Fantasy Cursed Island

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri cocked his head at the new coloration, that was different from before. "I had assumed all changes were so drastic."

"Shuffle gets upset easily," Jerry shook her head, "Where is that paladin, I need to shout at her."

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle shook her head as she sat up. "Not always. Sometimes they're hard to notice at first." She looked herself over before finding the markings, stretching out her leg to look at it. "Hm..."


"She's by the ruins of the village, I believe. I'm not sure why, but she seems to be staying there for some reason. I think Fia is with her as well."

 

[Deadwood Deer]

"Does this one do anything?", Beri asked, sniffing the markings.

"At least she has some shame," Jerry shook her head.

 

[Fangs9090]

“Mm, let me see...” Shuffle thought for a moment, getting in touch with her new ability. After a few moments, a quick burst of flame erupted from the marks, as well as from a few lines along the furred part of her body.


Asta nodded. “Emil, Beri, and Shuffle went to check on her, so they may know more.”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri jumped as flames erupted in his face. "Warn me, creature!", he hissed at her.

"I don't really wanna know more," Jerry shook her head and started flipping through the book with her good hand. "I'm still gonna punch her in the throat, though."

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle blinked and looked at him. “Sorry. I didn’t quite know what that would do.” She looked at her leg again. “That was cool though.”


“Ah, your reflection did that already. I believe she wounded her hand.”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

"That was the opposite of cool!" Despite running with Adran, slang was mostly lost on the leopard.

"Then I guess I'm doing that again," Jerry shrugged and turned the page, "Huh, that's nifty."

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle moved forward as she got on all fours, getting ready to do it again before she paused. “Ah, wait.” She sat back down before starting to remove her equipment. Emil chose to look away.


“Hm?” Asta leaned over. “Did you find something?”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri looked very confused as Shuffle began undressing. "And what is it you think this blood will do?"

"Yeah," Jerry tapped the page she'd opened it to, "This isn't in Common, I'd blown over it earlier because it wasn't important, but..." She scanned the page, "Yeah, this is thieves' cant, I know this code... it's how I got messages to my fence way back when."

 

[Fangs9090]

“I wanna experiment more with this new power, but I don’t want to burn my stuff.” Once she had all her armor and clothes and bandages off, Shuffle gave herself a shake before igniting her new marks again, letting the fire stay this time.


“Ah. I can’t read it. What does it say?”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri shook his head at the pattern, "Do not allow Adran to see this state," he muttered.

"It's notes," one of the things about thieves' cant is that unless you could read it, it looked like regular Common and Undercommon, or whatever script it was written in. But there were little things, subtle changes in sentence structure, little marks on letters, that gave away to someone who knew the code that it was a code, and they could translate. "Oh, that's nifty! Shuffle's maker had to remind herself how to Etch, whatever that is... stylus, oh."

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle looked over at Beri. “Why not?”


“Ah. Niudisa was the one to do that, correct?”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

"Because..." Beri paused and flicked his tail towards Adran and Erina's room. "Can you not hear it? That is why."

"I don't know," Jerry shrugged as she picked up the stylus with her good hand, holding the page with the ball of cloth that was her right. "But Joanne doesn't trust her enough, so she left the equipment with me..." Considering what Jerry had seen of runework, if she could figure it out it would either make her life much easier or have no impact at all to be able to use it herself.

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle blinked and tilted her head. “I don’t understand...”


“Perhaps you could figure it out then.”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri sighed, why was the one that looked like a child old as dirt and the one that looked like an adult a child? "Do not let Adran see you like this because he is going to do something stupid."

"Maybe," Jerry looked at the stylus and then her gauzed up hand, "I'm right handed, though, I can't hold the stylus right in my left hand, it's not a lockpick."

 

[Fangs9090]

“Oh. Alright.” Shuffle paused before hopping away from her stuff, standing in a clear space with a wide stance. Her flames flared up before her entire body burst into flames, though the marks still burned more intensely than the rest. The heat coming off her was enough that Emil looked over again.


“I suppose you’ll have to recover first then. Would the healing water help?”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri had to take a few steps away from Shuffle's inferno. "I do not think Fia would enjoy you taking her spotlight."

"Shuffle has it," Jerry shook her head, "I don't know where Poli is, though, her gastric juices can be used as a component in making healing potions." After hearing Poli's slightly feminine voice, Jerry was starting to default to female with the mimic, even though mimics were asexual organisms.

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle shook herself off she extinguished the flames. “No I’m not. We can catch fire together.”


“Last I saw, Poli was lingering over near Emil and them.”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Beri chuckled at that, "You are strange," he laughed.

"Yep, I think I better show Veo the recipe too," Jerry stood up and went to the door to see a ball of fire, Beri, and Emil. "The hell happened here?", she demanded.

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle looked over at Jerry, her flames dying out. “Jerry!” She paused before lowering her head. “Sorry about waking you...” Her folded wings drooped along with her ears, adding another item to her list of expressive body parts.

 

[Deadwood Deer]

"Shuffle, what did you drink now?", Shuffle just kept getting weirder and weirder, Jerry thought as she stroke over to look Shuffle over and make sure nothing too nuts had popped out. "Where'd you get the wings and why were you on fire?"

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle sat up a bit straighter. “I tried some of the blood vials from my maker’s satchel. That’s why I wanted to healing water, to make sure I don’t build up corruption.”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Jerry facepalmed with the ball of gauze, bopping herself in the face harmlessly. "You made me break my hand again over that? You could have just woken me up and instead you tried to be sneaky about it? How often has trying to be sneaky worked out against me? I thought you were smarter than that." Jerry shook her head, "Anyway, finish up what you're doing, I need the flask and Poli." Then she turned to look for Poli, "Remember that time you offered you gastric juices?"

 

[Fangs9090]

Shuffle put her ears back again. “Sorry...”

Polo formed a semblance of a head to nod. “Yeah. You need some?”

 

[Deadwood Deer]

Jerry waved it off, Shuffle didn't know and she was sorry for it, it was fine. To Poli, "Yeah, I need to show Veo how to make healing potions so I can have my hand back."