Open A Lesson for Two

[Zephari]

23th of Summer 515 AV

Zephari was quickly learning that she could never go a full week with "normal" days of work. She had been hear for just over a season now and it seemed that was an impossibility. Sure there were the days when she would just sit in the mines cracking away at a deposit, and on occasion she would get to work her friend Havar, but about every three days of work something weird by her standards would happen.

This ranged from some odd new gem being found my one of the reimancers in the lower levels, to some gas pocked almost suffocating some miners in another tunnel. She was rarely ever involved with the weird occurrences that happened in these mines, but on the times she was it was almost enjoyable, as it kept the job interesting.

Today was no exception. Some Akalak mines had dug into an underground tar pond in one of the upper levels, and almost drowned. The black goop had leaked down into the mid levels in which Zephari was working, and it ended up being that the entire work force had to break from their current job to help with cleanup, as the tar pool didn't seem to have an end. Zephari who wasn't exactly the strongest miner on the force was delegated to running supplies back and forth for the reimancers.

She spent the majority of the day running trips back and forth from the waterfall that cascaded down the main shaft from the creak on the surface. This creak's flow into the cave was carefully regulated by water reimancers on the surface, and it is used for keeping the mines cooled, and acting as a drinking source for the miners.

Zephari spent the afternoon running back and fourth carrying flasks and flagons to refill with water, as you needed a lot of water to clean tar out of people's eyes as the crews of workers and magic users pushed back the tide of black gloop. Most of the time Zephari was envious of the people who did the actual work in situations like this in the mines, but not this time. She was entirely happy to run water to the people dealing with it, as she hated the smell and feel of the tar, and was very glad that she only got a little of the horrid liquid on her hands.

The mine was closed early that day to allow for the cleanup to continue unhindered by people working, so Zephari finished up her work as fast as she could and headed out. As she headed for the great lift she tripped over a loose stone that was covered in globs of tar. After sitting and breathing hard to let the pain subside from her stubbed toe Zephari knelt down and picked up the rock, wanting to examine the rock.

It looked rather unremarkable at first, but as Zephari scraped some of the tar away from it, she began to see small glimmers of blue. She kept cleaning it off as she walked to the great lift, and kept doing so until she arrived at the surface. With the light of mid later afternoon now glimmering on the stone she could easily see there were many small crystals within the rock, of a dark rich blue color.

This of course delighted Zephari, as she automatically assumed that it was Akalite, one of the most prized gems around here, as it was named after the blue giants who inhabited Riverfall. But uppon further inspection she realized it was much darker and richer than Akalite, which was more translucent and usually glimmered pretty heavily. This was a duller darker blue, almost like a pastel paint.

Now normally Zephari would take her haul from the day to Kenan at his tent to help fill her seasonal quota, but she decided against it this time. This rock was all she had for the day, and she was very curious to figure out what it was, as she had never seen this crystal before. So she instead took the crystal and put it in her bag and headed straight for the city.

Upon her arrival back at the city gates she headed for Semele Park. She pretty much ignored her surroundings, only pulling her attention back to the real world when some one would say hello or wave at her, but otherwise her mind was preoccupied by the new crystal she had found.

He pace slowed as she entered the park. Semele Park was one of the quietest and most peaceful places in the bustling city, and it was a great place to sit and think. She wandered around the small pond in the middle of the park until she found a place to sit between two large limestone boulders on the edge of the pond.

Sitting down she pulled the stone out of her bag and began to wash it in the pond, removing the last bits of the tar from it. It was a large grained conglomerate stone, with the blue crystals embedded in the rock. The crystals had not grown in this rock, but had instead been added to it when the rock used to just be a pile of mud and sand. Each crystal was about the size of a thimble, and there must have been about twenty five of them in total on the rough surface of the rock.

"I've never seen anything quite like this one. Maybe there is something called like Dark Akalite or something? Because these aren't like the one's I've found before" she said softly, rolling the slightly larger than a fist sized rock around in her hands, looking at each crystal for a few ticks. She was completely oblivious the whatever was happening around her, and to whoever else mite be in the part.

OOC NoteBelow is a picture of what the rock looks like. Imagine a concrete esque looking rock covered in these little blue gems. This gem is in fact azurite if you want to look it up.

Gem :

[Duron]

Standing at the entrance of Semele park, Duron took of his yellow green vest. It was hot, and he didn't want to overheat on his jog, so the less clothing the better. The cerulean noticed a couple walking out of the park, and when the “normal” akalak saw him, he linked his arm in-between the arm of his lover and made a wide birth around him. Seeing the protective look on the akalak's face, Duron just tilted his head with amusement in his eyes and gave the skittish pair a impish grin. The reject enjoyed the Cerulean Cult stigma of being unpredictable and dangerous from time to time because he enjoyed making the “normals” uncomfortable. “Normals” were his nickname for the akalak not in the Cerulean Cult. When the human woman gave him a sideways glance and fixed her eyes on his intricate tattoos, the reject gave her a wink. The woman immediately blushed and turned her gaze to the ground as she continued walking down the road. Holding his vest in his hand, the cerulean turned his attention back to the path and started his slow jog.

As Duron jogged down the paved trails, the tattooed man was bombarded by different floral scents with every turn or fork in the path.He knew flowers grew natural all over the world, but they were arranged in Semele such artistic fashion, so it was hard to call them natural. It sort of took away from the natural beauty of the plant itself. He had this bias because he was a hunter, and he felt the nature had a much better grasp on beauty than mortals did. It was almost calming to be surrounded by such artificial beauty, but the amount of people in the park sort of made him uncomfortable. He was about five chimes into his jog, and he stopped to catch his breath. The cerulean green eyes caught a glimpse of a akalak warrior training with his lakan in a deserted patch of grass. The reject stood and watched the fluid motion of his blocks and attacks. Each movement in his technique was deadly and effective, and Duron was tempted to ask if he could train with him, but he figured the man was trying to concentrate, so he doubted the man would allow him to join him.

Standing up, Duron continued his jog down the paved path. After another five chimes of running, the reject could feel his heart start to pound and his breath started to become labored as he continued down the path. The akalak pushed himself a little farther, and eventually, he stopped, wiped the sweat off his forehead with his vest, and took a drink of water. Hearing the sound of birds chirping, Duron closed his eyes to listen to them sing without any distraction from the surroundings. The birds seemed happy as they sung about their freedom. The cerulean smiled and opened his eyes and continued his run through the park. As he continued his run, the tattooed man saw bucket in the middle of the path, and he could see a blue man tending the garden. Duron started pick up speed until he was sprinting down the path as he got closer to the bucket. He jumped over foot tall bucket and landed on his feet. He stumbled a little bit on the landing, but he was able to regain his composure and continued his jog down the path.

Eventually, Duron jogged into the center of the park by the lake, and he noticed that the area by the small body of water had a small collection of people. Most were other akalak, but there was a small number of human, konti, and a small mix of other races enjoying the lake. Deciding, he didn't want to draw to much attention to himself, he put the vest over his head and walked through the grassy area to the lake. When he got edge of the lake, he noticed a woman sitting off to the side between a grayish boulder and the edge and the lake. Duron's eyes noticed that she was holding another rock in her hand, so he walked closer to get a better look at the rock. He saw the rock was littered with small blue crystals on the surface. As he looked at the rock, he wondered if it was worth money. Looking at the woman, he noticed that she was human with brown hair and light brown skin. She was a attractive for a human female. Still curious about the strange crystals, Duron walked over to the brown haired woman. As he walked, he did his best to walked heel to toe to limit the amount of noise created by his footsteps. With his vest still covering his head, he said in common with a small smile on his face, “Pretty rock. What is it called?”

[Zephari]

The sudden words startled the the benshira, forcing her to thrust a hand into the water in order to keep herself from falling face first into the pond. Her stomach lurched and cramped slightly because of the angle she had to arch her back at to prevent herself from falling, but the pain quickly receded as she righted herself.

Leaning against one of the larger boulder she turned around to look the person who had spoken. This startled her for a second time. By now she was used to the giant blue men whom she had lived alongside for so long now, but she was not used to the ones with the tattoos. She honestly should have been used to them by now, but due to her exposure to them being almost purely as them being laborers in the mines, she did not have much experience. They creeped her out a little, though she also found them interesting. She only knew that they were considered outsiders, and that was caused by them having "Imbalanced" souls. She had never really figured out what that meant.

"By Yahal you scared me." she sighed, finally letting herself breath after the scare. After taking in two deep breaths, she continued; "I am not really sure. I am actually trying to figure that out. It is similar to a crystal called Akalite, but it's darker."

After her answer she looked into the eyes of the tattooed giant, expecting to see a look of simple greed as was common when people asked her about crystals. While she thought she saw greed, she mainly thought she saw a look on genuine curiosity, which surprised her.

Looking back down at the rock, she rolled it over a few times trying to find the largest crystal. The mixed stone had many different rock types in it, so it made it somewhat difficult to pick out what was crystal and what wasn't. Upon finding the largest crystal on the stone, she positioned it so that one was on top, and held the stone up toward the Akalak, as to let him see better.

Why do these guys have to be so freaking tall? Just makes everything harder for the rest of us! she contemplated, a small smile crossing her lips at the comedic thought. Her hand turned the rock back and forth to make it glimmer in the light, though it did not glimmer much, which make Zephari smirk.

"Normally crystals are so much shinier than this, it's weird" she said with a slight irritation in her voice. Bringing the crystal back down to her level, she noticed that she was still covered in dirt and torch smudges from the waist down from work. "Damnit! Forgot to change when I got home!"

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[Duron]

Duron smirked to himself that he was able to startle the human woman who seemed to not notice his approach. The woman told him that dark blue crystal wasn't akalite because it was darker than akalite. The akalak had no idea what she was talking about. He wondered if she worked in the gemstone mines. It seemed likely if she used such a scientific sounding name for the blue crystal. When she said the crystal should be shinier than the one in her hand. Duron knelt down to get a better look at crystal and suggested, “Maybe the Hall of Stone has it cataloged in it's collection. They might have your name for you mysterious stone.” Standing up, the woman seemed quite startled by her appearance, but to the akalak who grown up with a miner. He understood how dirty a person could get when he or she had been working in the mines. Duron shook his head and said with a chuckle, “Don't worry about your appearance with me. My father was a miner, so I am used to people coming home covered in head to toe in dirt. My father always told me that a layer of dirt adds character to a person appearance. The more dirt that you have on you the harder you worked.”

Running a hand through his black hair, Duron had to admit that he was curious about the woman. Maybe it was the fact that she reminded him of his father. His father's career was a miner in the gemstone mines even though he married into a well-off bloodline now. Now he was a blacksmith for the mine, so he didn't spend as much time in the dirt as he did in the past. Sticking out a hand to the woman, he said with a smile, “My name is Duron. What is your name?” He figured a introduction would be the polite thing to do before he started to ask her information about herself. Letting the curiosity takeover, the Cerulean asked, “Let me make a guess. You work for the gem mines don't you? What do you do? My father worked in the ground most of his adult life, but he is now a blacksmith for them. Are you a laborer or are you a researcher?”

[Zephari]

The man's words where smooth and respectful, even more so than the usual deep tone that Akalaks tended to have. His words were sounded true when the Akalak spoke of his father, and of hard work. All Akalaks in her experience respected strength and hard work but this one was slightly different, a different type of understanding.

His question confirmed this idea. "I am a geologist and miner in the mid levels of the mine. If your dad is a blacksmith then he probably made my pick, cus I only know of two or three smiths that work directly for Typhus." she replied with a big smile. Shaking the water from her hands she stood up to her full height, still over and foot and a half shorter than the Akalak.

"My name is Zephari." she answered, stick her hand out to shake his, rather boldly. She still had the slightest twinge of fear in her expression, as she was standing in the shadow of a cerulean who she didn't know, and she'd heard the stories.

"By how you said it, I would take it you yourself aren't a miner? Would explain why I have never seen you before."

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