Intermission 2 Page 4
————
With their rewards in tow, Ricki leads Kamau towards the district walls. There’s little chance the two of them could make it past the security checkpoint at the gates, but Ricki has something else in mind.
At certain points within the district walls there are hidden tunnels, dug throughout the years by thieves and smugglers to make it easier to get from place to place. Ricki, of course, knows the locations of most of these secret passages.
However, despite these tunnels offering ample protection from the eyes of the Imperial Guard, someone else is waiting for the duo when they emerge from the other side…
“Paws! Hi!”
“Hey there, Ricki. Fancy meeting you here.”
A merchant buddy? Is this our first chance to buy/sell stuff?
Do you think we’ll be able to buy anything with the money we’ve got?
Since we got the Coin of Revelry which is a Treasure, we should be able to sell it for 10 gold. That might give us options.
Is this a mask, face paint or is Paws partially albino-skinned?
Also, I hope he’s (or she?) not a (thieves) highway robber/tollbooth guy.
I like the idea (CombatDoctor mentioned it) that he might be someone (a fence? a travelling merchant?) to sell stuff to/buy from.
At least Ricki seems to know him and not be afraid of him that much that she feels an immediate need to flee/scream in alarm…
I also wonder how Paws will react to Kamau, once he appears through that hole in the wall…
Looks to me like Paws has clothing over chalk-white skin, so Ricki’s rags stand out (though she should have the armor at the moment). Head shape and eyes match, so this is probably a goblin, and Dungeon Eyes don’t have an obvious visual tell which helps with keeping them secret.
Aside from the head, there’s no bright skin anywhere else, and I suppose head/face sking being different from the rest would be kind of unusual by now (i.e. blue drunk humans have blue hands (see intermission2-p1), Kamau has hands matching his face, etc)..
..so how about a full helmet made of bright material, having holes for the eyes?
but then.. it would have to be a helmet made with ears specifically
..and a face mask similar to that of the thugs in the last dungeon
I wonder if they’re called Paws because they’re a kobold (or some other animal humanoid), or if it’s just a weird name.
From the art style, I would say this is another goblin (you can have a glimpse of what a kobold would probably look like here: https://ko-fi.com/lonestarnorth/gallery#galleryItemView the posts from 14 days ago, so 5th of April; I mean the one where there’s the small silouette of a creature seen in the light of the door, not the frontal shot; though the frontal shot may also be a kobold, if he’s wearing glasses or something on their face…).
Now goblins (at least the ones created by Ellipsis Stevens) have a tradition of being named by the tellers of their clans and oftentimes they get descriptive names like “Complains about Names” or “Saves a Fox”, depending on what the teller foresees for their future. (LSN did his first forum game(s) in the forum of “goblins”, the comic of Ellipsis Stephens, so he might follow this idea/principle for some of his creations, too.) The names also often get abbreviated, because they tend to be rather on the long side (e.g. “Don’t bug me, I have a headache” to “Hava”).
So perhaps this “Paws” full name is something like “Collects everything they can get their paws on”. 😀 I do hope we will find out.
Me too.
PAWn Shop?; meanings of “paw”: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/paw