Thea giggled, "From experience, my juices can make a normal human have enough stamina to last for at least a day. Some can go for two days, some only half. It varies on how strong their natural libido is." She gave an answer from experience, "Also, it enchances their dominant, or submissive nature too." She added just as she tried charging the ring. When she was successful to a degree, she doubted a tiny gem can handle the enchantment she wanted. Luckily, the shop keeper knew where to get more. Grinning under her hood, Thea's already pissed off a few gods during her travels, what's one more going to do? Besides, she was a half-demon, not like she was going to be welcome to paradise anyway. "Do you know where they deliver it?" She asked in a curious tone.
Chike nodded in response to Zaid's words as he agreed with the older man on that point. The plants and animals that survived in the wilds were ones that learned how to change along with the environment the Gods left them in whenever Their whims decided to alter those environments or find ways to alter the environment to their comfort. People were no different... though people had the extra responsibility of having to be more careful about offending or rejecting the Gods while making those changes. It was a delicate dance to be sure and sometimes he worried about how his superior was handling the steps... especially in situations like the one currently developing. Even though his stomach was starting to bubble with fear, Chike stepped forward. Looking up at the drunken customer, he smiled as peacefully and harmlessly as he could as he said, "Please, no need for anger, Brother. If you have an issue with the High Priest's words, perhaps we can discuss them peacefully?"
"Hmm, So it would seem they survived the first round." A hint of disappointment tinged Sahkmet as she leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms idly. "I wonder how many of them are going to be stupid enough to return to the ring to fight that thing." She turned her attention toward Safiya. "It's obvious that golem isn't quite normal and I'm curious as to the mechanisms of it. A creature like that would require a constant charge to keep together otherwise it would collapse, or at least lose a large amount of its mass the longer that it maintains its existence. Since it doesn't look like you're powering it remotely, I would guess that there's some other way that it's doing surprisingly well. Several enchanted gems hidden in the sands beforehand would be the easiest method. Of course, that doesn't explain the fine manipulation to cast spells. If it was a gem charged with a spell, then the movements would be much more simple and only serve to propel the spell forward. So either I have to concede that you somehow did the impossible and created a living, intelligent creature with its own magical reserve, or there's some other trick involved."
"Well, I'll leave it to you to sort it out the. Hurry up though...I wasn't kidding about taking a bath soon. Figure out some solution and I'll...see how our guests are doing." Raziyma turned her attention to the group approaching to rest a bit before the second round, seeming vexed between pleased at their continued survival and irritated. Kellia left to her own devices to the time being had to assume this was part of some kind of test, but there was never any good way to tell what the result that Razyima wanted was.
“As you wish, Your Highness” Kellia agreed and focused her attention on the guard and the salve girl “I do not wish to keep the princess waiting longer than absolutely necessary, and I'm sure neither do you” she told the pair. At least if you are smart you don't. She added in her mind. “So answer my questions and don't waste my time. First, tell me again what evidence you have that she is responsible for the poisoning.” She commanded the guard before turning her gaze to the girl “And then I want to hear your side of the story.”
@unisol_gr44 @Tjf "I've never lost and I'm not going to start against their fake warrior." Aversa was determined like Kijito, but nodded in agreement with Aresnios. "This is just absurd. Just attacking it isn't going to do any good. I'm not sure if it's even possible to actually kill it." She made her comment, as they entered the lower chamber where servants rushed to examine their armor and search for replacements. A few of the other fighters gave a small round of applause, their struggles at least having earned the respect of the other combatants. More importantly, the three fighters were circled by a trio that clearly didn't fit down here. Arsenios was face to face with Raziyma who was apparently ignoring some issue with a slave going on, apparently having delegated the matter to that elf she had following her around. The princess actually looked impressed with the fighters, but what she wanted would be a regular enough problem and it was only doubled by seeing that vampire woman from before on Aversa's side with the same smile. There were two black armored knights standing a little far back, still wearing their helmets but giving some kind of nod of approval to their vampire knight colleague, while Aversa had knelt to take a bow to her apparent superior. The third person was an older guy that he had never seen before. He had a serious look to match his scarred face, looking at Kjito. The two must have known each other. "You're not injured...good. So I can ask this. What is going in that head of yours? You know better. You're treating it as a single soldier. Compare it's size and actions. You should be approaching it as a formation. And how do you break them?" Ostrkuh didn't hesitate to giving Kijito a lecture directly in front of everyone. Kjito may have not really be concerned about the approval of the vampires or the royals, but getting chewed out in front of them probably wasn't a good sign. Raziyma just shook her head, staring at Arsenios. "Sister wished he'd have taken the field himself. That probably would've helped. I didn't know what to expect from that girl..but she's doing adequately." Raziyma carried her conversation with Arsenios as if Kjito wasn't even there, not willing to directly acknowledge her presence. "Yes. Your struggles have been rather impressive....but I'm afraid your weaponry falls just out of reach of being able to do any sufficient damage to it." The long haired vampire who looked to be some kind of royal or cleric had spoken. Her voice was soft and strangely a little too sweet sounding for a vampire, let alone a important one. But Raziyma gave the same nod of agreement. "I agree. I have never lost a bet against my sister in my life....she made...a better weapon that actually I thought she had. You can't win with those weapons. You need to cheat." She glanced over to the mercenary captain who grimaced, but had a look in his eyes that showed his thoughts mirroring the other two. "Stories about how brave something are fine for stories, but only survivors live to hear about the deeds of dead men." The three had made their suggestion, and Aversa scowled at her superior, but not trying to say anything openly rude against her either. "Milady...it's not a real victory, if we must cheat to do it, is it?" While obviously opposed, the long haired vampire just offered a gentle smile in return. "Please consider things carefully. Princess Raziyma has assured that the use of enchanted weaponry is acceptable. Nothing short of magic is going to do any actual damage to it. This will just make things more even handed."
@Auraicide 'Cheat? There's no cheating when fighting a golem,' Arsenios said to Raziyma, 'It's neither man nor alive, it deserves no fair fight. Bring the magical weapons. I have just about enough of your sister's games.'
"The demand for them has gotten higher than ever, so the few corrupt merchants who can get their hands on them will charge an arm and leg for them. The palace is getting a massive influx of them, since they're busy working on some insane war machine project. Princess Raziyma hasn't had much trouble getting the gems to keep flowing...that only makes sense...but you didn't pay for me to tell you about that, so let's focus on your thing." "They keep about a quarter for the university, then the rest are made offerings to the temple. Given that look in your eye...there's mountains of gems on the altars. It's the afternoon, so the high priest is probably passed out drunk in a bar somewhere and that creepy brat with him is probably trying to wake him up. If you're really dead set on taking the stupid option, you won't get a better opportunity."
Thea nods, "Great! Uhm... where exactly is this altar located?" She cheered, until she remembered. She had no idea where was what in this new city she found herself in. "Don't worry, I promise I won't tell anyone of your involvement." The succubi added, hoping to find a solution to her problem. If the shop keeper tells her where the altar was, Thea heads there immediately wasting no time.
Kjito bristles at her father's lecture. "Give me the weapons. There's no such thing as cheating, just good strategy."
"Why do I always need to clean up someone's blood every time you come by?" A woman's voice cut between Zaid and the drunk, both of them up in each other's face until Zaid took notice of the girl. Between her and his assistant telling him to ease off, he chose to refrain from just decking him. Elves weren't uncommon to see in the city. But a Wyld Elf would be rare even in western urban centers, let alone in Thiatan itself. Chike was fairly familiar with her due to how frequently the high priest dragged him out here. "Shinna. Still at work? Not checking out all the action in that arena?" Zaid had shifted into being polite as she approached, giving a friendly smile at Chike before staring hard at his superior. "Someone's got to make sure you don't completely trash the place. You're making him work today too? Cut him a break already." "I like the company. Besides, he doesn't mind. He figures that I couldn't manage on my own before he got here...but ah...I guess, I'll keep him." Zaid had often talked about Chike as if he was an annoying little brother tagging along rather than a serious servant. Not that it was a bad thing entirely. Some of the other priests could get...mean, to say the least. Zaid treated all the people under him rather well. "No way. I'm not accepting that. He can have at least one day off of dragging your lazy ass back home. At least ask him what he wants to do if you're not going to bother with work." Sinna's words had to force everyone nearby to freeze. As laid back as the high priest was, nobody would even consider it being a good idea to talk to him like that. But he just laughed it off, though Chike was aware that Sinna and himself were among the rare exceptions who could actually get away with it. "It's not like that. The temple is actually ran TOO well even if we're there or not. Nothing to be doing there. But..why not." Reaching into his pocket, Zaid handed the boy a bag of coin. "Find somewhere nice. Sinna needs a good night out." "What?" The elf was stunned at the impulsive decision, but the high priest only shrugged. "You need to take it easy for a bit too. That's an order. Figure something out. I'll...reach an understanding with these guys." Zaid turned his attention back to the drunk, and Chike was already aware of the mess this was going to turn into. Sinna already had a look in her eye that was a broken heart for the table that came down with a crash. Reluctantly setting customer drinks downs on the counter, she got near Chike looking confused about how she should be feeling. "He's going to be a while, I guess...what now?"
One of the few topics that could ever really engage her sister, were weapons and she looked almost something close to happy to talk about them. Safiya had muttered some curse words at the sand monster’s temporary retreat, but soon focused on Sakhmet’s words looking too pleased with the current standing to be too bothered. “If you want to get technical.... You keep thinking of it as a golem. It makes more sense if you think of it as a shapeshifter. The physical body is like a blanket woven of thousands of force gem fragments broken up into the grains of sand itself. It’s not quite intelligent exactly, but it does learn from basically muscle memory. It’s been reading fighters all day and figured out how to counter a lot of what they’re throwing at it..except...these are straight up fights. For proper war use it needs to compensate for way more strategies and it doesn’t so much think as just sort of takes an “If they do this-I do that” approach. This is all just part of the development process. I’m not happy about the charge up time for it to cast so that will need to be fine tuned..but it isn’t doing half bad at all. See how this is just one. Now imagine about five thousand of these when they are actually ready for war.”
Chike's eyes widened in surprise as he caught the coin bag, sputtering slightly at Zaid's order. He winced at the table crash as well, realizing there was no stopping this now and he looked shyly up at Sinna. The Wyld Elf was undeniably beautiful and her sudden physical closeness to him let him notice that fact all too well once again. He tried not to openly stare but he found his gaze trailing down from her bright eyes, to her full lips, and he managed to look away just as he realized he was starting to stare at her visible (and sizable) cleavage. He instead forced himself to focus on the coin bag, testing it weight to get an idea just how much coin the High Priest had expected him to treat her with. "W-We probably SHOULD g-go somewhere e-e-else," he forced out, his cheeks turning slightly red in embarrassment at both the situation and his own body's reactions, "I-If there's somewhere y-you'd like to g-g-go..."
"Um...right." While he glanced over to see the crowd gathering around fighters including the princess, it was obvious that he knew something was going on, but knew better than to try making it his business, instead focusing on Kellia. "They haven't figured out the exact cause yet, but the healers think it's a cause from a concentrated overdose of the medicine they give slaves. We've already rounded up her accomplices and we have the statements stating that she had specifically told them to do that." While anxious about bothering nobility, his voice didn't crack too much and he sounded sure about what information they had. The girl didn't share it. "I won all my fights fairly. How would I have time to plan anything or talk to anybody when I've been in the pits all day? They told me that I'd get a full pardon if I beat that guy and I did....he went down easier than I thought he would. But he just went four fights back to back when they put me in...so I kind of got lucky." She didn't look too proud to admit it, but the guard didn't look easily swayed. "Oh, right. He's just tired. Our mistake. He's just vomiting blood because he needs a nap." Giving a sigh, the guard was clearly exhausted at his position, but took a look at the desert elf. "The princess...has given you the authority to decide what to do...apparently." He was obviously baffled and doubtful of Kellia's actual importance, but looked willing to defer to it. "I really wouldn't want to keep the princess waiting either...but...and I'm just some grunt so don't listen to me if you don't want to...but not properly investigating is just going to piss her off more, right?...or well...princess Raziyma might just kind of..." He trailed off, not willing to say anything directly bad about the princess directly, but Kellia already well aware that knowing how vain she was, there was an equally good chance she'd take offense to Kellia taking too long. But the guard did have a point that not verifying things properly before making a decision might be just as bad. From the way it looks, this will end up eating up quite a bit of her time if she can't find a fast solution to it or doesn't just chose to make a judgment and ruling without the full facts, but, that couldn't really be considered a much better option.
“Enough!” Kellia cut the guard off - she could guess what he was going to say. “Which part of 'don't waste my time' you did not understand?” She asked, but did not wait for an answer. “Two things. First, you said 'her accomplices'. So what you're telling me is that she worked with multiple other people to poison her opponent, yet no one noticed or suspected anything until after the fact? Second and more important, you said that they haven't figured out the exact cause yet. If that is so, why are you in such a hurry to accuse this girl? What makes you so certain of her guilt? Even if you are correct about her trying to poison her opponent – and you still haven't convinced me that this is what really happened – how do you know that someone else did not beat her to it?” Kellia made a brief pause to catch her breath and consider her options. “I want to see her supposed accomplices and her opponent. I also want to speak with the healers trying to figure out exactly what happened. You can answer my questions as you lead me to them.” She had more questions she wanted to ask, but decided that they could wait a little bit. Instead she looked at the girl. “You are coming with us, but keep quiet unless spoken to. If you are truly innocent, then I'm sure you can wait a few more minutes before you are free.” And if not... The elf turned her attention back to the guard. “Well, let's not waste any more time. Lead the way.”
Sakhmet furrowed her brow and rested her cheek on her hand idly as she waits for the fighting to resume and contemplates the possible weaknesses of the creature. Discussing magic is certainly something that she enjoys. "In that case, it would seem as if it would be particularly weak to magic. Anything that may disrupt the fabric of the 'blanket' in a dramatic fashion could cause it to flail out of control and rip itself apart. Imagine a swiftly flowing stream. Without any obstacle, it could appear calm at the surface despite the swift movement of the water underneath. However, throwing a boulder into the stream could cause massive wakes and whirlpools throughout. To continue the analogy, Imagine a fireball being thrown at the golem or a large section of the fabric that holds the creature together being disenchanted. the creature would continue to move through and around the wound as if nothing was wrong and it would essentially rip itself apart."
"The temple is pretty much impossible to miss. They have a whole section of the city for it....if you're serious about this, don't even think about trying to touch anything in the inner sanctum. Stick to the public altars. Let me put it this way. Their religion isn't like the ones you'll find west. In their eyes, killing is just a personal problem between two people for them to sort out. The only things they view as actual sins are affronts to their gods. They will let a lot of things slide, but desecrate or offend one of their deities...it's bad news. Keep that in mind." Finding the temple was easy. While walled off, it had a massive corridor to enter through to come to a sizable courtyard where Thea could witness a few people kneeling by various altars and placing coins to the mountains of treasure just sitting there. But nobody seemed to think of trying to pocket it any. It might have been from how seriously they took their religion, but as Thea saw the columns of golden outfitted things standing still, it made the red haired woman's thoughts more clear. It took a minute to see one actually breath and be sure they weren't just statues, but that wasn't even for sure. They were...something. Mostly human looking, but the armor looking more chiseled from marble than actually placed on. Thea may have known magic, but the exact nature and process of what these things were, still eluded her. One thing was for sure. They wouldn't think twice about making use of those hooked spears if someone gave them a reason. She could see the altars farther outwards, where the gleam of various gems and jewels was unmistakable. The colors stood out, but from the distance, it couldn't be made out which ones were magical or not among the hoard issue to various looking statues of creatures, some ranging from mostly human to just bizarre in shape and form. While those altars had plenty of treasure ripe for the taking, the four armed things were standing the closest to those altars and it would take time to rifle through that much of the offerings to find what she was actually looking for. Farther away and mostly out of the line of sight for these temple guards was a pair of stone scales in front of the statue of Jackal. Meticulously placed and distributed to remain perfectly even in weight on each side, it looked like it would be the easiest place to steal initially, but not without making her theft more known. She could also see that while they were lined to observe pretty much everything going on in the courtyard area of the temple, none seemed to be paying attention to the pathway to the corridors leading to the inner workings of the temple, though if the shopkeeper's input was anything to go by, there would be a huge risk of getting caught inside.
"Crap." Thea cursed as she saw how well guarded they were, even though the head priest was gone. Looks like these people take religion seriously, which would just be a death sentence for her the moment she gets caught. The scale seemed the safest to steal, but not without needing to change the stuff in the scale. She couldn't tell if those guards were even human, which made stealing from the bountiful altar next to impossible. Sighing, Thea looks around for a stone that she could use to even the scale. If she couldn't, she leaves and decides to look for the bar where the head priest, and his assisstant was in. Thinking she could just seduce them to do her dirty work for her.
@unisol_gr44 @Tjf Aversa reluctantly gives a nod along with the thoughts of the other two. "I hate resorting to these methods...but I hate losing a lot more." The accepted agreement between the three resulted in a gesture from Raziyma and servants scrambling to pull the orders. The crowd of slaves had urged and swept the trio to a bench where they got sat down. Half the servants checked their armor, doing what kind of patch work jobs they could in the limited time to fix the damage while the rest went off on some kind of quest, leaving the three major observers to stare at what was essentially their stand ins. The return was met with the group of arena workers walking carefully with three objects. Two were unusually bright silver swords, with etchings of runes all along the flat sides of the blade. The sharp end had a faint tint of the energy behind it. Carefully they were presented to Arsenios and Aversa, while Kijito was handed what looked like a long bow, except for the wood being way too dark for standard material. Feeling it, she could tell it wasn't black wood either naturally. It had been blackened, likely by the same magic that made a few white letters glow in a language she couldn't understand, a glimmer of it's power. The vampire knight who held the new weapon, rose from the other two to take a look at an empty wooden bench and give her blade a practice swing. As the blade swung, the effect was immediate. Razor sharp gusts of green wind, following along the sword's movement in a draft, splintering apart the wood and tearing it apart before the sword made contact, slicing through the peeled back wooden bench with ease, the drafts of wind scattering the remains across the room. The intent was clear. The golem was all, but immune to standard physical attacks. However, powerful vacuums of wind like this could essentially scatter apart it's body, dealing with it's capability of being able to reform. Razyima looked impressed by the weapons, her smile unchanged. "These are on loan. Don't be too reckless with them." The mercenary captain took a look at the newly readied group and gave them a hard stare. "Don't be too reliant on any upgrades. That thing is still smarter than it looks. You have a way to actually damage it now, but it won't be enough to take it down on it's own. Once it realizes that things have gotten more even handed or it's backed into a corner, it will get desperate like any soldier put on the edge. That's when it will fight with it's all. Be ready for that." While he gave his thoughts, the vampire noble pursed her lips, pondering about something. "You need to survive two more rounds, correct? Perhaps, you don't need to completely destroy it or get it to a point where it's berserk. Just damage it enough to slow down it's attacks and make it more survivable." Raziyma hearing both of their thoughts, folded her arms and looked at the ground, clearly thinking about something. "Winning means Aresnios wins at our wager...however, that's better than losing a bet against my sister. It may be better to give it your all before it can properly adapt and try taking it down in the second round before it gets a third to adjust...but provoking it further on purpose might be a problem. Leave it intact for too long and will just continue it's barrage attacks without any trouble....this is quite the puzzle."
"Attacking recklessly? That's my kind of fight. I say we swarm the thing." Kjito confers with her companions.
