[Walkabout] After Hajime's electronic trick

[reincarnatedprince]

So what exactly happened with the electronics here? Did one of us activate a skill or something?

One of the natives is looking for help to fix things. Pertti, I think he was called. It would probably be good to help him out with this task so he doesn't need to spend too much time away from his daughters.

Comments

[amadine]

"Someone did something stupid" is typically the safe bet when things go wrong for no apparent reason.

[reincarnatedprince]

I don't want to assume the worst. It might be a side effect of something useful, after all.

[amadine]

Believe me, you should always assume the worst. Then, on the rare occasions you're wrong, it comes as a pleasant shock.

[reincarnatedprince]

Sounds like you're talking from harsh experience.

[amadine]

We've had amongst our number the sorts of people who think setting fires in a floating city held aloft by incendiary gases was great fun. Expecting caution and consideration of the potential consequences from more than one Traveler in a hundred is just setting yourself up for disappointment.

[reincarnatedprince]

Hmm. I'll be sure to keep that in mind. As I said, I don't like assuming the worst, but some caution in my thoughts does me good.

[amadine]

[There's a faint flicker of something like amusement.]

That it does.

Do you know how far-reaching the damage is?

[reincarnatedprince]

It goes mostly around the slopes, it would seem. So not that far-reaching, at least.

[triggerhappytraitor]

Yes.

[reincarnatedprince]

[Well that's short and sweet.]

I see.

[triggerhappytraitor]

[[Not the first time it's happened while he's been in range of it and he's resigned to it not being the last.]]

I've already spoken with Pertti to offer help with repairs. I assume he's one of the locals with... experience with the events of the longest night.

[reincarnatedprince]

That's right. He was guiding us to the forest on the night of the transformation. One of the Reindeer.

[triggerhappytraitor]

Our group went a slightly different way. [[In that the trio of sidekicks had gone running]] So we didn't encounter him.

Did he have any explanations?

[reincarnatedprince]

I asked a bit about it. No one really knows why the aurora changes some, but it has been happening for twenty years now. Not every year, but every five years.

There usually aren't men in black around, but they must be here investigating this case.

[triggerhappytraitor]

Likely, yeah.

An upside to that... incident. [[Totally still not annoyed about being caught in the radius of that nope nope, not at all]]

Though I would be curious what their data would suggest.

[reincarnatedprince]

It would have been good to know. Didn't we have someone half-infiltrating them? They might know what the information held.

[chalicejoker]

...when did you notice the problem?

[Not that it was him no of course not he's just politely curious and not at all guilty.]

[reincarnatedprince]

Only after we returned to our forms. So something likely happened while we were transformed.

[chalicejoker]

Imagine that.

[He is trying to sound surprised. He's not good at this.]

This trip has just been full of weird surprises.

Privated

[reincarnatedprince]

So, what did you do?

Don't worry, I won't tell anyone who doesn't know.

[chalicejoker]

I...applied some of Tower's power to some of those weirdos in suits who thought they could harass me.

[Hajime sounds reluctant to admit this.]

The last time I did it was to try breaking up whatever the Arcana pulled in Questing Country, so there wasn't as much potential for collateral damage. I didn't realize it had that much range.

[reincarnatedprince]

Ah. At least you seem to have been successful in hindering their progress, so it was a good tactic. You couldn't have known it would result in something like this.

[chalicejoker]

I've got a way of wrecking things. I should've known.

[reincarnatedprince]

Yet you couldn't have known. Not without proper testing.

[chalicejoker]

For that, maybe...but really. It's the sort of thing that follows me around.

[reincarnatedprince]

Plagued by misfortune and destruction?

[chalicejoker]

By destruction, at least.

[reincarnatedprince]

I'm sorry to hear that. Has that been something that's been going on all your life?

[chalicejoker]

...you have no idea how complicated answering that is.

We'll just go with yes.

[reincarnatedprince]

I apologize if that was a rude question. It just occurs to me that there are several ways of destruction clinging onto one. Both upon birth and upon curses...

[chalicejoker]

No, no, it's fine.

I was fated to it, one way or another. Let's just leave it at that.

[reincarnatedprince]

Ah, yes... fate. I have had my own fair share of that.

Anyway, what I said still stands in my opinion. You couldn't have known it would affect this far. So please, don't blame yourself too hard.

[chalicejoker]

...thanks. I'll try.

No guarantees, though.

[reincarnatedprince]

I will only ask you to try.