and roles to make her monk more flexible like the Acrobat. Once Velia comes into the room she could ask her about some lighter things like 'What made you pick a ranger' or 'what talents you have?'. Maybe. Or not. She wasn't sure if her companion would appreciate the tone. Kicking off her sandals, Alam flopped back on the bed and went back to reading about her Sigilmaking skill to read what all the options were so she could share with Velia on which rune they wanted. WC: 1052 TWC:6504 Comment: Sorry to keep borrowing the old man very light.
Velia made sure to keep her expression away from Alma's vision as she openly questioned the inn itself. She knew Geed didn't really enjoy people pointing out that his inn was small, but from what she could tell the old man didn't see to care when it was a newcomer that did it; although, from the glint in his eye as his eyes looked directly at her for brief moments changed that thought entirely. She's going to have to make amends for her 'transgressions' later isn't she?
Of course, her attempts to reduce what she had to repay him faltered right in front of her eyes. Shock! Alma completely misunderstood what she was trying to do, and offered that they pay for themselves, before putting 5 gold on the table. Utter defeat! Velia slumped slightly, but she was lucky that Alma couldn't see her. "Y...yeah... 5 gold each."
Guidobaldo was more than happy to take the coins as the girl asked which room it was. Of course, it would be the second floor; the first two had bunk beds and the topmost one was basically just one bed, but that didn't really matter. With a smug grin as Alma stepped away from the counter and headed upstairs, he watched as Velia tried to sneak behind the girl out of his line of sight.
A simple "Ahem" as he cleared his throat froze her in place.
"Eep." Velia stopped her escape and waited for the door to close and Alma's footsteps to vanish up above before she rapidly slid over back in front of Guidobaldo. He looked rather angry, compared to before. "Y-yes Guidobaldo... h... how may I help."
"You little sneak. Was this your goal? Nona, you know the rooms cost ten times that, especially since those adventurers showed up." Velia's only response was to nod rapidly. "And I hear you ended up cleaning that orphanage up pretty good a few weeks ago; not a speck of dust in sight!" The man grew a sinister grin, and Velia knew where he was going with this.
"You... want me to clean your inn?" She was visibly shaking. The last time she was here, there were some very, very dusty things in places that there shouldn't be.
"Yeah. To clean up your mess." As if to emphasize who's mess it was, Guidobaldo jabbed his finger into Velia's chest, pushing her back a few inches. She didn't fight back. "Calling yourself an adventurer. Pah. That's poppycock. A load of bull."
In response to him calling her plan a series of names, Velia removed her hat and held it directly in front of her, keeping her eyes closed and her face down.
"Ah ah ah, no. Don't you dare do it!"
She did. When she opened her eyes, the girl gave him the most adorable sad kitten face she could possibly give; It was Guidobaldo's weakness. Recoiling back, as if a vampire just saw sunlight, he shouted at her. "That's it, DOUBLE THE WORK THEN! Now get out! Shoo!" A slam followed as he shuttered the window so he didn't need to deal with the shenanigans that the Faunri continued with. In the end, her attempts to guilt-trip him worked, but in the opposite way she intended it to.
'Oh no, what if Alma heard that!?' Alma thought to herself before running up the stairs as fast as she could. With a slam, the door flew open and Velia fell through; she was moving much too fast. Still, even though she seemed to stumble around so much upon her entry, her hat remained attached on top of her head; this was simply due to a well-timed and well-placed hand to hold it down. Once she had the time to survey the area, she noticed that her companion for the day seemed to be reading the air in front of her; just like she could see that strange thing that Velia could see.
With just a thought, she pulled up her own series of box thing. It called itself a menu but, she supposed that was just a formality; it would be forever a box thing to her. She wondered just what part of it her new friend was reading. "Awh man! You took the bottom bunk... I wanted the bottom bunk." She grinned widely before jumping up with the grace as if she had done this before. Of course, she had; the orphanage only used these styles of bunk beds so they could fit more sleeping children in one place.
"Ah, bunk beds. This reminds me of home." She cooed, as she laid down extremely close to the ceiling above her as if not a care in the world about sitting up and hitting her head was given. "What about yourself Alma? I bet a girl with your looks probably got to sleep in one of those huge queen or king beds. Must suck having to sleep in these crummy old things, huh?" She laughed a bit at her joke; of course, nobody got to sleep in those, at least, if they did they wouldn't have left their home. Those things sounded amazing!
A confused gaze turned toward the door with her deer ears flicking up and downwards at the sudden raised tone. There was a floor and a door between them, so the words reached her disjointedly. For what fragment she did hear made her pause reading over her sigils as for what in the world those two meant. "Double?" Some kind of bargain went down but Alma was at a loss on what it could mean. They paid for their rooms all right and the beds were a welcoming sight to lay in so... a quest? No. Since when did quests have that kind of gimmick? Usually, it would be in something closer to a life simulation where multiple-choice dialog options were presented. If this was the case then that would be interesting to press their luck on asking for a bit more in return. Asking that old man later in the morning if there's anything Alma and Velia could help with wouldn't be so bad. Not so much would quests exist but a trade of service. Wasn't it like that in the old days? Trading goods and services for materials and money. It makes one appreciate having a quest window that simply accepts or declines than the intricate walk through people's dialog.
Soon enough, Velia arrived through the door. She made a strange motion as if pointing to Alma before complaining that she wanted the bottom bunk. Alma chuckled and sat up a bit and touched one of her antlers. "Nah, changed my mind.~" She laughed and watched the girl scurries up to the top bed. Even for 'not' feline friend was the top bunk a minor difficulty with the threat of the ceiling being so close. "Bunkbeds are neat. You had a set at home?" Feeling it was okay to talk about home this way made it easy to answer without feeling pangs of homesickness. "I did used to sleep in a queen size once given my own room. I don't mind these beds though. It's more cozy than the extra space the old one had." She pulled up her legs and sat crossed-legged on the bedside.
"So what were you two talking about downstairs? Something about doubling up something?" Alma tilted her head a little in hopes of some clarification. "Was there some problem he needed help with? If the money or experience is good then it wouldn't hurt to do so. Not a lot of options without going outside of the city limits." She opened for something simple of a task they can accomplish. Having either experience or money would be greatly beneficial before throwing themselves out at some wild animals. Speaking of the outside, Alma rested an elbow on her legged and leaned her chin on it. "Have you ever gone outside of the city before, Velia? The city is nice and all. A very far off into the future Rome if Google pictures were to say anything. I hear or figured really, that it's pretty dangerous out there. Although there should be some things we can handle just fine or even alone for that matter but was more wondering if you have gone out that way yourself."
Velia did carry all her stuff around so Alma had assumed Velia must be well-traveled. She even dressed as a traveling merchant type. Therefore she must have been outside the city at least once or something. It made Alma view the girl as being rather brave on top of being a bit of sunshine in this mess. Willing to go out and experiment with this new world and getting used to it all so well. In hindsight would the basics of human interaction not be any different than the real world but more so of actually having to do it more as a deer looking woman. If she could limit herself to the basic functions needed to survive then talking to people around here more should, in theory, become more of a natural process.
Consulting to that plan of how to be more like Velia, Alma nodded to herself in a tiny bid of self-confidence building as she listened in hopes of learning more of what Velia has been doing around Rome, er Romalia. Calling this place Rome was correct but incorrect. Rome also brought up mental images of someplace far more ancient and her history blurred head as a non-historical fan blurred Rome and Greece enough to earn punishing wacks from these history buffs for getting them wrong in the first place. Once Velia relayed to her what more or less she knew of what outside Romalia did Alma raised her hand in an offer of a skill she's been wanting to try out with someone.
"Still, yes, the outside of the city can be a bit dangerous. So, if you wouldn't mind to, I'd like to try something. Besides being a Monk and needing to someday learn what to do with myself on that, I also picked being a scribe and Sigilmaker. It says I can enhance a piece of gear to help out combatively. So, as thanks, would you let me try to enhance something of yours? I'd like to see how it works, how long it lasts, and all that. Maybe I could make some money doing this even. What do you think?"
Alma smiled now finally giving her offer a shot. This would be great learning potential to see just what this aspect of her selected talents does. If being a Monk meant to be on the front lines punching things then that would be an eventual art to work on... once Alma feels brave enough to tackle monsters up close than through a monitor screen. Scribe was purposely neglected out of the need for paper and ink. These items Alma didn't have on hand and not so much money for the moment to go buying things willy nilly. Outside Romalia should have a safe zone to get these, again in theory, based off of what Velia had told her that left Sigilmaker as the one thing Alma could do that didn't require fighting scary beasties or money blocking her way.
Notes: You could say the cats out of the bag! Or well, hat.
The girl below confirmed her suspicions; she did indeed sleep on a large bed fit for a queen where they came from. That explains how much knowledge she had about the intricacies of this Europea place that she had come from. Although, one thing seemed strange; Bunk beds were neat. That didn't make much sense as here in Romalia they were known to be pretty uncomfortable, existing merely so you can fit as many people into a small area as possible. Only orphanages and well, the Not Quite Inn had them; in fact, where did one think that Guidobaldo managed to get them from?
Now that she was finally inside and laying down, the conversation started to get laxer and the girl seemed to calm down quite a lot. Questions regarding what happened downstairs were dodged so deftly by simply ignoring them while the latter question about leaving the city was answered oh so simple. Simple wasn't Velia's name, however, as she popped over the edge of the bunk to peek over at Alma, her hat still placed neatly atop her head.
"Leave the city? Oh yeah many times." She didn't know what she had meant by Google pictures, but from the way she said it they must have been a great artist if they could draw future Rome; obviously a nickname for Romalia that the Europeans must have devised before coming here. "Truthfully, I've never really lived in a city. This would be the... second time I've slept so far into one." She spoke true as the Orphanage was further out of Romalia in an area that was more like a town than anything else; this was also near where she met her first adventurer. It never felt like a city over there.
Still, her friend seemed very wary of the outskirts of the city; almost as if she had been attacked on her way to Romalia but she couldn't point that out. It would give her away as a Romalian through and through. "Yeah, it's a bit spooky out there in the forest but you get the hang of it." She smiled, leaning further over. "There are a few things you have to be careful about. Jellies look dangerous but are pretty docile, they seem to walk right by me but the Boars... they will attack on sight if you are in their marked territory. Been chased a few times by one." A single hand popped over, pointing up, at least, to Velia's point of view. "Most of all though, you need to be careful with Goblins. Cowardly little critters but if they outnumber you, they'll try to kill you just for your stuff." Her hat started to shift slightly. "Luckily, they are rather rambunctious so you can hear them coming a mile away." It shifted a few more centimeters down her head, but Velia didn't seem to notice.
What piqued her interest is that Alma seemed to mention something about 'picking' scribe and sigilmaker. What she meant by picking must have been some form of vocational training she got to choose from her home region, but Sigilmaking... that was completely new to her. Enhancing a piece of gear... such foreign language to a girl like Velia, but she knew that enhance meant to improve and gear could simply mean a tool of some sort; perhaps this was adventurer talk for the items you use in combat? If she could make her bow better... then definitely she could make money off of it. Disappearing from view, Velia sat up, bumped her head on the ceiling with a quick light thud sound, before reappearing back below. She didn't even register that she just hit her head on the ceiling; it happened too often she was used to it by now and was able to just tap the ceiling rather than slam herself into it.
A large bow shot down from over the bunk before reaching further downward revealing more of the girl's arm, before her head popped into view once more. "Try enhancing thi-" Her voice cut short as her hat fell off from the momentum she had created from swinging down so fast. Just as soon as the hat had left her head, her hand released the longbow causing it to clack to the floor as she used her hand to press down what appeared to be massive cat ears sitting atop her head and poking out of her charcoal hair. Her face turned beet red as she realized that she failed to grab her hat, and was simply holding her ears against her head. A slight pause would come as she matched eyes with Alma before once again she vanished into the top bunk; a louder thud came followed by an 'eep' as she curled up and tried to hide in her coat. Right next to the bow itself, her hat had landed perfectly flat on the ground as it had upturned itself before landing.
"Hmmm," Alma rested a fist into her chin more. Velia turned out to not be a city folk after all. This was fine to Alma as she wasn't exactly someone that lived close to a metropolitan area. Her red-hatted friend recounted about Jellies and Boars. What a brave girl to be heading out of the city to see those. She needed to remind herself that with game logic that these monsters would be around the lower levels like herself. No game developer would have a starter beginner city and then put monsters twenty times higher than the starter character's growth. There would need to be a way to level up within the city to meet that demand. As far as she could tell was that there was no tutorial guide. Even if to say some mad man of a developer would have done such a thing, Gaia Reborn is supposed to be an MMO accessible to the masses, therefore, a way to train within the city or someplace nearby to practice skills like a dojo or training dummy field.
Her ears turned to Velia followed by her the rest of her head turned slightly to face them with a small, humored chuckle. So the worst most and worst thing to worry about within city limits were noisy Goblin types. She never mentioned about spiders, which was a huge relief, making the outside world of Romalia wasn't as fearful for the first mile or so. "If the goblins are like that then thanks for letting me know they're not the sneaky types. I wonder what a Jellies look like." Her mind pondered on this, if at all seeing a game banner showing off monsters in a cute art style would result in mascot like cute jellie creatures. Did Gaia Reborn have a pet system in it to train monsters from eggs? And did monsters even come from eggs? Alma was started to get ahead of herself on other dynamics yet seen in this world when Velia bumped her head on the ceiling in their scramble to get something to be enhanced. Her deer ears lowered reflexively as it sounded like that thunk should have hurt when a large bow was presented her way.
Her arm went to reach for it when the plop of that red frumpy hat fell with it. The deer woman looked at the hat and then at Velia. In the lantern light keeping their room lit would she be able to see the large black cat ears on her head. In a dull surprise on her face, Alma barely got a word in as her companion recoiled back into hiding on the top bunk where the next thing she saw was the swell of blankets as they hid under them. ". . ." An audible silence here as she was left to process what happened just now.
Putting the pieces together, she saw Velia's cat-like tail. There's no mistake in it that that was a cat tail from how it wiggled with a mind of its own. There wasn't a face or mouth at the end of it so it had to be a tail of some kind and only cats had that sort of long, slim fluffy tail. She never got a chance to touch it personally so what else could it have been? Then there was her odd and outright denial of anything feline. Which leaves to something Alma wasn't sure about in the whole manner of hiding in the first place. If Velia is a cat and Alma was a deer which means they both picked that one animal race of the game. Animal races are rather popular and so is being a dog or a cat type. She would have fallen in line if not for picking the deer figure upon stumbling across that option in the character maker. So if they're hiding from someone who also has animal features then would that mean they had a bad experience?
Ah, now that would make sense. There's no denying the popularity of dogs and cats that any race that is slightly beastly than basic human that could have ears and tails of one would gain that. To pick a popular race though should leave a person to be happy with their vanity to have a fluffy set of ears and tails but also vice versa that this encouraged other people to want to do the same. Alma sure wanted to when first seeing that tail of hers. So if people were bothered Velia about those cat features then Alma started to feel rather bad for potentially harassing them. In fact, the girl may have been harassed by multiple people to go into hiding like this that her deer ears remained lowered upon realizing this. A short cat girl like her would have gained any sort of ill intentions compared to a tall deer. If Alma were shorter and more fawn like then, yeah, it would be something like that. She sighed for a bit and stuck with that conclusion.
She got up and knelt to pick up the longbow to give it a once over and then the hat which she dusted it off with a few slaps across her thigh. It'd be the first time she picked up or touched another person's gear before. For a moment the novelty was like that. 'So this is real', were her impressions of the smooth bow, the taut string, and the thick cloth of the casket hat. Neither item was too heavy but she tried to handle them with care all the same. Before she could continue any further would be the one minor thing before the earlier interruption. With bow and hat in hand, Alma set the hat back on the top bunk and peered over to give that lump of blanket and coat a few pokes. "Hey," she began to ask in a low and quiet voice. "Can you tell me what to enhance the bow with?"
The cat was out of the bag quite literally here leaving her suspicions confirmed. However, it would be difficult to approach the topic any further if Velia was going to hide in their coat for the rest of the night. Continuing further with her question, Alma glanced over at her light of Sigils to read off what options could be given to the bow. A few of the skills acted differently if applied to a weapon or armor type with a solid hour of downtime afterward. "I mean, what would you want done? I can raise the Accuracy, make it have a debuff, have it shoot fire apparently. I might be able to put another one on it but it's got a small penalty to it. A once a day sort of thing but it's not harmful. I promise."
WC: 1139 TWC: 8663 Comments: Now she thinks they're a harassment victim.
Welcome to the help dialog for the Custom Mini-Profile Creator plugin!
Click on any of the tabs above to go through the plugin configuration process!
You can access this menu at any time by clicking on the icon in the bottom right bar (may not be applicable if you're on Forums.net), or you can disable the welcome window and/or the icon by going to Plugins > Manage > Custom Mini-Profile Creator and changing the Show Help option.
This step is essential as it gives the plugin everything it needs on the page to get as much profile information as possible.
To make the profile variables work you'll need to add a new line to the very end of Themes > Layout Templates > Mini-Profile and paste the code below on it. The code should be placed completely outside of the mini-profile, so if you're using the default mini-profile template this will be after the very last closing </div> tag. This needs to be done on every theme you have the plugin enabled on as the template is theme-specific.
If your mini-profile template is already customized and you've hit the variable limit for your template you're free to remove any lines from the code below if they contain information that you don't plan on using. For example, if you have no plans to ever add a user's IP to their mini-profile for staff reference you can remove <div class="mp-info ip">$[user.ip]</div> from the code and everything else will still work just fine.
Once you've added the HTML from the Layout Templates tab you're ready to move on to building your mini-profiles. If you want to get going and try some out now or you're not very adept at HTML, CSS, or Javascript, worry not! This plugin includes some examples for you to try out. You're free to skip to the Custom Profile Fields tab and read over this tab later when you're ready to build your own.
Here's a quick rundown of each of the components in Plugins > Manage > Custom Mini-Profile Creator:
Name This is the name you'll be adding to your custom profile field dropdown once you've finished coding the mini-profile. Pretty self-explanatory. Make sure this name is unique from every other name you use for your mini-profiles or you'll end up overwriting the earlier ones in the list.
HTML This is the HTML that will go inside your mini-profile. You can use just about any HTML tag here so long as it's appropriate for where the mini-profile is showing on the page. Please refrain from using <style> or <script> tags here. You have the next two sections for that! Also, remember that mini-profiles can show multiple times on the same page, so you shouldn't add ID attributes to any of your elements here. Two elements on the same page cannot have the same ID per HTML standards.
CSS This is where you'll place what would normally go in your forum's style sheet or what would normally be between <style> tags. Try to code your mini-profile's HTML in a way that will allow you to target it specifically with your selectors. For example, you can surround all of the content in your HTML with a <div> element with a class and target that class and its child elements specifically with your CSS. That way you don't accidentally target every mini-profile on the page with CSS that was meant for the one you're building. One more thing: The forum theme's CSS still applies beforehand, so your mini-profile may look right in one theme but not in another. The best way to circumvent this is to define as many styles as you can to override the theme's CSS.
Javascript Anything that normally goes between <script> tags will go here. This one's a bit tricky since you'll obviously want to target the custom mini-profile specifically. Luckily there's an easy way to do that. In your statements you can use the $(this) variable to target the mini-profile if you're coding using jQuery. Otherwise, if you only plan on using standard Javascript you can target $(this)[0] instead.
Once you've finished building your mini-profiles it's finally time to add them to the Edit Profile page for use! To enable selection of custom mini-profiles you'll first need to add two specific custom profile fields in Members > Custom Profile Fields in your forum's admin area:
Mini-Profile Theme
Staff Mini-Profile Theme
Mini-Profile Theme is for mini-profiles that are designed for member use. You can set the Who Can Edit option for this field to Staff With Power if you only want staff to be able to choose mini-profiles for users. Otherwise, if you want members to freely be able to choose their own mini-profiles you can choose Members and Staff With Power.
Staff Mini-Profile Theme is for mini-profiles designed specifically for staff use. This field is completely optional.
Set the type for both of these fields as Drop Down Selection. Click on the (View/Edit) link to add mini-profile names to each of these fields.
If you've just installed this plugin you should have three different mini-profiles already installed by default: Example 1, Example 2, and Example 3. You can add these to your dropdowns to test them out and see the plugin in action.
If you're having trouble getting this plugin to work despite following the instructions in the previous tabs you may want to check that each of your themes meets the prerequisites below in Themes > Layout Templates > Mini-Profile.
First, ensure that opening tag of your mini-profile template includes the $[miniprofile_class] variable in its class. On the default ProBoards theme it should look something like this:
<div class="$[miniprofile_class]">
Next, make sure that the default {foreach} loop for custom fields is present inside your mini-profile. It doesn't need to be visible, so you're free to add it inside a hidden element if you don't plan on displaying it or if it would mess up the appearance of your own custom template.
Beyond that you can do whatever you like to the mini-profile template for the most part and it shouldn't negatively impact the plugin.
The following is a list of available variables for use in the HTML section of the mini-profile creator and their definitions. Adding any of these to a mini-profile will generate the content described in its definition in place of the variable so long as the information that variable outputs is visible to you.
To reference your forum's custom profile fields you can use $[user.customfieldname], substituting "customfieldname" with your custom field's name. You'll need to type the name in all lowercase with no spaces and only use characters A-Z and 0-9.
For example, Mini-Profile Theme becomes $[user.miniprofiletheme]. This will output the value of the custom field. In the case of this example, it'll be the name of the mini-profile theme you've chosen in your profile.
IMPORTANT NOTE: These will only work if you followed the steps in the Installation tab of this window on each of your themes. Any themes that do not include the template code specified there will not have these variables replaced in the mini-profile.
$[user]
User's display name link.
$[user.age]
User's age (if visible to you).
$[user.avatar]
User's current avatar.
$[user.badges]
User's list of badges.
$[user.birthday]
User's date of birth (if visible to you).
$[user.color]
Hex color of user's group. If user is not in a group this will return inherit.
$[user.custom_title]
User's custom title.
$[user.email]
User's email (if visible to you).
$[user.gender.image]
Image associated with the gender selected in the user's profile (if available).
$[user.gender.text]
Name of gender selected in the user's profile (if available).
$[user.group.name]
Name of user's current display group.
$[user.group.stars]
Star images associated with user's current display group.
$[user.id]
User's numerical ID.
$[user.instant_messenger]
User's list of instant messengers specified in their profile (if available).
$[user.invisible]
Returns 1 if a user is invisible. More useful for Javascript.
$[user.ip]
User's IP address (if visible to you).
$[user.is_online]
Returns Member is Online if user is currently online.
$[user.is_staff]
Returns 1 if a user is designated as staff. More useful for Javascript.
$[user.last_online]
Timestamp showing when user was last online.
$[user.likes]
Number of likes this user's posts have received.
$[user.location]
Location specified in user's profile.
$[user.name]
User's display name in plain text.
$[user.personal_text]
User's most recent status.
$[user.posts]
User's post count.
$[user.rank.name]
User's current posting rank.
$[user.rank.stars]
Star images associated with user's current posting rank.
$[user.registered_on]
Timestamp showing the date/time the user registered on the forum.
$[user.registered_on_short]
Condensed version of user's registration date.
$[user.social_network]
User's list of social networks specified in their profile (if available).
$[user.username]
Outputs the user's login username in plain text.
$[user.warning.bar]
User's warning bar (if it exists).
$[user.warning.level]
User's current warning level (if visible to you).
$[user.website]
Website specified in user's profile.
You can utilize the $(this) variable in the Javascript component to target the mini-profile <div> element. For example, if you wanted to add a class to the mini-profile you can use:
$(this).addClass('class-name-here');
Profile variables can also be used in the Javascript component in this plugin. In Javascript the value undefined is used to signify that a value doesn't exist for the variable you've specified. With this in mind you can use profile variables in Javascript conditional statements within the plugin similar to how they're used in the actual layout templates section of the admin area.
if(variable) will only run if the variable you specify has a value.
if(!variable) will only run if the variable you specify has no value.
Example 1 (variable has value):
if(user.group){
$(this).find('.group').show();
}
If the user has their group displayed in their profile the above Javascript would make the HTML below visible if you had it hidden with CSS.
icon in the bottom right bar (may not be applicable if you're on Forums.net), or you can disable the welcome window and/or the icon by going to Plugins > Manage > Custom Mini-Profile Creator and changing the Show Help option.
icon in the bottom right bar (may not be applicable if you're on Forums.net), or you can disable the welcome window and/or the icon by going to Plugins > Manage > Custom Mini-Profile Creator and changing the Show Help option.
