Well, here he was again.

Bored beyond belief and time blurring and stretching into some malformed heap in the corner of his mind.

May as well make it fun, right? No high-stakes missions now that Aure was actually born, but something to do, right? Right, right, right. Eythan drifted from his home up in the chambers, having half the energy and mind to actually fly into some secluded nook of it (host to some untouched shards of jadeite, amethyst, and tiger eye, oddly enough) and alight before calling upon his apparent business partner. At this point, the strange creature should just feel the gryphon getting bored.

"Oi, Collector." Without even waiting for him to suddenly appear out of nowhere, Eythan continued, "what things have you got cooked up today, hmm?"

There was a long delay, this time.

A full few minutes of echoing silence, during which Eythan could be perfectly expected to give up and wander off. Regardless of where he went, however, a voice would call out from behind him after the time had passed.

"Back so soon..?" the voice drawled. The dark-cloaked figure leaned back, one cloven hoof barely visible where it peeked out from beneath the cloth, crossed over the other leg. Arms, too, appeared folded across a chest beneath that hanging cloak.

"I do hope my rewards have not turned out to be unsatisfactory in some way..?"

And as before, the smooth voice, unblinking red eyes, and mild tone were all fixed firmly on Eythan.

@Eythan

"So, so soon," Eythan agreed in an exalted voice, turning with an air of surprise at the delay. And there the creature stood, damn near akimbo. Carmine eyes blinked once, twice, as his ears shifted forward.

"Oh!" he chirped, "no, no, I appreciate them! I'm just bored. I like to keep my talons busy." All the more to hide from skeletons in the closet with. He wasn't about to admit that to anyone, though, let alone himself.

There was a long silence--very long--in which the Collector appeared to be a statue, simply carved from the stone upon which he leaned. He did not blink, and did not even appear to breathe, so that his sudden shifting--when it came--was just as startling as if the stone itself had moved.

He pushed off, and paced toward Eythan, the clicking of hooves audible on the stone. One clawed hand drew from his robes, and he spoke in his same smooth voice as he pulled a piece of parchment from the cloth. Upon it were scrawled hundreds of small, foreign black symbols in what looked like ink, all in neat little rows, and at the bottom was a long, black line headed with an X. This line held bare space above it, and the Collector placed this before the hybrid, on the ground.

"I have but one offer for you, and it is its own reward. I can make you the hero you wished to be. Simply sign here. ...Press your claws to the page, that will do. It signifies your agreement to aid in a time of need, in return for my assurance that you will save at least one life."

There was no sign of ink with which to "sign."

@Eythan

Had... he somehow broken the Collector? Was he secretly an automaton that responded and reacted specifically to everything yet had no protocol for this situation? Eythan's confusion gave way to momentary fright as the hooved creature casually just pushed off of the stone from standing stock-still. Ears flicking back as his eyes widened, a quiet "jeez!" slipped from his beak.

Then, the Collector pulled out a piece of paper, of all goddamn things, with a whole lot of writing on it. Eythan knew he could look at something and know that it was writing, but not know how to read it. "The fuck is all of this?" Squinting uselessly down at the itty bitty script for a moment, he looked up at the looming figure. "I can't read," he said matter-of-factly, decidedly not lifting a single talon. "That's a really short summary for all of this shit, y'know?" It wasn't that he didn't trust the Collector, because he didn't. It was more of a fact that there could be hidden details. Contracts always got you with the fine print.

"Is there a way to make it so I can actually read this?? Also, there'd better not be any murder here, because I'm definitely not signing in on that, sorry."

The collector paused a moment, perhaps making some sort of expression beneath the hood which could not be seen. He then shook his head. His speech took on a more rapid-fire cadence, businesslike and brisk.

"No, Eythan, I cannot make it so that you can read. Have this era's inhabitants forgotten-... ahh, never mind. I will explain."

He swept one hand's index claw down the page line by line as he narrated. "This contract is a necessity for my work, something I must utilize for tasks such as these. Animus contrahendi, you see. It indemnifies the task-giver--that is me--against any and all damages incurred by the signee--that is you--by your own actions. It assures that all information I provide is accurate to the best of my knowledge, that I am not sending you to your own death deliberately. This line speaks of additional clauses. Clause 'b,' 'c' and--'x,' there, as well as 'twenty-seven d,' pertain to your acceptance that you will attempt to perform the task given to the best of your ability and that failure to do so will not incur penalty on me. It assures that I am providing this information at my own behest and not another's; these clauses here are all incidental, defining word usage throughout the document... Exceptions in the case of force majeure or even casus fortuitus..." After this quite rapid-fire speech he paused, scarlet eyes scanning the page himself. "Definitions of signee, contractee, contractor, document, contract, and so forth. It must all be clarified very clearly, you see, if it's to be accepted by the courts. Now."

He again profferred out the paper, his voice taking on a more intense, solemn tone. "I do hate to put on the pressure, but we have very little time left. If you wish to save the lives I am sending you to save, you will need to act quickly indeed. It may already be too late."

@Eythan

Eythan, truly, had never bothered to actually identify any of the writings on any of the Caves's walls, not even in his own damn home. And, as much as he wanted to actually pay attention and comprehend what the Collector was saying, at the first bit of Latin, he phased immediately out of consciousness. Only a couple keywords stuck out and he narrowed his eyes, "death? There's a chance of that?" Then, there was some mention of courts and he narrowed his eyes further, ears perking forward in genuine interest. "Wait, the courts? Like, there's courts? Outside of the caves? Or are they here and we just don't know about them? The fuck?"

His gaze trailed back down to the paper, though, and he did lift a claw or two and hold it over the paper. Then, Eythan looked up expectantly for answers. At least there was enough detail for the information to sound somewhat reliable and real.

The Collector stared back, equally blankly, for a moment before speaking.

"There's no courts..?" A pause, and then--"Are they gone? Or perhaps they are in hiding? Then you are not-... This is--a mercenary contract. By allotting it to you I affirm that I have done my part, and will not and need not hire others for the work; you agree to take it on. It is a--it used to be a--very common contract."

A slightly troubled tone then followed. "I am beginning to suspect that I was imprisoned far longer than I previously realized."

@Eythan

"I've never heard of any courts?" Well, this sure was a case of questions spawning more questions instead of actual answers. Hell, if the Collector was confused, you could imagine Eythan's confusion. "I'm not a what? The only... really old Gembound I can think of are the one dragon and the lamb, and the ice bird, and the shroom deer. And, uh, Nemean? And a really tall, black one with armor." Also, damn, this was a mercenary contract. They used to be common? The loud ones may have, then, been far more gripping than he previously thought, if mercenaries were commonplace.

Regardless, Eythan would peer down at his hovering foot, talons clenching and unclenching. Slowly, he placed it down on the parchment, slightly sideways so it would fit on the line. "What do you need me to do?"

"Ahh, Nemean yet lives..? Who, though, is the 'shroom stag,' or a tall one with--armor, you say?"

Just then, Eythan's talons met the page. A searing light--painless, but bright--flared red, and when the hybrid removed his talons he would find a charred outline of his footprint, somewhat smudged, on the line.

The Collector would then rapidly roll up the parchment, tucking it away. At once, his demeanor was businesslike again, almost urgent. "Go to Cetus. Near the darker waters, about--" and here, he eyed Eythan critically--"--two minutes in, by flight. An empowered golem is on the march--hunting. I believe it has found prey--your kind, Eythan. You will hear it before you see it. Your task is to disable it. Your reward is that 'hero' status you have been seeking."

A clawed hand then unfurled from the robe, offering out a small stone--small enough to fit into Eythan's taloned fist, and pulsing with a softly blue-glowing sigil of some kind. "Take this. It is risky, but if you fit it into the gap at the chest, it should deactivate. Oh, and Eythan... If you can bring me the likewise-runed stone from somewhere on its body, a matching piece, do so. There should be other inscriptions on that rock that I can study to try and find out why it has awakened--and if any more are coming."

@Eythan