Magical vacation in Scotland [Rackie & Arc | Private]

"But that's like, the best part," Yurio said, but immediately shook his head. "No, never mind, no refunds," he then said, pausing. "Ah! What's a hurdy-gurdy?"

Aurora stared at him with her mouth slightly agape. "It's a medieval instrument. It's a wooden box with strings attached, a small keyboard, and a crank. It kinda sounds like bagpipes, but I much prefer hurdy-gurdy over bagpipes." Aurora finally explained.

"Oh, I see," Yurio said, rolling over onto his back and putting his hands out in front of himself, trying to imagine it. Clearly, by the way he set his hands in the air, he still had no idea. At least he was trying.

Aurora scratched the back of her head. She couldn't describe it well enough herself. "Gimme a sec." Aurora said, before crawling to the other side of the bed to grab her phone from the bag. After a quick internet search, she showed Yurio a bunch of pictures depicting the instrument. "Here. That's what it looks like. Ah, should've given you a lute. Would've been easier to describe."

"Oh, I see now," he said, looking over the picture and placing his hands in mostly, if not entirely, the right place. It was a strange instrument after all.

Aurora giggled at how Yurio tried to pretend like he was holding the instrument. "Alright. So you're traveling with this caravan through the ancient forests. You can hear your guide talking about the local tribes and how they don't like it when the colonists step their feet into those sacred old temples and other stuff. Anyway, it's all mostly banter. On one of the last days of your travel, your road got blocked by a fallen tree. It's late already, thus your guide decided to set up a camp near some old ruins. You sit by a fire, under the night's sky. In your caravan, there is this one person who never takes their helmet off. You notice how that person tries to just... sort of push food underneath the helmet and eat it that way. Anyway. What do you do?"

Yurio thought about his answer, while pretending to crank the handle on his imaginary instrument. "Uhm... I'm going to ask the guy, 'hey, what do you think about the whole tribe talk stuff? I mean, we're near a ruin right now. Don't want to step on any toes.'"

Aurora couldn't stop herself from laugh as she watched Yurio play on an imaginary hurdy-gurdy. It was too amusing. A moment later she put on a straight face. "'Hm... Provoking the locals would be stupid. Let's not move any closer to that pile of rubble.' The bucket head told you with a deep, but boyish sounding voice." Aurora said, trying to use her best narrator's voice.

"Right, yeah. I just hope we're not too close already," he said, smiling as he sat himself up. He couldn't keep his arms up like that anymore, however. He didn't want his muscles to cramp up...

Aurora remained in her position for a moment, before she followed Yurio's example and sat up on the bed. "'If we are, then we're in for bloodshed.' The knight-looking person let out a somewhat feminine sigh, before standing up to stretch their body. 'Anyway, waterskins a' gettin' empty. Let's do a good deed and fill some up.'" Aurora was clearly having fun playing with voices. She was trying to give both her narrator persona as well as the knight two distinct voices.

"'Yeah, sure, lets do that,'" Yurio said, nodding his head. "Uhm... Guess I'll follow this person, then."

Aurora nodded in response. "Okay, so the knight-person gives you two big waterskins, while they themselves take four of them. You two slowly walk into the woods towards a nearby river A few minutes pass by until you're finally there. The knight looks up at the full moon and, before kneeling by the stream to fill the waterskins. 'So, yer a bard yeah? You must know some entertaining songs... or tales, yes?' The knight stated." Aurora said, trying to picture everything in her head.

"'Totally, a whole bunch,'" He said, nodding his head, knowing enough about what 'bard' means to agree with it. "I'm going to do the same as him. Er, obviously, I guess."

"Gotcha. So after a while, all the waterskins are full of water. Their size and the amount of them put weight on your arms." Aurora said, continuing the narration. "'I've always liked listening to the bards and their fantastic tales. Sing a ballad for us back in the camp, will ya?' The knight said, then asked, before they started making way back towards the camp. Suddenly you smell something burning in the distance. For some reason, the fire from the camp grew larger and brighter."

"I'm about to answer, but noticing what's happening in the distance, I turn around and start running towards it." Yurio said, leaning forward a little bit. Seems he was a little more interested now that something was happening.

Aurora nodded, smirking upon noticing that she started getting his interest. "The knight follows after you and starts running as well. Their armor didn't slow them down at all despite looking somewhat heavy. Your good ears the racket made by the steel of that armor. Once the trees stopped obscuring your view, you saw a truly dreadful sight - the camp was on fire. Your other co-travelers were nowhere to be seen and the horses were gone. 'We gotta investigate...' The knight muttered, dropping the waterskins and reaching for their sword." Aurora narrated.

"I'm going to go and try to put some of the fires out, maybe we can save something that'd be of use," Yurio said, after thinking about it.

"You do that, while the knight keeps an eye on the surrounding, to make sure you wouldn't get ambushed by whatever attacked the camp. While putting the fires out you find more bodies. Some of them don't look like the members of the caravan though. Eventually, the fires are out. You've managed to save some equipment - tools, money, food and a few weapons." Aurora kept narrating, coming up with the events on the go.

"I'm going to try bag up as much of that stuff as I can. It could be useful," Yurio said. His draconic tendency towards keeping anything of value manifested itself as the generally expected hoarding within the little game, where it really didn't in real life.

Aurora just took it as Yurio playing his character. Well, until she remembered how dragons in fantasy books liked to hoard gold and other valuables. That realization hit her a bit late, however. "Thanks to a backpack you've found nearby, packing valuables and food wasn't that big of an issue. Although the more gold coins you shoved into your pockets, the more the knight stared at you. Aside from money and food, you got a bow with a quiver which held 21 arrows... two daggers, an axe and a small hammer. Meanwhile, the knight retrieved a small wooden shield from under a damaged carriage. 'You done looting?' The knight asked."

"'Oh yes, I've found anything that could be useful,' I say, slinging the bag onto my back," Yurio said, while miming the action with a couple nods and a smile.

Aurora giggled at Yurio's gesticulation and gave him a quick peck on the cheek. She then cleared her throat. "Ahem! 'Good. I think we should find out what happened here... Or rather, where were the survivors taken' The knight suggested." She narrated

"'Right, right. Well, lead the way!'" Yurio said. What else was he to do? The knight sure seemed like they knew what they were doing, more so than him anyway.

"The knight nodded then started looking around searching for tracks. Soon they started following a path into the woods. However, the path was leading strangely and dangerously close to the giant ruins you were warned not to get close to." Aurora narrated, then let out a yawn, which she quickly apologized for.

"If you're feeling tired, then we can get to sleep," Yurio said, smiling. That was the goal of the whole game in the first place.