A mass of flesh crawling over the entire landscape like a river of slugs.

[dwarfing]

WHO: Shale, NPC guards, you!
WHAT: Shale arrives, drags Shyhold's outer guard with them along the bridge.
WHEN: Today, nighttime
WHERE: Skyhold Gates/Courtyard
NOTES: Most likely threats of violence.

Skyhold Bridge

There's nothing as wonderful as a bit of late night chaos, is there?

The sun had just set behind the many mountain tops near Skyhold when calamity breaks out on the bridge heading from the cliff path towards the fortress. There's yelling and protests echoing over the gorge, accented with a bit of dispassionate grumbling. The night guards from the other side of the bridge are hollering, torches waving around over the bridge as they try to stop someone in the dark from crossing over.

Someone really big, and covered in glowing crystals.

Shale is dragging three guards behind as the struggling men try to stop them from proceeding, the golem mostly uncaring for the flailing of soldiers and torches in their face - all while stubbornly moving forward. There are calls for the gates to be closed and other calls for backup (and the Maker), but thankfully no cries of pain or people falling to their death.

...not that Shale didn't want to throw some of them off the bridge, but that probably wouldn't make a good impression of them as an ally. Still, the one with the greasy hair that was trying to chip them with a dagger was awfully tempting to toss off, just to listen how long it would take for him to reach the bottom.

Courtyard

Hello. There's a golem in Skyhold. They're not impressed, and would like to file a complaint about your hospitality.

Comments

Courtyard!

[amygdalae]

There are really not many things that can surprise Bruce these days, but this? This, even Bruce has to admit that he's a little bit stunned. He's heard of golems, yes, but the most he's ever seen of them are the remains of them in his few trips into the Deep Roads. Seeing one right here in Skyhold, complete and whole and pretty much overnight was--well. It was pretty surprising.

To his own credit Bruce deals with it with as much grace as he can muster. He goes around his daily routine as if a golem hadn't magically appeared, going all around the courtyard left and right and paying no attention to the new addition to the courtyard. It's... probably the best way to go about this. Hopefully.

[dwarfing]

Shale has caused quite a ruckus and people were giving the golem a wide berth, nervously milling around. It was almost refreshing to see someone that didn't seem to give a damn.

Smart man.

Unfortunately, Shale is just as happy to ignore as being ignored, but that doesn't quite help when you're in the way of whatever Bruce needed to get to.

[amygdalae]

Bruce honestly was quite happy to leave the golem to its own devices, as it were, but considering that now it was blocking his way to his next patient it was a bit hard to avoid it entirely.

He tried to go around it left and right, but those options were instantly out as he couldn't fit into those tight spaces. There was a pause as Bruce tried to think of an alternative path, but none came to mind. This was pretty much the only way forward and it didn't look like the golem was willing to budge without being asked.

Would it even do it when asked, though? One way to find out, he supposed.

"...my apologies, but would you mind letting me pass through?"

[dwarfing]

Shale, having kept their eye on the crows surrounding the keep and wondering if they could hit the evil fiends with a brick was roused by their dream of avian homicide by Bruce's voice.

Glancing down at him, the golem turns slightly so the guy could get through. He asked nicely, after all, and no matter how much Shale found people generally annoying, that helped.

"It is very busy. Why does it bother?"

[amygdalae]

Ah--well. At least that didn't go as badly as he thought. Bruce gives the golem a small nod of gratitude and starts to walk again, but before he can take a step the golem then... speaks. Which really shouldn't be so surprising, but--

"Ah." A moment's pause as Bruce realizes what the 'it' the golem was referring to. "Bothering with patients, you mean? Unless you mean something else entirely."

[dwarfing]

Shale stares at Bruce, mildly annoyed. "Yes. It is wasting time. Fleshy people take too long to heal, and there's things to kill." The golem is a little gung-ho to go out and murder Corypheus, okay. Last time they were out on a mission to save the world they didn't exactly stand around in a fortress.

There was always moving and fighting. Much less people, too.

[amygdalae]

Fleshy people--yes. Well. Bruce supposed he could see where that was coming from. And really, its not as its hard to see where the golem was coming from. It would be nice if they could just go out and defeat Corypheus quickly, but unfortunately it wasn't as easy as it could be. And besides, Bruce wasn't a fighter.

"Well, there are a lot of other people here who are good at doing that." Like Zevran, or the Iron Bull, or many of the other warriors and fighters within the Inquisition. "I'm here to help treat people. It would be rather out of place if I started to go around murdering instead."

[dwarfing]

There's another frown from the golem, but they had to admit that Bruce had a point. They had walked over to the Inquisition thinking it was only an army, but apparently there were common, squishier people as well. Like a little village.

"It has a point." They grumble a bit again, eyeing the tents. "I heard this place has mages. Do they not do the healing? It does not look like a mage." It's a good thing you're masquerading as a non-mage, Bruce. Shale doesn't like mages much.

[amygdalae]

If anything it was nice to see that somehow even golems weren't able to see through the cover he had given to himself, even if at the same time it made him feel a bit more guilty.

"There are mages, yes, but not all of them are adept in healing." There were the necromancers, for one, and the various other mages who were not even Harrowed yet. "And with recent events not everybody is receptive to magic." And that was probably already putting it lightly.

[dwarfing]

"Ugh. Mages."

Shale sounds about as happy as a naked person discovering there's mosquitoes.

"Then I will let the healer do its work." The golem moves a away a bit more, not having much interest in watching the healing itself. They were pretty good at crushing people, after all, and it usually showed all the insides quite well. People were filled with a lot of liquid.

[amygdalae]

"You have my thanks." Well that had all gone considerably easier than he had expected, but Bruce certainly wasn't going to complain. Anything that could make his job easier was always something good for him.

He steps past the golem after that, pausing to glance back at it once he was through, inclining his head in politeness as he makes another request of the golem. "If you wouldn't mind, could you perhaps not move back just yet? I need to return this way once I'm done, and I wouldn't want to disturb you again just for that."

[dwarfing]

The golem eyes Bruce again and makes an annoyed sound deep in their stony chest before they move even further away to give the man his space. If he wanted to run back and forth, that wasn't really their problem... there was just a bit of a lack of places where a golem could loiter without being in the way somehow.

"If it asks again, I will squish its little head like a pea." They mutter, even if there wasn't too much venom in Shale's voice.

[amygdalae]

Ah--that didn't sound like the golem was very pleased. Bruce did his best not to make any sort of faces, but settled for something of a strained smile, attempting to placate the golem before it did want to try something like squishing his head.

"Yes, well, I'm asking so that something unpleasant as that doesn't happen." And, really, if the golem really did attempt it... things really wouldn't end well for anybody. So it was best to try and prevent that if possible.