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The Pen is Mightier than the Sword

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OOC : First thing I have to say is "hello there !", since I haven't posted anything since I registered, but I've read a few tales and since theses were nice I'd like to join the community :)

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Something scratches the office door. A few seconds later, it opens on... something... something blurred which looks like an human. A small human, very small one, about 3 inches tall. The blur makes it hard to see anything, but it's as if it had a black fur... Wait, it's now smoothing its hairs... And it now looks like a robe ! And its hair are growing and turning red on its head ! Well, he definitely looks like a gnome now the blur's gone.

Once the transformation is finished, the gnome makes one step forward and says :

"Hello, is anyone here ?"

He waits a moment, and since nobody answers he begins to look around, and he sees a sticker on which it's written :

"Out for a moment, fill the form on the desk if you're looking to join.

- Wyvern, Elder of the Initiates"

When he finally finds it in the mess, he methodically complete it...

Name : "Asmadeus"

Race : "Unknown"

Ability : "Can transform himself and others into whatever he wants, can also exerce a minor control on people's mind (Usually referred to the class "Enchanter" or "Illusionist", the mind control can help people to move faster, or force them to be slower, as well as forgetting something or even to not to see it, but takes alot of effort and attention, so he is vulnerable when he is doing such a thing. On the other hand, the transformation allows him to behave as if he were everyone's friend, to be less likely to be seen, or even to look more impressive to someone fearful...)"

Story : "Asmadeus woke up in Ak'Anon, the Gnomish Empire Capital. One couldn't say he was born there, because he already knew how to speak, how to write, and a bunch of other simple things, but he had no memory of what could have happened before.

He was looking like a Gnome : Gnome legs, Gnome chest, Gnome head... But if someone looked carefully at him, very carefully, he'd notice a few blurs and some malformations, which betray that it's a mere illusion.

Since he didn't remember anything, he had to choose himself a name, and he used a Gnomish Name Generator device, which had either Asmodeus or Amadeus misspelled, and referred to "Asmadeus". Now, he had to find something to do, and believing he were a Gnome, he went to see the Gnomish King who ordered him to test his ability as a tinkerer, in order to help the development of the Empire. As a consequence, he went to different factories, took apart some devices to understand how they worked, and tinkered devices which would be better... Unfortunately, he was so good at tinkering that he made a self-thinking machine which wanted to rule the... factory. Anyway, this machine took a whole elite squad to be destroyed, and the King decided that it was too dangerous to let Asmadeus tinker...

He then was ordered to slain Minautors. Lots of them. And so he did during days and days, but as he were only seeing Minautors, he took Minautors' appearance too : he grew taller, and acquired bit by bit Bull's characteristics, such as fur, muffle, and more. He didn't notice that he was different, except that everything seemed smaller to him, and that he was less cold than before... But even with the Minautors reacting strangely when he attacked them, and not wanting to kill him when he came near if he weren't doing something bad, he didn't realise that he was one of them... He sure was dazzled when his fellow gnomes were rushing him when he came back home ! He fled the Gnomish Empire, and spent a few months wandering.

During theses, he learnt that he was able to modify his shape, and he exerced himself to transform into whatever he met : bears, wolves, lions, deers, and even smaller animals such as birds or cats. For having seen and understood the mechanics of experimentation subjects he autopsied, he could change his own anatomy to better to suits his needs, just as if he were tinkering his own corpse and moving the "gears", and he found out that the most efficient animal he could imitate was the wolf.

Sadly, the wolf wasn't a beloved animal, and Asmadeus needed to learn to transform himself quickly in case he met someone. That was a very good training, and as he met hunters looking for wolf pelts he even learned how to use his skill to escape traps, but sometimes that wasn't enough, and he found out that he could also make peoples forgetting about him. He already knew that he could influence people, since he often had to lull a Minotaur to slaughter another more easily.

As a perfectionist, he kept training until he considered his new abilities trivial to use, and he decided to test himself by traveling across a town in a shape the inhabitants hated without being seen, or by being intentionally seen by numerous persons and trying to make them forget him before they caught him, or even by trying to transform into things he never seen, that might be why you could have heard of some "monster of the Lochness" or even of werewolves.

When he was finally sure he couldn't learn anything else alone, he decided to visit a few cities and to behave as he were supposed to. He took a Gnomish aspect and began to read all the books he could find, and he saw an advertisement for the "The Pen Is Mightier Than The Sword" community, and since he never tried any, he thought that it would be a good thing to learn that how to act as a writer.

He found the Recruiter's Office close to a town in a glade, and was still in wolf form when he scratched the door, he was still transforming when it opened, and after a few times looking around began to fill this sheet."

 

Once he's done, Asmadeus looks around find a few contraption, on which it's written Almost Dragonic Device™, and after a last glance at the door, he picks one up which seems to be used to knot the shoelaces, he quickly dismantles it and not how it has been made, and he is building it back when...

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... a tail stinger flops through the open Office window, followed by a scaly arm and a tilted head of horns. Asmadeus lifts his head as he notices Wyvern cramming his wings through the small window space, then bites his lip and tries to speed up the rebuilding process. He reattaches the thingamabob to the whajamacallit next to the Device's blinking red light and starts to screw in the bolts, but jumps as Wyvern's familiar hiss of a voice catches his ear.

 

"Windowshopping, I see!" Wyvern rubs his claws together and lets out a triumphant cackle, then hops over to the box of products and shakes Asmadeus' somewhat gnomish hand. "A gnome with a fine taste in products. This application process is already off to a very good start for you!"

 

The illusionary gnome strikes half a smile as Wyvern snatches the Almost Dragonic Brand Device™ from his hand and lifts it to admire it in the light. Loose bolts fall from the small metal box as Wyv turns it in his claw, and the metal coating of the circuitry promptly falls from its frame. Asmadeus winces a bit as he watches the product lose piece after piece, and he stares at the ground for a long moment.

 

"Sorry..."

 

"For what? This happens with all of'em." Wyvern grins and waves the remains of the Device closer to Asmadeus' face. "These Almost Dragonic Brand De-Vices™ are perfect for removing the vices of tying shoelaces, and also work for removing wrestling vice grips involving shoelaces. The lil' red light sssenses what kind of lace it is, and sends a complicated message through the circuitry that eventually overloads it to the point of battery acid. Au'revoir, shoelacesss! I'll sign ya up for thirty to start with."

 

"Errrr." Asmadeus lifts a finger to speak as Wyvern rushes to the Office desk to fill out the order. "Actually, I really don't think that'll be necessary."

 

Wyvern lifts his head from filling out the form with a frown, halfway through forging Asmadeus' signature in the hopes of speeding up the ordering process. The overgrown lizard sighs and tosses his quill to the side, then tears apart the order form and turns towards Asmadeus' application sheet. He snatches it from the cluttered desktop and examines the details of his story for a moment, then nods and folds the paper with the flick of a claw.

 

"I certainly sssympathize with the whole 'invention backfiring' bit, as well as the 'disgruntled gnome populace' bit." Wyvern scratches his chin, then stoops down and snatches his quill back off the ground. He taps the tip of the quill on the "Race" section of Asmadeus' profile, then scrawls "Shapeshifter?" next to it. "You may wanna seek out Patham or Katzaniel for some interesting company... I should really try'n round up the gang of ya for cheap Almost Dragonic Brand De-Vice™ commercials. I'm sure at least one of you could change into a giant set of shoelaces."

 

Asmadeus stares at Wyvern with a confused expression on his gnomish cheeks, but relaxes when Wyvern pulls a stamp from the top of a candywrapper heap and tags his application ACCEPTED.

 

;-)

 

OOC: An ACCEPTED application piece, Asmadeus. Welcome to the Mighty Pen! :) I look forward to reading more of Asmadeus' antics, as well as any other writing you may have to share. I hope that you find the Pen a friendly and welcoming community to write in. Once again, welcome!

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Ak'Anon, near the Mines of Malfunction:

 

"GNOMIE CANNONBALL!"

 

The water barely rippled.

 

Minta swam down the beginnings of the abandoned "Digging to Erudin" tunnel. The flood covered up all sorts of useful gnomie shortcuts that the Dark Reflection evil gnomies had installed later. . .that was weird. . .the hatch that led to the Norrath-Pen corridor was open. Minta popped out of the forcefield which held the water in the tunnel and started down the corridor, leaving wet footprints.

 

The Pen Keep, Courtyard:

 

Someone who put their ear to the ground, next to a particular rock, might have heard

 

"'Asmadeus' rhymes with 'Theas', but you can't rhyme a 'chanter with a ranger. . .'who will play? us?'. . .nuh-uh, doesn't sound nice. . .Is funny, how come this end isn't open if that end wasn't? Gotta get Rydia an' make her track an'--ooo wait, I know!"

 

and a pitter-patter of feet back under the wall of the Keep.

 

The Tavern of the Quill, basement:

 

Minta darted out of a gap between a barrel and a crate, then pushed on a nail-head in the barrel. The barrel started to revolve, clanking like a rusty gear, and then six adjacent barrels also spun, pushing an unassociated sack of flour in front of the gap and sweeping brush-bristled revolving barrel bottoms across the floor, to sweep up any floury trails left behind.

 

The Tavern of the Quill, Recruiter's Office:

 

.00004 seconds after the candywrapper heap rustled, Minta burst through the door.

 

"I heard candy, can I have some Wyvern pleaseplease ASMA HONORARY GNOMIE!"

 

She changed vectors and aimed a superhappy hug at the new applicant, then stopped and bounced in place, almost flattening the Almost Dragonic machine.

 

"This is SO cool! There used to be lots of people goin' back an' forth from Solusek Ro to here but now I think I'm the only one 'cept for Star an' he doesn't come here much since he an' Rydia moved outta the Pen Keep an' we're gonna hafta get you moved into a room here or outside if you want, Annael lives outside an' Bhurin does too at least an' a few other woodsy people an' those silly cabbages an' ohyeah! you gotta see my room!" Minta grabbed Asmadeus's hand and charged for the door, only to fall flat on her face. She tried to kick, but her neato new droolproof shoes were neatly trussed together. The neato necro gnomie girl craned her head over her shoulder to see.

 

"Whooooooooa. . .you got a Wyvern machine to work? OOO! You GOTTA see the TALKING CLOCKWORK! It says "Caryon Artificer" an' gotta meet Astralis gnomie too!" she chattered, and poked one hand into a pocket and pulled out a crumpled, wrinkled black robe. Once the robe fell to the floor, it billowed upwards, filling with glowing red eyes and materializing a wicked scythe. "Spectre cut me free! Asma, we gotta make sure the trolls never get 'hold of that or we're gonna get kabobed! Is bad enough that I gotta make a gnomish army pie-tin-cutter, kabob-unsharpener, saucepan-lid-prier-offer, an' stomach-exit-driller, dunno if it's got more space for a twine-snipper an' apple-corer!" Minta kicked her feet loose from the severed strings, scrambled to her feet, and pointed at the doorway again.

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