The whole manual labour thing for people she doesn't know isn't the most appealing thing in the world, so Ellie bows out of that and goes to look around instead. She finds the Lorentia caves and can't help but be curious.

So of fucking course there's just cave ins and shit. But she noses around a little anyway, remembering the last time she was in caves.

Yeah, actually, this is a shit idea but here she is.

She stops at a sign with a skull on it. Someone else is here, nearby, so she remarks, "You think they mean that, or they're hiding like pirate gold or some shit?"

Later, on another path (or that same one, whatever), she finds a discarded sword near a skeleton. She thinks she's alone when this happens, but you might catch her plucking it away from the skeleton. It's broken and chipped, but any port in a storm, right?

"Sorry, Bone Man, but I think I need this a little more than you do."

Ellie is trying to question some of these people about if they've ever heard of a place called Matthias. They haven't, but the sparkly rocks catch her eye for a moment.

She gets talked into trying to open a few herself. And you know what? Actually, this is delightful. She cracks open one rock and there's not really much. But the second one has sparkling points of gemstone in it, lighter purple blending into dark.

"Holy shit!" she says, a little too loud, staring down at the rock in her hands. "Get a load of this!" she continues, shoving it at whoever is nearby to notice. Sometimes the simplest things are the coolest, okay!

Ellie isn't bad at tinkering with weapons, but the whole blacksmithing thing is a new one on her. This still isn't getting her answers, but all she has on her is a tiny knife so…yeah, she's willing to learn how to fix the busted sword. She has a couple coins from helping the geode guy and money means literally nothing to her anyway, so she hands them over.

She's a pretty small person, but the way she swings that blacksmith hammer is no joke. Catch her just after, admiring the (more or less) fixed up sword.

"This is metal as fuck," she says. Glancing up at whoever is watching, one side of her mouth twitches. "Get it? Metal. Literally it's…yeah, you get it."

[ Throw something else at me, dealer's choice!

Ellie is a CRAU from the village, which doesn't change much about her, but it gives her some experience with the idea of multiple worlds and a fairly cynical view of death/rebirth, along with a little extra dose of paranoia that might creep up on her.

Feel free to reach out for plot stuff if you like.