For their own reasons, Nemaris and Cas mutually decided not to tell the villagers about how Cas had almost let them starve to death..

Granted, Cas wasn't sure she would've followed through with her threat. Even if Kari had died... she didn't want to think about all that right now.

The official story would be that Kari -- as "THE GREAT SAGE'S" personal attendant, would be granted an exemption from the desert march. Granted, Nemaris had made a very wise point about how the rest of the villagers might react to such blatant favoritism. It was an observation that filled Cas with much worry. As such -- for making her so anxious -- Cas left it to Nemaris to make the announcement.

Cas had been nervous when the time came, but Nemaris nailed the presentation and the people... didn't really care; or, rather, they had bigger things on their mind.

The fields on the outskirts of the irrigation Canals brought a bad harvest. Of course they were only beet fields -- winter crops. The actual harvest wouldn't come for another three months, and the central fields were doing well... still, lately, the Oasis had been on everybody's minds and whispers were running about, ones that seemed to grow in intensity whenever Cas was brought up or even was seen.

Even as Nemaris made his announcement, Cas realized, a good selection of the audience had their eyes discreetly set upon her.

Kari looked lost for words as she was presented before the audience. Nemaris, ever the crowd worker, had insisted upon and conducted a massive dog and pony show about Kari's new position. All the tribal apothecaries, many looking even unhappier than Korivenna, had been gathered into a conga-line of blessings and holy-dust baths for the new Sage's assistant. "It's important to make things official," Nemaris had said, and Cas was content to let him conduct the gathering as he saw fit.

The crowd, though generally disinterested, went along to clap in acceptance of the ordeal. To his credit, Nemaris had conducted it wonderfully.

And then, it was Cas's turn.

She climbed the low hill Nemaris' had been using as a podium. Nervous about the ordeal, she attempted to scurry up as quickly as possible, though -- at her pace -- it came off as a dignified and slow ascent, one perhaps meant to build suspense.

Cas stood there. Out of habit, she cleared her artificial throat of nothing. Cas never feared presentations, but she felt she was ill suited to this task. Her experience was more technical explanations, not so much the rousing, inspirational speech Nemaris expected of her. Still, she made her best attempt at the task.

She looked out at the crowd that had been gathered. Even in winter, it was strange to see such a large crowd in the mid-day sun. Men stood sweating in their work clothes, some still carrying the field tools they'd been using when hastily called to come here, and not a single annoyed look among the bunch. It was obvious they were expecting something important, and Cas was glad to give it to them.

"Villagers of Karinessa!" Cas announced with a powerful voice. "We have called you, and not for any trivial reason! I have known for some time now of the rumors that have been spreading. Look around you! We have also called your brothers from villages Nari, Setu, Karmaz, and Korinna! We have called you all because, once and fall all, I want to say... I mean, to confirm the rumors. Yes, I have found a way we can heal the Oa-"

The crowd interrupted into roars at what Cas was surprised to discover was the end of her speech.

"However! However!" She yelled several times, almost instantly killing the mood as the villagers quiet, anxious again. "It is a great task for which we need your help... hence why we, again, have gathered you. Are you with me!"

It was... a terrible speech, all things considered, to tell by Nemaris' dissapointed head shaking.

The crowd still applauded in slight confusion, wondering more about the nature of Cas's vague call for help now.

The applause pattered down suddenly. A large man pushed his way to the front of the crowd; the people parted before him and he stood a few paces ahead of the front row, looking to Cas with sharp eyes. Cas recognized him as the man who'd saved Kari, and to tell by the reverential looks many of the men sent his way -- he was not an obscure figure in the villages, either. "Great sage!" he announced with a purposeful voice, taking a deliberate pause to let the crowd's attention settle. "I... have heard that you are wise to things beyond this world, and that your vision and foresight are unmatched. So it is that you have been able to find such an ingenious way to save our Oasis!" he bowed suddenly, "what would you have of us!" A roar of approval came from the people behind.

As soon as the shouts ended, he started on his second speech, directed to Cas, but perhaps intended for the audience. "We are in a dying village! Let us acknowledge that! We must grit our teeth and fight until we're breathing spit! And this I swear, great Sage. No man from Fari will slack under my watch!" Turning to the men assorted, he was pointedly speaking to them now, pointing an accusing finger over the crowd. "We will put our souls into this task! If I see any man treating this like it's his second field, I will beat them until their eyes turn red! And If I see Mr. Sharé treating this like he treats his first field... I will beat him twice!"

At this, a hilarious roar of laughter went through the crowd some men taking the time to give a few joshing shoulder-shakes to a man who was probably Mr. Sharé, by Cas's estimation.

The desperate tension form earlier mellowed into focused excitement, and the men quickly organized themselves by village -- splitting off into their familiar work groups, ready to recieve orders.

----------------------------------------

Cas was unsurprised when the mystery man showed up to her tent. She had asked the workmen to send a represenative, and he seemed like a natural pick for the leader position.

Sitting this close to to him however was... overpowering wasn't the word. Cas looked at him closer. It wasn't something she could see exactly. It wasn't his face or the way held himself. It wasn't anything special really, it was just something about him that was so much more noticeable than it was on everything else. Cas looked harder, wanting to see more, and that wanting manifested a character screen over the head of the man.

LVL: 23 - 29 Name: _______

"Sin," the man introduced himself simply, settling down into a cross-legged posture. The name didn't update automatically, and Cas had to manually will it to say "Sin".

"Cas," she replied, speaking. "May I ask. How old are you?"

Sin cocked an eyebrow and canted a fox ear. "That's certainly an impolite question."

Oh, right, no personal questions allowed in this village. Perhaps that taboo came about because of stat screens? When your personal details are on full display, maybe some privacy really was sacred. Risking it, she decided to ask another question,. "Are you... able to tell something about me by sight? Can you..." she struggled for the right words, "can you tell how strong I am... how old I am?"

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"If you mean your personal aura, I can't see much." Sin admitted as much with some embarrassment. "I haven't trained to read Sakkari aura's."

"Can you at least tell what species I am? Does it say I'm human or Sakkari?" Cas tried not to discern her interest.

Sin shook his head. "Only the strength of your aura," he answered simply. "Without more insight, it's impossible to tell anything." He gave a fatalistic shrug, closing his arms crossed.

"Wouldn't the fact that you can't read my aura imply I'm not human, though?"

"I haven't trained to read humans, either. Besides, even if you said you were a Sakkari, I would simply assume you'd trained well enough to hide your aura from me."

She looked back up at the Nemorian Man's character sheet. Well, more of a character card than a sheet. Cas hmmed. "Oh, so hiding your aura is a skill, then. Is that why yours seems so sparse?"

"Not more than it has to be." Sin gave a roguish grin. "An aura too well-hidden draws more prying eyes than it deters."

"Could you teach me?"

"Perhaps after we save the Oasis," he answered. "The sun will be up in a few hours, and I believe you said time was of the essence?"

"Oh, right... the plan. Yes. How are the kilns coming along?"

"They're being built as we speak, and that's exactly why I've come here. The men are curious to know... why are we being asked to make sixteen thousand clay chalices? That's four times as many as exist in this entire village."

"Can it not be done?" Cas asked.

"It can, but it will be costly, and the men are eager to know why. The women, too, I imagine, considering how unhappy some of the households have been."

"Well... it's all part of the larger plan," Cas began.

Sin only looked at her expectantly

Cas sighed. She'd been dreading this from day one, the day she'd have to actually explain what she was doing. It was hard enough back home where everyone at least had failed a science class. Here, though? Cas paused, and thought for a moment. "I need the bowls, because we need to collect a lot of sand."

From there, Cas explained it as best as she could, but -- in as few words -- it was essentially what she'd tasked Kari to do near the Oasis, but on a far grander scale.

You see, in order to find the location where the slimes were coming from, Cas needed a higher resolution map of the slime density. Kari's small efforts had been enough to give her a heading. With sixteen thousand data points, however, Cas was certain that she could get a far more accurate direction.

Cas had asked Nemaris to step outside the tent for the last part of her explanation, drawing in the sand.

So, you see, she explained, drawing a straight line from the Oasis. Once I have enough information, I'll be able to draw a line to where the water is coming from.

Sin looked puzzled. "But, it could be coming from anywhere along that line" he said.

"That is why we'll need to do it again near the Spire. This will allow us to draw another line -- " Cas drew another line coming from a different angle, intersecting the first "-- and where the two lines meet..." She let Sin finish her sentence.

"That's where our problem will be."

"Not necessarily," she interrupted, cursing her nerdish conviction to accuracy, "the problem could be an upstream phenomenon. Even if not, there could be entierly unrelated factors at play, correlation isn't causation and all that."

Cas had managed to say that sentence using only the Nemorian word's she soaked up. Sin looked at her like she'd cobbled together the mad ramblings of a witch.

"I mean... yeah. Finding the place will help us fix the problem."

Sin accepted this without much argument. "How are we to explain this to the men, then?"

Cas sighed again. "Do we need to?"

"Yes," Sin answered strongly.

"Why? All they have to do is collect sand in jars where I tell them to. All they need to know is that it'll save their village!"

Sin's answer was the sigh of someone who had to explain something very basic. "Because men need a purpose, Sakkari," a light hint of annoyance had gotten into his voice. "Those men out there may be saying 'Rahh rahh' right now. If you ask them, they'll tell you they'd march into Balthura's gates with you, some of them may even believe it. But reality has a harsh view of idealistic leaders, Sakkari. Those men are going to be doing a hard job, and most of them have never stepped foot outside their village, much less been out to the deep desert. Trust me, when the sun begins beating on their brows, and the sands rise up to sink them into the burning depths, they will-"

"Not do their job and let the Oasis die?" Cas interrupted, with bored disbelief.

"They'll get sloppy," Was Sin's equally bored answer. "This task may seem simple to you, but to the rest of us it's full of absurd rules and hard tasks. Consider what that will look like to a man who is sweating in the desert and is asked to sprint over quaking sands to ten distant locations and place ten bowls, each filled with a careful amount of sand. Oh, and for some reason, these bowls must be placed in the right location based on those arcane marking you showed me. Do you honestly think men will take the care to fulfill each task with great care?"

Cas paused... each man was responsible for ten grid coordinates, and each one was fairly far apart... that would be a lot of running for those that chose to make the trek.

Exhausted, hands shaking, away from home. Cas suspected if she were still human and asked to do such a thing, even she'd send back half her bowls looking like a mess.

Cas hadn't appreciated the human element of the task until just now, nor its surprising difficulty. The bowls had to be filled up to the same point, otherwise the slime count would be off. They needed to be taken in the same time period, otherwise more slimes could come out of the dunes over time. They had to be in their assigned locations, or else the map would be off.

That was three sources of error right there, and Cas had to ensure everyone involved actually understood the importance of doing everything correctly.

"I see your point," was her answer. Still... "It's hard for me to explain my process, however. They'd need to understand that the count I'm doing is... well, the numbers are going to be averaged, if everyone is even a little off, the error-"

Sin raised a hand to stop her. "You don't need to make them understand, just give them a clear vision to care about."

Cas blew out a frustrated sigh. "Isn't not dying a good enough cause!?"

Sin hmmed and hawed over the prospect. "Something more concrete."

"I don't have anything more concrete! This is all about abstract math and averages. Do you guys even have probability here?"

Sin laughed a bit, backing away from the venting Sakkari. "In that case," he looked around and led her into the tent. "How about we give them a reason," he said with a whispered voice.

Reading the look in his eyes, Cas gasped with surprise. "You mean lie?"

"Not lie," Sin explained gingerly. "The role of a leader is to guide his men. Not everything real is suitable for seeing by, aftter all." He gestured up at the sky, "can you say that light is a lie because it has no physical presence? Who cares as long as you can see by it?"

Cas thought to correct him about the whole 'light' thing, but was distracted by the fact that she... was about to lie in order to mobilize a lot of people into the desert.

Was she... was she about to pull a George Bush right now?

----------------------------------------

"Men!" Sin shouted, standing high on a hill as he addressed the work camp.

It had been a frenzy of activity that was stopped by his words. A line of half-completed ovens stood baking in the desert light, men carrying pots of clay made rounds between the desert and the Oasis, while others set about constructing the great, termite mound bakeries.

"I say, Men!" Sin shouted again.

This time, a chorus of, "Uwhaaaa!" came to greet him!

"I have consulted with the Sage!" he announced, stopped by another chorus of cheers. "There is a monster underneath that mountain!" He explained loudly, to the horror and anger of the crowd, taking a dramatic pause before revealing the horrific truth:

"And it is the one stealing our water!"

A yell of sustained vitriol was the answer.

"It may burn our crops!" Sin added, stoking the flames ever heigher.

Feat melted away to wrath, people quaking in their own skin as they yelled death threats up at the man on a hill.

Sin spoke like a preacher, stretching his vowels into an expression of genuine worry as he spoke the worst deed for last, "and it may... no -- it most likely is hiding monstrous weapons and magic, by which it means to destroy what remains of this world... on a mass scale!"

Cas had added that last part. It was pretty believable when these people thought the 'remaining world' consisted of their village. To tell by the horrified, mouth foaming, teeth gritting, screams that answered him... she was honestly kind of proud of herself!

"We need to do this," Sin implored, looking to the sky as if receiving a holy quest, "we must collect the desert sand, so that the Sage may locate this monster's cave, find him, and slay that son of a CUR!"

A short pause of disbelief followed, right before the tremendous uproar that shook the canopy of the Oasis!

"UWHAAAAA. UWAAAAAH! UWAAAAAAH!"