Johel
   Chronicles of the Starfall  
IC 01

  
  Slysummit, 5th Day of 32th Cycle of the Year 251 After the Starfall  
 Beneath the arena, the air is heavy, damp, and tinged with the stench of fearful despair and neglect. The walls of the subterranean corridors are cold stone, slick with moisture and stained with the memories of those who walked this path before. Faint, flickering lanterns cast long shadows on you and your fellow prisoners. You've just been brought out of a cell where you have spent the night before. You don't know what time it is exactly, what with the sun being absent, but you reckon that a meager meal was served to you maybe one or two hours ago. So it must be past noon. Which means your "chance at redemption", as the judge put it, is near. At the end of the corridor, someone shouts a command whose words are mangled by the distance. But right from behind the line of convicts, another voice reacts, shouting at you all : 
 Guard :   "-Alright, you scum ! It's show time ! Aaaaa...dvance !" 
 The person in front of you shuffles forward and, shackled in chains, you are forced to follow. When the torch light allows, you can see some of the guards, clad in dark, iron-plated armor, move with a mechanical precision, their faces hidden behind grim helmets. They grip long spears, the tips occasionally scraping the ceiling as they march. As you are herded through, you can feel that the ground is slightly inclined. And you are always turning left, meaning you are circling around something. Eventually you reach the heart of the arena's machinery : massive gears and pulleys groan and clank, supporting the wooden ceiling above, where wells of sunlight are falling from strategically placed mirrors. Nearby, slaves toil silently as they haul heavy loads or stoke the fires that power the arena's devices. This is also a waiting area, wide enough for dozens of men.

On the right side, series of cages are lined up. Inside, the beasts stir. These are no ordinary creatures, but grotesque, magically-mutated monstrosities. You can see glimps of the ones closer to the iron bars : some are amalgamations of various animals, their forms twisted and fused. Others are just normal predators, at least as far as can be seen but you doubt it is so. For each is there to inspire a sense of exotic dread among the public, reminding them of what lurks beyond Slysummit's walls, of why so many patrols are needed, the taxes so high, the food so expensive and the law so harsh. One cage holds a hulking mass of fur and scales, its body a hideous blend of bear and crocodile, its maw lined with jagged teeth that seem to glow faintly in the dim light. Another houses a serpent with the talons of an eagle and the venomous stinger of a scorpion, its coiled body covered in iridescent feathers that shimmer unsettlingly. As   Saber   pass near, the bear-crocodile lets out a bone-chilling roar, its serpentine eyes locking onto the illusionist with a predatory gaze. This prompt a chuckle from one of the guards. 
 Guard :   "-It likes you, boy. Alright, aaaaand... Halt !" 
 You've reached the base of a steep slope, leading to the arena’s pit. At the top, a massive, rusted iron gate stands close. The air here is dry and carries the faint scent of sand and blood, a sharp contrast to the damp corridors behind. You can feel the heat from the arena seeping through the gaps and the distant roar of the crowd. The area is better lit and you can now see clearly everyone. There are about twenty prisoners and eight guards, two of which are now removing the chains from each of you, probably readying you to climb into the arena.

What do you look like, what can others see when they look at you ?
What are your thoughts, words and actions ? 
Merilan
Ophilia is a slender, white-haired woman that could be mistaken for an ingenue at first glance, though years of experience with both knightly training and long hours in the healing profession have forged her body towards activity and wear both.  Her eyes are a light hazel colour, and just as everyone else, she's dressed in prisoner garbs, having been bereft of her equipment and noble presence.  Not even the pleasantry of footwear has been afforded.

But there's a keen, resolved gleam from her eyes, one that won't let the hardships of such an environment slow her down.  No, it's not the horrible conditions of the prisoners that give her disdain, it's the indulgence to which the people suffer.  As she observes the many chimerae and mutated monsters on display, she wonders just how they've gotten so twisted...

She will survive.  She won't die here.  She must discover the truth behind her father's death.
Dr.Gunsforhands
The woman behind Ophilia looks a lot softer - the kind of physique that suggests someone who walks to maintain their health and doesn't do much heavy lifting. The tight, careful   brown   curls in her hair have deteriorated since she's been here and now pile up in a tangle on her shoulders. Her doughy legs are peppered with stubble.

Not trusting the dungeon's floors, Constance has already fashioned some strips from her prison gown into protective wraps for her feet, revealing even more of her legs and shoulders than usual. These outfits are clearly meant to be torn apart at some point, so maybe that was an intended feature.

In your confinement with her, she's sometimes talked about the dungeon's features and history, just to have a topic of conversation. That, and she had an odd tendency to answer  what are you in for?  with   why does this horrible place exist at all?   and to get increasingly upset as she did so. It would be easy to write this off as prison life already getting to her, because it was, but it's still not much of a leap from her usual personality.

So, it kind of makes some sense that even a rich scholar like her would get locked up for saying the wrong thing too many times. Or for not being friends with enough of the right people. Or for having something in her collection that someone else secretly wanted. Whichever. She hasn't found out herself, yet. That will have to wait until we bust out of here. Not that the guards take kindly to talking about that out loud.

She looks over at the ominous slave-driven devices as the group is marched around them. Pulleys join the cranks to the ceiling, and to the mirrors on the roof. The gears start turning in her mind. If someone were to hold on to one of those ropes...

 
 Spoiler 
Might I roll to create an advantage with Investigate or Crafts by studying the devices? Something along the lines of, 'half-formed ceiling escape plan?'
 
MaltholLoth
Saber, that average looking guy, not skinny but not fat, just a rounded look. He ran his fingers through his mouse brown hair that was short enough to not get messy from being left. His blue eyes scanned around as he tried to think of strategies. That beast... The bear-odile amalgamation, he had swallowed hard.

Could his tricks help here against something like that? Those from his cell knee he could do small ones, he'd tried to keep everyone's spirits up with them. There was only so much he could do against an impending fate such as this.

He looked at those besides him, maybe it would be fun if death didn't seem to hang on his mind.