[LP CYOA] 傳

[Baltika9]

If it were irrelevant to him, I doubt the man would have mentioned it. Doing this job for him will definitely help our standing with the Manor and all the other men of influence that gather there. I sincerely doubt he is the only man of importance in Lady Ji's social club.

 

[Nevill]

Well, you might not be able to guess exactly what he has in mind, but you could probably rule out anything that he could get some of his own employees or hirelings to do and also get a vague idea of what it might be about from the background information already provided.

Well, I tried to reread the updates in search for clues, and... Hey! There was something else there, wasn't it?

Only now do you notice that behind the former clerk’s eyes lay a rather malevolent darkness. Given his intelligence, and his confidence in being in the same room with you alone, he might not be a man to be easily trifled with.

The bit about him potentially not being a subordinate to the Bandit King is missing. Now, why would that be?

 

[treave]

I don't want to guide the thinking too much.

The missing part doesn't change much, though. It was something you could have inferred for yourself anyway, and it's merely a subjective evaluation on Jing's part.

 

[Nevill]

I don't want to guide the thinking too much.

See, that's exactly the kind of thing that guides the thinking. That, and you have mentioned he has a daughter...
You are luring us to a certain path, aren't you?

Okay, now, if the mission is to fuck with the Bandit King - which may be the reason he can't let his cronies do it for him - then I am up to it.

Flopping to B.

 

[Azira]

He is the bandit king..

Dun dun dunnnnn!

 

[treave]

See, that is why I removed that part.

 

[Nevill]

He is the bandit king..

Oh, great. I though the identity of the Bandit King is too well known to avoid such surprises.

 

[treave]

No, I meant the flopping because you think it's going to be about screwing over the bandits and freeing Youxia City from them in some way (making it an easier choice for some).

...Not that I'm confirming the content of the mission in any form.

Du Yao is not the Bandit King, Pang Hu. You would not be able to mistake the two for each other if you put them side by side.

 

[Stygian Lurker]

voting B

 

[RealDDc]

The third option is totally out of place, it didn't even cross my mind reading the update. That makes me expect something from it and I just have to vote C. Logic does not reside.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

A
1. He probably wants us to assassinate someone, based on his comment about not assassinating royalty.
2. It's probably something that can't be done in secret or has a high risk of being found out or he'd have his men do it.
3. Given the above, it's something that is against the orthodox sects. He mentioned that the orthodox sects are customers and therefor he may not want to damage his rep with them too much.
4. This guy is one evil bastard, so you can count on it being bad enough to turn many of us away from it once we find out. I'm not sure all of us have the balls to see it through and backing out may be impossible without repercussions. This guy doesn't strike me as someone who likes people knowing his secrets.

 

[Esquilax]

Okay, now, if the mission is to fuck with the Bandit King - which may be the reason he can't let his cronies do it for him - then I am up to it.

Flopping to B.

Wat? The mission is to get the sword and the manual and then get the fuck out. Why is fucking with the Bandit King even desirable at this point? He's not a nice guy, but he's the only semblance of law and order in places like Youxia City. We made a deal with Wudang and we made a promise to Pu'er to look after her husband - those things are way more important to me. I'd rather avoid making more enemies if I can help it, so I find your logic - which involves going out of our way to make enemies when we can simply opt out of Du Yao's mission here and now - to be sort of insane. This is our only chance to make a clean break right now.

Anyways, I suspect that Lambchop and Tigranes have the right of it when it comes to what Du Yao's mission is going to be. It's going to involve secret information that's sensitive to Du Yao, it's something that he doesn't want one of his underlings doing, and it's going to be something that's bad enough that he didn't even bother asking the orthodox sectarians about it. Basically, it's bad enough that he decided to trust the incredibly fickle disciple of the Maniac over a bunch of otherwise far more reliable orthodox types over. Personally, I'm not sure that I'd be willing to see such a task through to the end, so I think that we have to back out while we still can.

 

[Smashing Axe]

I think this guy can be a useful ally to us in the future, providing we keep faith. Yes, we may have to do something dirty, or unseemly, but this seems to be the quickest route towards acquiring what we need, so we can return to our actual goal, whilst still potentially improving our relationship with the Wudang. If we don't take up his offer, we may be spending months trying to track down the manual and sword. I know this is high risk, high reward, but really I don't want to waste any more time here than necessary to 1. Make friends with the Wudang. 2. Speed up our recovery/Improve our skills

While the task will be unsavourary/unorthodox in nature, I don't think it will directly involve the eight sects, but rather be related to the internal politics of the city. Again, this is merely a hunch.

 

[Baltika9]

I dunno guys, those of you that had no problem offing that guy in the Manor for no good a reason sure are confusingme right now: if we could off him on nothing but a hunch, why can't we do the same now for an actual reason?

 

[Nevill]

Wat? The mission is to get the sword and the manual and then get the fuck out. Why is fucking with the Bandit King even desirable at this point? He's not a nice guy, but he's the only semblance of law and order in places like Youxia City. We made a deal with Wudang and we made a promise to Pu'er to look after her husband - those things are way more important to me. I'd rather avoid making more enemies if I can help it, so I find your logic - which involves going out of our way to make enemies when we can simply opt out of Du Yao's mission here and now - to be sort of insane. This is our only chance to make a clean break right now.

Well, obviously, it isn't our goal here, but it is the quickest path to it. We either make a clean break and search for the lost things ourselves (and pray that he doesn't impede our search so that we would return to him for help), or do some dirty work for him. Seeing as how our reputation with the bandits is at -25, and the city is at +15 (no doubt due to the man's favorable disposition towards us), I don't find such a choice of friends and enemies insane, but quite logical instead. Though of course, we have no way of telling who would our target be, and it may piss off someone completely different. That would be unfortunate.

I am cautious enough that I would want to vote for A, but I would also like to see what his mission entails, too. I don't feel strongly about either choice, yet.

...can he make a copy of the manual for us? He does have the resourses.

 

[asxetos]

Voting B.
Missed a couple of votes due to vacations but it seems that the options i would vote won anyway.

 

[treave]

Smashing Axe - B
Azira - B
Zero Credibility - A
Nevill - B
Kashmir Slippers - A
Elfberserker - A
TOME - A
Baltika9 - B
Kipeci - B
XenomorphII - C
Grimgravy - B
Esquilax - A
ERYFKRAD - A
Tigranes - B
Stygian Lurker - B
RealDDc - C
Lambchop19 - A
asxetos - B

***

Current tally:

A - 7
B - 9
C - 2

***

...can he make a copy of the manual for us? He does have the resourses.

Wouldn't be a problem for Du Yao. Of course, you'd really have to keep it a secret from Wudang.

 

[Nevill]

Alright. A question to B voters, then. And don't look at me, I may just as easily flop back to A.

The goal here is not to find the manual and the sword. If we do just that, the sword goes to Wudang, and the manual goes to Bai Jiutian - we do not gain anything from that, apart from a 'thank you'. The goal is to build our relationship with Wudang disciples, impress them enough so that they decide to deny the manual to Bai Jiutian and give it to us instead.

How does accepting a shady deal from the mayor bring us closer to that goal? Wouldn't we be better off bonding during our own investigation?

 

[Tigranes]

If we're going to impress the Wudangs by acting orthodox then I doubt we will succeed. We will impress the Wudangs only by showing that (1) Man Tiger Pig gets shit done; (2) Man Tiger Pig helps out Wudangs when Wudangs' hands are tied; (3) unorthodox ways might be unorthodox but they are not morally reprehensible and they can be useful. Besides, I'm pretty sure whatever we do with the beggars, the Bandit King or the prostitutes would have been similarly unothodox. Finally, the Wudangs and even BJ gave tacit approval when they left the room.

Now, the only unresolved issue is, what if Du Yao asks for something truly questionable and 'evil'? It's obviously a risk. But I think we run that risk wherever we go to an extent, and I've already detailed what I think DY's request will involve in general terms. We don't know for sure, but it's an educated estimate.

 

[Kipeci]

If we do just that, the sword goes to Wudang, and the manual goes to Bai Jiutian - we do not gain anything from that, apart from a 'thank you'. The goal is to build our relationship with Wudang disciples, impress them enough so that they decide to deny the manual to Bai Jiutian and give it to us instead.

It's been stated by treave that we will get an award from Wudang for services rendered if we actually do manage to secure this, but also that the reward isn't going to come in the form of one of their sect treasures. That's perfectly fair. However, I don't think that Wudang can actually do what you want to happen without causing a huge amount of outrage among even non-Huashan groups-- by their own reckoning, the manual isn't quite theirs to give away and is only on loan from Huashan, which is why they need to give it to Huashan. They're not going to support just giving it to us, though I imagine there's still some way to hold onto it if we really want to with accompanying costs to our mutual relationship. Personally, I'm fine with either just taking a peek at it or getting Du Yao to get us a copy of it once it's secured, though the latter obviously comes with some risks. I think that the Wudang are going to be happy with us for securing their stuff in a timely fashion, despite not spending much time showing the Wu brothers how cool we are.

Even if the Wu brothers start thinking that we're really bro, that's not going to be enough to persuade the acting head of the Wudang sect to give us the manual instead, no matter if he's a little pissed off at Huashan. If you're going to flop to A, I hope it's not out of a sense that we can change that view if we stall for enough time.

Basically, vote B if you'd rather be over with this faster and get whatever rewards Du Yao has to offer, vote A if you prefer not being involved in his shady business and want to invest more time bonding with Wudang and BJ.

 

[Baltika9]

vote A if you prefer not being involved in his shady business and want to invest more time bonding with Wudang and BJ.

At the definite cost of missing Cao'er's appointment.

 

[Kipeci]

Well, that's not absolutely true. It's entirely possible that we find some other lead that would let us be through with this relatively quickly... and it's also possible that we might be lead on a wild goose chase that does shoot over the bounds of our self-imposed time limit to get back to Cao'er. It's pretty clear that B is probably faster, though.

 

[ScubaV]

B.

As I stated earlier, my number one goal is getting to our meetup with Cao'er on time. B seems like the best option for that, as well as yielding other possible rewards. I don't mind at all if the task is unsavory, I just hope it doesn't affect our friends negatively or is flat out evil.

 

[Kashmir Slippers]

I am a complete idiot. I though A was the choice that agreed to his task.

Flopping to B.

 

[Baltika9]

So, uh, will we get to meet his daughter the next update?