katoomba ♔ while I formulate denials of your effect on me

[moonheart]

♬ Watching You Go - Ghosts

WHO || Alanna, Jaime, Faith, Fiona, Jordan, Adi [Closed]
WHAT || The Knights investigate a shady temple of Mystra.
WHERE || Katoomba, Australia
WHEN || July 24th [forward dated]
HOW || Actionspam. Single thread, don't worry about maintaining tagging order.

The Knights take off for Katoomba, Australia, to investigate a tale of a temple to the goddess of magic Mystra that was erected very suddenly and mysteriously, seemingly unknown to other Mystran clergy in the world.  A bizarre tale of a cleric being chased out with gunfire, and a missing bookseller with a connection to the church have left Wynn worried about what might be going on within the walls of the temple.  It is constructed a short distance from the actual city proper, up the river.  

Comments

[trebond]

[ THAT IS EXACTLY

WHAT ALANNA SUGGESTED

WE DO.

She grinds her teeth a moment before surging forward past them lET'S JUST KEEP WALKING JESUS. ]

[moonheart]

[ they head through the open doors into the courtyard. this wide, walled space is open to the sky. the floor is tiled with obsidian slabs, in which star-shaped white stone tiles are set, mimicking the night sky. two large stone statues dominate the square, each apparently portraying the same woman. they stand apart from but facing each other, each with hands raised up towards the other, almost forming an arch over the center of the temple. four small altars to mystra sit in each corner of the courtyard temple.

there are only two other visitors in sight, what looks like an elderly couple, as well as a temple guard and a temple priest. the latter approaches them with a smile. he looks about in his mid-thirties, wearing a simple blue robe trimmed in white, accented by a cloak of deep blue and a wide, ornate blue hat.

"Mystra bless you, friends! If you seek the Mother of all Magic, you've found of the places she dwells here in this world. Have you come to the temple for healing, or perhaps you seek to alleviate some other ailment? We ask very competitive donations in return for our blessings." ]

[twinfucker]

[Competitive donations. Jaime does his best not to roll his eyes and look properly devout and religious. He's not doing great (bluff 10).] Not one Mystra can heal, unfortunately. I doubt very much even magic can cure homesickness, but a brief respite from the speed and noise of this world could do us good.

[trebond]

We only hoped to take a look about the temple. It's so lovely; I've never seen the like.

[ Bluff 16! She's smiling, and that in itself is part of the bluff. Magic has always made her nervous. Being in a potentially evil temple certainly isn't making that simpler. ]

Do you get a great deal of tourism, here? We were told on our travels that we would have to cross the sea to find another temple so grand. We decided we must come to see.

[moonheart]

[ jaime gets something of a double-take, his attitude seeming to conflict openly with his words, but the priest doesn't look off-put by the fact. ] Ah, well, our temple has only been constructed fairly recently, but we have already begun to attract the interest of Mystra's devout. Are you worshipers of the Lady of Mysteries? [ faith, meanwhile, wanders off to look at one of those statues, hands hooked behind her as she rocks on her toes to study it ]

[trebond]

Not religiously, no. Have any of those drawn here come under your employ? It would be lovely to hear more about your goddess. [ :) pls. diplomacy 24. ]

[moonheart]

[ "There are some who have come here to seek revealed knowledge, walking far enough down that path to earn Mystra's Sacred Trust," he says. those who got a great knowledge (religion) check about mystra at the briefing would have never heard of such a thing, although it could conceivably be part of ecclesiastical knowledge imparted at higher levels. "If you're interested in learning more about her, you should come to our nightly services, and rejoice in Mystra." ]

[missindependent]

[ fiona should be playing into this whole tourist ploy, but instead she's wandered a bit away from the crowd, staring up at their surroundings open-mouthed and clearly intrigued. okay, well, i suppose that does play up the tourist bit, doesn't it. ] We should definitely come back for the nightly services.

[moonheart]

[ he smiles at her enthusiastic declaration. "If you happen to be truly interested in becoming part of our congregation, and perhaps even earning Mystra's Sacred Trust yourselves, we could always arrange for you to attend special three-day services that occur in the middle temple. We require a donation of two hundred and fifty dollars for each person interested in trying the service. Yes, expensive, but not too much for those truly interested in expanding their knowledge of the goddess of the Weave, no?" ]

[missindependent]

[ she looks to faith, excitedly, and it's hard to tell if she's so pleased because this is a perfect excuse to further explore the temple for the mission, or if she just really wants to try the service ] Count me in! Better than what we'd find at some souvenir stand, that's for sure.

[moonheart]

Sounds cool. I mean, uh... enlightening! [ yeah, that's the one ] We're in.

[ the priest nods. "Return at nightfall, those of you who are interested, along with your donations, and you may begin the three day ritual." ]

[mining]

[ Adi's about as skeptical as Jaime, but he keeps himself busy by eyeing the statues while the others do the diplomacy thing. He rejoins the group during the tail-end of that invitation, looking to the priest. ]

I'm guessing you prefer cash. [ Like any legitimate organization. It's probably also what most temples default to, but tourists ask inane questions, right?? ]

[trebond]

[ but

platinum corporate card.

they'll figure it out ok. ]

For each person?

[ she's not actually worried about it, but double-checking at all does a good job of giving that impression (bluff 22). ]

[moonheart]

[ the priest nods to both of them. "Per person, yes. We accept cash or simpler coin from the Shadow World." ]

Pretty sure we left our bags of gold in the other car.

[missindependent]

[ she looks between all of them, like 'why are you all so concerned with this meaningless crap?', turning to faith last ] Either way, we'll definitely be back.

[trebond]

Indeed. Thank you for your suggestion.

[ Alanna offers the priest a smile and turns to the others, nodding that they should go now before starting back out herself. ]

[moonheart]

[ and off they go~ heading back outside the temple walls, at which point, faith pipes up as they head towards the car ] Soooo, what do we think they're gonna make us do, exactly?

[trebond]

I've no clue. Whatever it is, though, it should afford us time to gather a better understanding of the temple's workings.

[twinfucker]

[Jaime... might have some bags of gold. Maybe. He's not gonna admit it. Golden dragons aren't really the sort of gold most people think of when they talk about shadow world coins.]

We should be able to sneak away during the proceedings. Away from their public face is where we'll get the real information.

[missindependent]

Sounds awesome. All of it, really. Perhaps there's something in my books that mentions this initiation ritual. I'll have to check it out when we get back to our stuff.

[moonheart]

Well, let's go check it out! [ and back they're gonna head to a hotel for a few hours to kill... you can just go ahead and summarize if they're going to do anything during that time with any relevant research checks etc., we don't have to play all that downtime out. i'm sure faith will accomplish... nothing productive. ]

[twinfucker]

[Jaime idk polishes his sword. That's probably not a euphemism for masturbating but you never know.]

[moonheart]

[ alanna spends most of the remaining hours asking around about the temple (gather info nat 20) and finds out quite a bit:

"The new temple went up real fast. They didn't spare any magic in building it, that's for sure. But I suppose that's what we should expect from clerics of Mystra."

"I heard it said that the temple would bring in more people and more business - put us on the map, as it were. It seems to be doing that already. At least, the priests of Mystra spend a fair amount of money in town."

"The police investigated the place after some folk complained of weird lights and odd noises at night. Imagine that! Odd noises and lights at a temple devoted to magic! Needless to say, they didn't find anything strange."

"I hear that the clerics of Mystra haven't been too friendly with the town's traditional churches. It's probably just big city church rivalry. Once the Mystrans get settled in, they'll come to understand that we're all friends here." ]

[trebond]

[ As nightfall rolls around, Alanna returns from pulling out hella cash from the Knights account and summons the group together to head back to the temple. On the way, she briefs them on the general public attitude towards it. ]

If anything untoward is going on in this temple, the townspeople don't seem particularly concerned with it. They're mostly quite glad of the temple, with the exception of the other religions, and a few who seemed surprised by standard magical fare.

Fiona, did you find anything about the initiation?

[moonheart]

[ fiona did not, in fact, find out anything about the initiation, other than to discover definitively that no such thing seems to exist. ... weird. ]