Arc I -- "The Price of Knowledge"

Werhom, it always seemed, was only ever "acceptable" to live in. Though a few rather shabby mansions clustered together in the heart of the city, the true beneficiaries of the town's mineral wealth lived to the south in Saeo-Craelhom, where they could lounge in opulent splendor with the rest of the Church's favored disciples. Rather than money and aristocracy, the town's true culture was that of brutally hard work, stoic pragmatism, and a rather biting acrid air on account of the eternally-glowing smelter that coated the land with polluting smoke. This was a place of industry, of fire and tunnel, and those unfortunate enough to allow themselves to be caught up in its gnarled, rotten hands were no longer bothering to fight against its raspy grip.

The one Church in the city was located just to the east of the smelter's deadly plume, and the faint wisps of smoke that floated by had the curious effect of staining the structure's stained glass effigies, so that the morning sunlight which would have otherwise illuminated the Lord's Early Triumphs only imbued the scenes of war and conquest with a faint lurid glimmer. It was only in the evening, when tired, sweaty workers poured in for their daily prayers would His Works shine radiantly, blotting their ashen skin red and gold and blue as they reflected upon their deeds as they knelt in well-worn pews.

Leasur Monavain loved this Church. He loved the feeble, clammy little Priest who bustled to and fro, placing one trembling palm on this dwarf's brow, or that woman's shoulder. He loved the way the windows kept every morning cool and grim, precisely the way he liked it. He loved the pews, with their long sharp needles that dug into the sinners' legs, or better yet the smooth stone floor that bruised their knees purple when he demanded extra-long prayers. It was a beautiful monument to the suffering of this city, a perfect representation of all that the blighted land stood for, and as he languished on the steel altar he salivated slightly at the thought of these miserable penitents' demise. Just slightly.

"So," his voice had some low undercurrent of quiver to it beneath the rather sour sound of strained vocal cords, "they send me you, and tell me that I am to make you useful. Such a pity." He pulled himself up to stare at them, intense eyes glowering. "I would rather have seen you impaled as on the walls as a warning to all other who would dare offend the Church, but the letter insisted that you be made useful.

"I don't care what you've done. It doesn't matter to me--you've all sinned in the eyes of the Lord, and that should've been enough to land you a spot on the torture rack, but unfortunately there are deeper sinners than you in this world. And our High Priest, in his infinite wisdom, has seen fit to execute two sinners with one stroke by sicking you penitents on more vicious curs, in return for you going back to wallowing in whatever filth you normally indulge in. Personally, I'd go and do it myself if only to have the pleasure of watching you scream for mercy as we pulled out your evil with hot iron tongues, but I'm not personally responsible for this, today."

Another paladin, previously unnoticed, stepped from the shadows and handed Leasur a small scroll. "Ah...thank you, Hadrian. These are you orders, penitents. You are to follow them to the letter, and if you dare deviate from them I will personally see to your suffering, and you will not enjoy that."

A Shabby Scroll:
O you who would see yourself redeemed in the eyes of the Lord:
There is a woman in the western hills, a vicious witch who is called
"Nemonus"

She has sinned against the Church by sending men to defile its halls
She has sinned against the Church by whispering blasphemies
She has sinned against the Church by aiding its malefactors
She has sinned against the Church by tormenting Its faithful

See this woman dead
and see yourself redeemed in the Eyes of God
and His Church.

Go Victoriously in the name of Hector

"Any final questions before you leave, sinners?" he asked, licking his cracked lips. His old scar was aching today, and its constant pain was both a blessing and an annoyance.

Ashir walked and walked that was the only thing he could remember before walking in a beautiful building that was the church. He had to say that Humans were a race that knew how to build with beauty. His legs made a rasping sound over the floor and he had problems holding his grip on this flat and slippery ground as his feet were not made for this area. He cursed his ignorance to speak logic in the land of religious prosecution but he could just not understand it. If they followed a good and loving god why was you then killed when not believing? He stood in front of some sort of Paladin and the first words were enough to see the extremism in his mind. Arish heard his task and slowly raised both of his hand as they were bound because him having long and sharp claws in a church could end nasty, "Why send untrained and unmotivated "Sinners" Wile there are highly strained and highly motivated Paladins? Would that not be more effective?" He tried to stay calm under the eye's but he was scared by that man, even more than his old bullies and maybe even more intimidating than his Gyoerth. But he ignored the fear and looked in the eye's with most of concentration wile he checked the other penitent's as he would need them.

Harvad looked down on the stone floor, while the preacher stood babbling about the righteous god of his. Harvad could puke, when he looked at the aristocrats of this land. He missed his own land, where the workers were held in high regard for their work. Or at least in the city and area his family controlled.
A surface atrocity began speaking, trying to reason with the preacher. Harvad gave him a silent poke with his elbow, as to indicate that he was trying to do the impossible, and should rather shut his mouth and do as he was told.
Harvad couldn't help but feel an urge to call out a heretic warcry, create a small hammer of his armor, and charge the preacher and paladin. But he knew, that he couldn't succeed when in the middle of hostile territory.

Harvad looked at the preacher. "I'll do as told, but be wary, that you are not protecting the relations between the Stonesoul nobles. We may be a small house, but we are influential. This will not be forgotten." Harvad said it, in a void tone. Void of emotion and anything that could hint about his true feelings against these people.
He rose from the seat, that he'd been given. The only thing he'd gotten himself with his nobility. How little these holy men cared about the influential and powerful, blinded by their false diety's powers.
"Where's my weapons? I'll go take care of that stupid witch of yours, as long as you holy folk won't bother me further." Harvad said in an unpleasent way, merely on the verge of barking it out as an order.
They'd taken his silver hatchet, and he didn't feel very comfortable about that, in a city with a giant stove. They could be melting his dear shield and hatchet at this very moment. The very thought made his stomach hurt, and his heart sink. He loved that hatchet.

His arms were forcibly bound behind him, the binds so tight that his elbows almost touched. There was a constant, almost agonizing pain shooting up his shoulders. Long, flat stones were placed between the ropes and Eirik's skin to prevent him from freezing them and breaking free, again. Before he was constrained, he managed to snap the forearm off one of the guards and then beat said guard with it until the arm shattered. Now a paladin had his arms in a pressure point lock, any suspicious movements and the paladin could hit it and easily take the man to ground. Eirik felt practically powerless in this situation, something he wasn't accustomed to at all. He had also been blindfolded to prevent any other mishaps that he might try to pull off.

The paladins led Eirik down numerous halls; his sense of direction was obliterated. After about ten minutes of walking, he was dropped to his knees after having the back of them kicked out. They smacked the solid floor, sending more pain through his body. The man didn't expect kindness out of these people, especially after all the trouble he had enjoyed causing them, and he didn't want it. The violence they instilled on him meant he managed to hurt both them and their morale. He was just waiting for them to kill him.

They removed the blindfold and he knelt before a preacher who was explaining to them that they would go out on a mission to slay some woman. Eirik had other plans to be had.

"Ah...and there's the violent one," Leasur remarked when two guards dragged Eirik into the chamber. "Were it that you could display a little more self discipline, you might be found yourself glorified in Hector. No matter." He motioned for the guards to cut the man loose, knowing full well he personally could subdue the savage were he to attempt anything.

"As for your question, insect," the paladin began to draw on the inner Light that so suffused his every passion, "every one of the faithful is pure in the eyes of the Lord. Redemption is not necessary for us--we are without sin and need not repay any debts. Oh, and--"

There was the briefest flash of light, and Leasur's eyes shined with silver and white for a moment as he unleashed a vicious blast of pure agony on the Maawlaevi before him. It was a spiritual attack that, while preserving the tissues and consciousness of its victim, would cause every nerve to jitter with pain, every muscle to spasm with divine paroxysm. It was not true Agony, not the soul-wrenching, body-contorting anguish that he learned to inflict on the battlefields, but merely a mild lash to ensure that his words were well understood. In a moment, it would be over.

A brief smile twinged across Leasur's face in the silence following the attack, and he felt the necessity to address the dwarf: "Good Sikhom, I don't give a damn about your noble house--we are beneath the sky here, and Craelhom's beautiful sky, nonetheless. However, I do apologize for any rudeness you may have suffered previously--if your weapons or armor were taken from you, along with the rest of your fellow sinners, then you may retrieve them from the northern barracks as you leave town. Be assured though, if any of you make trouble in Werhom, my Lord's patience will be exhausted and you will die. Good day."

As the paladin turned to exit to the rooms in the back of the church, he stopped for a moment. "Oh, you'll find the witch in the mountains to the north of the city, in the hills west of the mines. There should be an old logging road leading up to where she's been hiding--bring me her alive, if possible, or at least her head when you are done." He departed the room, and Hadrian soon slipped after him.


"Was it really necessary to do that to the Yeorc?" Hadrian asked when the two paladins stepped out into the morning air of Werhom. The smelter's fumes were diverted slightly in the gentle wind, and the air was remarkably clean today.

"Of course--it is a penitent," replied Leasur. "Our Lord cannot bear to hear the whines of insects when there is battle and conquering to be done."

The older man grunted. "Well, if you insist. Do you think they'll bring it back?"

"What, that book you think the witch has? Possibly, if it looks valuable enough. Penitents are known to scavenge the corpses of sinners for their own material gain. Filthy practice, they're like rats. Come, let us visit the prison--I need to make sure the sinners are acceptably uncomfortable."

Arish looked to the paladin and wanted to give a irritated sigh of feeling the unfair racism and a over zealous religion but the pain hit him first. Pain never bothered Arish very much as he had suffered almost his entire live but this was a another story. His back legs seemed to be useless for a second, he fell to the ground and wanted to scream but his mouth did not obey him. All of Arish's limbs made spastic movement's around him wile he lay on his back like a beetle. Then it ended and he rolled back on his feet as showing his belly never was a good thing in his home country. He let out a little sigh of frustration and he felt a anger but he was skilled in hiding anger and then there was the fact that humans could not read his face or see his legs moving somewhat faster or his sharp weaponry almost sliding out of there place.

Arish tried to talk to the dwarf as he had done some research on there kind and found there skills interesting "The stonesoul house? You must be Harvad stonesoul. I once did some research on your house and I ran on your name. I am Arish Maawlaevi of the Yeork from the hive Myagoeth or I was from the hive of Myagoeth but not important. Pleased to meet you." Arish wanted to let all of the so called penitents work together to perform there task so they could go there one way faster.

Malek sat towards the back of the cell, testing the ropes that chains that bound his hands. He stood behind the other prisoners, easily seeing the paladin over their heads. He was head and shoulders above just about any human he'd met, and had found it very frustrating to constantly have to stoop to get through doorways in these crowded human cities. The chains around his hands were well made, and though they strained as he pulled, they held fast. More irritating were the binds around his jaw. Seems the paladin had thought he would bite, so they'd bound his muzzle with a sturdy rope. He couldn't open his mouth, and the ropes were starting to cut into his skin. There was not a lot he could do with the Paladin watching, for he was confident that as soon as he tried to remove them, the Paladin would inflict some kind of over-the-top punishment for such a small thing. Once the Paladin left, he tried to hook the rope with one of his sharp canines, but, though he managed to wriggle his mouth open a little bit, though rope was too taut for him to get a good grip.

Seeing the dwarf, he managed to called out, his voice muffled from the ropes but still deep and rumbling. "Hail, proud dwarf. Seeing that you have been left without binds, some of us could use your assistance, if you'd be so kind."

Arish looked at his free hands and felt the need to let his weaponry slide out and to kill that paladin as the bastard deserved but he couldn't see him and it was a idea made out of fear and hate so it was a foolish action to do. He looked at the dwarf and then the other Penitents as he preferred to call things by there name. He heard the words of the dwarf and said slowly as a poet "Kill the truth speaker to please the liar." Then he continued in his normal voice "We shall have to locate her first, but as I know a thing or two of magic and how to avoid people it is pretty obvious were the best place for her would to be hiding. Underground as ground makes it as good as impossible to track and to search by magic of any kind." Then searched his belongings and found what he was looking for. They said only armor and weapons and he was anxious of what would happen with other possessions but it seemed they had spared his little backpack filled with books and some metals, although he could see that most valuables were taken but he never cared much about the little gold he had. "Now does anyone have a idea were to start looking for the target." He said the last words with a clear distaste for there goal as it was unfair and just a stupid task.

'Nemonus,' Eirik spoke the name in his mind. The title sounded familiar. Perhaps she was the same witch that aided him and his clansmen so many times before. If this was true; if he met the same Nemonus once again, he wasn't going to sit by idly while this misshapen band of fools attempted to slay her. Her talents proved to be useful against Craelhom before. Why would Eirik betray an ally that might still be willing to bring down the Craelhom hierarchy?

His binds were released, the pain from his arms and shoulders faded after a moment of soothing motions. He rubbed his arms while looking at the other prisoners. The Yeorc, insect, probably slow on the ground but had the ability to fly. Seems kind of timid. Overall, not to much of a threat if Eirik had to engage him. The Dwarf, stubborn, no doubt, and just as self-righteous as the preacher. The iron will would probably keep him going through the battle. He would probably be one of the hardest to take down, with the exception of the bi-pedal lion, he noticed when he looked back. Never had he seen this race. Indeed, they look fierce and they probably are, but he wouldn't be the nastiest creature Eirik has gone up against. And the Fyraa, skinny and lean, most likely agile and quick on his feet. Individually, Eirik would have little trouble. All together against him might prove difficult, and he would fight them all if need be but he was confident in his skills to persuade this group to turn their blades and claws on the preacher.

If this woman is as much trouble to Craelhom as Leasur claims, then where is the logic in disbanding her from this world? Eirik was sure that these people didn't care much for Craelhom, so hopefully they'd be willing to instead help this woman in her fight against this country.

He stood up, pushing himself up from the ground. Without speaking a word to the others, he left to go retrieve his weapons and armor from the barracks. The twin axes he always carried and the Plate armor crafted by his own hand. After gathering his things, he'd wait outside the church for the others.

‘God’. The word permeated through this world, a concept with many forms, each utterance denoting a different intent among bearer to bearer. Most commonly, within her travels, it had been used to refer to a particular manner of deity, or merely the concept of one. Here, in this country, it was spoken as if it were a battle cry, a rallying glory, a reverent declaration. It was somewhat admirable a trait, she supposed distantly, the strength of their convictions within their religious beliefs. But it was also a reckless concept that frayed the world in the hands of some its bearers. As she bore witness to the flaring, condescending bearing and light of the holy man before her, she easily recognized him as some of that number who allowed their religion to push them beyond logic.

However, no hint of this was displayed in her willowy frame, posture tall and neutral. No trace of any manner of emotion was conveyed through the position of her body, motionless body a perfect companion to the smooth rigidity of her mask. A small curl of emotion stirred within her mind at the spiteful conjuration of pain upon one of the others set with this punishment, but her frozen posture remained untouched. Tiraesoleit stood with the disquieting, eerie calm seen by those who viewed silence as emptiness, nothingness, a void, rather than a tranquil resting.
They were tasked to kill a woman who had offered alleged slights against the nation. Easily, her plan formed without any full intent. She would accompany the others who were charged this task as punishment, and find evidence as to whether or not Nemonus, this 'witch', was indeed so grave a threat to completely warrant bringing about her demise. Part of her strained against even considering the thought, citing that whether an individual should die is not in her own hands, but was quieted and separated with a counter-argument so practiced it bordered upon instinctive. If there was even a flicker of doubt as to whether or not she should take part in this, she would merely slip from this country as easily as a shadow and take her journeys elsewhere. It was a vaguely solid structure, but it was enough to satiate her need to prepare for now.

Obviously, due to the fact this matter was a punishment and not a job, they were given no matter of information concerning where they might locate this woman, and no offer of resources to assist them. Silently, she observed the others, gauging the impressions given by their physical appearance and demeanor, and also the small responses offered by the paladin that were directed to some of their number. Only after the man of the cloth had left and the others began to interact did she make any response, moving towards the insectoid creature, remaining at a polite distance. She had encountered some similar to him before, some of his own kind. Quietly, tentatively, she made a small connection to his mind, formatting her thoughts to words. They were soft and muted, like shadows upon the edge of a glade. “Apologies for intruding the privacy of your mind without proper indication.” The almost automatic phrase was something she oft repeated when requiring communication with others not of her own kind. “Do you bear any manner of injury from the paladin? Your exterior appears unaffected, and your demeanor has only mildly shifted with no signs of continued pain, but I cannot be completely sure there is no lasting mark through distant observation alone.”

Arish looked at the the Muu'oloth, the Muu'oloth were one of the few races that Arish didn't knew much about else than some biological fact's and a little history but he never really met one. In his eye's racism was the product of being unsure of finding other races that were as smart and skillful or even better so he never made a difference from races. He liked her way of talking and ways "No offense is made from my perspective as there is nothing I believe to be wrong to communicate in anyway. I have no injuries as the pain the paladin inflicts is in spirit I can call myself lucky to not say to much doubt to one that can't live with doubt. I am Arish from Myagoeth, pleased to meet you."