[Quest] too strange and strong to be coincidence

[Random Events]

strange tides are rising and rising

There is a sense of chaos that surrounds Novus. Someone has been captured and their intentions unknown to the rest of those that live here. The individual is clearly alien in appearance. While she looks mostly equine, she is green in color, the green of aloe. Her body is covered in small specs of light that that the ability to move around her body, congregating in one place to produce a large glow. When spaced out, it looks like her body flickers with the glow of starlight. She has three sets of eyes, one where normal equine eyes would be set, one set on her forehead, and one set behind her ears. It gives her 360-degree vision. Her body is covered in a slick goo, not fur that one would expect. Her feet do not contain hooves, but it appears she walks on air as her poly-dactyl feet (that resemble that of a primate) never truly touch the ground. She has no mane, no tail, and no gender. Her language is incomprehensible, a dialect that no one has ever heard of before. Her appearance is so strange and shocking that it has caused quite a bit of discussion about where she has come from and what she plans to do here on Novus.
 
Torstein was one of the few who came across this unidentifiable creature. He, with the help of a few others, has managed to capture her and place her in a holding cell. As the others look on, Torstein will gather with the others to determine what needs to be done about this strange looking creature.
 
And during their conference, something spectacular will happen. At first it starts off as a soft tingle, a feeling almost as though one has been sleeping on a body part too long. But the tingling leads to a warm feeling and Torstein will instinctively know that something is different about what he is feeling. Magic will enter his body through his exposed heart, the heart pumping it throughout his body and making him more aware that something new is happening.
 
And when the magic has settled within him, there will be this pressing need to interrogate the alien creature. He might not be able to explain just why he needs to speak to her himself, but he will know that he cannot do anything else until he has. It’s almost as if this need builds within him much like the pressing need to eat, sleep, defecate.
 
This pressing need with bring him to the creature and when his triennial eye meets the eyes of the alien, he will know why he must speak to her. His magic will grow infinitely stronger as he will begin to interpret just why this mare is here. He will be able to see that she is nothing but a scout but she is not innocent. Her people are planning a move to a place with more resources. She has been tasked to scout Novus to see if there are plenty of resources to support her fellow aliens. And what Torstein will learn is that her people plan to eliminate all other forms of life when they arrive. Torstein will have the ability to take care of the thread himself, or warn the citizens of Novus to prepare for war.

 The choice is his and his alone.

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It would seem that it wasn't only the gods who decided to descend onto the mortal land of Novus. More and more strange things are happening in the world-- beasts, broken magic and waves that seem to follow no rules of the tides. But the strangest thing seems to be one single mare who has been caught and trapped inside the caves. Perhaps she's a god... or maybe she's something else?

Will @Torstein discover the truth?

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This quest was written by the lovely @Zombie

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[Torstein]

"Speech..." — Thoughts... — Circe's telepathic speech.
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The murmurs that filled the Solterran halls dissipated into the dry stone walls but were not unheard. The rumors and gossip were not confined to these walls and had quickly spread like wildfire across the Day court... they spoke of a massive beast, green as the brightest and most alive forest. They spoke of a slick, seeping substance - but was it gel? Venom? Acid? They spoke of all-seeing eyes and strange tongues, of unrecognizable words twisted to be warped and aggressive. 

He could not stay away with all the gossip that had saturated Solterra, so he slipped silently down into the dungeons where they were keeping the prisoner. She seemed timid but at the same time confident and well-versed, even though no one could understand a thing of what she had said. Tor watched as others questioned her and were met with puzzled, incredulous looks - they didn't understand a trickle of what she said, nor did she of what they said. Frustration was overcoming the guards, who switched out aggressively as each got tired and ran out of tactics. 

Solterra had come a long way from the days of Zolin (something that was just a history book to Torstein), and torture was something that was far out of the question. Regardless even less morally sound tactics would ultimately be useless. What good is it torturing someone who has no idea what you're asking them to tell, after all? 

Red eyes, two looking and one seeing, studied the curious creature. And several times, she caught his gaze - calling out through the bars past the guards that were snapping at her, calling out to him. He did not understand but the other soldiers still looked at him curiously. 

Maybe they perceived him a monster as she was. Maybe they assumed all monsters spoke the same.

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Hours passed and the soldiers grew tired of their questioning. Long ago, Tor had retired to the upper halls of the castle, a floor above where they had the prisoner. He heard rotating soldiers talk as they mingled in the halls, heard them mention how she was perceived as a relatively low threat - how they had "seen weirder and she was probably just another new inhabitant." He also heard them say she was on an unguarded watch for the night, a pleasure provided thanks to her low threat status. Tor spoke to none of them but instead just took all this new information in.

And when the last shift had retired for the night, he slipped down into the dungeons and snagged the lock's key on the way down. The prisoner had dozed off in a corner but quickly awoke as soon as she heard his footsteps. She spoke to him again in a foreign tongue, and he met her with silence. He still did not know what she was saying.

But he approached her regardless, unlocked the gate, and stepped inside. He shut it behind him and there they stood - his eyes peered into her own, but his Triennial eye spoke to her mind. It locked onto her gaze with an uncanny calm and it read. Volumes.

She spoke soft words, but her mind said so much else. Words he could not understand.. their meanings were so vivid and bright in her mind. 

'I must report back to my people, else they will think I and this planet are a lost cause. I do not want to be left behind.'

Such vulnerable thoughts for such a strange, intimidating creature. And despite what his Eye saw, his gaze met hers once more. He saw that she was scared of what this place meant for her, scared that her people would leave her for dead. She was expendable.

They had no intention of returning to Novus if they did not hear back from her, and in that moment Tor knew what he had to do.

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He stepped quietly up the stairs that led to the upper level and peered down the hall. All shifts had taken rest and his leave was unnoticed.

Come morning, the guards would return to the prisoner: body stiff, throat slit as she had bled out, alone, on the cold floor of her cell. It was not Tor's place to act but he did not care. Not like they would know who had done the act, anyway.

@Random Events
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