SaufortGamer

You’ve just arrived in a swampy, dim town. As you look around, your gaze is met with shacks and cabins. It smells of rotted wood and wet moss. You duck and step into a tattered tent, illuminated by a series of candles suspended in the air. At the back of the tent, an old hag raises her head, “What brings you to this dingy town? she begins, then pauses to study your face—”Ah, it’s you. I’ve been expecting you. Sit,” she gestures at a cushion, “Tell me your story.”

Saurina sits down, legs crossed on the cushion. She looks around at her surroundings, doing what she can in the last few seconds before she has to engage eye contact with the old hag. After a few seconds, she exhales and places her hands on her lap and looks towards the woman, her eyes coated with a slight look of fatigue to them.

"I think you, ehm, may be mistaken in who you're looking for, though I'll certainly humour you with a bit of background. You'd be surprised as to what an outsider like myself could gain from a little town like this..." Saurina responds, fumbling her hands a little as she talks. She's not usually one for exposition, but she's very clearly anxious, so her words just keep pouring out.

"My name is, uhm... My old boss generally just called me "Sau", though my mother always insisted on my full name, Saurina. I used to work in a large tavern in a city a few leagues north of here. It was a large tavern, at least for where it was in the city. I worked there a few years, and my boss always told me I did a good job!" She laughs to herself, in a mix of self-amusement and nervousness, hoping that her light-heartedness could defuse the tension in the air a little. To her mild dismay, the old hag still looked at her expectantly, as though she was expecting something grand from Saurina. She looks away for a few seconds, before beginning to talk again.

"The tavern life was a good one for me, too good to last, I guess... A few years ago a small fire swept through my portion of the city. It didn't cause too much damage to the area, but it scared away much of the traffic for quite a long time. Because of that, the tavern spiraled further and further down, before closing up shop. I, uhm... didn't really have anywhere else to go from there. After the tavern closed, much of the business from that part of town spiraled too. From what I'd heard, a small belief became somewhat prevelent within the rest of the city, that the workers in that part of the city couldn't be trusted because they 'just let the fire happen'. That, unfortunately... includes me. So... I packed my bags and headed south in search of a new job... This town isn't too far from home, so maybe I'll be able to find something, anything, here...?" Saurina gazes at the old hag semi-expectantly, hoping that the old hag will direct her to somewhere, as scenes of the fire and the tavern's decay playing through her mind.