Strings and Corkboards

    Shibuya was still being patched back together after all the troubles and problems that having the crowned bastards living here. Rizadoman himself swore up and down there was a smell, no matter where he went he could smell it. That is why anyone who walked by the entrance of the library would find smoke coming out of it. The smoke smelled fruity, and following the source would find several small fires with pots of water and citrus fruits, and spices, boiling in the middle of the library. OFf to the side is Rizadoman himself digging around in some broken bookshelfs and trying to clear away a wall grumbling to himself. If anything the lizardman has been distant from his alliance as of late and some may even call it surprising for him to be here.

Haru was unable to smell anything regarding the Library until the whole smoke situation. There he is, an Artificer doing a walk down the city streets, making a mental note of things to ask Curtana to repair or logistics to handle. There is he, raising a singular eyebrow to the smoke. He assumes that someone is /burning the library/ as he slams the door open with his noodly arms. 'Slams' with the force of an angry nerd. So 'opens with strong intent' instead of strong force. The man with the monocle inhales the fruity smoke and coughs, not expecting that as he looks around. "This is not what I expected," he admits as he realizes the Library is not on fire, just Riza'd. "Riz, what in the Three Goddesses' names are you doing?" he asks as he heads to one of the fruity pots.

    "Removing the smell of the crowned. Can't you smell it all over, I will learn to deal with it in other places but I swear I will get it out of here." Rizadoman answers before chanting somehting about his ancestors , slapping his chest and then lifting an entire bookshelf, books and all and moves it aside revealing a small hole partially in the wall, partially in the floor. "Oh good they didn't find it." Turning back towards Haru he looks up, "Don't worry most the fire is controlled, nothing should happen to anything here." Taking another moment he begins to reach in to the whole trying to fish for something. " Why can't I ...Oh." Standing up he turns away from the hole and lets his tail snake down into it fishing for something. " So what brings you down here?"

"All I smell is cinnamon, oranges, lilac, lemon, lime, cayenne, and something I can only describe as 'the burning sensation when you inhale wasabi'," Haru says as his nose picks up a Burning clutter card in his Smelling Deck. "Palace Landers do not smell like that, even when I am burning them with my Wave Artes." The human takes a step away from the olfactory origin story. "The first thing that led me here was: Oh crap, the Library is on fire, look at the smoke," he explains, "and prior to that I was doing an inventory on all the repair projects to order and sign off on. Curtana is Moon Tree and he has key on helping, though the HQ still has a handful of orders that need your sign off on to make it official." Not that is stopping him from moving even while the paper work is being done. "What are you doing here? Tucked away some secret lore in a cache so the invaders didn't find it?"

    Rizadoman looks Haru dead in the eye and becomes as serious as if Haru just told him he was a goblin, "Who told you?" There is a long, long , long moment of silence from Rizadoman before his eyes widen a little, "Aha!" His tail wraps around something and fishes out a large book with several loose pages. Moving the package around he grabs it with his hands and picks it up. " Did you know that once a long time ago I nested in here in response to a strange mood?" The comment about signatures and paperwork goes unanswered, someone would forge his name on it eventually. "Turns out I went a little crazy and buried a bunch of leads, literally. "

Haru has this one blue eye as Haru plays the straightman routine against the wacky Law Lizard's antics. Pure Professor Snape energy coming off of the silver haired one. He even goes as far as Inspecting Riz to make sure he isnt suffering from a status effect. That is broken by the 'Aha!'. "I did hear rumors of the great Lizard Nesting of Four oh One," the Artificer replies, give or take a Yamotian Year. He continues on with the act, and what does a straightman do in these situations? They ask. "What kind of lead did you bury? Does it involve cheese?" In any other context, a wild question. In this context, valid.

    "Despite the evidence to the contrary I do not constantly only seek out cheese." Rizadoman comments as he moves towards a clear desk, people always joke about the cheese but a hole in the ground is really no where to hide it. The HQ was a much better hiding place, and sides the books hiding the cheese were emptied while he got the water boiling. As he approaches the desk and shoves everything on it off to one side, " This binder contains all the things I was working on a year ago." Opening up the book the pages can be seen very loosely in there , held by string which Rizadoman unties and begins to spread the pages out. Pages are sorted and placed on the desk in the pattern only the lizard knows for a moment but the links begin to form. Links around the goblins, around Ainz Ooal Gown, around the wave, even some divine beast research, everything he was tracking before the war. " The library seemed like the best place to leave knowledge."

Haru walks over and might have had a witty reply until the sweet sweet lore is laid out on the table. He picks up a page on the Divine Beasts. "I remember this one. Rather early on I was pursuing connections to a Yamotian Phoenix. Turns out we do not have one, but the Palace Lands does have Feng Huang. Currently bound to Middray, who was stationed here in Shibuya during its reclaiming." The paper waves a bit in his hand before he sets it down. "I can appreciate the irony in that." In the meantime he has had many Wave Artes that relate to a Fire Sprite that is a much smaller version of the greater birds. His elemental affinity for fire is only eclipsed by his connection to gem and metal. "And the irony in the question I asked Shiruba back in Ouph. Why did you stop?" he asks Riz, seriously. A page is picked up on the Waves, "There is always something that gets in the way. Undead. Gnolls. Palace Landers. Cursed Waves. But some of this stuff," he taps the paper, "could be the edge in discovery and advancement we need as an Alliance to survive the political and military climate here." Because behind that monocle, Haru is still the young man before Elder Tales. The rich son of a electronics megacompany that has been in Japan for generations. Modern day merchant prince. "Do you need help with these? Or, even, is this a private and personal investigation and not one meant to be socialized?"

    Rizadoman looks at the pages and nods his head, " That page you were holding led me to write a whole book on divine beings. So you never know what leads lead where." Taking a moment he looks through the papers and picks up the pile on the waves. "This one was something of value but it needs trackers and I couldn't tie up our trackers after the war. One of the people who came over during the wave never went back. Last tracked her as far as the Northwest of Ninetails. She was powerful enough to control a dragon..." Rizadoman trails off and growls a little, "Truly a crime."

     Taking a few more piecesaway he looks at the small pile left. "Then we have LupusRegina Beta, who is around Eas somewhere. She was behind a goblin incident which had poison that could cause increase pain. She was the provider. " Taking the page aside he puts it in another corner, then picks out two more, "Along with her associates, Shalltear Bloodfallen, last seen in Ninetales. Was responsible for poisoning candy given to children during the shadow festival, and Entoma Zeta here interupted a coming of age ceremony up in the westlands. She can summon bug minions, not to be confused with the giant ants that are also in that area, though they have appaered dormant for a while. " Finally he pulls out a final page and smakes it on top, at the top of the page is Ainz Ooal Gown. "They all work for him. Ainz Ooal Gown. His name has also been associated with certain items retrieved from waves and is a very powerful lich. Uta tried to use her special ability on his name, and I think it nearly killed her. "

     Stacking that pile up and putting it to another corner he continues to pull out pages, "The Quarantine, not sure if you were ever rbought up to speed on everything but why were we quarantined, and what did we let out when our alliance broke the quarantine. Also what significance does chess play into it all. "

     Finally he gets to the last few sheets of paper, " Finally just questions, questions with no answers. What is magic? Why is magic? What happened to the Alves? What about the goddesses the old man on new year called them his daughters. Are they really daughters to some higher god? What about the land of the spriggan now corrupted and damaged, is there anyway to cure it? Whats in the sewer beneath our feet? Is the labryinth forest solvable?" Looking up he looks to Haru for a reaction, for a moment. " That's all thats in here really. Any questions?"

"Add in 'Who is the Old Man on New Years'," Haru says on the notion of questions. "The main question I have is who knows about this and where these efforts have left off." Nothing if not pragmatic about it. "If someone came from the wave and /remained/ here, then this would prove as important or more important than the Gnoll or Undead threats. The Waves are a threat, both politically with Scale and physically." The young man takes a deep breath. It takes a moment to process all of the information. Sort it out. Focus on the important things and the important questions. "Sometimes I wonder if us Adventurers are as strong as the legends make us out to be when we have adversaries like that. If we had to pick a target to go after, the unknown person near Ninetails sounds most viable. Having that sort of power and knowledge is beneficial to both the war and to Wave mitigation." It sounds as if he is selling the value of the activity to himself, not Riz. "And no, The Quarantine was before my time in the capacity you are referencing it. Personally my research has gone into how Song and Enchanting work together along with Crown and Crown Removal. We have finite resources and have to pick our objectives with care or else we will have many half-measure investments that bear no return." He picks up a page, waving it as if to make a point. "If you had to say among all of these, what would yield the most potential knowledge or ability for us? What of these is attainable with an organized group from the Alliance's ranks?"

    Rizadoman looks up at Haru for a moment and then finds himself a seat. "That is a wonderful question. I don't have an answer. We always need something and it is ever moving. A decision now leads us to possibly needing something we decide against. " Taking another moment he shakes his head, "I am not trying to be paralyzed by decision but the decision is bigger then just me. You want an alliance focused task, we should poll the alliance. The biggest thing to me would be to drive back the palace landers to their land. For that we need something to take the attack to them. " Looking at Haru for a moment, "So I told you what I know. You can think on it, and you can come back to the others and tell them you think this."

"I have your take on it," Haru says with a thoughtful nod, "and I'll gather the thoughts of others on it as well. One thing is certain: indecision is a decision. We can do something about that by understanding what the members of the Alliance's interests are and compare them against the options we have in front of us." He motions his hand, "As much as we want everyone to agree, its not about that. Its about mutual respect in the decisions that are made in the larger best interest. I'll keep you, Giga, and Shiruba informed and consulted as we continue on, but we do need to continue on." Still, that is a lot to sift out. "Good luck with removing the Palace Lander scent," he says as he goes to leave, "and thank you for sharing this with me."