un: unlikely friend

[allforthecause]

[ Stealing a second pendant wasn’t easy, exactly, but not was it particularly difficult. As shrewd as merchants were, they were simultaneously arrogant when they thought they were going in for the kill - so using Kahl as a distraction (deliberately looking both well meaning and slow with too much coin weighing him down) made it easy to slip the device away and make his own exit long before the man noticed. He and Kahl met up again in a dank little corner, dark and damp, and crouched down over it as they changed the username and prepared their post.

They needed to get the word out - and quickly - but doing so as themselves would only paint a target on their back. So. Burner device, pretend to be a native from the city, get the word out, then ditch the device as soon as they were done.

Time to go. ]

To our foreign guests:

You’ve been promised to Rakkathu as bodies for his horde. Our King plays your host but has already cut a deal - your lives for ours. Or at least some of them.

A dozen plus a tax - this is what he has been promised.

My conscience won’t abide for it. You’ve done nothing but help where and when we’ve asked, only to get this in return. Don’t let him sacrifice you. Murder won’t buy us freedom, whatever our masters believe.

Please. If you’re anywhere near as strong as I think you are: help free us from him once and for all.

-L

[ ooc: comments with this icon and the un “unlikely friend” are from kahl and cass’s burner phone stolen pendant. Any replies from Kahl or from Cassian’s un “bee” are from their personal pendants. ]

Comments

un: yiling laozu

[weifinder]

Who are you? What gives you word weight we should pay heed to?

And why would any of you who've fought over a year here feel that anything which buys you time to seal your hell is anything but an excellent deal?

The king would be a fool to make that offer. Rathkeikaku has already shown he doesn't need a deal to influence our number.

So where, in all this, is the evidence in intention?

[inferus]

The one this information serves best is Rakkathu himself.

I would not doubt he had his influence in this.

[weifinder]

Likewise. He has no reason to try moving faster, he's not under a burden of supply chain needs for taking this place or its connection to hell. I know you feel it if you're in the Guts Bind, it breathes death when the seals are weaker versus stronger.

Rushing into any response based on emotion for what's convenient to what people already wish to believe is worse than foolish, it's reprehensible. It's playing into Raccatchu's hands. Not the people of this fortress in their last stage flight.

[inferus]

I have felt it along with magical and demonic energies, which is expected with this version of Hell so close.

I agree. Being ruled by one's emotions is dangerous at any time but especially in the middle of a siege. The group must act cautiously. We do not have enough information yet and certainly not from a reliable source.

I am certain the king has made a deal of some kind, but we do not know the nature of it, and war requires such difficult choices.

[weifinder]

Considering the king has willingly enough taken us in and tasked us to help, it's inevitable he's made other plans and allowances. What we don't know are his intentions with them, or what they are, beyond one implied surface read offered here by Mister L.

This situation is unstable. The king has negotiated to keep his people fed for months. We can't know better than the people in power deciding how to keep things moving here when we act.

Harm the king prematurely, then what? Intuit who will keep this from falling into further chaos? Hope people all despise their king enough to celebrate his deposing in a crisis? Very unwise.

[inferus]

Acting impulsively would only invite more instability and chaos in a situation that cannot survive more of either.

The only other option for a king is Thyvault who has already imprisoned one of our group. Many soldiers are loyal to Deimar, and the two sides fight among themselves when they should be focused on surviving the siege.

The chaos of not having their leader would only serve to harm their efforts to survive the siege, and they are already losing. We can only hope reason breaks through to anyone who may be thinking of doing something reckless.

[downswing]

( That moment when your spidey senses tingle because the death kings are colluding. )

[valeas]

( Okay, but hear us out for a sec: it's hot when they do it. )

[downswing]

( 'Rathkeikaku' )


Your memory is not so poor.

[weifinder]

Are we sure?

[downswing]

Certain.

[weifinder]

I don't know, I've always had trouble with recalling details I don't find important... Who was that first thing we faced? Unhanded?

[downswing]

It pleased the Heavens you were born with a handsome face.


( Because they spared not one lick of wit. )

un: Black Prince; text

[blackscales]

Desperate fools can make poor decisions.

[ It would be foolish, but that doesn't render it impossible. ]

[weifinder]

When it gains them something. Words on paper are a way to slow things down, but which of us has gone missing? Which of us have already been influenced by Rikachu without being 'handed' over, as if this place has the resources or people to spare on efforts of that kind?

And who benefits from deposing the present king in the middle of a siege?

[downswing]

( Rikachu.

Every time this son of a donkey starts to type —

Why you gotta make Lan Wangji look stupid for associating with stupid.)

[weifinder]

( when you can drive husbae mad refusing to remember the name of the local death warlord

a wei wuxian tale )

[blackscales]

[ We're just going to... move on from Rikachu, who sounds like an electric mouse. ]

I don't disagree that something doesn't fully add up, but I only mean to suggest we cannot rule out stupidity.

Sometimes, people are simply not as smart as you would hope. Sometimes, their decision seem foolish simply because they are.

[weifinder]

Yes, active can be a fool, anyone can have foolish moments.

Assuming we understand the cause without asking and investigating the participant in reach is being foolish ourselves.

un: unlikely friend

[allforthecause]

Some of your own have gone as couriers.

If you do not believe me, ask them.

I only bear a warning. Heed it or not.

[weifinder]

So you're saying that the king, in his wisdom, sent messages which would lead us, acting as couriers, to question his motives.

And you don't find that in and of itself a sign that things aren't as you, or those of us who were couriers, believe? I hate to ask, but does the concept of secrecy not occur to anyone of this place? Do you regularly send people around with notes asking for the couriers to be killed? Were these couriers bargained with to carry these messages for the sake of their own safety?

It's not that I wouldn't say such things happened. I question what it means, in the context of this war. You, stranger, feel more like a shadow manipulator than a king who is so obvious in intent that he sends couriers of the people he claims he'll "hand over" in the process of giving pretty promises to buy time.

[allforthecause]

Then make your own inquiries and keep your own council.

I’m not asking to to depose the King, as you seem to think.

I’m asking you to help render the sacrifice unnecessary.

[weifinder]

You may want to consider more clarity in wording, then. A call to "help free us from him" when discussing your royalty the moment before doesn't make it sound like Rathkinku is the one you're asking it from.

text |⍓| un: kahl

[kahl_175]

Kahl know them. They good person. Can trust.

[weifinder]

Being a good or bad person doesn't make them any more or less delusional in how to handle the situation, Kahl. What gives us the right or responsibility to destabilize a whole people in a drawn out war they're losing, simply because someone you call a good person thinks this is what is meant?

They can be trusted and also be wrong.