2017-03-18: Beach Episode

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  • Log: Beach Episode
  • Cast: Rosaline Calice, Xantia
  • Where: Silver Coast
  • Date: March 18, 2017
  • Summary: While out grinding low-level quests, a sheltered nun runs into someone who makes her look worldly and well-informed by comparison.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

The Silver Coast!

It's only Rosaline's second appearance and it's already time for a beach episode. Of course, it's not as if she's parading around in a swimsuit-- So it might not be what most people think of when they see 'Beach Episode', unless the concept of a catwoman nun provides fanservice enough in itself! In which case this could have been a quarry episode and it would have been the SAME THING!

God!

Rosaline would likely be upset with the narration taking the Lord's name in vain, but she's very busy right now. The sound of waves crashing along the deserted coast is intermittently broken by the cries of monstrous birds and a series of drawn-out, horrifying roars--

ARMs.

Rosaline is running along the sandy coast, rather speedily but having to periodically turn around as she raises her SMGs to spray at the birdlike fiends flying in circles over her, occasionally swooping down to snag her in their talons! So far she's managed to avoid them, but how long will it last?

"Please," she cries out loud, "stay still, bullets are expensive!" Tears are beading in her eyes.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Beach episode, yay! A pretty weird one though, those usually involve less monsters and more shenanigans. And more girls! Rosaline seems to be the only one out here. Seems to be... but not quite.

A ways down the coastline, a single figure can be seen, curled up on the sand in a fetal position. Xantia's just randomly decided to take a nap out here, it looks like. She likewise isn't entirely dressed for a beach episode, mainly because she doesn't own that type of clothing to begin with. But she wears a sleeveless shirt that leaves her midriff exposed and a pair of shorts, isn't that fitting enough for a beach?

Vaguely aware of monster noises in the distance that seem to be getting closer, Xantia should probably be getting up at this point. But she doesn't, instead covering her head with an arm as if they were covers. Maybe if she ignores them, they'll go away.

The noises are joined in by the cries of a person. That does causes Xantia to sit up, albeit reluctantly, looking at the approaching girl in the habit with bleary eyes. Boy, she sure is approaching quickly. She should probably get out of the way...

=====================<* CHALLENGE - Suddenly, Xantia *>======================
|Type: Comedy |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 1 |
--------------------------< Challenge Information: >--------------------------
There's a random girl in your path, just... just sitting there. Quick, jump! 
Evade! Do something, anything!! 
=Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck=================================================
<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline doesn't notice the girl right in the middle of her way at first. Maybe a part of her brain tuned her out, like it already tunes out a lot of things, because it's inconcievable that a person wouldn't have a reaction to, well... EVERYTHING going on right now.

And so comes an Agility challenge!

"AIEEEE!" she cries out as she narrowly avoids crashing into the young woman, instead literally jumping over her, propelled by powerful legs. As they sail over Xantia, it becomes apparent that the nun is wearing no shoes, her feet bestial, clawed and covered in white fur. A tail passes by too, swishing right into her bleary face.

While in mid-air, Rosaline flexibly angles herself to shoot the birds from between her own two legs! It looks really cool, except that every single bullet whiffs. Not a good look.

She falls into the sand. Whuff.

"Are you all right?" she asks, panicked, as she picks herself back up, sand getting all over her dark blue habit. Up above, one of the birds swoops in to grab one of them! Either will do! Huh-oh!

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

It's questionable whether Xantia is fully realizing exactly what is going on even now. She must have been really tired and a very solid sleeper, if she's still having trouble keeping her eyes open after getting vaulted over like that. It only causes her to rub her eyes and yawn. Huh, did she see that correctly, or are the person and the monsters kind of blending together?

Bullets go flying, and Xantia flinches, moreso at the noise than anything else. Then she sighs, finally resigned to there being no choice but to get up. So get up she does, leaping to her feet, streching out her arms in another huge yawn.

And, in the process, punching the diving bird monster directly in the face. She doesn't appear to have noticed the attack was happening, let alone having seemingly accidentally prevented it. "What's going on? I was sleeping," she whines, stating the obvious.

Not only is this a rather odd place to sleep, but now that she's standing up, it's obvious that the red-haired girl is positively covered in adhesive bandages. Evidently nothing serious, but it looks like she's no stranger to trouble. Which is probably not hard to believe, considering that it's still in question whether she's realized there's still a bunch of monster birds circling above the pair, momentarily daunted by the additional target, but likely to attack again at any time.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

The swooping bird, for its troubles, goes blasting off again. Rosaline looks at Xantia with awestruck disbelief. How? HOW??

But wait. Of course! Providence, hope!

"Oh, thank God, I knew you had a plan," she tells the heavens, out loud, crossing herself before putting her hands on the crucifix slung around her neck. A moment later, Xantia is bathed in pleasant-feeling light, her lingering wounds closing up.

"Please stay sharp!" she says, just barely loud enough to merit an exclamation point. "More are coming!" She readies her weapons, as the rest of the flock bears down upon them! With such a volume, her bullets are bound to hit SOMETHING.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

And now we know what it takes for Xantia to fully wake up: getting suddenly enveloped by light. That causes her eyes to widen, the girl looking at her hands and body in confusion, unsure what's happening. It feels... strange. "Huh? What did you...?"

She whirls about at Rosaline's warning, only now taking this threat seriously. Then again... "What, that's it?" She still doesn't seem particularly worried about this, even though she's about to get swarmed!

The reason for this quickly becomes self-evident. Any birds that manage to get through Rosaline's hail of bullets never make it close enough to do any damage, intercepted either directly by one of Xantia's fists, or blown away by the shockwaves generated when she applies full force behind her punches. When the creatures begin to realize that mistakes were made and halt their assault, she waits for the bullet storm to stop, then leaps in the air to deliver a final flying uppercut to one of them for good measure.

"Go on, shoo," she then suggests, waving her hands as if it would be a more effective deterrent than bullets and fists, before turning back to Rosaline, looking rather pleased about the whole situation. "I guess that wasn't too bad an exercise to wake up with!" It helps that her wounds aren't bothering her anymore. Funny, that.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline, with someone between the monsters and herself, manages to get a few good shots in. Still, the strange girl's power proves awe-inspiring, and takes care of the brunt of the flock. By the time the coast is clear (quite literally!) Rosaline is looking at the younger woman, googly-eyed.

Pro... vidence? Well, everything happens for a reason.

"Do you... fight often?" she asks, softly, carefully returning her guns to her sleeves. "My name is Rosaline. What's yours?"

The ground in front of them is littered with feathers. "Oh yes, we should pick these up before the waves take them." And she sets out to do just that. "Oh, praise the heavens, there's some money! And an Aquasol, too!"

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Pro-vidence? More like pro-violence! As is self-evident in Xantia's simple reply to whether she fights often. "Yup!" She seems pretty proud of it, even. "Just with my fists, though! I doubt I could shoot as well as you!"

Was she... was she really paying attention to Rosaline's shooting?

Either way, that point is soon forgotten about, as there's only one way to possibly respond to an introduction, with an enthusiastic (and unnecessary) fistpump. "I'm Xantia!" Zantia? No... "Starting with an X!" It might be a safe bet that this is the entire reason for her wearing a shirt with the letter X on it.

It doesn't dawn on Xantia to scavenge the loots before Rosaline starts to do so, quickly following suit. "Oh, yes, of course!" Rather than go for the feathers, though, she's... collecting corpses? She doesn't seem to see anything wrong with this. In fact, it's her who questions, "Why do you want the feathers? Those don't taste good at all."

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline gets complimented on her shooting ability. This seems to confuse her more than anything else.

"Oh, nice to meet you, Xantia," Rosaline says with a smile, hands crossed. Well, she's certainly never heard a name like this before. Is it foreign? "Where are you from?"

She dutifully collects feathers. "That should be enough," she decides after a moment. "How many do you have?" She doesn't pay immediate attention to Xantia's gruesome collection, until the question. Her skin goes white. Even whiter than before.

She doesn't immediately answer, collecting herself first. She brushes some sand off of her habit, finally remembering it's there. Cats have a complex relationship with sand.

"I'm on an assignment for the Adventurer's Guild," she finally explains, "I have to exterminate the magpie cockatrices that were stealing livestock from nearby farms, and bring back feathers as proof."

Another flock flies by in the background, but it's fine, they have twenty feathers now. They need to leave mobs for the others.

"So you wanted to... cook those?" she asks, tentatively. She doesn't seem completely digusted by the idea. Maybe eating birds isn't so strange to her because she's a cat.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Oddly, Xantia doesn't reply to the question where she's from. Maybe she didn't hear Rosaline? Then again, she seemed to momentarily lose her cheer for a second there. Hmmm.

Instead, she seems much happier to gather up carcasses, proudly holding up several by the legs in both hands. "I've got this many!" She didn't bother counting.

When the purpose of the feathers is explained, she looks surprised, then nods several times. "I see! So they'll give money for feathers!" She examines her own collection for a moment. "They've still got some, I guess I'd better keep them then!"

This is great, food that has parts that are worth money, which will buy more food! Already this is the best day, and it's barely even started! ...so what if it hasn't been early morning for quite some time now? She just woke up, that's what matters here.

She nods her head vigorously at the notion of cooking the birds. "That'd be great! But if I can't get the materials for that together, oh well!" Eating birds raw isn't strange to a cat either, right? "You want some?"

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline tilts her head when her question about Xantia's origin gets no answer. She considers re-asking... but that might be rude. Oh, how awkward. She decides against it.

"We could bring them together and split the reward," Rosaline proposes, regarding feathers. "The job won't be up forever, and not everyone will pay you for them." Xantia's Xantia logic might confuse some people, but let's be frank, Rosaline is already a fish out of water. Everyone is a little bit strange to her. It's good that she explained, in case Xantia was going to start paying for more things with feathers.

Despite being a cat, Rosaline is also a woman, so eating raw bird still seems unappealing to her. She wrinkles her nose. "N-No, I'll pass. We really should try to get a fire going." Hunting monsters is hungry work, as the inevitable (not really) Monster Hunter integration is going to attest.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

It's very good that Rosaline explained. Xantia certainly looks like she was expecting that giving feathers to the Adventurer's Guild would always lead to her getting paid. "I see. Okay, sounds good to me!" A simple soul, indeed, that judgement was sound.

As such, it's probably no big surprise that the messy-haired girl doesn't appear to understand why anybody would ever refuse to eat food of any kind. "Well, okay. Not much dry wood around here, though. We'd have to go to the forest for that." And she's so hungry. Ah well. She'll put up with it for the sake of her company. "Let's go, then!" And off she goes, at a brisk pace, expecting Rosaline will follow along.

Unable to stay quiet for extended periods of time, it's not long before she broaches another topic. By means of a sudden waterfall of questions. "So you're an animal person, huh? Does it give you special powers? What's it like to have a tail? Why do you use guns when you have claws?"

Thereby proving that not only is Xantia a curious sort, she is observant enough to take notice of details. Simple-minded maybe, but not oblivious.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline considers explaining to Xantia the health benefits of cooking food. Most people don't know, they just do it for taste, but Rosaline has read about it-- Aaaaand Xantia is off. What a strange girl.

There may be random encounters through the forest, but since the two of them form the very basis of a balanced party, their survival rate went way up than if they had explored it separately!

But here come questions. Animal person? Does Xantia come from somewhere that has no Beastmen at all? Where could that possibly be? SPACE??

It's likelier than you think!

But Rosaline explains patiently. "Most call one us Beastmen. I'm a catwoman, myself." A lot of people don't use the politically correct term. She'd rather not teach Xantia the words they use instead. "It doesn't... really grant us special powers, no." Rosaline is more agile than most, but she doesn't think it's that big of a deal.

But then comes a question that has her stop in her tracks. She looks at Xantia, then up at her gloved hands. She thought she had concealed them well enough...

Oh, of course, her feet.

Rosaline gathers her composure. "I'm just... not very skilled with them, I suppose." She seems somber for a moment. "ARMs are better for hitting airborne targets, anyway, and more accurate too."

Was she... was she really paying attention to her own shooting?

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia's not afraid of any random encounters! Rosaline would do well to be more afraid of which random encounter this girl will suggest eating next.

Shrugging a bit, Xantia waves off the notion of Beastmen. "Why would I call you that when you're a woman? And 'beast' doesn't sound like a very nice thing to call people. So, animal person! Doesn't that make more sense?" Give it up Rosaline, you can't defeat Xantia logic.

The cheerful girl merrily continues walking even though Rosaline stopped suddenly, forcing the 'Animal Person' to catch up to her afterwards. Wait, so is she or isn't she oblivious? She sure seems kind of... selective about what she does and doesn't notice.

And she just responds as if nothing happened, too. "That makes sense, you should do what you're good at! That's what I do. So if you ever need something smashed, just let me know!" Since she isn't carrying her hammer right now, it may not be fully clear what she meant by that, but... she punches things well enough.

At least Xantia seems to know exactly where she's going. Though her claim of a 'forest' being nearby may have been a bit exaggerated. It's a fairly small cluster of trees, a grove would be more accurate a description. But that's Xantia's definition of a forest, she doesn't know any better. And in this region, in this day and age, perhaps it's not unfair to call even a small group of trees a forest.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

"Well, you can say beastwoman..." Rosaline suggests, before trailing off into mumbling while Xantia explains her flawless logic. Animal person isn't TOO bad, she supposes.

"I'll keep that in mind," Rosaline breathes out. A moment's silence, then something occurs to her: "Are you... Are you a Drifter?" she asks, as it occurs to her that this would explain... well, maybe not a lot of things about the girl, but at least SOME things.

And then they come into view of the forest, as one might call it. Given that Rosaline comes from a desert region, she'll accept Xantia's definition, certainly.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia looks pensive when asked if she's a Drifter. "Hmmm... I guess so, maybe? I travel around, exploring and doing odd jobs. If that's what Drifters do, then I guess I'm a Drifter!" Only Xantia could hang around Drifters for this long without realizing what they do, and that she is one herself. Her circumstances do make her rather unique in that respect. Xantia is probably also one of the few who could consistently keep raising more questions the more questions about herself she answers.

But there's the forest now! Xantia points with enthusiasm. "There! There's always some dry twigs and leaves around here. Then all we need is some fire!" There's a beat, before she turns to Rosaline. "Any ideas?" Of course she didn't think this through entirely, are you really surprised?

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline has a small, awkward laugh when Xantia just realizes that she's a Drifter. It's not completely unlike the realization she had herself. Maybe she and the strange girl aren't so different after all.

She looks at Xantia in disbelief when she revealed that she forgot something so important. "Then... how do you normally make fire?" she asks. But in any case... She sets a hand on her crucifix. "Don't worry, I can handle this. I have a flame spell prepared for situations like these."

It's not a very strong flame spell, and it really is just for situations like these. For Rydia reasons, she doesn't like to use fire in anything but the strictest utility capacity. Lighting campfires, illuminating the way, lighting Holy TNT...

Not that Xantia would know that, of course.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

How does Xantia usually make fire? "I don't!" Simple question, simple answer. Nope, there isn't any more coming, that was it, that's the whole answer. Of course she's already displayed her willingness to eat things raw, but as for the other obvious benefits of a campfire... well, we just went over her amazing ability to only generate more questions through the ones she answers.

But, lucky her, her impromptu companion can make fire. It's not really that amazing. Except to Xantia, who looks absolutely thrilled about the display. "Wow, that was magic, wasn't it? I thought you said being an animal person didn't come with special powers, but you do have those!" That clearly has to be related, because otherwise why can't she use magic? Logic! She also probably should have noticed Rosaline using magic before, once again calling her observational skills into question.

What IS this girl?!