Rebuilding Science in a Magic World

Overnight, a disturbance was reported.  The missing fifth member of the group that we were looking for apparently was spotted on the village wall at one point.  They shouted something to the group in the jail cell, and the group yelled something back.  After which the person wasn't spotted again.

In the morning, before I went to the group in the jail, I prepared a few different fish options and multiple buckets of fresh water.  The biggest concern I have moving forward is that wherever these people came from, there might be more.  Even if we captured these few individuals, we have no idea about how dangerous others might be.  With the lizards and eagles, they were just beasts, and although the eagles showed some intelligence, we were able to easily outsmart them.

With other intelligent beings though, there is a much higher chance that they just swarm us, much like how we swarmed these four.  Given their armor and weapon composition, they likely come from a decently sized society.  That means that if they get reinforcements and want to fight us, we're screwed.  Even if we can take down a lot of them, there is no way we win any war, even if individually we're strong.

Which leaves us with one option, peace negotiations.  The hope here is that we can bring them around to negotiate on our behalf, and prevent some form of eradication campaign.  Of course, there are a lot of potential pitfalls involved with this.  If they're religiously motivated, or have a deep seated hatred for us, then we're probably doomed.  Which means we'll need to work on a backup plan as well.

Unfortunately, I'm still quite unskilled at the demon language, which means I'll need Zeb with me to translate things, since the one member of their group who seems to be able to speak some amount of demon does so only slightly better than myself.  I really don't want to leave survival up to any misunderstandings at this point, as I've already learned that lesson once.

When we arrived at the jail cell, it appeared that the two that weren't injured were attempting to treat their injured compatriots' legs.  Although it actually appeared that they were using some form of magic to do so.  The legs both looked significantly better than they had yesterday.  Healing magic.  That would be convenient to have.  We'll have to keep a better eye on the group moving forward though.  If they can heal themselves up, there is no reason they couldn't forcibly attempt to escape, which would be a nightmare in and of itself.

Through Zeb, I attempted to open communications, "We've brought some food options and water.  It's good to see that you're helping to treat each other's wounds.  I would have preferred not to harm you at all if we could have helped it though."

The robed dwarf approaches the food trays that we've slid into the cell, along with the water.  The others look at us with quite a bit of suspicion though.  The dwarf speaks to us, in a voice a bit higher than I was expecting, and then begins tasting the food.

Zeb looks over to me and asks, "Do you want the direct translation, or what I think they meant to say?"

I think for a moment, and say, "Why don't you ask them which they would prefer.  I'd personally prefer what you think they meant, but they might have a preference."

Zeb nods and asks the dwarf.  The dwarf looks between Zeb and me with a confused look before saying a few things to Zeb.

"They want to know if their Demon is so bad that I'm having to translate it for you.  They don't actually care which I choose."  Zeb says.

I let out a chuckle, then say, "What you think they meant is fine.  You can let them know that I don't speak demon very well, so that's why you're translating.  I don't think hiding that fact is going to be particularly useful.  Besides, they can clearly tell I'm speaking a different language between us anyway.  They could probably piece it together on their own soon enough."

Zeb nods, and speaks to the dwarf again.  At this point, the dwarf had brought the food and some of the water back to the other prisoners, who had each began eating.  The dwarf says something back to Zeb.

"They want to know why you don't speak the demon language well."  Zeb says.

"Just tell them my reason is probably the same as theirs.  It's not my first language."  I say.

Zeb nods, and relays the information to the dwarf.  The dwarf looks over at me for a little while, seemingly thinking about something.  They then shrug and return to eating.

I tell Zeb, "Ask them if they want any furniture or anything.  Although they'll have to make do with things made of stone, I don't particularly want them just sitting on the floor here."

Zeb nods and asks them, to which the dwarf seemingly asks the rest of the group before replying to Zeb.

"They would like chairs, a table, and places to sleep, if you're offering."  Zeb says.

I respond to Zeb, "Yeah, we can make those pretty easy, so I don't see why not."

Zeb then asks in English, "I know you said that we need to be cautious of bad relations with them, but they did kill a few goblins.  Please keep that in mind.  The other goblins in the village probably won't take too kindly if prisoners are treated better than themselves."

I reply, "It's good to keep that in mind.  We don't need another Kurg incident.  That said, we could deal with another Kurg.  I suspect though, that we would be unable to deal with what's coming in the near future related to these four.  So the balancing act is going to be difficult."

For the next hour or so, Zeb and I furnished their cell with the items the prisoners had requested while they ate.  Although I was interested in continuing conversation, I think it's probably best to slowly build up trust.  I don't want them to think we're easily exploitable.  Instead, I want to earn their respect if possible.  If that means waiting until we bring dinner to them to get more info, then so be it.  I had a feeling if I asked them about their fifth member at that point, they wouldn't give me real information anyway.

So, for the rest of the day, I began work on the guardhouses, while Zeb continued widening the sewer tunnel.  For the time being, trips to the ocean tide pool have been put on hold, and the village has been set to high alert.  Thankfully, we have a lot of food stored up in the smokehouse.  If we don't have any issues after a few days, we can send larger, escorted groups to the ocean to get fish to replenish our food supplies.

By evening, I'd gotten some work done on the first guardhouse.  Thankfully, we didn't have any interruptions throughout the day.  Unfortunately, the village had gone through most of the fish we had left, so the only meat on hand now is smoked eagle meat.  So for the evening meal, that is what was brought to the prisoners.

After giving it a taste, the group began eating, so I figured it was a good time to ask, "So, who is the fifth member who was up on our village wall last night, and what did you tell them?"

After Zeb translated, the dwarf clearly had a reaction, but replied, "I don't know who you're talking about."

So, they're playing it that way huh.  Fine.  From their perspective, I'm basically asking them to rat out their ally.  I move on with questioning, "Alright, so why did you kill the defenseless goblins who were merely fishing?  Before, you said something about how we would have attacked first, but I don't fully understand why you would think that. We're a relatively peaceful group, unless we're attacked."

Zeb translates again, and the dwarf responds after a little bit, "Every interaction I know of between demons and non-demons has resulted in bloodshed.  I don't see why this would be any different, although right now is a bit of an anomaly."

I ask, "What do you mean, every interaction?"

The dwarf looks about through the jail wall at the village for a little while, eating some food.  They eventually reply, "This place is a bit weird.  You really don't seem to know much about anywhere outside of here."

I'm a little bit frustrated by them dodging the question, so I ask again, "What interactions?  Enlighten me on what your experience between demons and non-demons has been."

The dwarf lets out a chuckle and begins a long story, "Well, the most recent major event was the invasion of the Demon Lord, Gokura."  At this point, during translation, Zeb gives me a worried look and continues, "That was over eight years ago now.  Whenever a new demon lord invades, it's always the same story.  They land somewhere in The Three Kingdoms, slaughter and devour everyone near where they land, and a united front is formed to eventually push them back.  Then a new demon lord will show up eventually.  Sometimes it's over a hundred years, sometimes its less than twenty.  Every time though, it's devastation."'

After I finish listening to Zeb's translation, I think back.  Gokura... Gokura... Where have I heard that before?  Oh.  I forgot because I don't use it often in English.  Everyone here has that name.  Gokura.