Jeff
Being called insightful makes Flowing Travel proud at themselves, as if they have a unique wisdom. In truth, their insight came from years of living in a human kingdom, and seeing how humans act toward each other and toward reptilians and other races. Back home, they would be torn down by their peers for thinking themselves as special. "Home? I hail from an island far from here. It's mostly unknown to this continent, save for the sporadic trade carried out by merchant ships. There are many species of reptilians. Some live in the deep sea, some live in the coral. (Keeping it open for anyone else who might want to make reptilian factions) My species, the Gyosi, have two islands we call home. Urgyos, which is where I was born, and Ongyos. Those islands are where we lay our eggs, build our shelters, and grow our food. Many hundreds of years ago, our civilization split. We fought a great war, almost to the brink of wiping each other out. Now, we have a peace. An uneasy, tenuous peace, which we carry on from one generation to the next. But we still maintain our armies, keep our swords sharp, ready for war again at any moment. We also have communities settled in these here lands which we are also charged with protecting against attacks by other races. I'm sure there are even some here in Krunada that you can visit."
Luis
*The human would stop and listen to Flowing Travels full story, he even picks up the spear and puts its pommel against the rock for extra balance. He was surprised if not shocked, he never heard of that place before nor the war that happened there. Not to mention there were multiple species and tribes, some that have outposts in the continent.*
*Garvyn was mesmerized by the information taking even a couple of seconds to let it all sink in before replying.* "Wow, I didn't knew any of that. That's quite amazing! All of that happened next to us and we didn't even knew a thing. Sorry of I butcher the names, but you are a Gyosi from Urgyos which was in war with Ongyos... That is a tongue twister that will be hard to memorize."
*The human then chuckles lightly as he scratches the back of his head and looks back to FT.* "Then you decided to take a break from the war and the bloodshed too right? I think I can see it now."
Jeff
Flowing Travel smiles. "You memorized it perfectly." Then they shake their head. "You misunderstand. While the war technically is ongoing, there is, at current, a truce. The bloodshed, while still terrible, is limited to occasional minimal skirmishes. In my post, I mostly defended my people from other races, and I have never been in a battle before."
Luis
"You are lucky for that... I mean we, technically. I've been to a fair share of skirmishes, but most of them felt more like one-sided battles or straight slaughter. You have no idea how much magic and other bizzare things can change the tides of a battle specially when you and your squad are just a bunch of normal guys with pointy sticks."
*Garvyn sighs and shakes his head.* "A shame we don't have an official truce around here. It's more of a 'You hit me, I hit you back' type of deal."
Jeff
"We also have magic users in our society." Flowing Travel mentions. "But not enough to base our armies around them. Most of them become priests or farmers, or something like that. Who are you fighting?"
Luis
"Around these part some mages, spellswords and certain creatures are one man armies by turmselves, it all depends on how much magic they are born with." *When he is asked who he has fought before, Garvyn looks up and squints his eyes trying to remember tge details before giving a response.* "I was part of the guard so we used to deal with humans a lot and the few things that can pretend to be a human or hide in the city like a vampire. When it came to skirmishes, we were the defense, so our thing was moving to a town in the outskirts, fortify it and wait for the invaders to hold them back long enough for reinforcements. We used to fight raiders, bandits, creatures, monsters, goblins, bugbears, elves, orcs and half races from Krunada, Vobet, Sicarlas and rarely from the Banished lands. Those last guys prefer to be sneaky and never play fair."
Jeff
Flowing Travel wonders if it's worthwhile bringing up that in the other kingdoms, Aicrotor is talked about as the aggressors; raiding and pillaging. Now they're hearing another perspective, and they don't know which one more accurately resembles the truth. Now they might have a clearer understanding of what Garvyn meant when they said they never met reptilians in good terms. Maybe they had completely misjudged them? It's possible that reptilians from the diaspora serving in their host kingdoms' militaries have been part of forces that attacked Aicrotor. "That sounds like you have a lot of enemies surrounding you. It's impressive that you are able to hold your borders strong against invasion."
Luis
*The human makes a sad smile and nods.* "Yeah, I'm also impressed by how we managed to hold on for this long with everything that exists around us, we lost a lot of good people just in the short time I was in the guard. Humans tend to grow faster than other races since we live less, so we can replenish our forces fast. But people with magic and adventurers surely help a lot when things are going really bad. The best ones are expensive to hire, but they can pull things not even our best units can do." *Flowing Travels didn't asked, but Aicrotor wasn't that innocent as well, the 'human supremacy' ideal already caused a lot of trouble for the other races in the past and still holds on till this day, but conquest is conquest, all kingdoms were victims and started conflicts at some point.*
Jeff
"Don't you have magic users of your own to face those of other kingdoms?" Flowing Travel asks, confused. "Why must you always hire outsiders for that task?"
Luis
*The human laughs and looks back at Flowing Travels with a smile.* "That's the thing, most mages don't join the guard or the army, they become adventurers. You probably never seen one of them in action, it's like seeing the pages of a story book come to life! What they can do... It's almost unbelievable."
Jeff
"I've heard stories." Flowing Travel nods. "The council of our high chief has priests from every one of our religious groups in it, due to the miracles performed in the temples. Every Urgyosi child learns from their village elder the stories of brave heroes from the distant past. I would love to witness such feats of magical prowess first hand someday."
Luis
*He keeps his smile up for a moment before slowly looking down with a more somber expression.* "To be honest it's... Scary. I mean, you know they are there to help you out and most of the time they are the ones that save the day, but... It always made me wonder, what if it was the other way around? What if they were fighting us instead, or what if they weren't there? What would happen to us? A lost a lot of friends to encounters like that, I saw them turn to ash and be scattered in the wind as if they were nothing, turned into faceless casualties whose names their slayer will never know. It made me stop and think about our way of life you know?"
Jeff
"It is a shame such power is used for destructive purposes. But I suppose that's the result of living in constant warfare. It's frightening to even think about, and I guess I should be thankful my people don't live like that anymore, so that mages in our society can direct their power toward things that help everyone, such as farmers increasing and sustaining crop yields." Flowing Travel isn't conscious of it, but they're subtly bragging. If their peers back home had heard them talk like that, praising the virtues of their homeland in response to someone bringing up tragedies, they would have teased them mercilessly for days. "I'm terrified of the thought of the kingdoms here turning their attention to Urgyos. I doubt we would survive, even if you don't use any magic."
Luis
*The man thinks about it for a moment before tilting and shaking his head.* "I don't think any of us would at this point, we already got too many problems here, diverging forces to attack an unknown land is a bad move most of the time. For now I think your homeland is safe, just... Be careful with demons and things that whisper in the dark, they love to stir conflict."
Jeff
Flowing Travel thinks about what they've been told regarding the supposed evil citizens of the Abyssal Empire, and its army of darkness. They haven't seen any indication that demons are dangerous. They've never even met any demon. "I'll keep that in mind." Flowing Travel notices that Garvyn seems to have had some difficulty with catching fish throughout their entire conversion. They slide off their rock. "Would you like some help with the fishing?"
Luis
*The main issue with demons lurking around is that you never see one until they already set something in motion, they were really good at manipulating people of all races and that is why he was not a big fan of them. After hearing the offer from Flowing Travels the human waves his hand.* "Thank you for the offer, but failing is part of the exercise right? I got to keep trying or else I'll just go rusty."
*Garvyn then turns his attention back to the water as he slowly approaches another group of fish and readies his spear.*
Jeff
"I'm glad to see you don't doubt yourself." Flowing Travel remarks. "Yet my offer still stands. After all, I also need to eat, so it stands to reason we can share a meal."
Luis
"It's less about self-doubt and more about... Just doing." *Garvyn then stands still for a moment holding his spear without blinking, locking his eyes onto a fish. He holds his breathing for a moment before lunging forward into the water with the spear. He holds the spear into the water and sand, shaking it slightly. Remarkably the lunge didn't splashed as much water as it should even if it was a single tip spear.*
Jeff
Flowing Travel watches, waiting to see if Garvyn had caught the fish, and wondering if they should just go catch fish for themselves anyway.
Luis
*After some shaking, Garvyn quickly pulls up the spear with its tip upward with a small fish stuck half way through the blade. The human then brings it closer to him with a small smile on his face as he holds the fish in place so it doesn't jump out of the spear.* "Nice step up, I almost missed this one almost."
*He then starts walking back toward the sand, before looking back at Flowing Travels and asking.* "Do you plan on staying for dinner? I can catch more for the two of us."
Jeff
"I'm not in any rush anywhere." Flowing Travel responds. "I can collect wood for the fire." They offer.
Luis
*The human raises his eyebrows and nods.* "That would be amazing, thank you! I'll try to get you a bigger one for that." *He then puts the fish on a big cloth like sheet over the sand and wraps it over the fish to stop it from escaping in case it was still alive.*
Jeff
The reptilian turns and walks away from the water. They're looking for a forest.
Luis
*After being done with the fish Garvyn returns to the water and the rocks to fish more fish. The catch there wasn't big due to the shallow water, unless you come across a shark or something, but that wasn't the case this day. The human keeps sharpening his spear fishing skills as he keeps dedicating himself to catch more fish as time moves on.*