Crap, I guess I need armor, don't I?

[Hashi]

An orphan was huddled in the corner, eyeing an apple cart and wondering just how he might pull off a heist of one of those juicy fruits when a woman appeared quite suddenly beside him. She looked totally out of place, wearing loose fitting dark blue multi-pocketed pants, a stained white t-shirt and a red vest. Her boots were covered in square steel plates over the shins and her wrists were covered by meshed steel, her hands in bright red fingerless gloves. But what most disturbed the child were two things. One was the vertical black mark and accompanying squiggles over her left eye. Two was the pair of naked weapons, a gladius and scimitar, that were thrust carelessly into a thin leather belt that was already beginning to crack from use.

"Madihah!!" The boy screamed in abject terror as he jumped to his feet. "Gods, it's the Marked One, don't eat me!!"

The djinn was left standing in the middle of the alley, a hand brought up to pinch the bridge of her nose in embarrassment as the child exited the narrow dead end roadway with the speed of a bat escaping hell. Shaking her head dismissively, she muttered more to herself. "Guess the kids here have heard that story, too. Though, when the hell did Madihah start eating kids? Stupid brats..."

Shaking her head again and putting the incident out of her mind, Hashi left the alley and began making her way through the crowded bazaar towards the shop she was trying to find. A few of the guards gave her naked blades nasty looks. Doing her best not to act threatening, she stuffed her hands in the pockets of her pants, grumbling under her breath. "Note to self, buy sheathes."

Finally she ran across the name of the store that had been recommended to her and stepped inside. It was quieter inside, so she didn't go to the counter immediately but rather began to browse through the displayed wares. Soon the ruckus outside was lost to memory as she find herself comparing the usefulness of several different styles of breastplate. Thinking back on her days as a gladiator, she found herself torn. She liked the mobility of a studded leather jerkin; but a solid metal breastplate, especially ones specially sculpted for females, offered far superior protection. There was also the scaled and banded metals ones, which offered the worst of both designs.There was also money considerations as well... since she was actually going to buy and bother to maintain her own actual armor for once, she found that picking it out was much harder than just grabbing whatever was handy or offered. She suddenly found herself remembering why she'd put off buying armor for so long.

[Slayer of the Rot]

Since business had begun to pick up, Cyril had started to stock the dusty empty shelves with examples. It was threadbare compared to many of the other armories, but there was enough to get the point across. So the merchant was elated by both greed and satisfaction when the blue haired woman entered and began to scan the motley assortment of breastplates he'd set out.

She looked torn, however. Cyril grunted as he lifted himself out of his chair behind the counter, and lit a cigarette as he approached.

"You look like you're havin' a bit of trouble, miss. Got armor on the mind? Anything you could want, we got. From full plate if you're tank - deceptively, by that figure - to light chain mail and leather if you're wanting mobility. You name it, I can price it."

[Hashi]

Hashi tilts her head towards the voice of the shop owner but doesn't take her eyes from the leather breastplate she's examining until after his sales pitch. Turning to face him she idly rests her hands on the hilts of her bare swords, a mindless force of habit.

"I hate wearing armor and I'm on a budget so this isn't a fun little shopping spree for me." Hashi rifles through her many pants pockets before pulling out a ratty pouch of gold. "I've got two hundred gold here and I need a light leather breastplate. I don't care about full protection I just want to keep some asshole from getting a lucky strike. I also need a leather pauldron, left shoulder only. Can't stand armor on my right arm in a fight. Metal plating or reinforcement is fine if you can squeeze it under the price cap."

The creak old fake leather of her thin belt, one bought from a discount store in Blackfrield and not design to holster weaponry, reminds her of her other need. She lightly taps the hilts of the two swords, her gladius and scimitar. "Oh and I could use sheathes for Akilah and Rukah here, and a belt to hold them."

[Slayer of the Rot]

Cyril fronwed and shut his eyes. The jacket hanging from his elbows rustled as he reached up to his head to scratch as he talked. "Ah. A leather breastplate will run fifty crowns. A pauldron, twenny five. I'll have to add thirty gold each for base metal reinforcement; iron, so the price goes up to eighty and fifty respectively. The weight will go up a bit, but I can use some iron I just got a surplus of so it won't go drastically. With the metal in it, the chances of taking a serious blow is at least reduced. The sheath for the gladius will be five, for the scimitar ten, and another ten for the belt. So, the reinforced leather sum will come to ninety five crowns; the sum for normal leather will be a hunnert and fifty crowns. That's with the belt and sheathes added, of course. BAGLEY!!!"

The little sack climbed onto the counter, still looking somewhat guilty over the damage it's cold had wrought a few weeks ago. Without a single nasty word, Bagley began to produce the items from it's yawning mouth."

[Hashi]

Hashi blinked a few times, face twisting with dislike as the numbers rolled off the merchant's tongue. She had not had enough to drink today to keep with this that kind of numerical tirade. So she merely half listened until he tapered off, just grasping the last number he said and hoping it was the total. Being ever lazy, the djinni didn't bother counting out a hundred and fifty gold coins. Rather she counted out ten and dropped them into her pocket, then ten more, until fifty coins bulged from one of the cargo pockets near her knee.

"That should be one fifty." The djinn said, with the serious part of her shopping trip over she seemed to relax a little, shifting back towards her usual roguish nature. She slid her hand into her pants pocket thoughtfully, jingling the metal coins. Since she did have some freedom of movement now she could just blow off the beer and meal she'd been planning on here and just used paper money back in Blackfield to fund the rest of the night.

"Since I've got some to spare, what can you get me in the way of gloves. I'm thinking a full left gauntlet with a hardened leather bracer, maybe a small metal plate if you can part with a bit more of that iron surplus and a partially fingerless right glove, you know like the kind archers use that only fully cover the middle two fingers."

Sliding her hands out of her pockets she brings her hands up to unfasten the mostly useless mesh bands that encircle her wrists and extended about six inches wide. She'd had a friend back in Blackfield make them up for her a long time ago, mostly just to give her a bit of blocking against slashing blows. She had a bad habit of ending up in knife fights if she drank too much Jäger. "If I'm a few coins short I can trade these. Ought to be worth a gold or two in scrap at least, the mesh is steel."

[Slayer of the Rot]

Cyril took the offered gloves and looked them over carefully. "Mesh? I haven't seen something like this since - " He stopped immediately, looking at Hashi with wide eyes.

"Since a convention in Alerar," he finished carefully, and glanced quickly over his shoulder at the familiar as it finished pulling a leather belt out of it's mouth.

"Oi! You heard the lady, spit out those gloves too!" He turned his attention back to Hashi, his expression almost blank. "Ah. Usually, you'd be a little over for that request, with just fifty crowns left, but trading in these gloves, I can give a pretty girl with beautiful hair like that what she wants for just that amount." He returned to the counter and began to wrap up the armor as Bagley pulled the first glove out of his glowing mouth.

"Then I guess your total is two hunnert crowns."

[Hashi]

Hashi gives a winning grin at the shop keeper's interest and tosses her head, idly running a hand through the remarked upon hair. "And here I though this little trip would be boring."

Digging back in her pockets, she pulled out the fifty coins she'd counted out and carefully places them on the table in five stacks of ten. Only just noticing the bag spitting out her gear. She gives it a curious look, but between her stint as an immortal wish-granting being and her life in the "modern" city of blackfield, nothing in the way of magic or technology could really surprise her. Though it did peak her curiosity.

"Cute pet you've got there, where'd you get it?"

[Slayer of the Rot]

"Mm, that's a big tale to tell right now. I'd normally be happy to bore a pretty lady with my stories, but you know the old adage; time is money." Cyril finished wrapping the armor up, and bound the gloves onto the top of the package with some string to hold it all together. With a sigh, he dropped into his chair again, taking a deep drag from his cigarette.

"But don't feel blue. I'm sure we'll see each other again, one way or another. You'd be surprised how small the world can be. By the way, that wasn't a crack at your hair," he chuckled, and settled back into his seat.

"Take care."

[Hashi gains the following:
-Leather breastplate with light iron reinforcements
-Leather pauldron with light iron reinforcements
-Leather belt
-Two sheathes
-One pair of new iron and leather gloves
- 75 exp.

And loses the following:
-200 gp
-One pair of cloth and steel mesh gloves]

[Witchblade]

EXP added! GP subtracted!