Arkadia: Year 1753 Day 240

This is the first world post by Amargaard, introducing several new characters on Arkadia, as well as explaining some of the main events in the Kellaroog area. It takes place the 240th day of year 1753 in the Arkadian Timeline.

No optional artistic objects have been made for this post yet. On another note, Year 1753 Day 240 on the Arkadian Timeline equals to Year 8749 Day 647 on the Giethallax Timeline, Year 695 Day 411 on the Vatari Timeline and Year 231 Day 383 on the Vika'el Timeline.

It tells of a late night evening in Gyro's Bar, located somewhere in Kellaroog. Gyro, the bartender, enjoyed what seemed to finally become a trouble-free night, while watching Scott Goldenstar's show on the bar's TV screen. Goldenstar revealed the design and rules of a new arena being built for the upcoming season of the Rortaillent Games on Arkadia's moon, Orez. This new arena, called 'the Dreadfort', would be the location for the Games' elimination rounds.

Soon, while the Grepett bartender, is looking for his finest wine for the bar's rich guest, Pyvir Gramrobb, a new person enters the bar and strikes fear into all of the present guests - Trikant's infamous leader, Karrient. Karrient greets Gyro with a racistic comment, reminding the Grepett bartender that his kind was once slaves to the Arkans, until the old Arkan Khan decided to free the Grepetts. Karrient then walks upstairs to attend the meeting with Pyvir.

Pyvir Gramrobb lights up a Hiva cigar and tells of the future arrival of a dangerous alien intruder, called Am'ar, who must be captured and forced into slavery. Pyvir also explains that he want the drug phyckiathin injected into the alien, and then proceeds to persuade Karrient to letting him purchase the slave even before his arrival.

After the Trikant leader has left the bar, a cloaked person emerges from the shadows near Gramrobb, having observed the entire meeting covered by invisibility. This person, Ael Cremm, reveals that he is impressed with Pyvir Gramrobb's persuation skills and moves on to explaining that Pyvir wasn't as useless as he first thought...

Year 1753 & Day 240
Gyro placed the clean glass next to the others in the kitchen's broad cabinet. That was the last one for now, the old Grepett bartender thought happily to himself while hanging the wet tea towel on a nearby wooden peg rail, and stepped back out to the bar desk. Most of the guests had full glasses already, and the rest had only come to watch the popular Scott Goldenstar's show on the huge flat screen hanging on the wall in the opposite end of the room. Finally a quiet trouble-free night in the bar! Relaxed, he leaned his dark gray-furred arms on the desk, and watched the show too. Goldenstar indeed had exciting news about the upcoming season of Rortaillent Games, but it was still a horrifying tradition the old Grepett thought to himself, but listened to the news anyway.

"We have been allowed to take a sneak-peak on the construction-preparations of the huge new arena on Orez, where the elimination rounds will soon take place!" the anthromorphic host said with an excited voice, walking backwards from the camera-angle in through an archway, until he finally arrived in a huge circular arena. The roof of the moon's new arena consisted only of thick glass windows, revealing the pitch-black night sky on the other side, dotted with beautiful shining stars. Gyro would have liked the view, if he wasn't aware of what was about to follow.

"The arena is called 'the Dreadfort', and a fort of dread is exactly what it is! Just take a look at this wonder!" Goldenstar said, while the show switched to a new camera-angle, revealing the entire arena from above. It consisted of three equally huge 'islands', Scott standing on one of them. The islands were separated by broad rows of deadly pikes. In the center of the arena was located a circular tower, connected to the three islands by metallic bridges.

"I believe the tower in the middle is what gave the arena its name - I'll say it again, the Dreadfort! Sounds good, don't it?" the yellow-eyed host said followed by a short laugh before he added "But let's move on to the exciting part - the rules! They are really quite simple - three full teams, three members each, will enter the arena from their respective islands, and will have to move quickly into the Dreadfort in the middle! Victory is granted to the team who succeeds in holding the fort free of enemies for just five minutes! Or, of course, if they simply eliminate every enemy in the arena! Ha ha! However the best part, ladies and gentlemen, is that no ranged weapons are allowed in this arena, so I can guarantee you some bloody man-on-man action once the elimination rounds begin!"

Gyro shook his head, cautious not to let anyone see it - he had always thought it was a terrible sport, but he had to be careful about voicing that opinion. The Rortaillent Games meant a lot to the Arkans, the most prominent species on Arkadia, and he certainly didn't want any trouble with them. That was when his thoughts were interrupted by the bell upstairs. The upper floor in his bar held the more important, high-paying guests who preferred not to be in company with loud-yelling drunkards.

The Grepett flapped his darkly feathered wings, a couple of times, just enough for him to land on the wooden ledge at the bar on the upper floor. The night's one and only important rich guest, Pyvir Gramrobb, a chubby tycoon of the Rortaillent Games, stood impatiently by the bar desk. Everybody knew that his team had reached surprisingly high standings during last year's season of the Rortaillent Games, but unfortunately all of his gladiators were wiped out during a single match against a greater advisary. The last couple of months Pyvir had spent many late evenings in Gyro's Bar watching Goldenstar's shows, writing notes, and having meetings with other influental people in the same business field. Gyro had only heard little of their conversations, but knew Gramrobb was in the process of gathering a new competent team for the upcoming season.

"What can I help you with?" the bartender asked kindly, but his kindness was only returned by a grumpy face.

"Isn't it obvious? A bottle of your finest wine of course.." Pyvir replied shortly, and tapped his fingers impatiently on the bar desk, and proceeded to look obliquely up towards the ceiling. In fact it truly was obvious, for he almost always ordered that, mostly when he was about to meet someone important.

"Of course, my wines are downstairs, but I'll get back to you shortly" Gyro said, and jumped back out from the ledge. The old Grepett's back ached a bit when hitting the ground floor, forcing him to pause for a moment, but he couldn't worry further about that now that he had a waiting customer. He proceeded to the kitchen and looked for the finest he had to offer from his wine cellar.

This was when he heard the entrance door open from the street, and noticed an immediate silence spread among all his customers on the ground floor. The voice of Scott Goldenstar remained as the only noice in the room, except for the sound of the entering person's heavy boots stepping across the creaking wooden floor towards the bar desk. Gyro hurried grab a random bottle and headed back to the bar desk to greet the newly arrived customer, only to be filled with terror like the others. Of all people, why him?

Karrient, the infamous hot-headed leader of Trikant, which were the military forces of Kellaroog, stood on the other side of the desk. The huge muscular man wore his usual blood-red suit, with the base-colored right sleeve, but with both his hands formally folded on his back. Yet his spiky red face revealed little formality. He was angry as always, and clearly not used to the cozy atmosphere of a late night bar. The stare from the tall Arkan's pupilless blue eyes that had a scary contrast to his dark red skin, did not move a second from Gyro's nervous face.

"Need I remind you how lucky you Grepetts are that the old Khan decided to take you in?" Karrient asked in a cold deep voice, and reminded Gyro of his species' past, as slaves to Karrient's kind. Only half of the Arkans supported their Khan's decision to free the Grepetts, and Karrient was clearly not one of them. Gyro was stunned, unable to reply to such an unexpected offensive question, and Karrient quickly noticed this.

"Where is he? Where is Gramrobb?" the Trikant leader asked instead, to break the silence.

"Pyvir Gramrobb is upstairs, I.. I assume he is waiting for you sir." Gyro replied, with his gaze lowered to the bottle of expensive wine in his hands. He could not bare look into these awful staring eyes. Karrient just grunted and walked away towards the staircase, while Gyro flied back up to the upper floor's ledge, where Gramrobb was still waiting for his bottle.

"This is all I got - you can just pay when you leave" the bartender said, trying to be as kind and humble as possible, but once again, Gramrobb didn't return any of the good mood. He just grabbed the bottle and returned to his round table, near the balustrade, from where he could continue watching Goldenstar's show, until Karrient finally entered the floor. Gramrobb's face immediately lighted up upon seeing his guest arrive.

"Aaah, punctual as always!" Pyvir said and spread his arms out from his seat, as a welcoming gesture.

"Make it short, Gramrobb.. I don't like to be in a Grepett's property" Karrient exclaimed racistly and approached Pyvir's table, seemingly not caring about Gyro standing just on the other side of the bar desk. Pyvir ignored it and started pouring wine into a glass, while the Arkan pulled out a chair with his large spiky hand and sat down on the other side. The chubby tycoon then proceeded to pour wine into a second glass only to be interrupted by Karrient.

".. I do not consume any kind of drugs. Only slaves do that.." he spoke coldly, which made Pyvir raise his eyebrows for a second and then stop pouring more of the expensive beverage into the glass meant for Karrient. Instead, he just grabbed his own glass, and leaned comfortably back in his wooden chair.

"Right, I forgot. Anyways, Karrient, we have important matters to discuss. In short, I want you to set aside a third one for me." Pyvir explained, and added "In about six days he will arrive, here in the capital. It's another alien man - this one with green skin and long teeth. His name is Am'ar and I of course want him alive, with a dose of phyckiathin injected into him. Simply set him aside for me to buy, just like the two others."

Kellaroog's military leader clearly was not pleased with receiving orders like that, and grimaced while rising threatening up from his chair. The tycoon apparently wasn't frightened by this at all, as he sat calmly in his chair about to light up a Hiva cigar, barely paying attention to Karrient's outburst. The Arkan hesitated with saying anything, trying to control his temper, and this pause made him look angrily at Gyro, who had watched them from the bar desk for a while. Scared of the furious military leader, Gyro decided to leave the two others alone on the upper floor, and returned to the lower floor's bar desk, where he could be free of listening to any insults Karrient would eventually come up with. Instead, the Grepett tried calm down, and watch Scott Goldenstar's show quietly like the rest of the guests on the lower floor. At the meantime, Karrient had made up his mind.

"Listen Gramrobb - I don't know how you continue to foresee the future, and neither do I care, but you should know that Trikant's slavetrade cannot be bribed. It's a professional facility, so same rules apply to you, Gramrobb, as to anyone else..." Karrient exclaimed angrily. Pyvir slowly moved the hand with his wineglass around in small circles to aerate the wine, then took a drag off the cigar and looked up, with his usual insidious smile.

"Oh, but I am not bribing you at all, Karrient! I am merely providing Trikant with useful information when to pay attention to dangerous intruders threatening Kellaroog - and I can assure you that this Am'ar is a dangerous threat indeed! Besides, you can simply consider this an ordinary prepaid purchase - I brought you the money already, and a little extra too of course." Pyvir said while flapping a bundle of valuable banknotes like a fan, and seemingly his well-argumented persuation had paid off, for Karrient considered accepting the deal already. Suddenly the furious Arkan spontaneously pulled out the money from the gem-clad hand of Pyvir, who at first was a bit shocked by the hasty movement, but it didn't take long for another broad insidious smile to spread on his face. Karrient stroked a big red finger through the banknotes, and turned his attention to the smoking tycoon.

".. I will put extra patrols on the streets in the next couple of days, and if he arrives like you say, I will set him aside for you.. but don't make it a habit coming to me.." Karrient spoke, and then walked down the stairs and out the bar without further ado.

Pyvir Gramrobb remained in the seat with an insidious smile and his eyes locked upon the wine in his glass. He then took a zip, and put the glass calmly back on the table.

"You see, master Cremm? I told you he was easy to persuade. Your plan works perfectly already!" Pyvir said, while a cloaked person slowly turned visible on a nearby chair. The mysterious person had secretly observed the entire meeting, hidden by an invisibility spell. The mysterious Ael Cremm, whose face was completely hidden by the shadows of his dark green cloak, took a zip of a teacup, and opened his glowing green eyes, as the only part of his face that could be seen.

"Indeed, well done Gramrobb. I admit you are not as useless as I first thought..." Ael Cremm replied, and closed his eyes again while taking another zip...