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?))
"I- uhm, well I don't if that is entirely appropriate for someone I have just met, but..." A pause as Gunnard eyes the crone up and down, "I'd like to know about you too, so I suppose an exchange of information is in order." He adjusts, removing his large hat and satchel and setting them aside before sitting down on the floor, his legs crossed.
"My name is Gunnard Beloselski. I come from a simple home on the edge of the country side, where my two children, Foxglove and Oleander live. However, my family line extends far enough back to the days in which my kind used to reside upon the Northeast mountains of Aegis, of which I imagine you have heard the tale of what transpired there. While one would normally be quite thankful that their ancestors were to escape, mine left me and my line with something dreadful: a terrible string of bad luck."
Gunnard pulls back his sleeve and unwraps some of the cloth around his arm, revealing a sickly black and green tint to his skin and veins beginning just before the elbow.
"Never been the luckiest guy in all honesty. One bandit there, a trip in the mud here. But, I thought all of that came to an end once I found her, my wife. Gods- it was like divinity itself had ordained our meeting. She was a beautiful sight, especially in mind and soul. Kindest I have ever met, so kind I thought that she'd melt away everything about my old life, luck and all."
Gunnard begins to wrap his arm back up as he continues speaking.
"Frankly, all that luck garbage seemed like a fairytale anyways. I don't actually believe all of my failings come from some kind of supernatural string of misfortune. In fact, I think a lot of my problems stemmed from my lack of passion, which is why after I married all of that disappeared. I had finally found a reason to be better, DO better. But now... well now I have a new reason."
Gunnard sighs, a growing despair washing over his eyes.
"A plague hit my town some time ago. My family, we took all the precautions- we did everything right! And yet, it still got her, that sickness. I did all that I could to heal her: potions, local professionals, I even tried to learn healing myself! I was so impassioned and hopeful that my efforts wouldn't be in vain, that perhaps if I just loved her enough then the sickness would be overpowered and dispelled! But no, this is no mere fairytale affliction. It got hold of my wife, and drained her of her life until she had none left. I tried to mourn and move on, but I couldn't. No, I couldn't stand to see her like that any longer, so I set out to find a cure. A cure for her sickness which I now carry, and a cure for death itself. I've scoured the land looking for someone who could help me, scraping every last bit of fortune I could muster, but no one could. No, every magician, every alchemist, every priest, they all denied my family the happy ending we so desperately deserved. So, I decided to take it into my own hands."
Gunnard stands, a determined grin plasters across his face as he picks up his belongings.
"If no one with magic can help me, then I will learn the magic necessary to bring my love back myself, invent it if I have to! I will search through every nook and cranny, read every book, speak to every person I possibly can until I stop this sickness once and for all and save from wife from the dreadful fate she did not deserve!"
Gunnard then snaps his attention to the old woman before placing both of his hands on the table in font of him, his face beaming with a smile.
"So! I hate to ask the obvious given the floating candles, but: know any magic?"
