>>5356623>>5356381>>5356356>>5356346>>5356317>>5356315Before you leave, there are matters you must discuss with the Elf-Specialist. It has been some time since you last saw the Serpent Priest in question, having left the unenthusiastic missionary with instructions to proselytize to the interested dark elves in terms appropriate to their unique culture. It is a culture he abhors, but you trust that he will have listened. Your only questions is how it has proceeded.
“Poorly,” he laments.
Disappointed, you ask him why this is.
“They mock my accent,” he hisses, tail swishing, long neck bowed in a slouch. “’You sound like the traitors on the surface,’ they say. As if THEY are not simply strayed from the superior strain of their sad species…”
“I thought I told you to speak to these dark elves in terms they could understand,” you admonish, growing annoyed now. “Remember? In terms of our SHARED values? Survivalism? Pragmatism? Strength-through-trial?”
“I have tried,” the Elf-Specialist sighs. “But… These virtues which you ask that I emphasize… I do not…”
The Elf-Specialist struggles to spit out the words, but you spare him this shameful burden—of admitting a deficiency to a technical genetic subordinate. He is an academic, a linguistic and cultural specialist. As a Serpent priest, the Elf-Specialist is taller, stronger, and more imposing than any elf—let alone a stunted Drow—but he is no mighty warrior, nor a scout or survivalist. He has been raised in luxury (relatively speaking) and in libraries.
“These elves… I tell them of great deeds done and perils overcome with the aid and inspiration of the Dark Gods Beyond and Below, and they ask me silly questions—Beyond what? Below where? Can they go see them? When I cannot give simple answers, the monkeys chatter and laugh—damned mammalian ATHEISTS, Dragonborn, mocking our Dark Pantheon!”
“There must be a way to get through to them,” you insist.
“They demand evidence,” he sighs. “They are… Faithless.”
Evidence? Well, that seems manageable. But what SORT of evidence?
>Tell the Elf-Specialist of the cursed hotspring, and lend him your moon-blade and the secret words to weld its powers—perhaps he can demonstrate your subjugation of the ancient sacred, as you did?>Have him gather the skeptical elves to join you for a sacred communion with the Dark Gods—you shall light a candle, say the sacred hymn, and show them what you were shown: their comrades, and Paeris, in the realm of the Serpent Ascendant>Call another tournament, and show your might to these skeptical elves in the form of another ritual duel—it has won their respect before>Delay your trip to take the elves on a journey-quest into the deep darkness yourself, and resanctify the cursed hot-spring yourself… Though it will further delay your return to Bloodrise>Write-in 