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Ari's out collecting mushrooms on the Blood Moor.
Yes, there are demons, and zombies, and once he saw some bipedal cows with halberds for some reason, and yes, they could theoretically kill him. But he has a very sharp scythe, and he can conjure fire and lightning at his whim, and just in general, Ari can take care of himself.
Uncle Deckard told him not to go too far. Ari told him to go teach his grandmother to suck eggs.
Maybe one of those mushrooms was more "magical" than expected, because now he suddenly finds that everything is spinning and blurring...
...He finds himself on a forest, a different one. Very tall trees reach towards the twilight-purple sky.
Well, the Blood Moor isn't a forest, it's a moor, so any forest is going to be a change of pace. Also, purple sky? Purple sky.
Ari has no fucking idea what's going on.
He checks for portals. Or a waypoint, a waypoint would be very convenient.
There are no visible portals or waypoints. There is a squirrel the size of a cat peering down from one of the trees. It offers no answers. Just the soulless stare of a squirrel that's evaluating something for their nutty content.
The sky is the same purple-ish shade all over, no sign of a sun nor moon, just the unusually bright stars. He can spot some constructions in the distance, a riot of colorful builds to one side and some old-looking stone buildings in the opposite direction. The second one looks ominous in a way that's hard to quantify.
Well, those certainly are some probably-demonic ruins. Ari will stay away from those, no matter how much lightning he can conjure.
He nods politely to the squirrel before unfurling a scroll of Town Portal and intoning the command word. (Even when you're going barely a mile from camp, you always pack a portal home. One of the many lessons Adria taught him, back before he was a Cain.)
As the command word is spoken aloud the powerful magic energies of the scroll... fail to produce any effect. The squirrel climbs up the tree, leaving Ari to stand there, presumably even more confused.
...Well, that's a problem.
Half-heartedly, he verifies that he can't cast it from his own mana pool either. Conclusion: nope.
Lacking other options, he picks up his basket of mushrooms and starts off toward the colorful, non-ominous buildings.
The colorful buildings remain non-ominous as he approaches. Unless Ari thinks tacky color combinations as ominous, then everything is doomed!
Fairly quickly, Ari stumbles upon a road and soon after he spots a cart pulled by two ten-feet tall horses. There are three passanger, two women and a girl. The women are seven feet tall and five feet tall. The girl spots him and waves.
Tall horses. Tall woman. Weird.
Ari waves back. "Hello! I'm, um, very lost. Do you know where we are?"
The women look back at him, and then the short one (who isn't driving) speaks something. It sounds like a question but not in a language he knows.
Pantomiming "I'm lost" is surprisingly difficult. Ari settles for looking around in obvious confusion.
After trying variations of inquisitive-sounding phrases the women mime offering a ride.
Ari climbs into their cart happily, thanking them in a language they definitely do not speak.
Good. They go towards town without much conversation (possibly because it would be somewhat rude). The little girl pokes at the mushrooms, but then pretends that she didn't once she is caught.
They get into town proper without much ado. After pondering for a moment, the tall woman stirs the horses to go left and they arrive at a lighthouse-looking building with a tall tower.
There is a tall, muscular, blond guy who was just about to climb the short set of stairs leading to the front door. He turns and after a brief exchange with the women he mimes for Ari to follow him inside.
Ari approves of this transfer of custody. He follows, still holding his mushroom basket in one hand and his scythe in the other.
There is also a tall and lean guy inside the building, he looks up from his book. And after a brief exchange he reaches inside a cupboard for something and throws at Gabe.
Who catches the thing. It's a bracelet, made of blue leather strips and bits of crystals. Gabe pokes the crystal and looks up at Ari. "Hey, is this working? Translator bracelet."
"Yep! You're coming through fine. Incidentally, d'you know where the hell we are?"
"You got kidnapped by a world called Elsewhere, it does that sometimes. But don't worry we can send you back after a brief lecture on the nature of magic."
He is absently fiddling with the bracelet while saying that, then he offers it to Ari.
"Well, that's convenient. I kind of already know how magic works, though." He sets down his mushrooms and flicks his wrist, conjuring a crackling sphere of red lightning, then dismisses it and accepts the bracelet. "It's kind of my thing. Being a witch, and all."
"Cool power! And I am fine with skipping the magic lecture then. I'm Gabe Valentine and that's my cousin Henry Oswald."
"Hi. How come you haven't heard of Elsewhere? Or you just didn't realize you had been taken by it?"
"I'm Ari. Itinerant witch and future Horadrim." He turns to Henry. "Interesting question. I'm not really sure how I hadn't heard of Elsewhere, being that I haven't heard of it. I'm sure you'd say the same if I asked you how you'd never heard of Akarat. Or Khanduras, I guess would be the direct parallel."
"No, I haven't heard of any of those places, which I guess I could explain away. But it would be very weird for you to know magic but not about Elsewhere... And some of the translation is coming off weirdly."
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