[Dark Sun] Marauders of the Dune Sea

Dawn breaks in the City-state of Tyr, and the city is already a bussel of activity. The people of the city are out with the first light before the raging heat of the dark red sun reaches it's apex. The wind is still this morning and cool (85 °F) but promising to rise.


The elven market echos with the sounds of vendors hawking there bobbles and wares. Everywhere are shops and stalls, selling everything from silks and pottery to meats and produce. The air is filled with the smells of food from street vendors. Skewers of erdlu and kip, and flat unleavened breads seared in a brick oven.


By purpose or by chance this is where you find yourselves this morning.



[sblock="OOC"]

Welcome to the game folks. Let me know where your at here, and feel free to roleplay a bit in the market.

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Ya'tta walked through the busy marketplace. He looked around and grimaced as only a Thr-Kreen can. His mandibles twitched as he saw the waste of bodies around him. So many people that lacked strength... They did not deserve to be clutchmates.

His antennae moved back and forth slowly, his eyes scanning the market. He wasn't quite sure why he ended up in this place known as Tyr, but it is where his feet led him. Ya'tta took a moment to debate calling his Kitora, his name for his spirit guide. He decided against it, since he did not feel like fighting the majority of the market.

Instead he paced along, a strange hissing sound escaping his mouth.

Aisop wanders the market, taking in the morning sunlight. He sighs slightly, as he considers his financial situation. It wasn't so long ago that one with skills such as his own could always find a position welcoming him at some noble's home or another. Civil turmoil was bad for business. Everyone was too busy jockeying for power and position to worry about entertainment.

Oh, the taverns and common houses were still always willing to employ him for a night. But there's only so many times you can tell the Fall of Kalak . . . honestly, it only happened a few days ago, and they were all HERE when it happened. . . never mind.

Still, until things settled down, he was on his own for breakfast. He strolls through the market, attracting a few glances. He's a striking figure, to be sure, but while many dismiss him as another elf, he's a little too short, and there's something wrong about the shape of his face. Still, he's hardly the strangest thing walking the streets today, as he passes by one of the insect-men on his way.

Garok

Garok strides with long steps through the marketplace. A look to his green eyes, always seeming to promise a quick end for anyone meddling, is enough to keep possible thieves away. But, as imposing a big, muscled armed and armored mul may be, all this attributes are pretty 'normal' for his race. The most unusual thing about him are the color of his eyes and his preference for a more exotic weapon, called a gouge.

He had only some ceramic pieces left. Time to find a possibility to make money...

[sblock=OOC]

[sblock=Mini stat block]Garok
Perception: 12 Insight: 12 Low-light Vision
Level: 2 XP: ?
AC 18 Fortitude 17 Reflex 14 Will 12
Initiative: +4
Hit Points: 35 / 35 Bloodied: 17
Temporary Hit Points: 0
Resist:
Saving Throw: -
Action Points: 1 Second Wind: 1
Surge Value:8 Surges per day: 12 / 12
At-Will Powers: Far Hearing, Battle Wrath, Berserker's Charge, Passing Forward
Encounter Powers: Incredible Toughness, Disrupting Shove, Power Strike
Daily Powers: -

Condition:

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Fresh from settling his final matters at the arena, the mul Darus, his only possessions in his hands, leaves the gladiators and makes his way into Tyr proper.

Once in the market, Darus realizes, for the first time, the freedom that he would now enjoy. 24 ceramic pieces in his belt pouch. That's all that remained after tallying up the various fees and bribes involved with freeing a gladiator slave. 24 ceramic pieces would buy plenty. 24 ceramic pieces seems like a sorcerer-king's ransom.

Darus approaches a vendor selling red and yellow star-shaped fruits. "I'll take one of those," the mul indicated. "And one of those." The former gladiator is pleased to bite into the succulent star-shaped fruit.

He walks further into the market. Darus realizes his folly in spending all 24 of his ceramic pieces on his first visit to the Tyr market, so he starts thinking more of his immediate future than spending money on frivolity.

Eben the Mul turned away from the darkened corner where he had been talking to a figure hidden in the shadows. Speedily, but without attention drawing haste, he walked away. He didn't chance a look over his shoulder, but he knew that Kalistus would have been long gone by the time he reached the next corner...

Continuing through the market, he purchased a little food and replaced the worn rope from his pack - the one he used to carry had been badly damaged in the previous evenings excitement.

The marketplace of Tyr was a cosmopolitan place; no stranger to the odd and unusual. Here elves walked alongside insectoid thri-kreen, parting to make way for half-giants striding with halflings on their shoulders. And then there was itself.

It was shaped roughly like a man in that he had two legs, two arms, and something like a head. There, the resemblance ended. It was made of rough-hewn slabs, or shards one might say, of dark obsidian all connected to one another by tough, thick woody fibers. Over the obsidian were draped thick hides, some scaled, others simply cured. Whether this was an attempt to imitate clothing, or perhaps to cushion blows that might crack obsidian, was not immediately clear. It walked at a slow, methodical pace; each footstep printing deep into the dusty soil with a loud THUMP.

Its head was roughly chevron-shaped, with the sharp end pointing down at its shoulders and the two points on top jutting up like horns of black crystal. The one on the right was a little stubbier, a little shorter. Just below the juncture where its head split into those two projections glowed two orange-red points, each one slightly oblong. From how the thing moved its head about, one could conjecture that those points served as eyes.

From the large, blunt feet to the sharp tip of its longest head spike, it was perhaps six and a half feet tall. Heavily built, with a broad chest and thick legs and arms, it was a strange and intimidating sight that loomed over most folk as it passed.

The strange creature, or thing, surveyed the booths at the market, its desires inscrutable...at least for the moment.

Kasha wanders idly through the market, observing the traders and listening to the chatter. Doesn't look like they're suffering too badly in terms of goods coming on. Though there do seem to be a lot of people testing the sand. Smaller caravans, with less of everything. I wonder how long that will last. Tyr is still rich. With a grimace, she turns sharply left as her wandering take her close to the elven section of the market. In a short path between two stalls, her eye is caught by a patterned scarf, but when she tries to bargain for it she can't settle an acceptable price. Shrugging, she moves on.

A thumping in the ground draws her attention, and she steps back into the shade of a stall's awning. A creature of stone and wood and fibre is walking past. "I never saw nothing like that before." The stallholder sounds amazed as he watches it going past. Kasha takes the opportunity to slip a couple of betel-nuts into her pocket. "I wonder what it is." She sounds as much amused as amazed. "Think I'll follow it." She gives the trader a quick wink, picks up a bag of nath fruit and tosses him a few coppers, and follows the creature.

Belros

Belros walks through the marketplace. The elation he had so recently felt from his emancipation had begun to subside. Walking through the marketplace, Belros begins to feel disgust with the world around him.

"How can people live in such a desolate place," Belros wondered. He longed for the forests of home.

"I have to get out of this city," he said to himself. However, he realized he did not have the means to immediately do so. For the moment, the city was the only safe place to be. He doesn't have the wealth to buy the necessary protection to venture too far out on his own. Even if he did, he doesn't know the way.

He sees elves all around the marketplace. Belros grumbles. Elves were the reason he was brought to this place. He tries not to dwell on it.

He suddenly sees a lumbering figure made of stone and wood coming through the marketplace. Such a creature should not exist. To Belros, it appears to be an abomination of nature. Belros feels anger at the sight of such a creature, but dares not approach it out in the open. Belros thinks it might be wise to follow such a creature to learn about its ways before he attempts to destroy it.

As you wander the market various merchants attempt to get your attention but one seems out of the ordinary. A large half-giant dressed in clothes not befitting this part of the city-state. He watches the crowd without making any offers, he seems to be looking for something. He studies peoples moving through the square.


On the other side of the square a young human quietly approaches Kasha,

"You are Kasha of Uxkhal? You are known to House Shom, I have been asked to deliever this letter to you." She hands you a letter sealed with wax and the seal of House Shom.



Back on the other side of the market the Half Giant points at Garok, "You, Mul" then points at Eban, "and you the other one, with the sword, come here, you looking for work?"

His eyes then catch the creature of stone and wood, "What in the wastes is that? I think I've been in the sun too long." He shouts out at it. "Creature, do you speak the common tongue? do you work? No forget work I think I could get my monies worth if you just stood in my shop." He mutters under this breath, "I could feed it pebbles and sticks."