Breaking the Rules Pt. 02

"Just as soon as you answer," Nuru agreed. He'd take quests from the board if he had to.

"Lunch is at noon. My bluff check is unmatched, and tells me none of those factions I mentioned are correct. As you have said nothing about yourself, we shall narrow these explicative of why you have joined, if it is so. Nyala will have banished the fear of what has killed your parents."

"I... How did you...? But no."

"You watched them die, and Adisa promised the skills with which you could have saved them."

"You might be right, except I'm a bard, not a healer."

"Yet your appetites lead you to the means by which to capture the attention of tender young morsels of femininity. This power could be bolstered only by Jabu."

"I'd never heard that. I wonder if it would have changed my decision. You see, this is the kind of insight I was after."

"Yet perhaps you have a love for entertainment, though hate the guise of a stage minstrel. Legba could accept this, to fill the need for diversity of the comedic arts."

"See, nobody told me about all the Low Factions. How was I supposed to know?"

"You knew of at least one. Eyamba delights in the unusual paths to success; a bard which uses percussion as a weapon would go high indeed."

"...as a weapon..." Nuru wondered. "Truly, this has been most fruitful on any question except the one I asked."

"Then perhaps you felt Chosen after all. They wane, a shadow of their former selves, but one could rise to the top merely by existing long enough. A sad, siren song of Tumelo, that you heeded even so. You are right to doubt for your future."

"I've met a Chosen, but I did not join. Not for lack of interest on their part, I admit."

"Why then, I must congratulate you. I did not recognize you as one of our own - had you but answered the sign, we could have saved so much of our time. For I can see that you are not one inclined to fall into the sewer of Samba's filth and thus there can be but one choice remaining. Perhaps I will go on sabbattical and we can delight in the cracking of skulls in time to your beat for Neeoka's glorious name. "

"Seal Club. I can't help but feel that perhaps there was another choice."

"OMMMuch wisdom your doubts have. There is indeed a path of needles to thread. Were by some chance each of them done successfully, it could be that the whole choice could be avoided, for a time."

"Where were you ten levels ago?" Nuru muttered.

"Why, here of course. The Guru has been banished from Home Town for just such forbidden knowledge. The Rulemakers guard this jealously, for within it lies the key to greatness of a kind only hinted upon in the oldest and most forgotten of lore. In the end my own path could not reach the final challenge without the assistance only a faction is obligated to provide. Within a hairsbreadth came I to inventing a new faction; yet, alignment pacts negate this possibility. Be our association kept secret, perhaps my aid will allow one of us to succeed through our next generation before they too are forced to make your choice. Imagine, two factions in concert, united in the love of shedding the blood of the unworthy. I pray I live to see that day."

Nuru shuddered.

"Why dost thou recoil. It is our highest calling!"

"You assume too much," Nuru said, straightening up. "I am not one of yours, either."

"But there isn't- No. It cannot be. This knowledge no one else possesses! The EXP needed to pass the Gate-!"

"I found another way," Nuru said.

"MMMMMAPPRENTICE!" The Guru cried. "MY CLUB! THIS ONE WOULD USURP US! DRIVE HIM TO THE DEEPEST OF GRAVES!"

The Guru was lightning-fast, raining blows on Nuru's shoulders and back of his head as he retreated, but lacking in strength to cause grievous injury. It would only take one critical hit though, he felt. And the apprentice, a younger and less withered man, would surely decimate him once he finished scrolling through his inventory and produced what weapons he carried.

"!Kafa Mara Nauyi!" Nuru said, taking off at top speed and almost failing to clear the rope as The Guru clutched at him and dragged him down.

"I SEE YOUR MIND. YOU CANNOT OUTPACE THE WIND WHILE PINNED TO AN ANCHOR!" The Guru screamed.

(What is this guy's deal!?) Nuru yanked at Sanaa as he dragged The Guru along kicking and biting. He had to pause and replay her words in his head several times as he pushed, pulled, and half-dodged.

/What a sad creature. He knows his desires - knows there is nothing holding him back from his carnality, yet believes himself pure by keeping a woman's touch away. He revels in the spilling of blood, rather than harnessing its power while still in the veins of her sex, but cannot help himself looking at what he could reach out and touch. His inner conflicts hobble him, and he hides himself in a cloak of words. A simple man, now made utterly transparent and despicable by his pride./

(You're sounding a bit wordy yourself.)

/He and I are much alike in our passion for influencing others. The difference, on the surface, is that I take pleasure for its own sake, not pain. He instead delights in destruction, creating a world in which he stands tall by tearing down everything around him. Neeoka is the last of the draconids, and the greatest. As a god he cannot be killed as the others were, and embodies their nihilistic natures. Those who follow him mainly do so because their own horizons have shrunk to see no farther than their own lives./

(So, people have more fun with you, and you're more sophisticated, is what I'm hearing.)

/Try not to die, will you? I'm going to have a devil of a time replacing our rapport./

(I'm open to ideas!)

/He's higher-level than you. He's debuffed by his sedentary lifestyle, but if he gets his hands around your neck, you're done. Best to just get away. I hate to say paladins are your friend, but in this case they might be./

Nuru smashed through bushes and Chibuzo's traction slipped on the dry earth trying to knock Nuru from his feet; his grip was strong, but attempting to get more leverage he only managed to keep a grip on Nuru's sleeve as it tore halfway loose. The Guru barely paused to take a breath from a ceaseless tirade of inane babble. His apprentice was not so well equipped for a chase, being heavily encumbered with who-knows-what, and struggled to keep up, pausing to puff and pant before standing up and continuing pursuit. The gate where Nuru would be leaving came into view - and as he hoped, a group of paladins were clustered, talking with the city guards.

"Help! Help, I'm unarmed and I'm being attacked!" Nuru called out.

The paladins all turned, and half of them started towards him.

With manic desperation, Chibuzo took off his own belt and slung it by the weight of the buckle around Nuru's waist, caught it, and then pulled down to trap his legs. The apprentice pulled out two wicked looking clubs and threw one of them down near Chibuzo, and started swinging his own opportunistically any chance he thought Nuru had an exposed limb he could hit without also hitting his guru master. He managed to land a few glancing blows before the paladins caught up and wrested Chibuzo's club away before he could make use of it.

"Bluargh!" the apprentice said, being cast aside by a Shield Charge, and rolling to be engaged by two of the paladins, while the four remaining surrounded Nuru and Chibuzo.

"Halt at once, or we will stop you by force!" one of them said.

"OMMMy duty is clear, he possesses forbidden knowledge that must be destroyed!"

"A tribunal will settle this. If it is as you say, justice will be swift."

"OMMNO! A speech in court, a letter, any opportunity will endanger us all! He must die now!"

Chibuzo's eyes opened wide for the first time, and in his sleeve Nuru saw him preparing a dagger to strike.

"Hey!" a new face interjected between them.

"Monifa, get back!" Jaz called out.

"OMMLittle girl, this is no business of yours, stand out of the way!"

"Mister Nuru is my friend! You should be ashamed of yourself! Look at you, foaming at the mouth like a madman! If he was dangerous we all would have long been doomed, I travelled with him all day yesterday!"

"But- but-!"

"You're the one always talking about 'violence is the last resort of the foolish' every time I come through here. Are you a hypocrite, mister Chibuzo? More like ChiBOZO!"

"But- I- but..!"

"You just wait until I tell all your followers and everybody here in Sapphire City about how you're acting! Attacking an unarmed man and a little girl! Some fountain of wisdom you are!"

The paladins seized a moment of indecision and dragged all of them apart. The Guru regained his composure and sat passively on the ground, staring off at nothing in particular. His apprentice had to be stunned and manacled and carried away.

"MMMUnworthy this place is, now. As was the apprentice. Mmm, call of the wilds I feel again. I shall seek enlightenment abroad. Yes."

"Are you unharmed? I apologize that I wasn't faster in rescuing you," a paladin said to Monifa.

"Hmph. I didn't need rescuing from that idiot. He couldn't hurt a fly."

"Well... ah... of course not. You're a fierce little warrior. Listen to your father though, next time."

"Daddy, did you see me? I stopped the bad man from yelling at mister Nuru!"

"Yes dear, that was a good idea, but some people only listen to adults. You should too."

"Aww, but daddy-!"

"I should ground you for disobeying, but I think your mother will have a better way to explain this to you."

"I'm sorry daddy, I didn't mean to be bad. I just saw him being mean and..."

"I know. It's hard sometimes, but you have to remember to do the right thing for yourself instead of someone else. Come on, let's go home."

"Yay, home! I get to introduce you to all my daddies!"

"Monifa, hush, we talked about saying things like that."

"Oh yeah. Come on, mister Nuru! I can't talk about it but I can't wait for you to meet everyone."

"Hah hah... yes, me too."

*****

The road was short, with all manner of thoughts swirling through Nuru's head.

(Did you hear that, what he was saying?)

/I do have other things to do than watch your life fly by, you know./

(Yeah, but- man, what a revelation. A new faction.)

/It is a phantom, a rumor whispered among demons and angels both. It's what I have been working on since I heard more of it from my Fieflord after I captured his soul. It's what he was working on, why he had a Respec Potion I was able to use. There's a ritual which requires its use, to create something called Limit Break. This is deeply forbidden knowledge, Nuru. Don't be going around sharing it; the gods all guard the twelve-faction balance with absolute force./

(You want to do that yourself?)

/Let us say I am... interested in the possibilities. There remains the problem of systemic bias. A succubus has never been allowed to reach archdemon status for long, and a ranking archdemon or archangel is a condition of the process./

"You all right?" Jaz said. "I've never seen him act that way. Not even when they almost ran him out of town about spreading rumors about corruption in the city guard that turned out to be true."

Nuru let out a deep breath. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm alright."

"Gods above, I never pinned him for a Seal Clubber," Jaz said. "I heard them talking to the paladins, those bystanders. What did you say that got him so riled up?"

"Oh, nothing really," Nuru said. "Just discussed personal choices. I thought maybe he could confirm I saw my choices correctly. Apparently he could only help me with what *not* to choose."

"We all have a purpose in life. For some, that purpose is to be an object lesson to others. My father told me that once," Jaz said. "Shall we go?"

"The sooner the better," Nuru agreed.