[Jean] Chapter 6: The Wind Temples of Velothia

[pringerbeam]

     "Sure you can!  You still have all your skin, your tongue, you're not vomiting up blood...  In my experience that's more than enough.  Do you know how hard it is to beg for mercy when your jaw has been ripped from your skull?  Pretty hard."  Jean looked back to Rem, reforming the tentacle seat into a longer couch shape and lounging in it.  "Right?  I mean, I'm being pretty generous here aren't I?  It's not like I was gone away with the boss that long.  I feel like I still know what's up with the human psyche."  He asked as he rolled on to his side and propped his leg up.  "Maybe you're not the one to ask...  Here..."   He rolled the other direction to face back towards the girl.  "In order to show you that I am magnanimous in my generosity, I will grant you your wish.  For free even!  Rem!"  He clapped his hands.  "Fashion her something and help her get 'dressed...'  Don't use too much material though.  I have a feeling our friend is quite hungry.  Just enough to cover the tits and ass...  I'm not sure you know what either of those are but I think she can help you figure it out."  He rolled onto his stomach and grabbed the book off the stone floor.  "Let me know when you're done.  I need to get started on this."
     He opened the book and started skimming though the pages.  Finding a blank page he stared.  "Hmmm...  Need something to write with..."  He looked over to the crests scattered over by the pile of clothes.  Walking over he picked up one that had a thinner profile and an angular end which he pressed down on the floor and ground into a sharp point, somewhat surprised at how little effort it seemed to take.  "Must be those hero stats..."  He muttered as he walked back over to his tentacle couch and flopped down, having the  tentacle prop his head up as he lay on his back with the book open on his stomach.  He took the crest and stabbed the sharpened end into his chest a few centimeters and let it sit propped up as he flipped through the book to a blank page before withdrawing it and beginning his writing while he waited on the girl.

See side thread

[Throndir]

The moment you commanded Renenutet, she seemed to focus her attention on the tentacles near the girl. She then moved towards the pile of clothing, and picked out a few random choice pieces. Throwing them towards the tentacles, the tentacles transformed their ends into a metallic form, and thinning them out, almost like knives. Methodically they began forming the clothing, and soon enough they had something that was exactly to your specifications.

Renenutet licked her lips. The piece of clothing was hardly any clothing at all. Something akin to a thong, and the 'bra' if it could be called one, was bordering the line between almost nothing at all. The tentacles held her again, as they quickly put the clothing on her.

"Okay... fine!" The girl yelled at you, blushing all the time. She had her new bra and panties, but she seemed to still cover herself as much as she could. Her face was red.

"You're at the Wind Temples of Velothia... Everyone here are nomads, but in a different way than you land-dwellers might expect... These temples are lifted up in the air by our prayers to our goddess, and I am..."

She glared at you.

"I am supposed to be the one to teach the summoned hero how our world works... But I refuse to believe you're a hero!"

[pringerbeam]

    Jean had the tentacles let one of the people go.  "That's a good idea because I'm definitely not one of those.  Sure I have some abilities and titles that say I'm a hero but it would probably be better if you think of me more as just some guy.  Trying to do those hero things hasn't turned out that well."  Jean closed the book with a snap and licked the blood from the end of the crest, taking a moment to admire the design.  "So you're supposed to be my guide or something, but that doesn't answer who you are.  Don't be too stingy with your words.  Your friends are counting on you.  Give me enough information and I might even let two go.  Perhaps by telling me something about your goddess?  She isn't pink haired, rocking a nice bosom, and possessing a killer sense of schadenfreude is she?"  He said, poking at the small wound on his chest.  The sensation was... different.  He hadn't been paying attention when he had stabbed himself with the crest earlier, he was too focused on looking into the book, but after the tortures of his master, the feeling of a simple flesh wound was almost...  pleasurable.  "Well that is really interesting."  He said, continuing to press on the bleeding hole.

[Throndir]

"I am the priestess of the hero! Mother passed this on to me when she left for the lands below..." The girl said, her voice hand a hint of pride in telling you her title, even though she was still basically stark naked.

"Pink-haired? No! Our goddess is the Goddess of Air, Ninlil. Though, the land-dwellers call her by a different name. She is a beautiful goddess with a cloak of winds surrounding her."

The girl stared in shock as you continued to purposefully wound yourself, you could tell that she was visibly disturbed.

"This is all wrong! We were supposed to summon a hero... a weakling from what some of the other land-dweller countries have summoned. And I... and I was supposed to be the one to teach you... and... we would have driven the demons back with you, and everyone would have started praising the goddess of air..."

"But instead... we have..."

[pringerbeam]

     "Instead you got me!"  Jean released two more captives from the grip of his tentacles.  "And if my track record is any indication, I'll be dead in the next day or so.  So it sounds like you've rolled snake-eyes.  Though you did have the thing about being a weakling right."  Jean kicked himself up out of his seat and walked over to the edge of the temple, looking out to the sky and get an idea of the layout of the floating land.  "Flying islands eh?  And powered by prayers you say?  What kind of a problem would you have with demons if you're up here?  Seems like you're pretty safe.  Its been at least half an hour and I still haven't been mauled by some demonic entity."  He tapped his chin with his bloody finger as he looked out to the serene expanse.  "Looks like you have it pretty good up here."

[Throndir]

"We do have it good up here! But we can't just lower our islands to help people either! Our sister temple tried that... The last time that happened, the land-dwellers who claimed to have 'needed' us, simply attempted to make use of the floating island temples for their own sanctuary. They killed, captured, or enslaved the priests and priestesses of the other temple... Tried to make it work, but without enough of the priests working together, or the goddesses' blessing, the temple simply wouldn't lift again. But still, we can't just stand by without helping the others. The demons know of our presence, but they haven't yet sent their winged armies to search for us thoroughly. But when the land-dwellers are no more... They'll go for us next."

"My mother went down to the land-dwellers many years ago to find a working summoning circle and also to attempt to start relations with the land-dwellers. The summoning circle up here... the one beneath you, only just a few days ago was it charged enough to attempt your summoning."

[pringerbeam]

     Jean let another prisoner go and absent-mindedly mumbled to himself.  "Flying demons...  Of course there are flying demons..."  He continued to look out at the blue expanse, pondering his options.  "So can you control where your temple flies to?  I have someplace I need to go and I'm guessing we're up high enough I can't just jump off the edge here."  He peers over the edge of the land to get an idea of how high up they are.  "In the meantime, you at least get to fulfill part of your role and keep telling me about this world.  My last shot was a bit too... Brief...
To get much of an idea on what's going on.  I also need to learn how to fight since I really can't afford another meeting with upper management. Sure...  I'll probably die anyways but might as well give it the old college try.  Oh, right...  He held up the sharpened crest that he had been fiddling with in his off hand and stuck the point into his wound.  Then with a quick rip he slashed across his chest, opening up a gash where the metallum had cut him before.  "Can't be forgetting those lessons of the past."  The cut wasn't as deep or wide as the wound inflicted upon him before but he was still morbidly satisfied with it.
     "Well I'm getting bored here with the interrogation."  He let the remaining captives go and started walking through the crowd to where contents of his bag were scattered on the floor.  "Rem, you stay here with our companion and let her finish nourishing herself.  If anyone tries to recover their clothing please kill them.  I'm going to go figure out what the deal is here.  If she finishes come find me and bring her with you."  Jean returned the book and crests to the saddle bag and slung it over his shoulder.  He started walking down the steps of the temple and looking over his shoulder he called to the girl.  "Well?  You said you were going to teach me.  It's lesson time!"

If you want me to take damage from this I'm fine with whatever.

[Throndir]

I'll leave it up to you on what kind of training you would like, some brief options:

1) Exp, as per Downtime rules for Pathfinder, though potentially modified slightly to take into account just regular sparring, instead of 'adventuring'.
2) 2 Training Sessions as per Isekai RPG Training set (specify what specifically)
3) Reading and studying your book

We can split these into their own threads, and just link them from here, since they're side activities.

The girl's face paled when she saw you cut a deep wound into your own chest.

Eventually you had begun to walk away, calling out for the lesson time. Panicking, but relief at the same time due to the fact you at least weren't actively threatening anyone, the green-haired girl and her bird followed.

"Wait! You don't even know where you're going..." She frowned, then made sure to catch up to you.

"Let me get a change of clothes from home... and umm.." She pointed at your complete lack of clothes. "I'm not sure where you're from, but normally people cover that up... Oh... is that it? Is that why you thought nothing of stripping everyone's clothes? It's just normal to you? Haha..." She was forcing herself to laugh, though you could tell there was really no mirth in it, it was as if she was trying to make sense of what had just happened.

"Because heroes are supposed to be... noble and... gallant..." She shifted uncomfortably.

[pringerbeam]

     Jean continued to walk down the steps, looking around as he descended from the temple.  "What?  The penis?  Oh no back in my world people tried to cover that up, your bits too.  It just seems a bit unimportant now."  He breathed in the brisk air as he strolled along.  "So does all that stuff about being noble and gallant.  Tried that before and trust me, it doesn't work.  That's why I suggest you endeavor to keep the heroics to a minimum.  Sounds like your mom tried the hero thing.  How did that turn out for her?  I'm going to guess..."  He closed his eyes, tilted his head back with one hand on his forehead.  "Using my astute powers of observation...  That it went over worse than your summoning just now."  He opened his eyes and looked to the girl at his side.  "Am I wrong?"

Jean will split his free time between training and studying his book/experimenting with his powers.  Spending 1 training session on each as available.  See Side threads.

[Throndir]

No side thread for studying your book?

She stopped walking then, and glared at you.

"That's not her fault!" She yelled loudly. "She just wanted to help everyone. What she did was right! Even if... Even if she isn't here with us anymore." You could tell her eyes were starting to waver.

"Mother did her best, she tried to do her calling as best she can. You can't understand... At least we summoned you, we're farther than where mom got, and I'll be fulfilling her dreams and wishes for her!"

[pringerbeam]

     Jean continued to walk along the path, letting the girl fall behind.  "Yeah... I dunno about that.  I mean I'm sure she tried her best but seeing as she's not here, she either still failed, or succeeded in summoning a hero that's more of a shitbird than I am."  He plucked a flower from the nearby greenery and gave it a whiff.  The pollen tingled his nose and he sneezed.  "Whew, still got allergies I guess.  What's this flower called?  Actually, come to think of it...  What's your name?"

Could I get a general description of the area?   Like am I in town, or is there one visible from where I am?  Is it all one giant island or a bunch of them strung together?  Is there anyone else around other than the girl?

[Throndir]

The two of you continued to walk from the path. The temples themselves were a string of various floating islands, each of different sizes and shapes. The island where you were first summoned had an open-air ruins around it. A bridge connected the island to the next one. The bridge itself looked flimsy, being made out of a combination of twine rope and wooden boards. With the high winds that blew, it seemed pretty precarious. The island you were on looked like it was connected to a bigger island. While that island too was connected by bridges to smaller floating islands.

There were some buildings, possibly homes that you had passed, along with other individuals. You noticed that all of them wore similar clothing and robes to the first 10 that greeted you upon your summoning.

"When mother first set out, we were supposed to meet with her exactly one year after her departure. We were supposed to meet up again on top of mount Velothia, where the dragons are. But she never appeared... We waited there a week as well, but we realized it was probably enough time. We asked the Elder dragon to give her a message if she did eventually come though. Then... We ascended back into the clouds."

"A week from now is when we'll be at mount Velothia again. This would be the fourth year we're coming back... I'm sure... I'm sure my mother was just held up." She forced a smile.

"It's a scary world with the demons down there and all anyways."

"That's called a Moonlight Dew Drop flower. There's other flora and plants too on our islands." She made a face when you asked for her name, as the two of you walked, there were other people looking towards both you and her, many of them noticing both yours and the girl's lack of clothing. It was fairly evident that they were whispering amongst themselves.

"My name is Dalina... forever known as an exhibitionist..." Her features tinted red more, as if remembering the fact she was still lacking clothing. More so when she realized the other people in the distance were probably talking about the fact she was basically naked with an actual naked guy behind her.

"And what's the villain's name?" She asked plainly.

[pringerbeam]

     "Good question.  I mean, he rattled off a bunch of titles but didn't really tell me."  Replied Jean as he looked at the flower, paying no heed to the observers and passerby.  "Oh.  Did you mean me?  Why it is as I said earlier.  I am Jean Valois, master of the maniacal moot of minor megalomania.  But you can call me Jean or as my boss calls me: F̜̫̤̙͉̖͖Ǫ̟͔̺̙̫̺͖Ó͖̪͎͉L̪̭.̷̤͙̝"


The word howled out of Jean's mouth like the wailing bubbles that escape from the desperate lips of the drowning.  Jean was impressed that he could even attempt to emulate the strange tongue his master spoke.  "Can't really get the same impact of the big boss' own words.  Would need more volume but hey, mortal lungs, what can you do?"  He tossed to flower to the winds as he crossed the next bridge to the larger island.  "Dalina, nice name.  Nice bod too.  You really shouldn't get so hung up on the exhibitionist thing.  Gotta flaunt it if you got it, you know?  Besides, I'm sure against any human male you would have them bent over backwards, or more like forwards I guess, if you just even hinted at letting them see your impeccable physique.  Though if you really don't want the reputation, I'm sure I can manage to cause an incident that would give you something else.  If you're prepared that is..."  Jean slowly twirled in place to let Dalina see his grin and wiggling eyebrows as he walked towards the larger gathering of structures that he assumed to be the town proper.

[Throndir]

Color change for readability.

"Earlier...?" She blushed slightly remembering what had happened just moments ago, she frowned.

"I couldn't much focus because of what you had your minions do, villain." She mumbled. The girl looked at you funny when you mentioned what you boss called you. She had attempted to speak the unfamiliar word, but it wasn't the same.

The walk across the bridge would have been daunting back in your previous life. But as you walked through it, you were able to stay on the bridge with relative ease. Dalina had glanced back at you a couple of times when you had first stepped on the bridge, but after realizing your dexterity, she began to lead the way without much mind.

"Flaunt it? Having men fall?" Dalina echoed your words almost incredulously. "I don't think you realize how blasphemous you just made me, the Priestess of the Hero, along with our head priests and priestesses..."

She breathed in deeply.

"You're going to cause an incident...? What do you mean? I'll have you know, that stunt you pulled back there is an incident enough!"

"Bearing my body... to you..." She couldn't help but blush. "Never mind about showing that to a hero, you're more like an evil mastermind! And you have minions too! An octopus girl and random tentacles?" She shivered.

"Who is she anyways?" Dalina asked as she kept her eyes forward. "How she wrapped herself around you like that... you two looked close..."

The two of you eventually made it past the bridge. The first few things on the main island looked to be a variety of gardens, fruit trees, and small farm plots. There were some livestock as well, primarily chicken, and larger beasts that resembled some sort of cow. There were many homes here, most of them had two floors. The island itself had a natural mountain-like structure to it, and the path curved upwards, in some places, steep enough to warrant the use of stairs. At the very top of the mountain was a castle-like structure.

[pringerbeam]

     "Evil?  I think that's a relative term.  Mastermind?  Hardly.  Ooooh..."  Jean ran over to a flock of the island's chickens.  Chasing them around until finally picking one up.  "I need this for something...  Does the hero get to seize property?  If not I'd like to know in case someone tries to take it back."  He said as he held the feet of the upside down panicked chicken that was clucking and flapping its wings wildly, sending feathers flying as it whipped to and fro.  He handled the chicken and stuck it into the crook of his arm, pressing its wings down to stop it from escaping.  The chicken continued to try and claw and scratch at Jean's skin but he was satisfied with the more limited movement.
     "Her?  Well I guess she's Renenutet now!  You could call us co-workers if you know what that means, though I'm prety sure she's subservient to me.  Don't really know much else.  Only known her for an eternal torment or two and there wasn't a whole lot of talking."  Jean looked at the various trees that they passed, walking over and picking on of the fruits.  He looked it over and took a bite, slowly chewing the flesh to best dissect its flavor before going to town on the rest of the unknown food.  "I mean, there was a lot of screaming.  And the vomit!  You know you can still vomit without anything in your stomach?"  He said with a mouth full of fruit.  "Hey what're these fruit?  Not poisonous are they?  I might have wanted to ask that first."  He wiped the juice from the fruit on his bare chest, serving only to spread around the stickiness rather than make his hand any cleaner.