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Post by lloydturquoise on Sept 4, 2017 17:16:41 GMT
(This diplomacy thread is a continuous string of diplomatic exchanges, between the Viikhalak delegation, led by Kevennys Neevaanir and various players/npcs they come across in both the North and the South)
*** I'll message you before hand, to notify you that your nation is on the itinerary of Viikhalakan visitation. Don't feel obliged too though, if you don't want too ***
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Post by lloydturquoise on Sept 4, 2017 22:21:27 GMT
Chapter 1
Sails and sand
Kevennys Neevaanir's hands wouldn't stop shaking. They weren't by any means uncontrollable or violent, but it was a subtle tremble or the flinch of a digit. It was a week since Neevaanir had let a drop of liquor or wine or even ale grace his lips. The harsh matron that was water, was his only liquid acquaintance.
As he leaned on the gun rail of the stout Lorcha, he closed his eyes and fantasised about the last drink he had. It was a wine, from a vineyard in Khava maybe. It was a sultry red and it stained his lips as he guzzled from the bottle. He did so alone.
He'd planned on sharing such a bottle with Jaarno, but after that meeting, he'd scowled at his brother. How'd he agreed to send me away like this! Neevaanir rubbed his eyes. The feeling was something similar to when he was younger, when Hiivak or Mik' would guilt him to hide their misbehaviours. Or when Saardana would convince him to play by her rules always. Or when Jaarno dissuaded him to not sneak out or take risks.
He'd felt like a child and he hated that.
"They're back! At our aft!" Every head, including Neevaanir's, swung to the back of the ship. Their vessel was travelling along Wayfarers Isle, and Colossi had been following them for days. Their hulking ships, with huge sails, big enough to threaten the clouds.
They watched everything.
Not two days since the merchant agreed to sail them from Saarsipa-La. The giants followed them along Damgh's shore. They followed them through the Bay of Tears and around the Cape of Nepali. Sometimes there were three ships, sometimes only one.
Neevaanir knew you didn't have to be a sailor to know that the Colossi had reasserted themselves on the seas. Both inner and the open ocean.
There was more though. The crew and delegation saw other ships though, more and more in stranger fashion and design. Streamlined vessels with many decks and arrays of guns. The sails were many and the crews were cautious.
The merchant captain, who's vessel was a crude imitation of these foreigners, said that they were Vinayans. Men of the east who lived for the sea.
The Colossi were apparently returning to the west on their account. At least in part, the Colossi weren't the sort for explaining intention nor opinions to outsiders. Regardless, as their ship strained around a jagged coast, eventually the Colossi dipped back behind the seashore's stacks and headlands.
It would be hours before the ship peered into view of the Vinayans settlement and it was built with the Colossi in mind. Chunky walls, batteries for dense gathering's of cannons, trenches filled with bramble and caltrops. Neevaanir recognised these fortifications in foreign form, though on scales and materials that weren't replicated anyway in his empire.
Outlander ships were gathered in the harbours near this fortress by the sea. Their ship stuck out like a sore thumb.
Crews of men stared at them as they floated towards a beachhead. The delegation unfurled flags and banners and Neevaanir was rushed into his cabin, scrubbed and changed. His 'handlers' weren't the sort he'd to be the ones changing him. Old chaincoats, wimpish subetmen and soured courtiers. None of the people he'd of liked to join him on this venture.
The captain wasn't too bad. Though Neevaanir was just happy to have someone sympathetic to his unwanted sobriety.
Finally, washed, shaved and dressed presentable. A party was assembled, and with the Kevennys, they clambered down ladders into shore boats and began rowing towards the fortress' quays. Each boat had a banner flapping the red helm of Viikhalaka over it's bow. Neevaanir sat beside between an aged chaincoat, who complained about ships and boats and the sea incessantly. Along with a bureaucratic subetman. Who wrote down everything the chaincoat said as evidence for when he returned to his office in who knew how long.
There were fifty in the delegation in total, a mixed lot, but a versatile lot Neevaanir would admit. Someone in this party could answer any one of his questions, it was just finding out who that was the hard party.
The selected delegates neared a quayside. Neevaanir's translator, a sailor of the captains spruced up for the meeting. Had for days now been reciting quotes and phrases in Vinayan or whatever dialects he knew they spoke. He'd learnt surprisingly a lot, though the translator came along anyway, should he cock up any first contact and offend eastern sensibilities.
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Post by zurajai on Sept 8, 2017 20:45:41 GMT
The Gurhimic vessel churned through the water like a seal, squat and rounded but with surprising efficiency. Like its makers the vessel seemed to care little for the waves that touched its hull, smashing them aside. The sails, triangular and rectangular in shape in equal measure, huffed with the winds at their backs. The ship was making good time to its destination just as it spotted unfamiliar ships at dock. The crew alerted the captain immediately.
"What in the world are those things?"
The captain was a gruff dwarf of Thrumish descent, his voice always sonorous despite the gravel imparted by his sea-borne lifestyle. Ritual tattoos denoting notes for his family's personal song dotted his forehead and right cheek, giving off a sense of swashbuckling rogue.
"We spotted them in Vinayan Harbor. They seem to fit the descriptions of some trade partners of the Ecclesiocracy. The Viiklalaka or something along those lines, I believe."
"Right. Bring us in as normal, get the ship stocked up for travel, and see about getting us in contact with those Vii- those foreigners immediately."
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Post by Alex on Sept 10, 2017 2:58:40 GMT
The shrill sea-whistles of sergeants and captains called out through the light mist that hung over the fortress of Wayfarer's Isle, mingling with the cries of terns and gulls that circled above the colony's port. Casper Accora strode with a purpose across the stone ramparts, passing by assembling infantrymen with their flintlock muskets and navy blue uniforms, past entrenched field cannons and their smaller kin of infantry guns which the garrison had brought with them, all of which looked out from the battlements with threatening promise and intent.
"What is it captain!?" The Governor shouted above the din as he approached the closet captain with silver epaulets adorning his uniform, joining the man he looked out over the battlements and across the bay. It was a brisk but clear morning bar the light mist which had settled throughout the night, one could look out and view the sea for miles.
"Ships sighted, Governor." The Captain spoke though Casper had already seen them. A native vessel rested at anchor a distance out while smaller shore boats adorned with red crests bobbed upon the water working to close the distance. Behind them loomed a larger vessel, a Western vessel with a flag he recognized flayed across the main sail. Indeed, he'd seen the sigil of the United Kingdoms before on vessels passing through for supplies, rest or news.
"Seems we're popular today Captain. At ease, I will see what our guests want." Casper declared as he made his way down from the walls and towards the side-gate leading to the quays. There was a groan of protest as the wooden gate, reinforced with iron bands, was pulled aside for Casper to emerge with a troupe of Fusiliers.
His dark greatcoat was tight about him as Casper walked along the quay towards the assembling foreigners. Clearly Westerners, the last time foreigners had come to this island it was to threaten war, and worse, he hadn't understood a damn word they had said. So it was with a certain caution that he now advanced towards these new humans with his retinue of guards, spying behind them the United Kingdoms ship closing in.
"Greetings." He ventured, a hundred questions lingering within his tone.
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Post by lloydturquoise on Sept 10, 2017 7:07:25 GMT
"He says 'greetings' your lordship" the sailor-translator stood behind Neevaanir, peering over his shoulder.
There were still delegates and officials disembarking their boats behind the greeting party. Though they were non-essentials or organisers of the tour itself. Neevaanir could hear them muttering about the other flagged ship. Similar but also dissimilar to the majority of vessels and fortifications.
A herald took steps forward, between the Easterlings and the Viikhalaks.
"His Imperial majesty, Varakeisari Gavrilako IX, head of the imperial dynasty. Presents his son, Kevennys Neevaanir, to discuss the possible exchanges between the Viikhlakan empire and... the Vinayan State." The herald read from a translated parchment. the Viikhalaks assembled themselves more properly, with chests and icons held and gathered by the large party. The Viikhalak's sailors kept themselves separate from other sailors on the quayside and kept themselves to the boats. Retainers stepped forward with gifts of tobacco wrapped in cloth.
"The Dynasty and Imperial Bureaucracy wish to give you these gifts of smoking leaves and good cloth. To show you that Viikhalakans come on good fortunes." Neevaanir looked nervously at the foreigners, their uniformed men wore little to no armour, but their rifles looked like matchlocks without the matches. It was most confusing, did they not think we had guns in Viikhalaka?
"It is our hope and fondest wish, Noble amongst Vinayans, that you send good words about the Viikhalakan Empire to you and your superiors, if you so have them, and offer them audience and consulate in Saarsipa-La at the Varakeisari's behest"
Neevaanir was bored of this speech already, as he heard delegates behind him climb back into a boat, no doubt heading towards the stranger ship amongst a strange settlement.
The kevennys paid no mind though, just as his handlers did most of the talking with the Vinayans, so too would they do it with the other easterlings.
A small boat boat of delegates, mostly low ranking subetmen and a couple chaincoats, would safely approach the Gurhimics. Shouting various western greetings and phrases and seeing what words got a response.
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Post by Alex on Oct 22, 2017 17:31:07 GMT
Casper's gaze flickered between the translator and the man for whom he spoke, listening to their words before giving a nod to a fusilier beside him whom, shouldering his flintlock, shuffled forward to take the offered gifts of the Viikhalakans. As the exchange was made the Governor himself offered a solemn nod in deference to the foreign prince.
"Well." Casper began, searching for the right words with which to meet the unexpected royal visitor and their representatives. "Allow me to be the first to welcome the... Kevennys to Vinayan lands and thank him for these most generous gifts on the behalf of the Serene League. To cross the seas in these times is no small feat whilst it is run amok by black sails." The Governor replied, wiping his palms on his greatcoat. "Diplomatic relations with all nations is a wish likewise shared by the Serene League, I will have a letter conveyed to the capital immediately."
Pausing, Casper took a moment to regard the docklands around them and the closing Almuric ship. "Perhaps, we ought to continue this conversation in my study?" The Governor offered.
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Post by lloydturquoise on Oct 22, 2017 23:36:04 GMT
"The kevennys says that it must be a feat, coming from the man with many ships" Neevaanir had translated, chiming into the conversation finally and looking at the easterling officer.
"Yes, let us go inside" The Viikhalaks agreed to the offer of getting out of the seaside wind and somewhere quieter from the crashing waves nearby. The party followed the Vinayans as they walked them away from the quayside.
"If your people are a league of sorts, are you representing a single member... people, or are you representing the whole?" The translator asked the governor, at the behest of a scribe-subetman who anticipated the information gladly for his papers later.
"There are some in my nation who would not appreciate diplomacy with certain nations however, though are mission is not to entangle in the politics of our lands but discover those of the east" Neevaanir had instructed the translator to relay. Though the translator had cleaned it up and cut the slang.
"It is to our understanding that your league is invested in merchant work and that of navalcraft?" The question was raised from some of the retainers, though it was mainly to shed light on rumors that they had gathered from fishermen and lonesome traders along the Yanitro. Another question to fill the time as they walked past the easterlings fortifications and away from the docks.
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