The "Best" RPG Ever-14

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---

Rayna was looking through a rack of furisodes, eyeing one in particular in a darker red color than her current outfit, when she saw someone familiar seeing her through a store window and coming inside.

"Hey Rast," she said on hearing him step up behind her. "How are you today?"

"I'm alright. Cap has me on town duty for a while, least 'till Pirr is off the mend. Less dangerous and all. Uh, you and miss Lynn haven't accepted another job yet, have ya?"

"Nope," she said, turning around. He was wearing lighter armor than the day before, and no magic helmet, so his face and long hair were visible. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, ah, Cap has a special job...another of the patrols found something out there needs looking into, and she thought you'd be good for it."

"Sounds interesting," said the fox-girl, putting a hand close to her lip. "I'll have to check with my partner about it."

"Yeah, of course. Er, where is she by the way?"

"Just changing. She should be out soon if you can wait."

"Sure."

She pulled out the furisode she'd been looking at and held it up in front of her, looking it over. "Hmm.."

Lynn walked out of the changing room in a black tank top and knee-length skirt, with the same shoes and long socks she'd started out with. "Oh, hey Rast," she said, trying to ignore a noticeable jump in her heart rate and a slight heat in her cheeks. "What's up?"
"Well, ah, Cap wanted to know if you'd be int'rested in a special assignment," he said.

"Did...she say why she wanted us specifically?" asked Lynn, uncertain why she hesitated at the start of the sentence.

"Somethin' about illusionists having a good eye for details, I think..."

"Well, I'm already curious enough to at least hear her out," added Rayna. "What do you say? We weren't gonna do anything else interesting today anyway."

"Yeah, probably not." Looking back at Rast the archer said, "So do you need to bring us to her or do we just go off to the guardhouse on our own?"
"You'd better do the second one, miss Lynn. I have ta attend to my patrol route still."

"Don't want to make the Captain upset, eh?" said Rayna.
"Well, ah, I ain't paid to do nothin', is all," he said.

"We'll head over there as soon as we're through here, then," said Lynn.

"Thanks kindly." He nodded and then walked back out of the store.

"You know, I think he likes you," said Rayna with a mischevious grin, on her way to the changing room with the outfit she'd picked out.

---

"Hm...what about this one?" Nora pulled a notice off of the main board, showing it to rest of the party. "I-it's just, gathering information, so maybe it won't be too difficult?"

"Not with our luck," said Katherine, taking the paper to read it over.

"Your luck, maybe. My luck's awesome," retorted the witch.

"There's more to luck than good or bad. Harder work for better rewards is technically neutral luck. Anyway, yeah, I like this one. It's different." She handed it to Zach next.

"Hey, why do I get it last? Lemme see!" said Mika, hopping and trying to take the paper from the taller girl.

"Ugh, stop being so childish. Here. It's not even that interesting." He shoved it at her face and she had to take a few steps back to actually take the paper and read.

"Oo, mysterious castle exploration. Recommended for people who...can run away really fast? Well, that's us to a T!"

They took it to a desk worker at the guardhouse, a blond elf whose right arm was in a sling. "Hm..yeah, you look like you can handle this one," she said, looking at the four of them over the top of the paper.

"So, where is it and what exactly do we need to do there?" asked Zach.

"For that matter, why do they care about some old castle?" added Katherine.

"Well, the frontier isn't supposed to have been inhabited for centuries. So it's rather strange to find a big castle just standing there untouched. Some archaeologists went in with some of the guard, but they came back without the guard saying they had seen something terrifying, but none of them could agree on what it was exactly, just that they wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. The guardsmen showed back up a few days later with a similar story and no idea what they'd been doing in the intervening time.

"It seems like whatever's there isn't bent on killing people, which is why it's out on the main board and not in here. Here, take this," she handed Zach a small notebook and a map with directions from the town the castle in question. "Your job is just to find out what exactly is in there so we know who to hire to go and either exterminate or negotiate with it, depending on the situation. We need you to take notes in case there's some kind of forgetfulness magic involved."

"I assume you don't want notes on the castle's architecture," said Zach.

"No, just anything unusual in there. The first people to notice the castle just thought it was abandoned, so keep notes on anything about the place that doesn't match that description, especially anything especially supernatural in there. In fact..pardon, miss, are you a weaver?"
Nora took a second or two to register that she was being addressed. "M-me? Well, uh, yes, but not a very good one yet..."
The elf nodded. "You'd be best for taking the notes, then. What with the higher...magic sensitivity or whatever it is. Experienced mages should be able to make sense of anything your senses pick up that you can't understand yet if you describe it well enough."

"Okay."

"Hey, I have magic senses too," said Mika.

The elf tilted her head slightly, looking down toward her. "Nowhere near as fine-tuned, but I guess you'd be able to tell if it's a demon. If that's what it is, I'm sure no one would mind if you ate it."

---

Once they had taken their old clothes and the new ones they weren't wearing back to the room at the inn, Rayna and Lynn set out for the guardhouse.

"So hey, what do you mean you think he likes me?" asked Lynn.
"You're still thinking about that? Wow, I guess you really do like little wolf-boy too~," said the foxgirl.

"N-no," she said, blushing visibly now. "I mean—maybe, but it doesn't matter. Look, I just wanna know what you're talking about."

"These big fuzzy ears pick up all kinds of things," she said, pointing to one of them. "As soon as you walked out and he saw you I could hear his heart moving a little bit faster. Yours too, actually."

"And you think that's enough to go on? Maybe he's scared of me for some reason."
"You're not scared of him, though."

"Pshh. I'm not scared of anything."
"Not even a little romance?" she said, teasingly.

"I'm not scared of that, I just don't have time for it. We're trying to win this game so we can get out, right?"
Rayna shrugged. "I'm just trying to have fun, myself."

The archer stopped. "So wait, you don't want to go back to normal?"
Rayna stopped too, giving her friend a serious look. "I do..I mean, I've got people back home probably missing me just like you do, and I'm worried about them, too. It's just, what's happened to us is so crazy that there's no reason to assume any kind of rules apply. If this even is what we think of as a game, maybe it doesn't even have a win condition. Maybe we'll be pulled out and turned back to normal at complete random—or maybe we won't, even if we do 'win'. I'd rather adapt to and enjoy what's going on now than worry about what might happen in the future."

Lynn sighed. "I guess so. I just don't think I can accept this body as really being me anytime soon."

"Even so, there's no reason you can't have just a little fun with it. Heck, you even went with a cute outfit like that rather than jeans and a loose t-shirt or something."
The other girl fidgeted with the material on her skirt a bit with a hand. "This was comfortable, and I can move around in it just fine...and I have bike shorts on under this in case I need to high kick for some stupid reason, too."
"Sooo, A dinner date, maybe?"

"Mmngh." Some of Lynn's earlier blush came back. "Maybe. If he's interested. And not today, either."

---

Zach, now back in his original armor, stood a short ways outside of the town, looking at the map.
"You're not reading that map correctly," said the cat-girl from behind him.

"How do you know? Your eyes are closed!" Zach

"I can skim your neurological processes. The part of your brain that's supposed to be involved with navigation isn't even lit up. I bet you think that way is north," she said, not opening her eyes but pointing in the general direction of the afternoon sun.

"Well—you read it, then," he said, pushing it into the arm she had out.

"Thank you. Not interested in wandering around lost for hours." She opened her eyes and scanned the map. "We need to head south, which is this way."

A few minutes of walking later, Mika said, "Say, how do you know which way is south? Is that a psion thing?"
"No, I'm just paying attention to where the sun is."
"W-wait, this isn't earth," said Nora. "How do you know which way the planet spins? Maybe it rises in the west..."

"Oh...right. Hang on." Katherine closed her eyes again.

Excuse me. One of the guardsfolk standing at the town's edge snapped to attention, looking around.

"Whowhatwhere?" 
Shh. I'm a psion. Just need to ask you a quick question.

"Uh...what's that?" he said, under his breath.

Does the sun rise in the east?

"Nnnnno..everyone knows the sun rises in the northeast. Is this a prank?"

Thank youbye.

Opening her eyes again, the psion consulted her map again and then made a 45-degree turn to the left. "We need to go this way."

---

"Hey, I'm Rayna, this is Lynn. Rast said the captain wanted us for something?"
"Hm?" said the desk worker. "Oh, sure. She's in that door over there, same as usual, Just knock."

"Good morning," said the captain flatly after letting them into her office. "I hope you don't mind me making a request so soon after you got in town."
"Oh, that's fine, we need all the work we can get anyway," said the fox-girl.

The captain nodded. "Right to it, then." She handed Lynn a map with a specific location outside of town marked on it. "Our regular patrols found something unusual there...some burn marks in the grass that don't look like a monster made them, some kind of symbols or something. I have my suspicions as to what it is, but their description wasn't enough to confirm them."

"Soooo...you want us to go get a better description?"

"Right," she said, nodding, and handed Rayna a small sketchbook. "I'm hoping between the keen eye of an archer and someone whose magic deals almost entirely in appearances, you'll be able to pick up on things your average warrior wouldn't. I need you to draw any symbols you find out there in as much detail as you can manage. And...I don't know exactly how magically sensitive you are, but if you notice any peculiarities to its flow around there, make a note of it."

"Hm...I'm not complaining, but I am curious," said Rayna. "This seems like a really easy job for a slightly more observant guard, or really any adventurer. Why seek us out in particular?"
"Yes...this is the other part of my request," said the captain, leaning forward on her desk a bit. "If this is what I suspect it is, I don't want word getting out about it. Don't discuss it in detail with anyone but me. I had Rast go after you for this in particular because seem trustworthy, and I'd hate for you to prove that wrong. Understand?"
"Well, of course," said the fox-girl, giving an emphatic nod. "But...what is it you think it is that would get people so worried?"

"Hmm...I'll explain it when you get back. It'll just sound silly if I turn out to be wrong."

"Okay," said Rayna, looking at Lynn.

The archer nodded, and turned back toward the captain, "We'll take it, then. Probably...right after lunch?"

"Sure. Just don't put it off too long, I'm having patrols go around that spot for now and I don't want to arouse the suspicion of any nobles about that."