The last of the dark stain seeps out of the worn leather and crawls over the Auctioneer’s fingers. They go still, staring at the bruise-black magic on their hands as the ruin’s runes answer with a slow, sick pulse.
The Auctioneer
It was not a clean escape. That spell left a trail.
The Clerk tightens their grip on the brown boots in Jax’s lap, then sets them down carefully beside his knees, as if the leather itself might bite. The Auctioneer’s fear turns sharp and practical, all at once.
The Clerk
So that is how they found the gate.
Jax’s own boots are still off, his brown adventurer’s pair resting within reach, their creases and bulbous toes catching the weak ruin-light. The Auctioneer, suddenly compliant in a different way, adjusts the place of the boots like a servant at a shrine.
The Auctioneer
Held as asked. No tricks, no chase. Just the bargain.
A cold rhythm taps through the broken stone, not footsteps, but the ward-runes answering the tethered magic. Somewhere beyond the gate, the bidders are no longer guessing where Jax stands. They are arriving.
The ruin falls into a tight, waiting silence, broken only by the soft shift of worn leather against Jax’s lap.
✓ Quest Accepted
Stop the bidders from entering the ruin
✓ Quest Accepted
Get out of the ruined castle
“*I paid the bidders 5 million from entering the ruin and me and the others that are with me decided to leave and then I decided to have the ones that are with me drag me by my feet since I pay them 2 million gold to drag me by my feet so I act like I'm screaming and kicking*”
SUCCESS (Good Agility, rolled +1)