Meet the Author: Rizadoman

    As the last light of sunlight fades, the children of Fort Ouph have gathered in the center of town, where a massive bonfire has been put together. The one who made it had worked on it now all day, dragging one large piece of lumber after another into town, the cold air visible on his breath. Rizadoman hefts one final log into the pile with a groan before he steps back and shouts, "Gather one and all! For I shall share with you today a tale of magic and adventure, love and tragedy, and yet behind it all will be the truth of the past. " Rizadoman then breathes fire upon the logs lighting it ablaze and standing in front of it, waiting for all to gather.

    Once the people gather, and children are directed to sit up front for the best view Rizadoman nods his head before he begins, " Today's tale takes place long ago, when the first adventurers departed this land. The people of this land were left without their protectors and instead they were left to fend with the monsters and villians that swarmed to fill the vaccuum of power. " Taking a moment some enchanted powder is thrown into the fire as the smoke and shadows of the fire begin to show monsters fighting people. "Back then there was a simple street urchin, her name was Gracia. She lived day to day as best she could but she had lived a hard life and had little. Little did she know that she would be one of the heros of the future to come. " Again as he talks , the smoke and shadows shift to match Rizadoman's words showing a lone skinny feminine shape.

    "Meanwhile, through the forest, is our other protagonist of the evening. A thief who steals to survive, Dante. A man who was forced to crime to live through these hard times. " The shadows change to show tree tops and a man leaping from one another before Rizadoman waves his hand dismissing the smoke. " Let us begin the story of 'Beasts and Monsters' " The lizardman throws something on the ground that when it strikes lets off a flash of light and sounds of thunder.

Schneider stands a bit off to one side. Ever interested in historical stories if they have some truth to them, he will listed to Rizadoman. He knows just a little about thr era Riza is speaking of, and he will not interrupt, guessing that sime interesting history is about to be told, and possibly less contentious than the pieces he learned and was compelled to remain silent about.

    Drawn by the sound of thunder and flashing lights, Fuka ambles in at a somewhat more rapid pace than her normal flounce. "No one told me there were fireworks!" exclaims the exciteable sylph, looking around wildly. Then blinking at the smoky illusion. "O-oh. Not explosions then? Battle? Ooooh neat!" she says, settling in with the rest of the small folk to observe the tale. And probably interrupt and heckle a little. It IS Fuka after all. "Carry on, storyteller! Oh, Riz'daman!" Fuka adds, with a usual excess of exclamation marks.

Shiruba is here, and she is not alone. She's brought some children from Ninetails, several likely orphans from the conflict with the Undead Army or the Dark Waves, to listen to stories and poems and other daring plots. So they can learn what it's like to be proper heroes of the people, and not the monsters many of their kin had been subverted into.

Done in some degree in Gabriella's honor. She'd want future generations to learn of the great trials and valiant deeds done by Adventurer and Lander alike. To be more like them and less like... the darker corners of existance.

Shiruba is sitting and listening intently. Of course the kids, being kids, are listening but also fidgeting. At least until the shadow play starts. This is something most of them haven't seen and keeps their attention for a bit longer.

Back on earth Llyn would have been doing such thing as PR work for the books she did. Still it's fun to be on the other end. She smiles at Shiruba but the look on her face goes to a frown then one to concern as she scans the children. She does not say anything on that as she comes in to meet the Lizard man hisslef. Also there is an elf around here somewhere but she's headed off to deal with something at the moment.

    Rizadoman has been going for a good fifteen minutes , talking about the character Gracia, explaining how she met Dante in passing and that they really didn't seem to get along at first. Then he went on to tell how Gracia had been lured off the street with promises of a new life by the mage tower. The smoke shapes into a rather good recreation of the mage tower and continues to shift to follow and match the lizardman's words.

    " She was not the only one to take up the offer of a new life either. In the Mage Tower they stayed, as they were offered room and board in exchange for a chance to help the people. Her turn came, down the tower stairs she went. A potion given, and a slumber took her. Then the magic began..." Rizadoman trails off as the female image begins to be overlapped with a magic circle and then seems to have seizures and convulsions beforeslowly changing, growing taller and her fingers gaining claws. " Gracia, the Hyena Cait Sith was born that day, the first Cait Sith. " There is an image of the lone female cait sith before Rizadoman adds, " Not the last though, joining her as the first few was Rey, the fox. Neko , the monkey, Superbias, the chameleon, and Tsurachi, a Komodo Cait Sith. They were the first of the Cait Sith. "

    Rizadoman gestures to the smoke as more people stand with the figure now in the shadows, " Created by the mage tower to give the people of the land the help they needed. These people, these Cait Sith took on the features of the animals they were fused with and were trained to fight the villians of the land and help to restore peace to the villages and towns that needed them the most. " The smoke figures shift and begin to fight smoke monsters but in the end the cait sith figures seem to barely win. "Unfortunately , the new Cait Sith were not enough. They needed something more. So their creator, Jered Gan returned to make something more. "

    "Just as before aa need for those brave enough to take on a new life was found, and this time though it as those who had brought woe on the people that would be the one to set things right. Thats right, thieves and villians, promised freedom and a new life if they would join. Included in this group was a recently caught thief that we havve already met called Dante." The Dante figure appears in the smoke oncce again before the magic circle. " Jered Gan cast his magic on Dante and the transformation began. " A toss of powder into the fire causes it spark and crackle and roar loudly as Rizadoman shapes the smoke to show different runes and the typical Werefang tattoo before teh fire dims slowly and things go silent.

    The fire breathes back to life as Rizadoman speaks back up now showing a new groups of figures around the 'Dante ' figure. " The magic ended and a new species was born, though they weren't aware of it yet. This would be the birth of the Werefangs. "

    Rizadoman gives the crowd a moment before he speaks up looking at the children around him, "You see these new Werefangs they did not know how to become the monster they were in. No they had to learn it but when they did, they became the power that was needed to help the Cait Sith bring order to the lands in chaos." The humanoid figures are shown shifting into more monster shapes, some loook hulk like, some have wings and others look more like a traditional werewolf. There is even one that is a lizardman.

    "The protectors of manity were created and with the Cait Sith they were able to defeat the monsters and villians that threatened the innocent. " Both figures of the Werefang and the Cait Sith are shown fighting with monsters and winning easily. The torches around the square brighten up as Rizadoman steps infront of the fire, " Which is where we will end the story for the night, however that is most certainly not the end of Gracia and Dante. No they have much more story to be heard. "

     Questions begin to tossed out from children and adults alike and Rizadoman begins to field them best he can.

This turning into telling the origin story of the Cait Sith and Were Fangs gets more apt attention of most of the Ninetails children, as several are young Cait Sith or Were Fangs, or know someone of the races, and so on. It gets Shiruba's attention too, though from a more scholarly point of view, being one of New World's two resident Loremasters.

There's a lot of oos and aahs, though one smart alec starts asking why Neko was the name of a monkey and not a cat.

Schneider looks skeptical of Riza's history, as he vaguely recalls something a lot less neat and clean and woven together. But he's not going to get any mileage by being a jerk. So he asks Riza, "On a scale where 10 is absolute literal truth and 1 is pure metaphor, where would you say this story stands?" With the bonus that the kids are unlikely to understand the question /or/ the answer.

Llyn is listening intenly to Rizadoman with a critical eye it might be easy for him to tell another writer is clearly watching and asssessing him. She does seem to be enjoying herself as she forms a block of ice to sit on. Stupid Undine tricks 101 right there. She seem to be enjoying it a good deal and starts to think about her writings.

"Also given the human races long obession with cat girls."

She clearly being humours.

"I"m curious how much lore you had to did up to write this and where did you find it if you did?"

    "I'm not sure about obsessing about long cats." Fuka murmurs, though it's a stage murmur that carries well enough. "Or just humans doing so. But short cat girls are adorable too you know!" the sylph says.

    She eyenarrows at Schneider, though there's no heat behind it. Just sus. "Are you suggesting Riz'daman is making this up? I can't imagine him making up a story just for fun!" Fuka claims. Whether she means she thinks he's fundamentally honest or whether she's claiming he's just uncreative, well, who knows?

    Rizadoman stands and answers a question from a parent, "All the stories of Gracia and Dante and their friends will be coming to a near by library and book store soon." Then the lizardman hears the question from Schneider and smiles and steps infront of the fire as he speaks, " The question has been asked if these people were real and to that I will only say that the story makes them real. Whether they truly existed or not before tonight , my words , the smoke, your own minds gave them life. That is the power of story, a power where we can become the gods and goddesses of the world we create. " It is a total non-answer for the children but in the midst of the talking Rizadoman flashes Schneider a 5 on his hand.

     Turning to Llyn, meeting her eyes for a moment and judging them before he speaks up on that, "I find that when I want to write a story I go right to the source. Unforunately they declined the interviews, so instead I took the history of the people and simply gave it more life." In otherwords he has some pages of documentation but thats it. Then Rizadoman turns to look at Fukaziroh and adds, "Thank you for the support Fukaziroh."

That answer yet not entirely an answer gets a snicker from Shiruba. Yet he's not entirely wrong, history is often a reflect of who's accounting it as it is of the past itself.

One of the kids tries to creep forward, wanting to see what trick was used to make the shadow puppets, but stops when Rizadoman moves around the fire. Then he is quickly grabbed by the scruff by Shiruba and pulled back amongst the others before he can cause a ruckus.

Schneider eyes Riza's hand, and a 5 is more than he would have guessed based on what was said to the kids. But he simply nods to the answer. He supports Riza's right to embellish by saying, "The older participants are necessarily not chatty on the subject of times gone by. There is a lot more that they have cause not to see shared, so I can see them being generally reticent."

Llyn listens for a moment and tilts her head a little bit.

"A good way to do it as you can. Also being honest about it I think is good as well as it was enteraining. Yes stories have power they can unify a culture or people. To destroy them can break the soul and bonds of a nation on which they were part of the foundation."

    Rizadoman looks about and nods his head, " Yes as was said the stories of a land can bind the people of the land. It can cause people to take up the banner of heros and unite as one. " He says as he rubs the head of one of the young children. "Now then to the parents of the group, again my book with this story and more is coming out soon. I would encourage you all to find it and share it with your children, at the same time take care. Some of it may be a little scary for those to young. Please read appropriately." All Rizadoman needed was to get Yamato's first parental riot.

Schneider considers Riza's story. It's pretty positive, and not disfavorable to the status quo. But Scheider wonders, "Did you stumble onto any other history in your researches? Maybe things that didn't fit neatly into this particulat narrative? Which libraries have you checked?"

    Where Fuka's from, one does not ask questions of the teacher unless invited to. Then again, this is Fuka. "This whole werefang cait sith fuzzyfication thing was entirely willing, then? No tricks? No scams? No blackmail or getting someone drunk and they wake up chained to an oar?"

Llyn seem pleased at this. "I think i will pick up a copy but how are you rolling them out given so far as I knew there were limits." She seems to be interested and does seem to be in a good mood. She looks to Fuka and humms curious about this question.

"It's possible but it will take time," Shiruba explains to Llyn. "Large scale printing is still a relatively new and expensive process."

    Rizadoman speaks up and answers the easy questions first as he notices most the landers beginning to disperse, since it is late after all. " Well as Shiruba said, we will start with mass publishing. Enough copies for the libraries, and then to supply some for book salers. After that I am thinking of looking at the new multimedia books that are under developments and put it out there to. Finally of course I would like to teach the stories to the bards and spread the stories by voice. " Rizadoman sounds hopeful before he looks at FUkaziroh, " The story I told you tonight was the story tonight Fukaziroh, of course if you wish to know more you should read the book. " That definately sounds like he may have adjusted things for the crowd tonight and then his eyes fall on Schneider, " I found the documentation in the Tower of Mages, while trying to get an interview with Jered Gan. Unfortunately beside that I don't know what you mean."

Schneider looks intrigued at getting anything out of the Tower of Mages. "/Now/ you've told me an interesting thing," he says. "You are definitely a lizard with some contacts if you got a chance to do research with them. At some point, you'll have to introduce me."

    Rizadoman looks at the group of people still about as he summons a bubble of water hovering over the fire. " And with that I will call an end to this gathering of story telling. See you all next time." The bubble pops pouring water out on the fire before all the torches extinguish leaving everyone in the dark. For at least a moment before the torches come back up. It would appear Rizadoman has a flare for dramatics.