The weathervane that sat atop Chimera's house creaked with all the pleasant sounds of a dying cat, and woke her rather roughly. With many mumbles and great, unseen effort, she slid out of bed and yelped a little; someone had placed a tub of icewater at the exit of her bed. And, of course, she slept barefoot.
Cogs turned inside the somewhat young woman's head, for about half a second. "Ahh.. Shiri, I'm gonna detach your head and feed it to the pickies if I catch you!" she shouted, bluntly, stepping out of the rather unwelcome wakeup and fixing herself a look around the dusty straw-floored room for a towel.

It was windy outside, she noted, as the last scrapings of water came off cleanly. A lot of stray sand out there, but then this was Morroc. The frontier. Suitably far from civilisation, but around a rather constant oasis anyway, so nobody minded. Heck, as far as Chimera cared, they could go suck it wherever else they were. Nearest place to here was a tossup between Prontera, that capital city where the big rich knights live.. or Payon, which isn't a bad town really but is a stone's throw from Alberta, money capital of the continent, full of really, really rich merchants. The reason her stupid sandals might have cost so much, too. 500 zeny? Her job didn't pay her enough to spend half a 'kay' on footwear.

Shiri had got her a special present, though. 'One of the merchants was sold a pair of carded sandals. But he had no use for them.' That had been the story. Which was fair enough, since Chimera had become accustomed to the little speed-up her shoes gave her. Very nice, but not worth too much in what she did for a half-living. Only half; you didn't become a full Kapra if you weren't willing to go celibate.
As she wrestled with the striped Kapra dress, a rather cute and lengthy pink dress with white stripes, a blouse, an apron, and a rather strange little hair-covering, Chimera idly considered that, life would be better. She didn't need to do this for many more weeks, anyway. For she, like many other people of this world, wanted to see the world.

The dusty room she described as hers, quite conveniently, had a little wall set up as a Fareth shrine. While she almost paid religious homage to this thing most days, it was mostly fleeting since, of course, nobody had seen the guy for a long time. It was impossible in her head that such a legend could die, so therefore he was out there. Perhaps she'd meet him when she actually managed to give herself enough money to get by.
"I hope you're still out there, you good for nothing, because when I get hold of you for that water I'm going to-"
"Shiri isn't here, missus Chimera." mentioned a voice, at that point. And the green-haired female swung around. It was just Haek, whom she knew as Shiri's little brother. She thought he looked kinda cute, in that slightly typical brown garb, with what appeared to be armour but, really.. wasn't much good at all. Little guy in training? That's what that stuff made him appear to be...
"So where is he?" asked the half-Kapra, grinning sweetly just as practice. Heck, why not? She'd be tending to people for most of today, the ill, the needy, the overburdened, and those needing a place to be for a while.

What was said next would most likely provoke an unexpected reaction from anything Kapra related.
"Shiri left for Izlude in the middle of the night. He's going to become a swordsman."

The resulting cry of defeated anguish actually forced the weathervane atop the place Chimera lived to detach, and fall in a slate-assisted dive off the top of the roof, landing in a bush. Poor metallic Pecopeco. Someone would put it back up later.

"He's not allowed to leave without me! We've been through this."
"He got an offer from a knight who wanted a trainee to occupy his time. He decided to take it and.. hoped you'd understand."
"Oh.." Chimera grinned. "I understand perfectly.. that I have to beat him up next time I see him. Utter PRAT. I don't have anywhere near enough money yet."
"He asked me to put the water there, though, since he wouldn't be able to. I felt he needed the last laugh, anyway." Haek mentioned, before scampering away. And not without good reason, since she was after him like a shot. "I'm gonna eat you alive! Get back here!"

Sigh, she thought, as she pounced upon Haek and sent him for a dirtscrabble. Praise be to carded sandals.

---

"You, Chimera, are a mess." mentioned Jennifer, as Chimera arrived in the crossroads in the north of the city. Of course, the side effects of making a certain friend's little brother wish he had more common sense is, of course, stripes that aren't really white, but a sandy brown.
"Sorry, Jen. It really, really needed to be done. You hear Shiri's up and gone?"
"I heard, and I want a word with you about it. But we'll talk when we get lunch later." Jen went quiet now, and Chimera sat upon the floor, and toyed with the bag containing her things that she needed to do the Kapra business out here. Good for hitting annoying little brother people with, too. And it showed.

Chimera was handling storage with a young archer when Jennifer stopped, and wandered sharply to a guy that had just arrived in town. The guy was a thief, and his yellow top was in rather bad shape, as well as the rest of him. Most of an arm lay open.
"What the heck..?" Jennifer spoke.
"Priest... priest..." the guy mentioned over again. Jen, who was very calm and collected in such situations, ignored this fact, and ran to him in panic, and shook him about.
"What happened to you?"
"Hey.. I'm trying to bleed in peace here.."
Jennifer let him go, and the guy collapsed, and coughed a little.
"So. What happened."
"An overrunning. Restless GMs. People are being knocked about in Izlude and Prontera. Priest?"
A helpful priestess, dressed in flowing white, wandered over and mumbled a few words, before the entire square was bathed in white light. The thief was okay, if a little worn out.
"Hey, you even got rid of my scars? You're good."
Chimera rubbed her eyes. Nothing new. Lots of priests and the like around; few really died from such wounds. Unless they were slain during battle, which.. meant priests just did resurrection anyway. The mind boggles. But the green-haired female again considered. Izlude.

"Shiri would be in Izlude by now, I think." Chimera wondered.
"With a knight who's powerful enough to want a trainee. They'll do fine. You, meanwhile, have lunch to eat. Can we eat at your place?"
The sun was, by now, beating right overhead. The thief had gathered his wits, and with a sandy back, had wandered away, to some safe place within Morroc. Loosening her headband, the slightly docile Chimera did the same, shifting sand about as she wandered to her safe place, the house and the room she lived in. With the missing weathervane in process of being repaired, right now, too. Chimera waved at the blacksmith who was actually performing the job, before going inside - Jennifer in tow.

Jen wore a proper Kapra dress, and a priestess's armour and robes underneath it. Her level of ability was not advanced enough to deal with many things, but that was her lack of training; she'd been a Kapra for too long, and the brown hair of hers was sun-baked many a day. Both of her and Chimera shared blue eyes, though, and both looked at each other as they ate cold lunches and swapped thoughts about Fareth, with helpful glances at the shrine.

The shrine was a rather large collection of things. On the wall was a chalk drawing, done by a particularly gifted artist-acolyte. Fareth was arming an ornate bow, wearing his trademarked propeller and looking somewhat tired, which since he'd probably be able to beat whatever he was arming for with a peashooter and a dustbin lid shield, was hardly surprising. Assortments of genuine Fareth Kills memorabilia sat on various sides; a chipping of the Crescent Scythe, some preserved honey from the Mistress. The centrepiece was .. a propeller hat.
"Are you sure that's -the- hat he wore when beating Baphomet the first time?" Jen asked.
"Positive. I won it in a competition held to raise money for the town. He'd apparently sold it off to get money, and that's pretty fair." Chimera said, chewing on a piece of meat. Meat was good. Easy to get hold of, too.

Jennifer sat up, then, and glanced at Chimera. "I think I've decided, and you already.. you're not exactly the most typical Kapra trainee in the world, are you..?"
Chimera shrugged. No, she wasn't, since she was probably endowed with the most agility and dexterity in the town at this point. That, and she liked making people suffer a little too much. "I suppose not. But I need the money."
And Jen held up a bag. "This contains gemstones. Blue ones. From my resurrection collection. I'm not quite good enough yet, but.. take them. I can get more, somewhere. You want the money to go out and seek your life out there, right?"
"Jen.." Chimera was then just given them. Jen spoke again.
"C'mon. You're a thief by nature if not by class. You knew about the bag beforehand and there's one less in there than there should be. But I don't mind. It's your calling, and you certainly have a role model up there."
Chimera blushed. "Ahaha.." Yeah, uh, that was not something she expected to be found out... "Legend has it Fareth stole the propeller hat you're now in possession of. As well as 13 thousand zeny, two gold rings, and four slotted wooden mails. From the same guy. In the same night. In his before-legend days, anyway. I was working as the late-night Kapra in Alberta when he did it. Wily one, is he."
"I never heard that story before..." Chimera looked inside the bag. Yep. Stones. She didn't deserve them, but she was being given them anyway,

"I wouldn't have taken them all, you know." Chimera mentioned.
"I know. Give it time. You would have, soon enough." Jennifer mentioned, grinning.
"Blah.."
"You're ambitious. When you make it to the top, remember who I am. That's all I ask. And I think you've at least got yourself something to get you there." Jen said, standing to leave. Dusting off her dress from the dust of the room. "If you want to leave immediately, you can do that too."
Squee. Chimera spoke quickly. "Uh.. Thanks! I'm not going to forget this.."
"Well. I'll see you if I do." she spoke, before turning to leave.
"Wait a second.." Chimera said. "Do you know where the Thief hideout is?"
"Good question." Jennifer asked, not turning back. "I heard rumour it's around the Great Pyramid due northwest. That's where they seem to be based, anyway."
"Thanks." Chimera nodded. And then the Kapra left.

Jennifer wondered, afterwards, precisely why she'd done that. Looking back at the house and the room.. she wondered. Perhaps it had been something she had to do? The GMs, powerful as they were.. those things were everywhere, controlling everything, but not doing it openly. Perhaps one of them had a plan for the girl?
Eh. She was a Kapra-priestess, and the GM was a GM. And an unknown one at that, if one was even there. So this line of thought ended quickly.


For some reason, Chimera decided to try approaching the Thief guild in her Kapra uniform, so with some tossing and trading with a potion merchant, she took supplies, grabbed a kitchen knife and a dullish coverall cotton shirt, and set forth. Heck, it seemed the right thing to do?

Something didn't sit right with her, though. It was unlike people to be this generous with her. Chimera stole stuff and was, often, very inconsiderate. It fit who she was, but it didn't make her any friends quickly; especially not ones that donate several kays worth of zeny into her lap for no reason. She, however, had more things to think about. Like what these Pyramids were like.

It's not like she'd ever set foot into a serious dungeon before, anyway. But the potions.. would probably come in very handy indeed. Very handy.

It looked dark from outside, and very looming... so tall, and sandbricky, and smelling of monsters and death and blood, and people lying outside, mostly rather inept, and mostly healing up gradually. A place for people not wearing Kapra dresses and a random shirt. And that's as much as Chimera noted, deciding to stay outside for now, and just.. compose herself mentally. Heck, she considered.. this would certainly be interesting, however she managed to fare.