isleofavalon | [open] Catch-All

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[open] Catch-All

🧙 WHO: Griffin O'Callahan and YOU
⚔️️ WHAT: Quests & Tasks
🕒 WHEN: The month of September
🗺️ WHERE: Camelot & the Land of Rot
⚠️ WARNINGS: Theatrical dismemberment & mostly fake blood; Undead creatures, destruction of remains

Questboard Task: Shear Determination

The tiny sheep are enchanting. Griffin is not at all put off by the fact that they belch fire, being fairly fire-resistant himself. He turns to his sheep-shearing buddy (that's YOU!) with a big derpy smile. He is genuinely pleased to be here, and looking forward to the work.

"Do you want me to hang on to them while you shear, or the other way around?"

Griffin is built like a man who could easily restrain a normal-sized sheep, so these miniature woolies should pose no issue. He's also built like a man who could headbutt a normal-sized sheep, because he's got the rack for that particular activity, too.

The rack in this instance refers to his horns, but his pecs are also pretty spectacular.

What do you do?

Questboard Task: Cult Classic

CW: theatrical dismemberment and (mostly) fake blood

It's evening, the sun has gone down, and Griffin is meandering his way back to the inn. He's taking his time and checking out a new little side-street he hasn't gone down before. There are some neat-looking little shops lining the walk, and he's taking his time checking out the window displays as he passes by. He's been on the lookout for hats. Not for himself, but for Daisy. He and his parents had put together quite a nice collection of cute hats for his pet tarantula back home, and none of them have turned up in Avalon. Now that he's settling in and got a bit of an income, he's on the lookout to build her a new collection here.

Since he's paying more attention to the windows than to what's in front of him, it's not really a surprise when he bumps into someone dressed head to foot in black armor.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I wasn't watching --"

"None shall pass." The be-armored individual interrupts him, and he blinks when he notices how cheap the armor appears.

"Er, sorry?" Griffin is confused.

"NONE shall pass." The line is repeated with more emphasis. Griffin tilts his head to one side as he considers this, before shrugging.

"Oh, well, if you say so. I don't want to cause any trouble." It's a little annoying, but he turns around and begins to go back the way he came. He'll just pop back out into the main street and use his usual route back to the inn.

There is silence from the figure for several long moments as Griffin retreats, ostensibly as they process what has just happened. They were clearly expecting a different reaction, and now they have to skip half their lines.

"Oh I see, running away, eh? You yellow bastard!"

Griffin has been called some unpleasant names in the past, but "yellow" is a new one on him. He pauses for long enough to turn back to look at the figure, and (Dex Save: 18+3) just manages to avoid being hit by what looks like a flung mannequin limb covered in cheap black armor.

"Er, no? What? What is happening?"

The Black Knight now appears to be missing their entire right arm and is spurting an impressive amount of (probably) fake blood from their disarmed shoulder. When Griffin turns back to face them, they charge. "Have at you!!"

This lad is not familiar enough with Earthly pop culture to recognize what is happening. Someone please help him.

September Prompt: ⦿ The Fighting Badass

CW: Undead creatures, destruction of remains

Griffin isn't particularly bothered by undead, so wading into the Land of Rot for a little daytime zombie-farming hadn't been a big deal. All told, the undead around here are pretty slow and dull, so knocking a few animated skeletons apart and gathering up their scattered bones hadn't exactly been backbreaking work. He generally gets a better workout manning the forge. So he's still feeling plenty energetic upon settling down to camp for the night, which is why he offers to stand watch.

Things are pretty peaceful until just a bit after midnight, when the quiet is broken by a poorly-stifled yelp of surprise from your friendly neighborhood tiefling.

"Ow! Hey, knock it off." He's trying his best to be quiet, but the sensation of teeth chomping down near the tip of his tail catches him off guard. Griffin whips said tail around in front of himself for the purpose of removing the animated skull that's latched on there. It's been undead for long enough that nearly all of its sinew has rotted away, so there's very little strength behind the chewing. It's just an uncomfortable sensation Griffin would prefer to cease. Prying the skull from his tail takes no time at all, mostly because the motion completely dislodges the thing's jaw. It drops away and clatters to the ground.

"Oh, shoot. Ugh," He leans over to retrieve the jaw with his free hand, and just happens to glance up to see he hadn't been as quiet as he'd hoped. His red eyes have no iris or pupil, but do have the tapetum lucidum membrane that reflects light and causes the unsettling appearance of glowing in the dark. So there's just a behorned, glowing-eyed demon lad with a skull in one hand and a jaw in the other grimacing apologetically in your direction, now.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."

OOC: Prose or [brackets] is fine, I'll match your format. HMU at

gundamkiwi if you'd like to chat, ask questions, or plot!

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[He's used to the stares at this point, to be honest. Though he's not really paying attention to them NOW, because nearly all of his attention is on the sheep.]

Not yet! This'll be my first one.

[The sheep bleats again. Is it answering Gokudera, or is it baa'ing just to be baa'ing? Who can say? Griffin sure can't. He's just here for the cute sheep and also the filthy lucre, because he has a spider hat collection to rebuild. Also eating and clothing himself is nice, and he's got to pay extra to have trousers tailored with an opening for a tail.]

Let me know when you're ready.

[It's hard not to pay attention to the sheep when they're so cute. Gokudera moves to put a hand against the back of the creature's head, uncertain whether or not it will need much holding, or if this is really a two-person job.]

Please be still for us, but if you get wiggly, that's okay too.

[He pets it and smiles and then looks over at Griffin, giving a nod.]

Go ahead.

[The wool doesn't look too matted, so he hopes this will be an easier task than it looks.]

Alright!

[He's been trying to watch some of the other shearers, but hasn't learned much. With that said, though, he kind of imagines shearing a sheep must be fairly similar to shaving, since the end result is basically the same. So he picks a starting point near the sheep's head, and starts trimming down its back.]

[The wool is a lot thicker than the scruff he scrapes off his own face every morning, but it is, in the end, similar enough he gets the hang of it pretty quick. Once he's no longer concentrating on figuring this out, he returns some of his attention to his sheep-shearing partner.]

My name's Griffin, by the way. Sorry, I should've said so before. What's yours?

[It seems the sheep gets uncomfortable when Griffin is by its neck, and it tries to turn and bend its legs, but Gokudera just holds it as steady as he can.]

Shhh... It's okay...

[He's just gonna sort of baby-talk this animal, because it's so cute! How could he not? The sheep blinks up at him and he smiles at it before it seems to spit up something that he side-steps. Gokudera's eye twitches in irritation and he points its head with a little more of a firm hand then before.]

Calm down, fuck... Hm?

Oh. [Gokudera glances about, trying to make sure no one is listening to them. He's careful about giving out his name.]

It's Gokudera.

[The way the sheep looks with the wool coming off in a sort of sheet makes it look peeled and he's staring at where Griffin's going to work next.]

Edited 2021-09-06 23:13 (UTC)

[And Griffin brightens visibly when he hears that name...though Gokudera may not notice, since he's watching the sheep be ~~peeled~~ sheared.]

Oh! I think we talked on the network. You said you were from Namimori, right? It's nice to meet you in person!

We did? I don't remember...

[Gokudera knows that he spoke with this person, but knows nothing about him. There isn't anything really ringing any bells. He'd made most of his posts on the network as video, so there's probably people who have seen his face and read over his conversations with other people.]

I was there last, yeah.

[Maybe he's going to withdraw a bit from this conversation, not knowing this person very well. He's a bit worried (when isn't he?), that this person has heard of Namimori, but his discussions have been pretty public.

And for that matter, is it really nice to meet him? Gokudera's pretty sure that guy is just saying that.]

Where are you from?

You don't?

[Well, that's disappointing; Griffin had enjoyed their text conversation and he had thought (or maybe assumed) that Gokudera had, also, but...Mm. Oh, well. Text can be a hard medium to get acquainted over.]

I'm from The Scorched Wilds, in Flamecrest. But I was living in New Orleans before I got brought here.

Oh

[Gokudera had enjoyed their conversation, but he's not as enthusiastic in person. More... dismissive and tends to be inaccessible. It's a very different mood without the network to hide expressions.]

The one that works as a blacksmith, right?

[He at least doesn't sound too bothered. Gokudera looks up from the goat and can see and hear the disappointment. Great. Now he feels like even more of a dick.]

It's different, reading a username and meeting you in person... Darin treating you well?

[The last time he'd interacted with that guy, something was horribly horribly wrong with him. Gokudera could have died, but... it wouldn't be the first time and he doesn't actually hold the smith personally accountable.]

Yeah, that's right!

[The disappointment quickly gives way to his default good cheer - he guesses Gokudera had just needed a reminder! Which makes sense to Griffin, especially since he'd deliberately used text.]

Uh, yeah, I'm sorry about that. I've had some, um. Bad experiences, sharing my appearance with no warning, so I like to just stick to text.

[He's getting a little less skittish as more and more days go by. So far no one has run screaming for holy water or religious symbols after running into him, so that's been slowly building his confidence in the people of this place.]

Darin's been really great! I'm really lucky he took me on.

[And kept him on. But we're not going to talk about Darin's feelings about Daisy. 8')]

Going out in person is just the same. You're sharing your appearance without warning every time you go outside. This is a world of magic, and if people are unpleasant, then... they're just normal stupid fucking people.

[Gokudera grumbles. Anyone that's going to judge this guy for looking as badass as he does (it's the horns Gokudera thinks are awesome), then they're just stupid or jealous. He'd probably ask some rude questions if he were to meet him in person before over text, but... he's a jerk, so... takes one to know them.]

I've had unpleasant experiences with many people over all sorts of stupid shit. My hair, my collar, my accent. Not a lot of mixed folks in Japan...

[Because he certainly doesn't look completely Japanese. OR Italian. The silver hair and the slightly angled green eyes are an interesting combination, but he looks nothing like his father or his mother.]

Ah, I mean... is he well? In good health?

[Gokudera is starting to pay a little more attention to Griffin, warming up to the conversation.]

Oh, well yeah, that's a good point. It's just a habit from living in New Orleans that I need to break. I'll get over it eventually. Probably.

[He shrugs a little, and returns some of his attention to the sheep he's supposed to be shearing. It 'baaas' and gives a little wiggle when he reapplies the clippers, but doesn't otherwise react to the continuation of its interrupted haircut.

Gokudera's reassurance and commiseration is appreciated. It's delivered with the same grumpy-ass "fuck 'em" attitude (and language) he usually expects from his buddy Shane, which has him feeling a little homesick.]

...Wait, people give you crap about your hair...?

[Gokudera's hair looks perfectly ordinary as far as Griffin can tell. So do his eyes. He'll address the other's question about Darin's health in a moment - he's just puzzled as to why anyone would give someone crap over the color of their hair and eyes, which are typically things individuals generally don't have much control over.]

I've never been there, so I don't really know what it's like, but I can understand habits like that...

[Gokudera is still holding the sheep, but it's not fussing too much. Seems to just make its own comment at Griffin continuing where he left off.]

Silver isn't really a common hair color.

That, and one of the worlds I was on followed a caste system. People were divided depending on their hair color. Blonde, white, silver, red, orange, and pink were all mongrels. Every other color... so, cooler or dark would be Elites. It wasn't really even legal in that world for me to be around anyone that was an Elite.

[Shit sucked.]

I lived there for two years, so... I get it. Breaking habits that formed because of where you were...

That sounds horrible!

[And also uncomfortably close to home. It sounds pretty comparable to some places in the Infernal Realm for the prodigious amount of totally unnecessary racism. Luckily those areas are easily avoided.]

I'm really glad you're not there anymore.

[Gokudera reminds Griffin of Shane so much he's willing to bet he doesn't want to talk about it, or even have a big deal made of it (or any notice taken of it whatsoever, actually), so he does his best to modify his horrified expression back to a more neutral one, and looks back down at the sheep he keeps getting distracted from shearing. Time to change the subject, Shane Bishop style!]

Sorry, you asked about Darin. He's well - good health, good spirits, everything seems good as far as I can tell.

Yeah.

[He shrugs. Griffin is correct to assume that he doesn't want to talk about it or make it into any kind of deal. What he's just shared is really just the basic information about the first world he was whisked away to. The worst, but now that it's in the past, it makes every place he's been to since then so much better.]

Oh well. I'm just happy that the people I care about aren't there anymore.

[He doesn't want to think that there can't be worse worlds out there, but he can hope that aside from his boss, the rest of the family is back home.]

I'm glad to hear it. We've only met a few times and last time, he didn't seem well.

[Gokudera isn't looking at Griffin to see how his initial expression was or how it's changed. He's still very much focused on the sheep, or so he'd like it to seem. There's some tension bleeding out of his near-permanently knitted brow, and he's watching the creature he's helping with honest interest, wondering if it will belch fire again.

Maybe he could catch some of that fire with a light magic barrier-bubble?]

Let me know when you're getting close to this guy's stomach.

I'll bet.

[Griffin is definitely curious about this horrible place where Gokudera apparently spent so much time, but it really doesn't sound like an appropriate topic for this particular point in their newly-made acquaintance. It's definitely better to keep to more neutral topics, like mutual acquaintances, so he's happy to move the conversation along.]

Really? I wouldn't have guessed it to look at him now. I'm glad he's doing better, too.

[He pauses in the shearing again to glance over at Gokudera when Gokudera makes that request about the sheep's stomach.]

No problem. Uh, why, though?

[Griffin is polite. Gokudera has had someone walk up and make remarks on him wearing... bondage gear? In reference to his collar. There are all sorts of rude and uncomfortable ways to have an initial conversation.

Talking about past worlds and checking in on mutual acquaintances can be on the same level of casual to the bomber.]

I agree. How long have you been interested in smithing?

[Does he honestly care? No? Is he attempting to have a normal conversation? Yeah.]

Ah well, he didn't put up much fuss for his neck, and I thought either or would be more sensitive considering how each are weak points on its body.

[Spoken like the person who owns a pet leopard, so knowing target areas of weakness in other animals that could be its prey pays off.]

Oh, jeez, since I was a kid, I guess. I was probably about nine or ten when Belligerence gave me a tour of his forge for the first time. I apprenticed with him as soon as I finished school, right before I turned eighteen.

[He continues to shear (trim and peel) as he talks, and nods when he hears Gokudera's explanation for his request.]

Okay, yeah, that makes sense. I'll let you know.

[This is a bit of a slow process, though, so it'll probably be a little bit before they hit tummy town.]

You don't look that old.

[Maybe it's a compliment, maybe not. Mostly, just an observation. Gokudera watches the sheep and frowns as it shifts, not uncomfortable with the shearing process, but no longer happy with having to stand there for so long. Gokudera doesn't know what sound to make to calm the creature down, so shushes it mildly, and it belches fire at him, which he points a finger at, and then encases it in a bubble.]

You almost got me!

[The sheep looks at him, then away, as if ignoring him. Gokudera gives a slight grumble and moves the fire-bubble to the ground before he allows it to pop and singe the stones on the ground.]

Wait, how old do I look - Woah!

[Even though Griffin had gone into this job knowing that the tiny sheep could breathe fire, he's still surprised to witness it. He's totally distracted from his question by the unexpected fire breath and Gokudera's immediate counter to it.]

Hey, that was really awesome! Nice work!

[The sheep bleats quietly and shuffles its feet. It looks like it's thinking about making a bid for sweet sweet freedom, but it's only about half-sheared. Anecdotal evidence heavily implies that dogs occasionally experience embarrassment from bad haircuts; maybe sheep do, too.]

Hmmm.

[Gokudera stares at Griffin. Either he's blessed with those cheekbones, or his cheeks are a product of losing the roundness of youth.]

Maybe just recently eighteen. I thought for sure you were around my age.

[Bummer. Gokudera doesn't like anyone older or younger than him]

Yeah, I've been practicing.

[Just sittin outside practicing blowing bubbles, seeing how big he can bend his light magic into them, how quickly, whether or not wind fucks it up or how durable the light-magic bubbles need to be.]

[These cheekbones could cut a man. ~~Also it's starting to seem like Gokudera is actively looking for reasons to not like people, gosh.~~]

Oh, wow, really?

[He's not particularly baby-faced. It must be his demeanor that tricks people into thinking he's so much younger than he is.]

I'm twenty-seven....And actually, I think my birthday's soon. It was April back home but August when I got here, so I gotta figure out when June should be.

[The months between the known realms never line up either, so figuring out his birthday isn't a weird concept to him. But that's not something he can easily do while he's giving this cute sheep a haircut, so that's a thought for later.]

That looks super handy. What kind of magic is it?

[Gokudera would probably be a hermit if he could.]

Yeah.

[It's definitely in how the guy acts that makes him seem younger. Gokudera isn't staring at him, because that's rude, but considering what Griffin said on the network, the enthusiasm went a long way. That, and he's just... easier to talk to than most.]

When is your birthday?

[Gokudera's is (according to the posted date of this log) in eight days. He won't say so, though. Doesn't even tell his boss or his friends.]

Light magic.

Huh, okay.

[No one's ever misjudged his age by such a huge margin before. Sure, it's barely ten years, but still, that's a pretty big chunk of life when you're not even thirty.]

It's June 1st! When is yours?

[Look, if someone asks when your birthday is, it's polite to ask back! He's not a rude boy, okay?]

What other things can light magic do?

[There's some crossover with the magic he's familiar with from home, but there's a lot that's new and unusual, too. Not that he's anything close to a magic scholar - back home, he's only really familiar with the spells his more magically-inclined friends cast. But it's interesting to him, either way.]

[To be fair, in Gokudera's home world, his boss's tutor is cursed to be a baby. The world's strongest hitman as a toddler sized infant. He's the same size as a five-year old, so Gokudera can't pinpoint most ages.]

Coming up. Doesn't really matter.

[He could always lie. It's just a birthday.]

Mostly it's shields and illusions. Sometimes I use it for cloaking...

[Dang...is Gokudera's birthday another touchy subject? He guesses he'll leave that one alone, too. Gosh.]

Cloaking? Like, going invisible?

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