War for the Crown Gameplay

"That feels like a really big thing to just assume," Sepsinia replies. "But I guess if they can't take it away it doesn't matter that much who it comes from."

"We could start an Involuntary Abyss Society," Sepsinia jokes with a wry smirk.

Momo wrinkles her nose. "I'll have to look into that. Maybe there have been other people in history with similar curses to mine, it could lead to more knowledge."

"That might help," Sepsinia agrees. "It's always better to know more, that's what I just spent most of my afternoon doing."

"Ah, that's why you were over then? I see," Momo says with a nod. "At least your affinities are easily traced. Mine are some divine accident."

"Yeah, Sarina was giving me some coaching on sorcery," Sepsinia explains. "One thing that helped in my case was drawing the connection between the specific abilities I've developed and the bloodline. Maybe some combination of your curse and the types of spells you receive could point you in the right direction."

A shrug. "Very possible. It might help to categorize my abilities more thoroughly, might help lead me to the interested party. At the very least, I suspect no archdemon would be particularly interested in making remarkable healers."

"Even to heal their own, that's not really demons' style," Sepsinia agrees, "Having a lot of healing magic is probably a good sign that whoever gave you magic isn't too bad I figure."

"It is at least likely to be a reasonable power source," Momo says, shaking her head. "Enough about that, though, I'm tired of thinking about it."

"Do you want to just take a walk around the gardens?" Sepsinia offers with a smile.

Momo nods. "Sure thing. If you want, I can talk your ear off about literally every plant in here."

Another morning, Selli Okerra and her father arrive via carriage; Baron Okerra's at the Palace of Birdsong to meet with Martella alongside the other barons and chart out some long-term plans for the county. Nicolaus himself heads inside quickly, giving brief greetings to people he passes along the way, while Selli makes a beeline for the training yard to meet with Josie. "Hi!" she grins at seeing the aasimar.

Kneeling down to get to Selli's level, Josie smiles and replies, "Hello there!" Pausing just a moment, Josie squints and asks, "Have you gotten taller since the last time I've seen you? You're going to catch up to me in no time at this rate." She pretends to be huffy for a beat, then breaks back into a wide smile.

"But then I won't be able to do this!" Selli giggles and does a forward roll between Josie's legs, miming stabbing motions at her calves and straightening up behind her.

Josie laughs and replies, "True, I doubt I could do that against someone else my size. But I can reach the top shelf without a stool. Trade-offs for everything." She grins widely at the girl as she stands on the tips of her toes, just long enough to make her point.

Selli desperately tries to stand on her toes and then jump, but her maximum vertical is barely as high as the base of Josie's hand. She harrumphs, "Yeah, I guess being tall is cool," she sighs in mock-disappointment. "I'll be tall eventually. Dad's tall for a human, and Mom was taller than he is!"

The archer giggles and replies, "'Eventually' is such a drab word. Let's focus on the now instead. How about we head to the back and you can show me what you know about using a bow."

"Okay! Do you have any shortbows around? I tried using a longbow once but I couldn't really pull the string back properly, it was too heavy," Selli explains as they make their way to the training yard.

"Yep, I borrowed one for just such an occasion." Josie stops at a small table with a bow and a quiver full of arrows laying on it. Handing Selli the bow and a blunted arrow, she instructs, "Ok, show me what you know about nocking an arrow and drawing it back. Don't fire it just yet though."

It's immediately obvious to Josie that Selli's put a lot of work into finger positioning and nocking, as she does that very carefully and deliberately, holding it just right, but as she draws the string back and needs to use more of her strength, her technique wavers, arm shaking a little and pulling back at an angle that's easier, but will ruin her aim.

Josie comes up behind Selli and straightens her arm out. "It may be more comfortable to draw back with your elbow pointed out like that, but try to keep your elbow directly behind your hand instead. It takes some practice, but will keep everything lined up better. Now, take aim and try to hit the target."

Selli nods and smiles, "Yeah, okay!" and this time she holds that form flawlessly, drawing back in a smooth motion as far as her young muscles will allow her, then she releases the arrow cleanly and it flies straight into the middle of the target, cutting a direct path through the air and embedding itself in the wood. "Oh wow that really helped, thank you so much!"

Josie smiles widely at her and replies, "You're very welcome. I can only take some of the credit though, you were the one putting in the effort. Now, try to do it all in one motion, like this." Josie pulls out her own bow and swifly fires an arrow right next to Selli's shot. As Josie pulls another arrow from her quiver, she says, "Remember, elbow directly behind your hand." The woman slowly draws back the string this time, pausing as her hand touches her face before relaxing the string and putting the arrow back away. "Give it a few tries in a row, just to help you get the motion into muscle memory."

Selli tries it again a few more times. On the first, she moves too fast and falls back into her old habit, and because of that the shot goes wide, missing the edge of the target and hitting the wall behind, but on her next she focuses again, and while it doesn't have quite the precision or force of her first shot, it does hit the outer bull's eye, and her next, following quickly after, is only a little more outside than that, still on target. Her practice in fencing and swashbuckling technique is obvious from her impressive flexibility and comfort with her growing body, major improvement for her would just be a matter of strength and focus. "Okay, yeah, that's way better! Now I've gotta learn how to do that while jumping off a roof and then pulling out a sword like Cayden Cailean does in the stories!"