Venomous Desire(Porne)

[porne]

"Well, it was that or let me penetrate deeper into the forest. I'm difficult to fool with magic illusions. And I'm not a fan of the centaurs, and I'm sure they've got sayings about wars making for strange bed fellows around these parts as well." I comment before wincing at the sexual implications of my chosen idiom. "...Anyway, I've got an ample supply of the healing salve if you need it. Let me know if you have anything else to discuss, or if you'd just like to rest for now." I mention.

[Sallin_Kari]

She pauses to consider what you say, before finally answer, "Not really. War has more cost us allies then given us unexpected ones." She sighs before adding, "And I doubt your salve will help at this point. It's been weeks since..." She pauses to touch her scars around her eyes, "My vision was taken."

[porne]

I pause at the thought that she might be blinded. "I don't think it will, but it's more there for any cuts and bruises. Anything more than that will require a bit more time on my part." I mention, trying not to cause too much damage to her mindset any more. "But, it's probably for the best that we focus on doing what we can for now." I tell her, trying to move along and hopefully get her patched up.

[Sallin_Kari]

"You're a healer then?" She questions your comment about being able to do more. Still she lets you get close and you can tell the injuries are as almost as 'healed' as she'll get without further help, the scabs starting to peel off to reveal the scarring underneath. You're not entirely sure what happened, but there are dozens of small cuts and wounds over her face. Not exactly indicative of a normal weapon, so you're not sure what caused it. Regardless of the scarring and inflammation, she still has that elven beauty clearly visible.

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Basically she took a face full of shrapnel.

[porne]

"More of an alchemist by training. The salve certainly helps with most wounds as it promotes healing. Unless you want me to poke around inside the wounds to see what I can find, I don't know how much help I'll be. What caused these wounds? Some kind of multitailed whip maybe?" I begin to trail off as I look at her and turn my more magically oriented senses on her wounds. If there's something actually embedded in the eye, I could remove it and apply salve to heal the wounds after the fact. It should even work on nerve damage, something that is normally resistant to healing tinctures.

[Sallin_Kari]

She pauses for while and cocks her head to the side, clearly wondering if you might be stupid, as you examine the wound. It doesn't look like there are any major pieces in there, only tiny almost too small to see particles. There doesn't seem to be any nerve damage, it only being surface level, however the issue seems to be that her 'lens' is entirely replaced with scar tissue. While... possible to heal, getting the lens to be correct to allow for sight beyond blurry shapes is... unlikely. "Have... have you no experience with the centaur's muskets?" She pauses to judge your reaction before adding, "Their shot hit a tree I was using for cover and the resulting splinters raked my face."

[porne]

"Are muskets what they call their wands? I know they're quite loud, and I've captured a few of them to look over, but I never really got the chance." I tell her, unclear on what I could do. The extensive damage to her lens is not something I could fix by just cutting it out and then smearing some bio-accelerant on it. "Shrapnel can definitely be a problem." At this point, there's nothing I can really do, it would take a much more talented alchemist than myself, or a gifted healer most likely. I vaguely recall that people that lose their sight will experience temporarily heightened hearing, maybe I can accelerate that with some kind of nerve stimulant?

[Sallin_Kari]

"Wands? They're not magical. They throw metal balls at high speed. You can't counter-magic that. You can barely defend against it!" She declares in disbelief. You're not sure if you can help with here hearing, but recalling what she did when you first arrive, you think her hearing already above average, so she shouldn't be too bad. Still, it might be possible to restore at least some of her sight if you regrow a lens. Might not focus properly but it's something... Of course revealing you can grow body parts is probably not something a stranger would take kindly too... especially when you tell them to trust you while you take a knife to their eyeballs.

[porne]

I do have the ability to grow body parts as needed, and unlike most dragons, mine are 'permanent' versions that are made of actual flesh and not simply magically altered reality. But... it's quite a ways from being an easy thing to do, so I decide to grow a few eyes on one of my parts that's hidden below in my personal room. The fact it will be dragon flesh instead of elf flesh is also odd, but something I'll try to explain away as alchemical experimentation. Yes, if I'm confident, I'll give it a try when I can.

"Ah, that would explain the smell and such. Anyway, I do know a few ways to... alter smaller animals. I'll try and capture a few to experiment on, see if I can't get their eyes to grow to proper size and possibly transplant them. There might be some side effects..." I find my mind beginning to wander, both on the subject of eyes, organ transplants, and these fascinating metal devices. I wonder if I could grow something similar?

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Point of order, at early stages, traditional plate armor was quite effective at stopping lead shot. At least until smokeless powder and they cut loose on the speed.

[Sallin_Kari]

The eyes should be done in a day or two. You have time to think how you are going to explain away any details.

She is... taken aback by that and with her already suspicion of you, she replies curtly, "I don't think that would be necessary." As for the idea of replicating these weapons... Maybe? Growing metal barrels would... not be the easiest thing, to put it bluntly, but maybe some other organic material? You don't have a firm understanding of the mechanics of it, so you'd have to figure that out first. Though at least you have a few samples.

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Eh... that's... a bit broad. There is a massive time between the invention of guns and the invention of smokeless gunpowder. Hell, there is a large time difference between armor falling out of favor and smokeless gunpowder. Smokeless gunpowder is a relatively recent thing, only coming into any sort of notable use during the later wild west days, around the same time cased ammo started becoming available, rather the just paper-wrapped cartridges, while one of the last forms of wide spread metal armor was in conquistador and armored dragoons. Sure there were later metal armors for bullet protection, but they were something you'd raise you eyebrow at seeing because they were so uncommon. In addition it wasn't really... 'traditional' plate since they substantially increased in thickness over the pre-gunpowder plate in order to attain bullet proof, and the problem got worse with time, necessitating covering less and less of the body in order to attain the required thickness without weight a prohibitive amount. I mean, we're talking several hundreds of years of development here. It's not like guns were invented and then just stayed the same until smokeless gunpowder was invented. By the time that muskets were a thing, armor was... out of fashion.

Sorry, weapon nerd me is shutting up now. Sorry for the rant. But yes, armor would provide protection. Maybe not absolute, but some.

[porne]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Ah, I was a bit fuzzy. My impression was that OG armor was still useful for early guns, but as they developed, the shear cost of it kept it away from anyone but nobility rather than as a viable piece of equipment for 'common' soldiers. And by the time steel production became cheap enough to make it viable, smokeless powder had moved the goal post a lot further and it was no longer worth the 'weight' requirement. I mean, I've got a chunk of AR500 in my closet, so it's not exactly expensive.

"Well, it's also an experiment to see if I can, so it's no bother. The weapons are still interesting, can you describe the principles behind them?" I ask, hoping to divert her to something else that I might be able to use.

[Sallin_Kari]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Well, the reason for platemail coming into being was steel production becoming cheaper. But yeah, generally by the time of smokeless gunpowder I.E. the civil war period, you could still 'buy' metal bullet'proof' armor, but it was quite burdensome and expensive so wasn't really worth it for most people. But yeah until the 1600s most professional armies would have breastplates at least for at least some of their more elite soldiers. The whole pike and shot era. Just armor was sort of losing the arms raise at that point, with it reaching the peak of practical weight while still covering the essential. This is probably where the idea of a full suit of platemail being so heavy that a knight couldn't move in it and so would be helpless if knocked off his horse. After all, if the small amount of coverage that the more modern breastplates covered weighed like 30kgs, how much would covering the whole body weigh? Well... like 20 kgs actually because it was significantly thinner, and designed to allow for movement.

Okay, but ain't AR500 a composite? It's not just a plate of steel unless I'm grossly mistaken.

"I'm not sure, but it uses some sort of powder that ignites. How it generates the speed from that I don't know," She explains, "But you can always tell when one of these have been fired recently because of the brimstone stench it leaves behind."

[porne]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Industrial mass production mostly. I mean, short of the Bessemer process or similarly, it's difficult to be that low. Much less hit the composition requirements reliably.

Nope, AR 500 armor is made of AR 500 steel: https://www.steelwarehouse.com/ar500/ but it's usually got a sprayed on layer of polymer foam similar to truck bed liner. It offers no real structural effects, just prevents spaling and rust by sealing the material. Shit's fucking heavy though, price of cheaper armor.

"Hm, I did notice the smell." I summon one of the 'muskets' and begin to inspect it. I notice a strange set of levers toward one end, and recalling that's the 'safe' end, which likely has the activation mechanism, I poke around at it, taking a sniff near the back, trying to figure out what it could be made of.

[Sallin_Kari]

There is a small hole bored into the musket, smelling strongly of the brimestone, leading to a flat surface which seems to stop the larger lever, which is currently resting against it. The small level on the bottom does move when you pull it but doesn't do anything initially. After fiddling for it, and pulling back the larger lever until it clicks into place and pulling the smaller one do you get a reaction. The lever swings forth, slamming into the flat surface, and sparks. Okay... what does that... do?

"Are you... Messing with one of those things?!" You hear the elf declare astonished after the sparks, "Those things are dangerous!"

[porne]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

You know, I deliberately tried to have her be steering clear of the 'activation' end.

I assume tipping a 'loaded' one would cause it to dump the musket ball out?

Hm, sparks. With the flare of heat, the loud burst, and the intense smell, something flammable maybe? A heat reaction to linear force spell of some kind? I know I've smelled these compounds before...

"Huh? Oh, this one has been used, so I assume it's drained. I think I've got some that are full."

[Sallin_Kari]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

Okay but what else is there to play with? I decided not to mention the barrel itself, as I feel that's just over specific. Did forget about the ramrod.

And generally no... the musket balls are in there pretty good. They didn't want them to roll out. Hence the ramrod rather then just rolling them down the barrel.

"They're not fucking wands!" She snaps, "They are something like a crossbow, so can be reloaded after a shot."

[porne]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

I didn't think they could hold that kind of tolerance to get a snug fit. *shrug* not important now.

"Hm, that would make more sense. So, they throw a ball of metal using some alchemical solution whose function is triggered by sparks. The smell on this definitely makes me think it's something that burnt, the brimstone scent is definitely related somehow." Recalling the searing pain of impact, I make a note to grow my internal scales a bit thicker and hardier if I can. The impact of these things is brutal.

[Sallin_Kari]

Spoiler (click to show/hide):

I mean, they're lead. They'll just deform when under pressure of the expanding gas. The point is that they do not fall out in real guns.

The elf is just rubbing the bridge of her nose with her thumbs as head rests against her pressed together forefingers. If it is reloaded though, you might need something more then just the weapon itself in order to figure out what the missing part is.

[porne]

Hm, do I have any of them loaded? I begin pulling them up and doing a quick inventory, also looking for any supplies of their alchemical material.

[Sallin_Kari]

Pulling out of the muskets from when you... met Ruby's father. You begin examining it.
Roll 16
Luckily for you, this one does not seem to have been used. The pan has a covering, that when removed reveals a black powder, with a slight brimstone smell itself. Examining further, you believe there is more of this black powder through the hole. Trying to fish it out from the barrel, you find that there is something else down there, but it seems quite happy to remain where it is. You're not sure on how to get it out without tearing the barrel open.