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Post by Noa on Mar 18, 2021 21:45:09 GMT -6
As soon as it was done, it moved away from the wall, the new crystal in its claws. Even in the dark, Aster could see the faint light given off by the crystal, even more than was ordinary for these types of crystals. Each one had its own colored glow, but in particular this one radiated... light.
A pure crystal then - one that held light magic energies. Aster himself had never seen one in person, though he knew that they must have existed. It was a good find - a very valuable find, given that these were used for divine magics, and generally rarer than the elemental crystals that he was used to dealing with.
But it wasn't the prismatic crystal that the gargoyle was hoping for. The disappointment was evident on the gargoyle's face and the set of its sloped shoulders.
Aster patted it on the back. "We'll keep looking."
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Post by Noa on Mar 18, 2021 22:41:48 GMT -6
They had already been at this for quite a while, so Aster didn't blame the gargoyle for feeling discouraged. Aster knew that he had managed to find a prismatic crystal down here before, but they really weren't that common, and even with the gargoyle's expertise, they were still struggling to locate one. Heck, they didn't even find magical crystals on a regular basis.
But the only thing they could really do was to keep trying. And in the meantime, well, the pure crystal might fetch them a pretty penny that could buy a prismatic crystal... although Aster had the sense that the gargoyle might want to find it personally, rather than having one that had been purchased through other means.
Still, it was an idea, and he would present that idea to the gargoyle in due time. In the meantime, they might yet strike lucky, since their trip was just starting.
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Post by Jack on Mar 19, 2021 1:48:04 GMT -6
Eww, there’s fungus growing down here!
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 15:03:52 GMT -6
Aster was back in the mines with an interesting experiment to try. Instead of taking the gargoyle with him, as he usually would have, today he had Arnica with him instead. He had come across a spell that would apparently let any creature gain a temporary aptitude with the tunnels, the same way that the gargoyle had. It took a lot of energy to cast, but he thought it might have been useful, so he had spent all his spare time in the last few days trying to learn it. Finally, he felt like he had it, but there would be no way to be sure unless he went and tested it out. And so, here he was, with Arnica, concentrating on the flow of energy between himself and the hen. He felt the spell taking shape, and it felt as though this was right... Something must have happened, at least, right? 1 (new trip)
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 15:07:39 GMT -6
He opened his eyes and looked Arnica over, but visually she was still the same. Honestly that wasn't necessarily a bad thing, considering a change in physiology wasn't really something that the spell was supposed to do. The trouble was that it made it sort of difficult to ascertain what exactly had happened, if anything. Had the spell taken properly? Had it not?
Evidently, more evidence was needed. Standing at the tunnel entrance had never actually turned up much in the way of gems for Aster, so he supposed the best thing to do was to go further in.
"Come on girl," he said to Arnica, leading her along with a treat. She wasn't familiar enough with him as of yet that he could just head in and expect her to follow, the way he could with some of his other creatures, so he had to rely on bribes for now.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 15:10:08 GMT -6
It wasn't that odd for his Sarane not to be very close with Aster, at least not anymore. He just didn't have time for them the way he used to have time, and so not all of them were well trained, or even trained period. At least the lot of them were broken in now, so they would stop trying to savage him, but Aster still did have to rely on Rhys to help him stop from wanting to savage each other. The drakes, anyway. The hens were generally a milder bunch, though the third tiers had some tempers on them sometimes.
As for Arnica, she was one of the Sarane that he had been working with as of late. There was a tournament coming up, and he was of half a mind to enter something other than an untrained brown drake this time, to better his odds of winning at least a few fights.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 15:11:54 GMT -6
He didn't expect to make a champion out of any of his lot this time around. He had other projects to focus on, and anyway he had already won a few times before, so he figured it was better to let someone else have a turn at it if they wanted it badly enough to put in the work. And it was a lot of work, since not all the drakes would be untrained, and these days there were a lot of lineages putting out third tier monsters into the scene. You had to be prepared for that, and the prep took a lot more energy than Aster had to spend.
But it was just as well that he was training them some, since he had just gone through and broken in pretty much all of his drakes anyway. They would listen to him now, and he meant to capitalize on that.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 15:16:11 GMT -6
Seeing as he was training her though, Aster figured he might as well spend some more time with Arnica. She was one of Avander's descendants, so he felt that he owed it to her to pay a little more attention, especially since she was one of the third tiers with tempers in his collection.
So far, their trip wasn't going too bad, but that was at least partially because she had spent some time with him already. Granted, that time had been spent with her in a pen, where getting to Aster and having a go at ripping his arm to shreds was a little more work than most broken Sarane were willing to put in. But he was still probably playing with fire a little bit by doing this bare-handed.
"What do you say, girl? You sense any gems in here?" he said as they walked through the tunnel.
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Post by Jack on Mar 23, 2021 15:52:08 GMT -6
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 19:48:32 GMT -6
He doubted she would understand anything he said aside from tone, and even then it wouldn't be the nuanced understanding of a creature that had been with him a long time. But still, if the spell took, she would notice something interesting and lead him in that direction after a while, wouldn't she? That was what Aster was hoping for, anyway.
Though, then again, there was a small voice in the back of his mind that voiced a lot of doubt about the idea too. It was only when Arnica stopped and began looking around, as if she had noticed something and was trying to ascertain what it was, that Aster began to let himself think that maybe she was onto something. "What is it? What do you have?" he said.
She couldn't tell him, and there was no way of knowing whether it would be a gemstone or... some pocketpet.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 19:50:54 GMT -6
Unfortunately, pocketpets did make their homes here, and they were pretty good as far as distractions for predators went. They were small, they scuttled around, and all that. They sure provided whelps plenty of things to chase when Aster took them to the Mansion. They weren't as numerous here, but it would make sense if that was what Arnica had noticed.
While he was thinking all that, Arnica seemed to have narrowed down what it was she had found, and headed off down the path of her own volition now. Aster followed on her heels, not wanting to miss it if she had in fact found a gem. Not that she could have gotten it out herself if she did, because her claws weren't made for digging through dirt and stone the way that conventional mining familiars' claws tended to be, so for once, Aster's digging tools and expertise were actually necessary.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 19:53:06 GMT -6
Funny that - he hadn't expected that this was how it would be to feel needed on a mining expedition... Not that Arnica would care that much about the rocks once she saw what they were, he supposed, but even so. Aster would definitely have more to do than he had had on mining trips in a while. If they found any gemstones, anyway.
Arnica came to a stop at a nondescript bit of rock wall, which seemed to be a promising sign. Aster turned the beam of the flashlight onto the area that Arnica was looking at, and didn't see any holes where a pocketpet might be hiding. It was possible that he was just missing it, since the rock wasn't exactly smooth and uniform here, but he wanted to believe that the spell was working.
"You want me to dig here, do you?" he said to Arnica, and rolled up his sleeves.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 19:55:36 GMT -6
If that was what she was telling him, then he had to at least give it his best shot, didn't he? He was the one who had put her up to this, and he was the only one who really stood to benefit by it, so.
Picking up the pick, Aster started evaluating the stone. Arnica seemed to sense that something was about to happen, and got out of the way, watching Aster with wary eyes from the opposite side of the tunnel. She was pretty calm about being down here, but that wasn't necessarily surprising. Her mother had been a black hen, and although she didn't necessarily look it, having inherited most of her color from her father's brightly colored wings, she did come from cave dwelling stock.
Heck, maybe that would help her out as much as the spell did - though she wasn't raised down here, the way wild caught black Sarane were.
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Post by Noa on Mar 23, 2021 20:01:32 GMT -6
Well, whatever it was, he was glad for it. It would have been an ordeal to deal with a Sarane who couldn't cope with being down here, and it would have been pretty miserable for the Sarane in question too.
Aster hefted the pick, and began to work his way through the stone. He had to be careful, since there was no concerned familiar here to tell him when would be a good time to stop, and he doubted that Arnica would do it, spell or no spell. That she could sense stones was likely, but knowing anything about their excavation was probably beyond her, since she had never cared about gemstones in her life before now.
Because he had to go slowly, the work was painstaking, and he found himself sort of missing the gargoyle pretty quickly. But it was also an interesting exercise to be able to apply his skills again.
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Post by Jack on Mar 23, 2021 20:54:23 GMT -6
Some gold and an opal, how cool!
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