>>5629746“I welcome you to my home, Mister Long Wang of the East… Though I understand you’ve been here for some time, hm?”
You bow your head again, in acknowledgement.
“I am told you would have words with me,” the King says, sounding rather skeptical. He regards you with eyes that, though somewhat obscured by bags of hanging, loose pink skin, are still a piercing blue-green hue, and focused as any young warrior’s might be.
“Yess,” you agree, drawing a sniff from Alexos, and a quick glance at his brother.
“Prince Rufos tells me you have rid my realm of a great evil, with the aid of Sir Heinrich Yosef. I am in your debt for this, and so I am inclined to listen.”
Rufos’ expression remains impassive, a careful mask. Ekaterine’s eyes are searching, looking to you for explanation.
“So,” this greatest King of Men and Chosen of the Gods says, “speak. I’m getting no younger, nor healthier… Nor, fi I’m being frank, am I inclined to be awake longer than I must be, at my age, unless it is to attend to important matters. I will thus assume this important, and that you will get the point, so I am wasting no time nor asking you to repeat yourself for the sake of my old ears and failing memory.”
You can’t say that the king, ill and old though he may be, strikes you as anything less than razor-sharp in his mind and keen in his senses. Even the (ceremonial) sword which he leans upon like a cane as you shifts forward in his seat radiates a sense of… <Danger>. Your instincts scream at you, from somewhere deep inside. Though he never had the chance, this man is a true scion of his ancient bloodline, possessed of all Alexos’ combat abilities and all Ekaterine’s inner fire. He may not be a dragon-killer, but it is only for the lack of opportunity, not a lack of will or power.
