>>5397059The next day, the Drow tailor-armourers bring you the fruits of their labours. It is your first time donning such equipment, but with the elves’ aid, you come to understand how to elaborate confabulation of leather straps and insect-chitin components fit together.
Your elven attire exposes altogether more skin than you expected, though a sleeveless tunic of rough, thick-woven silk backs it to avoid chafing; hardly necessary for one such as you, but you suppose it is a sensible precaution for thin-skinned, scaleless elves. Your forearms and talons are reinforced by gauntlets which, upon closer inspection, seem more ornamental than functional—they will guard you from small weapons, glancing blows from blades, but would hardly deflect the direct impact of a blunt weapon like a mace or maul with any effectiveness. Your thighs and the back of your calves are mostly bare, too, though greaves and boots protect the front of your legs, and a codpiece guards your genital slit with a rather unnecessary bulge and gap—a stylistic touch that seems to crudely imply perpetually-external mammalian genitals. Perhaps they simply couldn’t figure out how to shape that piece without something like that, or feared it would imply femininity?
The armour is flexible, at least, allowing room for future growth—through <Dragonshape> transformation or more permanent transfigurations; it seems your changed appearance since your last visit was not lost of Jazkarmel or her servants. Lending the whole affair a touch of personal livery, the chitin has been engraved and stained with some yellowish ochre, as if to simulate the gold-and-black colour scheme which you wore upon your first visit to these people; the engravings are winding, serpentine designs, clearly meant to evoke a great snake or dragon. The chest-piece is sturdy, as well, multilayered and thick; it bares a fearsome, fanged visage with draconic horns.
As a finishing touch, the stylist-courtesan (now wearing the same light armour as the males, and as you) joins her male counterparts. She steps close—close enough for you to get a whiff of that enticing aroma one more time—and pins your hair in place, in an elaborate arrangement of braids and bun.
“It is good,” Jazkarmel notes, looking you up and down with clear approval.
Do you concur?
>Yes, it’s actually what you had in mind when you forsook the heavier plate>No, but you will wear it for now—until you can replace it properly, for the sake of politeness>No, you feel ridiculous. You’re shaving your head, putting your cloak back on, and forgetting this whole embarrassing escapade 