My Sexy Skill Has Increased! Let's Play A Dance with Rogues

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Even the dragon. Even the goddamn dragon!

Well, dragons are shapeshifters in this universe, sooo...

;A;

WHY.

WHY. NO. Stop that, please. Can we get one male in this world that won't either try to fuck and/or betray the main character ? D:

You know, I tried to answer this with an example like three times, and each time I stopped before clicking "post" and thought, "wait, am I really sure about that guy?" This game.

There's that Dhorn dude that really follows their rules of "NO SEX BRO". Arto something.
And I guess Simon too?

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I know that's a common conceit, but it's so damn stupid. If I could turn into a tuna, would I find myself sexually attracted to tuna? No, because they're fucking fish and I'm a fucking human and what the fuck is wrong with you*.

*Not you, obviously. I'll take unnecessary clarifications for 100, Alex.

But tuna is the sexiest fish. You cannot deny this.

Brb, uninstalling my browser.

Well, I think it's a bit more complicated than that when you're talking about non-human races that are intelligent. And in this context it's less "sexual attraction" and more "physically capable of sex." But, yeah.

We find a safe place to rest in the caves before making the journey back to the Dwarves.





"Sounds like they're having fun."

"I hope she doesn't kill him." Bran grins.

Pia blushes slightly.

"Humans..."



So remember what I said about Anden's Madonna/whore complex? When I get to the non-canon Anden romance update, please remember this scene.

"The dragon is dead." I hand over Sziths' head.

Lorekeeper Namli blinks at the dragon's head, unable to speak for a moment. "This is a most unexpected turn of events indeed!"

"Are you going to help us now?"

"You have to tell me of the battle! Did you find its treasure?"

"You bet."

"Oh... well..." He clears his throat. "M'lady, you're most welcome to trade with us, of course." There's a greedy expression in his eyes.

"What about opening the tunnels?"

He hands over the key. We trade some of the treasure -- we don't need most of it anyway, despite Gemli's protests -- for a few scrolls. After Pia shows me how to read them, I feel a bit more prepared for whatever else we might encounter.



And further down we go.

With an uneasy feeling I stare into the darkness. But everything's quiet.

"You're sure it wasn't a shadow on the walls?"

"I saw something! I'm sure! It looked like a big ball."

"Whatever it was, it's gone now."

We move on cautiously, but the way is clear.







I tie a rope around the crystal and tug at the knot. It seems secure enough to hold my weight. Once I get across, I can tie the rope to something on the other side for the others to hold onto.



I manage to pull myself back onto the edge of the pool, gasping for air.

"M'lady... it would probably be best if you did this without your armor on."

Really, I don't know what else you were expecting.

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I can't wait until there's a scene where an NPC suggests that something would be easier if I put clothes on.

I love how that is my only dialogue choice. I'm not even allowed to protest anymore.

"We'll turn our backs to you of course, M'lady."

"Please, yes."

Norah helps me out of my clothes.

WHY.

Pia does look every now and then.

Anden studies the ceiling, careful not to look at me.

Bran studies the floor, but I catch him peeping every now and then.

Gemli grins and looks at my butt!



The water's freezing cold. I struggle to swim across; even without my armor, it feels like something's pulling me under.

This is a pain in the ass. Basically, if you fail your checks you start drowning and continually lose HP until you make it back to the surface to start over again. It took me at least three tries to get across, and it's not like I have low Strength and Dexterity or anything.





"Well done, Riona!" He smiles at me.

The others follow without a problem as I pick the lock on the door. I didn't expect to find anyone where -- anyone friendly, at least -- but when I open the door, a nervous gnome runs up to me.



"We're trying to find an exit that gets us to the north side of the Black Mountains."

"Ah..." He looks at me like you look at someone who's not right in the head.

"Do you know this area well?"

"I live here, yes."

"How did you get here? You've got to admit this is a little way off."

"Uh..." He looks irritated. "I fell into the river, if you have to know. A few years ago. I've been living here ever since."



"Err... yes. There's a big waterfall behind my home."

I don't like where this is going.

"Is there a way we could reach the lower levels without falling down that waterfall?"



Thanks for all those dialogue options, ADWR. Well, we know where we're being railroaded. Time to get to it!

Budo unlocks the door leading down to the waterfall.



I hate this place.

"I suppose food is hard to come by in this place."

I don't know why I'm defending him. But seeing the gnome dead on the ground... even if he and his pet attacked us, I feel pity.

When did I start feeling so squeamish about killing people who want to kill me?

We stop to eat before moving on. Budo had a fire going already, although I don't even want to think about what was in his cooking-pot. I throw it away and let Gemli take care of the cooking. I take Bran aside, ignoring the knowing glances that Norah casts me over his shoulder.

"When you came to me before the fight with Vico... Did you follow us before?"

"Truth be told ,yes. I woke up when you spoke to him, and I was getting worried when you two disappeared."

"I'm very glad you were there."

"He won't harm you again."

"Why did you risk your life for me?"

"Because you are worth it, Riona."

"How do you know I am?"

"I just do."

"Do you think I'm pretty?"

I blurt it out without thinking. Gods, I sound like a child. But I have to know what Bran wants from me.

"You're more than pretty, Riona. I've told you as much when I first saw you, and I haven't changed my mind." He smiles.

"So you think I'm pretty, but you've never tried to, uh..."

"Are you complaining?"

"Well, most men are eager to get under my skirts."

"Small wonder they are. You're probably the most beautiful thing I have ever seen." He gently lifts my chin and looks deeply into my eyes. "Is that really what you want, Riona? Are you sure you're not just feeling lonely?"

"Look, I wasn't asking you to marry me or something."

I shouldn't be so irritated at him. If he's treating me like a child, it's only because I started it.



"Oh..."

"I do not want to spoil this, Riona. I have the greatest respect for you. And I know how lonely you are at times. But I do not want to take advantage of your situation. I think you have to understand your own feelings first. I think you will, in time." He smiles and gently touches my cheek.

I'd forgotten that Bran was a little bit condescending.

"Now I see why it would be handy to be able to float above the ground, like that eyeball thing did."

"The eyeball was much prettier than you, too."

"Yeah, I couldn't help but notice those longing glances you gave to it."

"I'll stick with my Ranger Boy." She grins and puts her arm around Anden's waist.

"You cannot seriously think about swimming down that waterfall, Riona!"



"I don't see another way."

"Oh damn."

Taking a deep breath, I slide into the dark waters.

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I knew that using the console to bump up my STR every time I hit the weight limit would pay off in the long run!

We look around, but Pia is nowhere to be found. Neither is Gemli. I know we should keep searching for them, but Bran and Norah aren't as steady on their feet as they want me to think. I call for a rest and build a fire, then take a look at Bran's head.

Norah and Anden go off by themselves. I try not to listen. I crawl into my sleeping bag, and Bran lays down not far away. But I can't sleep. I'm not sure if it's my imagination, or it really is much colder down here than on the surface, or in the tunnels closer to the mines. And no matter which way I turn, there's a rock pinching at my back.

"Is everything alright, Riona?" Bran lies on his side, his head propped up on his hand, whispering through the darkness.

"No, I really hate sleeping bags!"

I think he understands.

He chuckles softly, then turns around and lies still again.

"Bran?"

I whisper his name into the darkness.

"Hmmm...?"

"I'm so cold..."

"Hold on." He shifts and pulls a blanket out from under his sleeping bag and holds it over to me. It's still warm.

"But this way your back will be all stiff tomorrow."

"It will keep you warm, you'll see. Sleep well now, little Riona."

He lies back down, and I hear him shift around, unable to get comfortable again. I crawl over and nudge him.

"Can I just sleep with you in your bag?"

He doesn't respond for a couple of moments but just looks at me. Then he nods and smiles. We don't have a lot of space, and I'm very much aware of his body. He lies on his side, and I cuddle up to his chest while he puts his arm around my waist.

Even if he doesn't want me, just sleeping with a man feels... comfortable. Safe. I fall asleep easily, warm in his arms.

Full disclosure: I screwed something up again. There's supposed to be a conversation when you wake up, but it didn't trigger and I don't know why. That conversation is apparently necessary for the Bran romance to progress later unless you fiddle with variables (which I did). I went back to try and trigger it and get screenshots, but I have no idea what to do. So this next dialogue is constructed from me looking up the conversation in the toolset.

It takes me a moment to understand where I am when I wake up. Bran's arms are still wrapped around my waist. I haven't slept this peacefully in a long time...

Norah walks over to Bran, grinning at me all the while, and prods him. "Hey! Wake up, you big oaf!"

He stirs and half-heartedly fends her off, pinning me down in the process. The sleeping bag is really a bit small for two people!

I pinch him, and he rolls off of me.

"Oops. Sorry Riona." He starts wiggling himself out of the sleeping bag. "Riona was just feeling cold last night. Not what you think, sis."

"Uh huh. Cold."

I blush.

"This is none of your business! Shouldn't you rather be worrying about Ranger Boy?"

"Oh I cannot complain about last night..." She grins widely.

Anden walks up, and blushes when he sees me entangled in Bran's sleeping bag. Norah drags him away, still grinning. I glance at Bran as we get dressed.

"So what now...?"

"I've been asking that myself."

"And...?"

He bends down to me and softly kisses my head.

"Does that mean I can sleep with you again if I'm cold...?"

He smiles. "Yes." There's a sparkling in his eyes that hasn't been there before...

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next non-canon update

So did Nora get all that offscreen too? Did she convince him that they're barbarian married by common law in the main storyline or does he just have weird double standards?

Some of it is just inconsistency in his character (like, he doesn't seem to have any qualms about sex with Norah). But I'm pretty sure that the main reason he doesn't get down on one knee and beg Norah to marry him to restore her honor is because, unlike the Princess, she doesn't have honor to restore.

Also Anden is in denial when it comes to things being not how they "should be." See his amazement that Norah is a woman who fights and isn't, like, girly and stuff (uh, Fighter/Rogue standing right here, thanks) and his refusal to believe/understand that the Princess might just enjoy sex for its own sake. Norah can get away with being sexual because she's a wild barbarian woman and that's just how they are. The Princess is supposed to be virginal, and therefore must be despite all evidence.

Stop me if I'm reading too much into this. I just have lots of feelings, I guess.

i am throwing tables and chairs just reading that

cemented my hatred for anden wow.

Sorry =(

I guess you didn't finish the Anden romance and can't help give me an idea of what happens at the end, then?

From what I know, everything stays incredibly vanilla and he doesn't change one bit.
I think, even after everything that goes on in the main plot, he's still all "OH MY HIMEEE~~ SO PURE AND CHASTE AND AHHH~~~~~". I think he's more in love with the idea of the Princess being a PURE PRINCESS than he is with the Princess the person. And that is a reason why I could never, ever be in a relationship with him. Because he denies this integral part of what makes the princess who she is.

sit and think about that for a minute. I will suffer through the Vico route but I can not bear to go through the Anden one.
i think there's something wrong with me, but at least i have a reason.

That's not a half bad love confession. If it wasn't for the inconsistencies Nerys pointed out, I might have even swooned a little. I do wonder, given the uneven quality of certain parts of this mod, if Anden's apparent Madonna/Whore complex is intentional or not.

Condescending or not, he's actually respecting us! That's more than can be said for, like, 80% of all NPCs or something!

And, by the seven gods, Anden is exaggerating quiiiiite a bit, isn't he? He puts the Princess in a pedestal like she's a goddess herself or something. I quite liked him because he was so polite and sweet and respectful, but I must say that his romance ruined him forever annoyed me a little.
I'm heart broken that we can't romance Norah, though. We're so much cooler than Anden.

By the waaaay, I was meaning to ask, what the heck is that little rock-wolf thing that follows your party around? Someone's familiar?

Yeah, that's exactly it. It doesn't frustrate me the way Vico does, but I guess we all have our breaking points.

Ha! Well, if the Norah route were at all consistent with what she does now, it would just be her flirting with us for the whole game and making the boys jealous, and then revealing last minute that actually she's 100% straight, sorry. If she were altered in a convincing way to make a romance possible... it could definitely be interesting.

Yeah. Due to the better henchman AI mod I have installed, party members actually use their abilities and spells, so Anden will summon a wolf and Vico (when he's around) will summon a ghoul; Pia will reliably cast her bard spells; and stuff like that. It's pretty great. Makes some of the ridiculous battles a lot easier.

Man that's why he becomes so stuffy? =/ ugh. I do prefer Vico over that.

And Bran's ruined forever for me after that "lol I'm bouncing." incident. >_>

*hugs Rizzen close* least you're honest about being mean.

Like, okay. Vico's a cunt.
Vico is a flaming, twisted, rotting cunt.

But at no point does he deny a single thing about the Princess or what has happened to her. He's done a horrible thing, but he does not deny that it's happened. He knows if she's slept around (maybe) and he does not deny it. At the same time, if she doesn't sleep around (hard as it can be to avoid in this thing), he knows that too. The thing is this.
He does not deny the Princess' existence. He does not say "hehe, you're my innocent [insert generic animal]." He calls you an animal as a pet name, yes, but he does not for one second assume that you are innocent. And that is a thing that I can genuinely appreciate. He doesn't downplay a single thing that you've done and acknowledges all of it. Anden, on the other hand, would rather live in denial and turn a blind eye to the things that the Princess has done and accomplished if it doesn't fit his little guidelines as to "what a princess should be like".

In that sense, I am more towards Vico than Anden.

but vico is still a rapist cunt so i mean really i can just say that i don't like either of them and be done with it.

It just really gets to me when people pick and choose things that make up a person and try to ignore the rest of what makes them...them. You love a person for all they are, not just the good points.
That asshole.

To be fair I don't think a non-naive princess would be interested in him. Least for more than the lulz factor. I mean...if you play a non-ideal princess to him...he refuses to romance you. That to me at least says it all. (I really had to play the wide eyed idealist princess to trigger his romance). Maybe I did something wrong I dunno.

I haven't tried to trigger the Anden romance other than by changing variables around, but I know he at least will end the romance if you're dismissive or mean (in what you might think comes across as a joking way) or if you're pushy and try to insist that no, you really do like sex. There might be some things in normal dialogue, not just his player-initiated flirts, that affect the romance, but I don't know offhand.

I keep trying to look through the game's dialogue files and ~uncover its secrets~ but the conversation editor is just so incredibly messy to follow. Each conversation is a different, often randomly-named dialogue file, I don't always remember who the conversation starts with, and the branches frequently dead-end and you have to pick them up in another branch. Also I can't figure out how to just do a simple dialogue search, although I'm sure there must be a way. So my knowledge in general is limited to "things I've discovered myself in playing" and "things I've read on the Internet which may or may not be true for this current version."

This literally just occurred to me reading this post: I think in this respect Vico is the anti-Anden. Like, Anden assumes you're innocent, but even if you haven't slept around much Vico by default treats you like you have been. (I'm thinking back to the conversation at Tony's where he says he'll see you again prostituting yourself to the sailors, even if you haven't triggered the scene where he sees you and rescues you, as one example.) I don't know if it's really that Vico acknowledges what/who you are in some kind of active way, or just that he makes a guess and, based on the nature of the game, his guess is more likely to be right than Anden's.

Of course this just brings us to a whole bunch of points from the video game romance thread which I know we've both read, so.

I'm not arguing with the rest of your post, particularly:

Yeah.

Yeah I tried some what I felt to be harmless flirting only to get that "I'm sorry" dialogue and I kind of went "wut?" he's really touchy.

And yeah Vico tends to assume you sleep around. I have several princesses that pick the sneaky/screw this I'm out options/silver tongue (Even avoided general guy *cheers*) and they got the same dialogue as my willing to sleep with some people princess (though my everything that moves princess got different responses. Ah I love her so much the snark. The Snark <3) so *shrugs*. Yeah it's more him guessing and because the game is so nintendo hard if you decide not to sleep with someone he is far likely to be right.