Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rhialto" data-source="post: 364817" data-attributes="member: 630">As panic seizes the Empire, and its Daimyos meet and discuss things, another event occurs that might be better noticed, in more peaceful times.A small fleet of six ships, (rumors of which have circulated for a small time now) anchor themselves on the coast of Southern Zamede, near a small fishing village.  Almost immediately, a small rowboat is lowered from one, and quickly comes ashore.  From it quickly emerge a tall pale man clad in black, a more recognizable gaijin, who seems to serve as a translator, and two shorter men, clad in black, who carry what look like long sewing needles. On the whole it is an eerie group, their pallor somewhat indicitive of corpses.  The tall man pulls out a long golden rod, capped with a strange curvy symbol.  He plants it in the ground, and begins to make what seems to be a rather enthusiastic speech about it--at least the tall man is enthusiastic about it, while the other two seem somewhat less so.  The translator makes a go at giving a word-for-word translation of the speech, then finally gives up and makes do with a summary.  The gist of it appears to be as follows--this stick is pretty special.  Anyone who follows this stick, will get a large reward.  All in all, it is one marvelous stick.  A trio of particularly daring young fishermen go forward, half-jokingly, and place their hands on the stick, and make long-winded oaths of loyalty to it.  The tall man seems delighted, and walks out to the ocean, then turns and beckons them to follow.  The three do so doing, wondering when the afore-mentioned reward will come.  They are thus entirely startled when the tall man takes each of them in turn by the shoulders, shouts some words at them, then dunks them in the water.  After a moment, during which he shouts more words, the tall man pulls the man up, and kisses them on the forehead.  The startled fishermen walk back to the shore, coughing up seawater, and throwing back resentful glances to the tall man.  The tall man then speaks a little more, and then, apparently satisfied, gets back in his boat, and rows back to his ship, taking his magic stick with him.After a few days, opinion in the village remains split as to whether the man was a ghost, or some kind of lunatic.  Both sides agree that he was not a normal man.  After all, what normal man goes around dunking people in the water, and making them swear loyalty to a stick?  Still, several days pass, and the man is not seen again.The ships however remain anchored in the harbor.  One night, another rowboat goes ashore, and hires a horseman to deliver a message to the capital.  Aside from that, the ships simply sit there, quiet and enigmatic...</blockquote>

Verification