Your character has just arrived in a swampy, dim town. As they look around, their gaze is met with shacks and cabins. It smells of rotted wood and wet moss. They 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.”
((How do you respond?))
Example: As the cloaked woman, known as Luz, entered the tent, her expressions couldn't be read well due to her wearing a robe, her hood always being up over her head to cover her face. A pit of darkness behind the beautifully dark blue cloak/robe. She didn't respond to the hag, just standing. She would rather stand.... just in case. Luz wasn't much of a talker anyway. But her body language and the gaze that the woman could feel but couldn't see, it felt heavy, tired even. Her head dipping down to look at the floor before she finally spoke, "I suppose you want to know who wanders into your swamp at dusk,"
Luz said, pulling her cloak tighter as the mist curled around her robe.
"Very well, Hag. A story, then-my story."
"I was born between worlds. My mother was a Dark Elf who could track a whisper through a gale; my father, a human captain of war who believed discipline could tame fate itself. They raised me on the border, where neither kingdom bothered to decide who I belonged to."
"When the Great War came for my family, I offered my sword. What they never told me was the war was about me. People sought to have me outcasted simply because I was half of each whole. Also... didn't expect they'd hand me an army soon after. But battles have a way of revealing what you're good at-and what you can't outrun. Strategy came easily. Victory, too. They called me 'General' before I was old enough to understand what that truly even meant."
She paused, staring past the hag into the memories that moved like smoke.
"You'd think triumph would feel like something. It didn't. Not when every field I won on was soaked in someone's blood. Not when every order cost more than I let myself admit."
"So when the war ended, I left before they could pin medals on me or carv my name into stone. Let the world heal without me-I wrote that, though I doubt anyone listened."
Luz shrugged, a small, tired gesture.
"And now I walk. Roads, forests, ruins-anywhere that isn't a throne room or a battlefield. I don't know what I'm looking for yet. Peace, maybe. Or forgiveness. Or just... a place where I can be Luz, not a war machine, not half one thing half another."
Her gaze met the hag's, steady despite the gloom. She slid her hood back, revealing her light blonde hair, and her light icy blue eyes. Her skin was fair, but a slight tinge of Dark Elf complexion for an undertone to make her look a pasty color. Her face, scarred but not in a displeasing way. It looked good on her. Her body, curvy, yet feminine and built for war, leaned against a nearby table.
"Is that enough of a story for your curiosity? Or do you intend to ask for a price next?"
