[center][img]http://i.imgur.com/7HlmcQK.png[/img]
[h3]Yorum: Escape[/h3][/center]

[hider=Breaking the Post Drought]
This post follows the opening chapter of the story of Edda, Toun's little seeker du jour. Most of the post is told as a recount from Edda's perspective, both for brevity and so I'm not too occupied with a prologue to this whole arc.

Edda is a hain chipper woman who escaped Xerxes before the murder-fuckening with a bunch of friends (including a sculptor hitchhiker named Caress) and tried to sail around the white ocean in search for a new home.

During the voyage, they pass by a coastal acalya outbreak and all get Logosbestosis.

Most of them die, but Edda prays as a last resort. Toun answers.

Toun enters Edda's consciousness and gives her a mission to find a chosen hain and find a promised place called Yorum, where her and other hain may be essentially forgiven by Toun. It's a bit dense, you might want to read the whole paragraph.

Edda wakes up to find that the boat and everyone on it have been transported clear of the acalya and near a town. Everyone has had the acalya completely taken out of their systems and their bodies reverted back to normal. Everyone who had died in the meantime had not woken up.

Edda, in the meantime, moults her shell and reveals that her mission had been inscribed on her new shell with Tounic calligraphy.

On the beach of this new town, a local hain patrol comes to greet them with the lead warrior speaking to Edda. The sculptor translates.

The recount meets the present. The warrior says they're welcome if the white giants don't kill them. He also mentions that the blinding purge has destabilised the region just a teensy bit.

He invites Edda to meet the local king.
[/hider]

"My name is Edda. I am a chipper and these are my friends. We mean you no harm.

"We have been travelling for some time now. We counted the days. Sixty-three days at sea. 

"Yes, it was horrible. Our friends and family died around us where there was not enough to eat. Others died from sickness, pus-filled wounds, and the like. None of us complained because turning back to Xerxes was worse. We could not go back after the Énas returned.

"Before, when the army of the heavens stormed the city to take the Énas away, the Blowfly began cleaning removing the people who hoarded selfishly and harmed others. With her in control, we were united and orderly. We were building something better together. Though the responsibility to my family meant that I had not travelled for some time, my days as a chipper had granted me wisdom enough to know that Xerxes was headed somewhere great. It was unlike anything the world had seen.

"Of course, the Énas returned before we could reach true prosperity. The Blowfly did not have the power to oppose him, the Énas both being sired by gods and flanked by a new army. We escaped in the dead of night before he could destroy everything.

"It was risky. We got together our closest friends and their families and pooled coins for food. Tokgos, one of the trolls that arrived with us, he owns the cog we sailed in with. He used it for trading before now.

"We sailed away from a scream on the docks, followed by a riot. A goblin servant of Tokgos flew into some kind of rage and tried to kill us on board. The goblin was not the angry type, but he simply screamed and struck at us. We were all terrified that we would be similarly afflicted. Thankfully, we must have escaped in time. The city burned on the horizon that night, but none of us went mad. We had to throw the goblin overboard, the poor soul.

"The next matter was which direction we would go. South was full of territorial Rovaick and the unending stroke of Teknall's hammer. There was no viable land there. East was open ocean. None returned from there seeing anything more than waves. We were to head north, skirting the coast.

"No one followed us. It was peaceful, even optimistic. We sailed and rowed every day for weeks on a prevailing wind to get far enough away from the Énas’ reach. True trouble started when we saw huge pale crystals covering the coast. No one knew what they were, but they had a deathly humour when we neared them. Everyone began coughing up blood. We tried to sail past as fast as we could, but there were only more of the crystals. After a day, we stopped coughing and our bodies began to change.

"We could scratch and peel it off at first, the little grains of sand that were growing on our skin and shells. They kept growing. They…they covered us, transforming us. We would have panicked, but we all became lethargic. We were about to accept our deaths. However, seeing my family succumb, seeing all my friends about to die, I tried to weep, but I could not. Everything built up.

"Without any outlet, I beseeched the gods. I closed my eyes and pleaded. 'Please, gods of Galbar! Teknall, the great mason! Illunabar, the dream matron!' I called out the names of all the gods I knew of to be kind. None answered initially. I became desperate and named the rest. 'Mammon, the demon below! Please help us! Toun, the porcelain creator! Forgive our imperfections and help us find a new life!'

"It was that last prayer that I uttered. That did it. I fainted from the crystals constricting my lungs and had this dream. It was like I was floating in a sun. It was so white and bright. I could feel a godly presence all around me and there was no presence like it. It was Toun himself; the clay devil that created and forsook all hain in the beginning.

"He did not speak my language to me. He instead presented a sequence of symbols that looked roughly like southern Rovaick writing, but...purer. Even only having a passing knowledge of the writing, I knew exactly what it read as.

"'This is my command to my chosen hain. By the ascent to perfection, render onto those cast out servants a new paradise. The promised goal of Yorum; the grand walls on the north-east corner from the moat of Cornerstone shall house countless hain to better themselves. Building these walls shall not be gods, but the hain who ascend to their ambition. Let them be free of the brutes of mal-nature. Let them become greater than the meddling that scarred suffering into this world. You, chosen hain, have been born with an eye for battle and war, an eye for inspiring your fellow hain, an eye for leadership, and an eye for the gods. Around you are tools to see Yorum grow from the ground. Redeem your people and your flaws shall be lifted. Rise up and hold the world with no fear. Your creator demands your purpose fulfilled. This shall be made perfect.'

"I floated, confused at the concepts flung into me. I may have been a chipper with plenty of knowledge about other things, but I wasn’t a war leader. I had little knowledge of battle or leadership, and I was no particular scholar of the gods. I felt as if I was not the chosen one that Toun addressed. I spoke as much to Toun, not seeing myself worthy.

"There was...disdain from the god, only for a moment. Perhaps I had misinterpreted? Or disappointed him? I cannot know. His answer was simple.

"'Go to Yorum. Search. Find. Build.'

"I woke up. I heard the ocean again, I was still on the ship. I looked to my body and found no trace of the crystal. Those around me awoke in turn, just as healthy. Well...most of them. Some lay dead. Free from the crystal, but dead. Too late to save. My last partner and my last child were among them."

She raised a hand, covered in red markings. "Please, it has been long enough for me to grieve. Let me continue.

"We found ourselves on the coast as we were before, but no crystals were visible. We had sailed past them. Far past them. I believe Toun had brought us out of that hell so we could serve his will. A fair trade for the likes of us, I suppose.

"We kept sailing. Our food ran out and the fish and coastal foraging were not enough to sustain us. We had been dying, one by one, mostly from getting sick or needing food. We landed here as this was the first settlement that we spotted. It is bigger than I expected. Not as big as Xerxes, but it appears prosperous here. What is this place?"

A wave broke on the beach to apparently end the chipper woman's recount. The hain warrior in front of her nervously ran one hand over his stone club while the sculptor sitting between them translated.

Most of the warrior's discomfort was from being in the presence of the sculptor; [url=http://orig08.deviantart.net/ad6a/f/2015/244/7/6/armaros__angel_of_undoing_by_petemohrbacher-d97zdav.jpg]a gaunt, eyeless human woman with stony skin and many grafted arms hanging from her torso.[/url] Edda, at least, was glad that she had accompanied them from Xerxes to help translate.

"Caress, that is what you said your name was, Jaanic thing?" The warrior confirmed. "Tell Edda this. This home of ours is named Loralom, and if the giants do not take her friends, they are welcome. Jaanics are not permitted in the town. As well, tell her that Yorum is the name of this entire realm, from the coast to the jungle in the north-east. There are many towns like this. I am afraid there are many, many more hain as well. Your mission will not be easy if you wish to find just one." The warrior shifted in place. "Those markings on your shell. They are the symbols you saw, aren't they?"

The chipper woman was tall enough without her straight posture to sit taller than the warrior, but not the sculptor. She sat cross-legged and straight-backed with her hands on her knees. She offered a nod once Caress had forwarded the warrior's words, though the bright red glyphs that covered her entire shell made the question almost rhetorical. Even seeing a few of them offered a glimpse into the hope and purpose that her previous words had conveyed. To a hain, they were the opposite of a second hatching -- beautiful and comforting.

"They are," Edda answered. "I moulted before we arrived and they were on my new shell. We originally set out to find a new home, to build what Xerxes could have been, I will also find this chosen hain. I believe he or she will be the key to making this all possible." Edda ended her statuesque demeanour with a small shrug. "Besides, surely there are only a few in this land that fit the description given to me."

After Caress translated, the warrior chuckled with a strain, raising his beak. "You have a lot more hope than you are letting on, but you will find little enough hope amongst us." His voice lowered into a grave drone. "You say we look prosperous, bah! The reality is that this is all recent rebuilding. Slow and with reused bricks and columns. Warlords rule these parts, knocking it down where they can. The blinding purge wiped out any small peace that we had. And now? This scorched land is now littered with cracked shells from the fighting."

Another wave broke on the wide, flat beach. An emaciated group behind Edda stood silent. It was made up of three trolls and two goblins, all of which had three red symbols on their hands; five humans; and seven hain, one of whom clutched two eggs closely to her chest. They went from tense to nervous while Caress translated.

Edda cut through without hesitation. "Then we must all do better."

The warrior paused again. His palm slowly turned upwards. "You had best meet our king. You two will like each other, I think."