epidemiology | PLAYER PLOT ★ STORM THE CASTLE

Entry tags:

PLAYER PLOT ★ STORM THE CASTLE

THE CASTLE ( NOV 7 )

Our resident warrior princess, Kidagakash Nedakh, has formulated a plan to investigate the castle and speak with the royals. (The OOC plotting post can be found here.) Now, it's time to put it into action.

The castle itself is huge. From the outside, you can see a beautiful garden, a pond, and a statue commemorating Odette. You can also see several guards, some more invested in their job than others. A few are stony-faced, menacing men with looks that could kill. A couple just look like they'd appreciate a pretty girl or interesting guy to liven up their boring day.

On the inside, all the halls look different, yet the same — different pieces of art, different wall fixtures, but everything else is identical. There's many portraits of the king and his late wife on the walls, sparkling chandeliers, and servants scurrying around. Odette's pale, smiling face and cascading blonde locks look somewhat familiar, but that might just be because of all the statues of her likeness around the city.

The castle has pretty much every room you'd expect a castle to have. A library, a wine cellar, a dining hall, etc. Within them, characters can expect to find various things of interest — there are many books, fancy stationery, even some valuable coins if you look hard enough. There's also many letters to be found detailing the situation in Chantes; of course, there's also plenty of letters on far less official business. Some of them have quite steamy imagery.

There are plenty of servants milling about inside the castle and out in the gardens. In the dining hall and their chambers are several of Chantes' most important nobles. And then, of course, there's you.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Alright then.

[There's no need for him to apologize, Eren's right. Julius folds his arms together and keeps a relatively stern expression during everything. He goes off and answers Eren's question.]

With the use of my world's advanced technology creating an artificial soldier was possible for us. They were faulty in some ways though. Sometimes they malfunctioned it was problematic.

[Too problematic. It's always better to just use a real soldier over an artificial one. Julius had to learn that the hard way. ]

What are your thoughts on this? [He'd like to hear Eren's opinion!!]

[There are times when he really feels his ignorance as to the workings of other worlds, and this is one of them. Honestly—]

I don't understand how a soldier can be artificial.

[Soldiers are people, by definition. A thing created for war without a will of its own would be—what? A weapon? Does it fight on its own, or do they control it from far away? Is it alive? It's hard to give a real opinion with the limited understanding that he has. But for what it's worth, he leans against the rough wood of the table and gives Julius a serious answer with what he's got.]

It seems cowardly.

[Blunt, maybe a little unkind. But Julius asked.]

When you enlist, you give up your heart for humanity. [At least, that's how it is where he's from. The set to his shoulders squares a bit when he says it.] If you've got the power to fight, it's your responsibility as a soldier to use it to the best of your ability.

[That isn't to say that he'd discount any advances made in methods. The 3DMG was developed that way. Squad Leader Hange tries to understand the titans better in order to better defeat them.]

You can't win a battle at a disadvantage if you're not willing to take risks or develop new techniques for fighting it. I enlisted to protect humanity and to free them from the walls. I can't imagine turning my back on that just because it would keep me safer.

[Even if there was some artificial construct that could take his place. Sitting back and waiting for the battle to be won doesn't sit right with him.]

[Julius can respect Eren's determination and strong will to fight. "Enlisting to protect humanity" though, Julius wonders what motivates Eren as a soldier. Eren's willing to accept risks as part of his duty, but that's not something Julius can do easily.]

I have a lot to learn from you it seems. [It's only the truth. Eren's kind of young to be a soldier and that didn't really matter too much to Julius. He sees some insight in Eren's words even though they're blunt.]

Thanks for answering my question, Eren. [Julius sounds grateful too. Then he bows down politely to show some respect.]

[After basically calling Julius—who would outrank him by far, if that mattered at all here—and his comrades cowards, he doesn't expect a response like that one. It's never been in Eren's nature to hold his tongue, so he's no stranger to being met with scorn, resistance, laughter. Instead, Julius thanks him, bows his head, acknowledges his point of view and claims to learn from it. The severe set to his shoulders slacks a little. He can't claim to understand Julius's choices, or why he'd made them. But Julius hears him out, so he does try.]

What are you fighting?

[Back in his own world, in the war he'd stepped away from.]

[Rankings don't really matter all that much here. Julius will give respect where it's due though. Eren definitely deserves it. ]

I fought against violent gods. They devour everything by nature and kill humans. [He pauses for a second.] You're a soldier too.

You must know what it's like to fight a battle you might not win. How long have you been in active duty for?

[This is just Julius being curious. Eren seems to be a skilled fighter so Julius wants to know for reference.]

[Woah, hold up there. Something Julius said seems to hit a nerve, because Eren sits up at attention all of a sudden. It's not quite right—titans don't devour everything, they just devour humans—but the sound and the scale of it (A battle you very seriously might not win) strikes a chord. Rather than actually answer Julius's question right off the bat, he gets a little sidetracked.]

Devour— [Mostly because of that.] What d'you mean gods? Are they giants? Titans?

[He has to ask. No one he's mentioned them to has any concept the of the titans. But he's not naive enough to think they couldn't exist elsewhere.]

[Julius is a little surprised at Eren's reaction.]

The Gods I know are formidable beings. The only way to fully kill one is to extract its core. [Otherwise they just keep coming back like an annoying mosquito.]

Some of them aren't exactly large. [He tries to relax a bit before speaking up more.]

I don't know what to make of these titans you mentioned. Perhaps you could provide me with more detail. [It's hard for Julius to answer that question when he doesn't have a good idea of what a titan is to begin with. ]

[It's easier to compare things to something that's been a constant your whole life...which might be why it's easy to find similarities in what Julius is describing. It's not like he'd be disappointed to be wrong—he wouldn't wish something as terrible as the titans on any other world of people. But he had to ask, and Julius's gods seem to be terrible in their own right. (It's not like he isn't interested in the similarities and differences inherent in the worlds they come from, as a rule. They're supposed to meet up here to discuss the castle storming, but they can take a couple minutes to compare notes. It'll gnaw at him for ages if he doesn't.)

His expression narrows and his posture stays sharp. This time he actually answers Julius's questions.]

They're giants. [Again, because that part is important. He says "giants" with the inflection of someone talking about a particularly disgusting insect.] Most of them get as big as fifteen meters tall, but there's at least one that's over fifty. All they do is hunt down and devour humans. They can't be killed unless you take out their weakness.

["Extract its core," cut out its nape. Close enough to make you wonder. Maybe there really could be some insight they could gain from each other about their respective enemies. It sure as hell couldn't hurt to try. And, since he skipped it last time—]

I enlisted three years ago to fight them.

[Over fifty meters? That large? Julius can't imagine something so big. He narrows his eyes slightly as if he's deep in serious thought.]

Our enemies have too much in common. It could be a coincidence, but I highly doubt that. There must be some kind of connection between our adversaries.

We should discuss this topic again soon, Eren. I want to find the truth behind everything.

[He's pretty sure that Eren wants to know what's up too. Though, they are getting a little side tracked here. Julius doesn't mind that too much. ]

[That's a sentiment he can definitely get behind. It goes without saying that he's curious about Julius's enemy, too.]

Yeah. [There are more and more people milling around from the castle crashing crew, maybe it's not the time or the place. But he has no problem seeking Julius out sometime later for a followup.]

We don't know very much about them. The titans. Anything that can help us wipe them out is worth investigating. That's what the Survey Corps has been risking their lives for all this time.

[So anything they can learn from each other is worth looking into. And vice versa, for Julius's gods, though that goes unsaid. Cultural exchange at its finest.]

Getting to the bottom of it could help us put a stop to it for good.

[The titans sounds more mysterious now.]

Right. You've been fighting them for a while. It must be difficult to defeat a titan. [Humans seem so small in comparison and yet Eren can still fight against them fearlessly.]

If I may ask how exactly do you strike its weakness? I don't know if it's possible to bind their legs in order to restrict their movement.
[It's a plausible strategy to him, though he wonders how Eren normally defeats titans.]

[Mysterious as hell, it's true. Hard to get a read on something when killing it comes at great peril, when they vanish into thin air afterward, when they're too dangerous to capture alive most of the time. Julius has been answering his questions, so he returns the favor to the best of his ability.

He shakes his head. Trapping them can help, yeah. But it's labor intensive, hard to set up, unreliable.]

There's too many of them to rely on something like that. Not unless you're trying to capture one alive.

[And even then, their track record is pretty shit. He raises a hand to tap at the base of his neck, right at the nape.]

Their weakness is high up, and really small. You need to cut it out in one strike, so we use equipment that lets us maneuver in the air.

[And then there's Eren's ace in the hole. But that's not exactly standard.]

Binding them isn't an option I suppose. Kill them swiftly or face consequences...right?

[You guys must have really high death rates. This is no laughing matter! Julius expression darkens and he pieces all of the information together. He's still having a hard time stomaching the idea of titans running around killing humans, even if it is a concept he understands. It's never easy to deal with things like death and people being eaten.]

You fought bravely on the battlefield. For that you have earned my respect.

[He's just being honest now.]

[Their casualty rates are atrocious, you don't even want to know, Julius. It's a bit of praise he's not expecting—most people are quick to call the Corps foolish or suicidal for daring to face off against those kinds of odds. It doesn't go unappreciated.]

Yeah. Thanks.

[At least an operation like this one ought to be a walk in the park in comparison. It's all the time they have for that, though. As the inn fills up a little more with potential castle crashers, they need to get to business. He stands, but offers Julius a hand to shake before he leaves.]

Good luck. [With your half of the mission. If he remembers right, Julius is on infiltration.] We'll keep 'em off your backs.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

PLAYER PLOT ★ STORM THE CASTLE

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject