It was amazing how calm people could be when a situation was simply too messed up for them to comprehend. Stubbed toe? People cried like it was the end of the world or something. Trapped in fantasy RPG land? Everyone was going about their merry way doing quests and shit. Incomprehensible! Well, that wasn't quite right either. It was totally comprehensible how people averted their eyes from reality: the question was merely of how long it would last.

However, Nicaea could admit to himself that he was not exactly above the masses, seeing as the first thing he'd done after digesting the news was to try out his fortune telling skills. It was a shame he hadn't spawned with a Crowley-Harris Deck, but people would probably be more familiar with the Rider-Waite anyway. Apparently his fortune for the day involved new acquaintances, which was probably a good thing given the scenario. However, there was also a shady and unfortunate place involved, or something. Knowing what he did now, it would have been a good idea to Google Tarot meanings again or something...or just not have played the game.

After being kicked out of some local gambling dens without much success, Nicaea decided that the next best place to look was the Bottomless Cavern. Sounded dreary enough to him. His divination seemed vindicated when he saw a quest marker go up. Increasing his pace to a light job, Nicaea arrived at the cavern mouth, seeing another garishly dressed dude with impossible hair. "Hey, did you have a quest you were going on? My reading for the day predicted that someone here might need help." Stretching the truth a tiny bit was also part of the fortune-telling profession.

Nicaea was pretty confused now. "No, are you a philosopher?" Was this going to be one of those 'quirky'-type players? All signs pointed to yes, especially given that handle. Well, nothing wrong with that; better than crying oneself to bed in a hotel room. "I'm Nicaea, I guess. I'm a fortune-teller...I guess." One's identity really got weird in a situation like this, but it would've felt just awkward giving out his real name now, after the other guy's introduction.

"Uh, anyway," he continued, trying to get back on topic, "You here to do a quest here or something?" It would have been awkward if this 'Blank' guy actually wasn't, or if he'd already finished. How did fortune tellers handle a bad cold read, anyway? Well, he'd deal with that as it came. "I was hoping I might help out, although I guess I'm not super useful. Fortune telling ain't really a combat ability, sadly." Oh, how he wished to have chosen a different class now.

He stared at the cave entrance dubiously, then back at Blank. Feeling a little awkward, he decided to just pause and hope the other person would fill him in a bit. Sometimes in games people would just walk away, but in-person that would have been simply devastating, at least to Nicaea. He wished the others were...

Well, no, he didn't. That was an awful sort of thing to wish.

"An Ace, huh? I'll craft a fighter plane for you sometime, then." Obviously that wasn't the intended meaning, but Nicaea couldn't help throwing out a stray joke every now and then. What an odd class. Sounded like some sort of tanky class too, apparently. Well, by the looks of things, this was more of an exploration, so DPS probably wouldn't be too important, especially for these sorts of beginner quests. Right?

Nicaea shook the outstretched hand with what he judged to be an appropriate degree of firmness. "Our fates are entwined then...or something like that. Let's get going!" Since Blank had indicated that he was bulky, Nicaea hung back slightly and waited for him to take the lead. Also, the fates had not exactly told him where they would be headed anyway, so there was that.

"Oh, yeah, it'd be a waste if I didn't use a skill here. There's no table around, so, let's see..." A quick shuffle of the deck, a quick draw of a card, and... "The Devil, huh? Great, fantastic. Uh, let's see, I foresee chains of binding within your path. Let the fates bless you so that you may avoid this coming tragedy." He flashed the card once at Blank, causing the card and its target to glow briefly. "Not bad, right? Thought of that on the spot."

Descending into some "Bottomless Cavern" while talking about the Devil...yeah, that was definitely a fantastic time. It had been a while since Nicaea had read Inferno, and he found himself wondering if the game designers had read it either. Was there actually a bottom to the cavern somewhere? Or would it just be procedurally generated all the way down?

Well, couldn't ignore the question at hand forever. "Let's see, The Devil, right?" Luckily, Nicaea had remembered a little about this card because it was one of the 'edgy' ones. "Well, most people would think bad stuff like evil or whatever straight off the bat because, y'know, devil and all. But some like to read into it more, like how the 'Death' card actually means 'change' and all that. Personally, I think the 'Devil' card represents being restrained. You can see here that the image on the card features bindings," he said, holding the card up for Blank to have a look. Though it was dark, the metal of the card seemed to catch light unusually well, making it at least somewhat visible. "Most versions have that motif as well."

"The inverted Devil would mean losing control of your inner demons, I guess. Losing restraint and all that." Nicaea shrugged, feeling a little silly for having said all that. After all, he didn't really believe in this mumbo-jumbo back in normal life. "Well, yeah, that's that one. You into occult stuff? Palm readings or crystals or whatever?" The natural sounds of the cave made Nicaea wonder more and more why he was continuing with this line of conversation, and he consciously tried to relax his shoulders a little, with limited success.

Internally, Nicaea was wondering if he'd accidentally pulled off the fabled 'cold reading' or something like that. After all, most people tend to be 'restrained' by something in their lives, so it wouldn't have been too bad of a shot to have taken intentionally. He felt a ridiculous moment of pride which quickly went away.

The appearance of a glowing light caused Nicaea to blink a few times before slowly looking back towards Blank. "You got a special item already? I guess this ain't your first time at the rodeo, huh? I haven't been on any of the quests yet, 'sides whatever we're doing now." As he jabbered on, the fortune-teller gave both paths a quick appraisal.

Now that their lives were at stake, neither path was particularly appealing in all honesty. Furthermore, his morning reading had indicated some degree of fearful misfortune. In this case, he really did have to just put his trust into the Ace, in which case...

"If you don't mind, let's go down the left path. Fighting some large monster is one thing, but a ladder leading to nowhere is quite the horrifying prospect, don'tcha think?" Nicaea was the sort of person that invested in government bonds: better the evil you know, even when it was obviously a poor choice. "Of course, I'll leave it to you, since it looks like you've got more experience and all."

"One could also say that the left route is the sinister route," Nicaea remarked, in keeping with the rather dark tone of their conversation thus far. As they moved, he kept his hands on his cards, shuffling them nervously. Occasionally he would make a slip of the hand and the cards would clang together a mite too noisily for such a mission.

All of a sudden, Nicaea stumbled, slowing a moment to catch his footing. He looked down and gulped, properly noticing the large footprint (which he'd accidentally stepped into) for the first time. "Whoa...that's big." Strangely enough, the thought made him somewhat more relaxed; it'd be hard to miss something so large between him and Blank, hopefully.

"So what does an Ace do, anyway?" Now that combat was a very real possibility, it was only logical to get a feel for his party-mate's capabilities. Some of these classes were sort of non-indicative when it came to combat. Actually, Nicaea decided that his own class probably fell into that category after thinking it over again.

At least this dude had a sword. It beat having no sword. The lack of a big tower shield or something was slightly concerning, but as long as Blank had some sort of protective skill that probably wasn't a necessity.

"Passing through?" Nicaea looked down at the footprint, confused, before it finally hit him. "Oh...uh, yeah, let's get a move on." At that point, he was almost tempted to ask and take point since it seemed like there would be something frightful from the rear, but he didn't have a glowing flashlight crystal. Besides, that would have loomed pretty weak, even if Nicaea normally didn't care about that sort of thing.

For a little while, he tried to remain quiet and keep vigilant. However, the cave noises and threat of a rear assault drove up his nervousness until the poor fellow couldn't help but start to jabber a bit. "So, you're a defensive type, right? Does that mean you have, like, defensive weapon skills or something?" A jack-of-all-weapons seemed more attacker-y than anything, but perhaps this was just some sort of niche build. Nicaea himself was no stranger to jank; building melee wizards in Dungeons and Dragons was his thing.

After a while, something occurred to him. "You don't think there's, like, another exit up ahead do you? Kind of sounds like it, but..." Was it a bottomless cavern because the bottom was a hole? Sounded like the sort of crappy joke that murderous game devs would have thought up.