[WORLD ONE] SPEED DATING EXTRAVAGANZA

[spellbindmods]

Who: Participating coven members
Where: The Palai marketplace
When: Day 49
Open/Closed: OTA

[ Any and all who are in the marketplace will find that there is suddenly a mysterious barrier around the marketplace (that may be eerily familiar to some) -- specifically one large portion of the marketplace with a large number of tables and chairs, perhaps purposefully set out for nefarious reasons.

A few Palai are ushering coven members to chairs, and everything seems about normal. As normal as the Palai can be when they're putting on a show anyway. It's not until a sizable portion of the coven members are seated (and also supplied with breadsticks and small shrimp), that things get a bit more bizarre.

Thanks to the power of the Eltos, a small band of energy keeps coven members stuck to the chair (magic can interfere, of course), but that's not the end of it. On each table, next to those delicious smelling breadsticks and shrimp, is a bowl of scraps of papers. Every five minutes, a strip of paper will pop out from the bowl.

If you ask the Palai, they'll be inclined to explain speed dating to you. Asking questions, getting to know a person, then being shimmied off to the next potential mate -- this is made possible by Elto magic yet again, through flying chairs that transport their holder to a new table at standard intervals.

The Palai are extremely invested in this exercise? Will you let them down? ]

[ OOC: In the spirit of speed dating, each character will have a top level. All who want to respond to this top level can with questions from this post, but the threads have to end at 10 comments from each character. After this last tag, the characters can be assumed to have been whisked to a different potential match. You're free to have characters make up their own questions, interact with Palai serving food, etc. ]

Comments

[oneandmikleonly]

How are you planning to do so? Are you nobility, or...?

[he associates government most immediately with the kingdom (queendom now) of Hyland, the imperials of Rolance...is it possible that Flynn is a prince-knight, like Alisha, and hadn't mentioned it?]

--it's an admirable goal, I didn't mean to jump ahead. I'm just curious about other systems from ours, how they work.

[thatdamnknight]

I don't mind explaining.

[talking about his world is fun!]

I have no noble heritage. My parents were of an upper middle-class standing, but we ended up losing that when I was still a child.

[funtimes losing your dad first, getting kicked out from your home to the poor part of town and then having mom die of an illness.]

That said, I've always been determined to join the knights and rise up in rank so to bring about that change regardless of my lack of noble blood. Recently, I'd attained the rank of Captain, which is the second highest rank in my world's army, and prior to coming here, I was granted the role of Acting Commandant. Even if I return to my previous rank once all is said and done, I've no doubt that I can bring about change as things stand.

[oneandmikleonly]

I didn't mean to assume...I think our systems may work a little differently, or I just have a biased viewpoint. There are military on both sides of the continent, but my closest contact with them is Alisha, and she's a princess and a knight both. Admittedly, I don't know the backgrounds of the rest of her knights, but I think the commanders at home often have some kind of connection to the royal families.

[there's historical context for it too, but he always had other things to focus on than checking if that held up to the modern day. he files that away as another thing to check, when he goes home someday...]

...you're right that you would be able to affect change after worknig your way up like that, though. How old were you when you joined the knights...?

[thatdamnknight]

[a princess and a knight both? flynn would honestly be interested in meeting an individual like that. few members of the royal family join the ranks in his world and even fewer princesses.]

18. I'm 21 now.

[on other words, it took 3 years to go from a grunt to head honcho. no big deal.]

[oneandmikleonly]

...well, you'll definitely be able to put a lot of time into it, then, I hope.

[he hopes Flynn doesn't take that as a morbid comment on human mortality; it's not meant as one.
it's just...nice? a little inspiring? to know that there are humans who want to change the world, even in this strange fish-out-of-water environment]

What would you define as 'fair treatment,' then? What would your goals be?

[thatdamnknight]

[nah, flynn takes those words in a positive light and smiles.]

I hope so, too.

[may he be with the knights as long as possible. the longer he’s around, the more he can do.]

To change the system as whole would be my ideal. I’d like a government where all people matter regardless of rank or class or whatever else. Rich or poor, all their voices deserve to be heard. Additionally, I’d like the knights’ main goal to become protecting the people as opposed to focusing their efforts on solely the nobility or self-preservation.

[those are the ideal changes. how many of those will come to fruition or to what effect, who can say? but he will damn well try his best to make his dreams of a good government a reality.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[...he smiles just a little to himself, hiding it with a hand even though Flynn can't see it; his friends back home would approve of this human, he thinks, jaded as they are towards humans in general. he really is reminded of Alisha.]

Those are worthwhile goals indeed. A fair system like that sounds like a much better thing for humans all around -- not as much resentment, not as much major conflict. Hopefully...?

[thatdamnknight]

[exactly that. a world like that would be better for everyone. maybe he'll fall short of the ideal, but even slight change could help many people. flynn nods.]

Hopefully it'll come to pass. I'll give my all to make it so and try to overcome any obstacles that could hinder my progress.

[oneandmikleonly]

[he nods, a little]

...it's a bit like that at home, too. Sorey and I were focused a bit more on seraphim and humans coexisting, finding a way to perceive each other and live on the same level again, but there's a lot of wars too, a lot of problems with the human systems. Seraphs have their own problems too, of course, but we don't have a central governing body or anything -- we're too scattered, in comparison. Elysia is the biggest community I've seen, and there's less than twenty of us there.

[thatdamnknight]

What sort of problems do Seraphs face?

[aside from not being seen by some people.]

[oneandmikleonly]

[he sighs, at that one]

Malevolence is the biggest one. It's spiritual impurity from living things -- if it's too strong, it can poison us, and there's a lot of it at home, from all the conflicts going on. It's why you don't find many seraphs living right among humans any more.

We think we've solved the source of the worst of it, but of course there's still a lot of work to do.

[thatdamnknight]

[that sounds as rough as his own troubles. it also sounds as though a good deal of progress has been made with the malevolence if they potentially eliminated the source.

which is why flynn offers mikleo a warm smile.]

If you've already come that far then I believe you can see your goal through to the end.

[oneandmikleonly]

I--thank you.

[he can't see the bright smile he gets in return, but it's certainly there in Mikleo's tone of voice; unfortunately, on this bright note, their chairs rise in the air in preparation to whisk off]

Ack -- let's talk more later, all right? I enjoyed that.