She takes a deep, audible breath in and out, just to show that she's paying attention. Still with the water - maybe in Hell setting you on fire is worse than killing you instantly, it'd hurt longer, but why not - do that - do not ask do not ask -

If he doesn't know she has something he wants, except she doesn't know - it must be Asmodeus - but he won't believe her - did she only make things worse or did it work, would he - do that and not give her her health back, if he wasn't worried about - one of his rivals, or superiors, is three too many superiors to have if Hell has nine levels - does - would he ask everything she knows and then kill her anyway, if he was sure no one knew she was here; will he do that either way, actually, why would he ever keep keep that promise—same reason as anyone else.

She takes another deliberately shaky breath. "Who - holds you to your deals, Spoke?"

"No one. I could be lying right now. Looks like it's your best bet, though." Unless she's messaging Zam right now. Please don't be messaging Zam right now. Spoke would really like for this to not be entirely a bluff. Unfortunately threatening her to this effect will do nothing but bring "messaging Zam" to her attention as something that might be helpful and which Spoke cannot actually stop her from doing. Or Vitalasy, actually, if Vitalasy whitelisted her--that would in fact be worse than messaging Zam, although hopefully Spoke would get more warning--is she moving around at all, even micromovements like looking around, or does she freeze entirely in place?

Does... it... —do not say that—

Tolar thought you didn't need someone to hold you to - he's not even claiming that stop hoping. Right. Right. There's... dogs in the corner, maybe if she flung herself between them he'd hesitate to risk hitting them. Or they'd eat her, which would hurt longer. No.

Nothing in her pockets, not a dagger nor a pair of dice. No one to turn to, no where to go, nothing to bargain for.

She wonders what happens, if he keeps - if he keeps killing her. Weaker and weaker and weaker... she wonders if she can starve, here. How many times can you die, before the worlds get tired of having you?

No good options. No way to survive, this. Is there anything else she wants?

...she wants the "leave you here for a while". She'd rather suffer alone. If she asks for that she'll never get it, so, so... what?

Maybe he'll... get bored. She puts her head in her hands turns away and—does not cry she cannot cry she can't it'd sound like she's laughing at him—whimpers like other people do when they cry.

(Xenia is not currently familiar with the kind of Message that has greater than 110ft range! Also she is both a) extremely scared and b) pretending to be extremely scared, so even when she's not moving around she's still, like, shaking.)

Hmmm. If she's shaking then she's not tabbed out typing, so that's good at least. She seems...more genuinely upset than is normal, even for a spawntrap. Maybe she needs a bit of carrot to go with the stick?

He drops her a cooked pork chop, even though she's probably not hungry right after respawning. "Hey. Xenia." He snaps his fingers a few times next to her, trying to get her attention. "I gave you the heart back, alright? I don't want you trapped here forever. Just tell me what you know and we can be done here. How's this, I'll even throw in some totems for your time."

Flinch back from finger-snapping! —not an attack, yet. ...why did he drop meat on the ground. Rock. It's not very dirty rock? She doesn't pick it up. ...yet, it appears that possibly you can in fact starve in Hell. 😔

She - rubs at her eyes to try to cover the absence of tears, takes another half-step back - whyyy is he switching to bribery - right, lying. He doesn't actually sound like he's lying but that's stupid. She doesn't even know what a totem is. It doesn't even sound like anything to guess. Why should she want any, is that too rude to ask. 'Why would you do that' no, she is supposed to already have an answer.

"I - we didn't have those in Cheliax," she says, and then immediately starts triple-guessing whether 'those' is clear.

Now we're getting somewhere. Not allowing totems is fair enough, Lifesteal didn't allow totems for all of season 3 and a decent chunk of season 4. No results for "cheliax smp", so it's--a private server, probably. Possibly a code name.

"Well, we have them here. Cheliax is--a server? Who owns it?"

Oh no, theological questions. She's not sure if 'server' means more like 'empire' or 'barony' or something more magical, but maybe she can get away with skipping that and go to the one has an unchanging correct answer. "Asmodeus."

Spoke doesn't recognize that as anyone's name or alt. He hovers frozen for a bit. Obvious spelling of 'Asmodeus' has a namemc; account exists since 2015. He doesn't recognize the skin. Asmodius? Has a couple of results that look more plausible but no smoking guns there either. Azmodeus? Azmodius? Both existed since 2017. He files it away to look at in more detail later, especially Asmodius. But he shouldn't do that for too long; he tabs back in and he's moving again.

"Does Asmodeus have any other names? Are any of the names I mentioned people you recognize from Cheliax?"

When he's frozen she - backs away slowly, another couple of steps, another look around this stone box that catches nothing more of interest than the... open sky...

When he tabs back in she's slightly further away from him.

...oh no, he's decided she's answering-his-questions now. She has not decided she's answering all his questions now. Um. Well, she did just get away with skipping one. And. Well. She has literally been whipped before for failing to answer one of those questions comprehensively, but the other one he doesn't know already. And he froze up when she mentioned Asmodeus so maybe she should keep doing that?? So. She... will. Yes.

"Uh - um - while of course no mortal knows every right and style owed to Asmodeus, he is also called the Lord of Hell, the Prince of Hell, the Ruler of Hell, Keeper of the Key of, of the Vault, Prince of Devils and Prince of Darkness, the First, the Archfiend, Lord of the Ninth as Lord of Nessus, um, Master of Witches and Lord of Lies, Supreme Master of the Nine Hells..." and if she runs out of titles before he runs out of patience, she can also switch to reciting them in Infernal...

She does not run out of titles before Spoke runs out of patience. "I get the idea. Someone's full of themselves." He laughs. (And those all sound like titles, not alt accounts--damn. This does make it more confusing who Asmodeus is, this isn't Parrot's style. Or Vitalasy's, honestly. So, probably not related, just some random middle schooler with a server and a taste for the edgy, but something to keep an eye out for.) He drops Xenia another pork chop, even though she's not picking up the first one. He'll have to pick them back up soon if he doesn't want them to despawn, but the gesture probably counts for something, right? "Ashswag. Vitalasy. Are either of them on Cheliax? Is that where you know them from?"

...are... devils allowed to mock Asmodeus... this is very unlike everything she has seen about the Church of Asmodeus and also all other 'hierarchies' ever. ^{*that she has observed in her hundred person village} Wait what if he is a fairy, what with the, the that and the lack of fire and the food—

(Xenia edges away from the pork chop not like it's an end crystal, but like it's a much weaker explosive than that.)

Ughhh she should have stuck to crying can't switch back right now that's too obvious - has he ever heard of a 'plate' no don't draw attention to not eating the food, that's worse than not answering his questions - why does he say 'on' Cheliax, like it's a plate -

(She's not - actually frozen but at this point she has backed away from him twice and is actively trying to not make facial expressions.)

- say something, start talking, he'll kill you - "I don't - I already said I - I've never h-heard of - of - " he is going to kill her he is going to kill her " - I can't - say anything else - "

Hmmmmm. It's harder to tell, like this, if she's tabbed out. Zam's layer isn't on, but if he uses the End to get to spawn it'd be basically instant. He drops her a totem instead and then backs away to let her pick it up. Totems are cheap, information is valuable. (If she knew what to look for, it'd be visible that he's using stacked totems, but without knowledge of how this works, it's not any weirder than the pork chops.)

"Anyone else you know from Cheliax who I might know? Anything you're willing to tell me about how you got here? C'mon, I'm being nice." Water bucket: once again in hand. He doesn't actually want to leave her here, all it takes is one second of not watching and Zam could be here with water, so he'd really prefer she cooperate. And they might be on a timer now, if Zam's already on his way. He could put her in a bedrock or barrier box, maybe, but they're at world height, he'd have no way of breaking it if he wanted her out other than getting Ash to do it. Which is an even worse idea than all of his other ideas today. At least Xenia doesn't know what he can or can't do. "You want out, I want to let you out. Give me something to work with here."

Spoke drops a... golden doll..? on the ground, then backs away from it. Xènia... also edges away from it, that seems to be the recommended procedure. (Glances up, to check she's not under the lip of the box.)

Well he might have heard of Alicia, if she actually was a fairy she is not naming Alicia to this thing. If he's still a devil maybe he'd've heard of... the Queen? But he isn't acting like he's heard of Cheliax at all.

"I - I don't - " she's been instructed to believe that he's 'being nice' now, she should try to sound less scared "I don't - know who you might know, s-Spoke, I, I, I don't know where I am" mmmoderate success.

Is she stupid. Spoke gave her a totem. Does she want to die.

Well, if he picks it up again it won't stack, and he doesn't actually have a spare inventory slot, so it'll just stay on the ground.

"And how did you get here?" He sounds pretty clearly disbelieving. Someone had to whitelist her. Someone had to give her the IP. If she asks where she is again he can give the spiel but right now he's pretty focused on getting her to stop blatantly lying. If he had a way to get her to be less scared, maybe--but he's already tried giving her food, giving her a totem, giving her space, and he's already said he won't let her out of the prison without some information.

(She does eventually twig that 'drop things on the ground' could be the recommended procedure for giving things to unimportant people, but 'weird doll' is even more ominous than 'food' on that front and he hasn't even ordered her to pick it up, and, also, that would involve very briefly getting slightly closer to SpokeIsHere.)

Hard swallow, abortive shrug. What even is her honest answer, she died and her soul belonged here, probably? Shouldn't they be expecting that?? —they were lying about Hell being well organised, or this is somewhere else—does he really not know, it doesn't feel like a pretence but, how would she even get closer to an answer, there's no point asking...

She should say something, keep talking, every second dripping past under the open sky is—something—probably nothing even if—maybe she should just ask, what's a delicate way of saying 'do you actually not know'... no, "I'm surprised you don't know" is worse, just—

"Do - you actually not know?" she asks, and immediately regrets everything about the sound of her voice.

"I mean, I'm pretty sure it was either Parrot or Vitalasy, but it'd definitely be nice to know for sure." Is she trying to figure out if he has console access, to check who whitelisted her? It's not conclusive either way, he could be playing dumb, but if he were playing dumb he would've done that from the beginning instead of bluffing that he knew more than he did. Fuck, he's making all sorts of mistakes in this conversation. In his defense, it has not at all gone the way he would have predicted. "It'd be really nice if you told me."

There was a third name in this conversation and she remembers what it was, which was... Ashwag? Why is that not on the list. Did she act any differently about an Ashwag? Surely not. Should she ask... hahaha no.

She should ask something else though, he didn't hurt her for asking a question and she wants—she wants him to go way - he won't—so - keep talking, if the things here can fly then the longer she stays under the open sky the more chance she has of... well, probably not better options, but. Something.

She waves at the golden doll thingy. "What is that?"

(Ashswag isn't on the list because Spoke mostly trusts Ashswag--he'll fuck around if he thinks it'll be funny, but Spoke's pretty sure Ash isn't working against him. He can't say the same for Parrot or Vitalasy.)

"Totem. They're good for not dying. Unless you want to die, I guess. I'll give you a second one if you want me to demonstrate."

Oh, it's that thing she was supposed to be bribed with. Is that the kind of "if you want me to demonstrate" where she's supposed to say yes or no, those can get you punished either way. So far she has seen him want to play at killing her and give her objects or at least drop them near her, so by analogy she's leaning yes...

 "If you like."

She’s really not giving him much to work with here. 

He drops another totem. 

...is she supposed to pick it up, it's her best guess but he's not really giving her the answer here. Uh. Er. What if touching it does something to her what if accepting his bargain does something to her what if he gets mad at her for asking too many questions—

She edges closer to the totems and then when she's close enough there suddenly isn't another decision to pick them up.

Does she pick up the pork chops too, and if so, which one is she holding?

Two pork chops (stacked), two totems (not), holding one of the latter.

Okay, cool.

He steps forward, punches her once, and then steps back again. 

Xenia has reached the goal [Postmortal]