Duel:Eboric v Kuzial, Match 11 of the Frostmaw Tournament

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Duelists: Eboric vs. Kuzial.
Duel: Traditional 3 posts each, with final defense. 10 minute posting limit.
Stakes: Autohit post. Advancement in the Titans of Winter Tournament 2012. Winner takes all the prize money.
Judges: Jerralith, Satoshi


Frostmaw Colosseum

(Continued from Match 12: Iverfin vs Kasyr)


Kuzial enters the arena bearing a weapon not seen before in his hands, ignoring any carnage left in the wake of the previous battle. It looks like it's carved from a single piece of ebony; a long shafted spear with a wickedly curved half-scimitar on the end. Both have been heavily blackened, something most drow do, and it rests in the hands of the former Weaponmaster as easily as his fine swords so often do. With a snarl the haft of the weapon is driven into the rocky ground, enough that the dark elf can release his grasp upon it and take from around his neck the piwifwi he wears. The cloaks of the drow help obscure view and also offer protection from some spells, but against a warrior like Eboric, it would be more hindrance than help. Discarding the expensive cloth without a second look, Kuzial once again takes the weapon in his arms, before twisting it in a tight circle, causing the blade on the end to hum as its razor edge cuts the air with vicious ease. The drow refrains from his usual pre-duel remarks, attempts usually to throw off his opponent, and instead stands with knees bent, waiting for the sound from Satoshi to signal this bout to begin... he didn't even bother with a mocking bow. It seems the time for games is over.


Kasyr gives Satoshi a sort of crook look, before he simply makes a roundabout return to the Arena- albeit to the stands, rather then the battlegrounds. Once situated near Satoshi, he'd neat splay out into the ruins of his seat.


Satoshi, after giving Kasyr a sidelong look, quickly dusts herself off and straightens up at the sight of Kuzial arriving, before clearing her throat and announcing to the cheering audience, "Who will reign supreme in the Weapons Master category? The warlord Eboric, or the patron of House Stavret? Let the combatants take their places so we can find out!" With that, the magus takes a seat beside the kensai and coughs.


Eboric steps down onto the floor of Frostmaw's collosseum once again, resplendent in his war gear. The mithril hauberk is freshly repaired, cleaned, and polished, and his helmet already rests on his head, the decorated face plate hiding his features. He carries, slung over one shoulder, what appears to be a mess of ropes, while in the other hand he holds his trusty seaxe, as ever, although he holds it somewhat awkwardly, as though the grip is larger than it normally is. As he did just a week before, the werebear struts proudly into view, offering a wave to those who cheer him, and a rude gesture to those that don't. However, this time around his attention turns to his chosen foe far more quickly, and he eyes the drow with the cunning of a man born to fight.


The Match Begins...

Satoshi said to Kasyr, "Next time, please don't throw a wolf at me... Also, thousand gold says one of them loses an eye."


Kasyr said to Satoshi, "I don't plan these things. Et, well, you're on. A thousand gold says we get a lost tooth or few along the way, though."


Kuzial eyes the strange items the warlord carries for just a moment, before with a light shrug he charges directly at the barbarian. In silence do his feet press upon the rock and snow, his psychotic gaze never once leaving the large warrior. As he nears him, the patron makes as if he's going to stab out with the long weapon in a straight-forward thrust, before dropping a globe of darkness over them both. Devoid now from the need for sight, the patron of House Stavret viciously lifts the haft of his spear high above him, causing its sharp blade to dig deeply into the stony earth below. Kuzial uses the embedded weapon to vault himself high overhead in a tight summersault, before using his innate levitation to quietly drop back to the earth. He wastes no time then in twisting around, drawing as he does two fine daggers from hidden sheathes, before he leaps towards what he hopes is Eboric's back. Without war cry he raises both his weapons and stabs out; one aimed to slide beneath the decorated helmet and into the soft flesh of his neck below, the other aimed for the barbarian's kidney on the side that was holding the rope...


Dulcinea gives Kasyr and Satoshi a mildly horrified look.


Satoshi's attention is on the fight as it abruptly begins, little notice given to the team of healers extracting an unconscious Iverfin and frost giant from the debris of the private booth. The two will be tended to, of course, and sent on their way afterwards.


Eboric begins to move even as Kuzial does, feet pounding the ground to meet the drow's own charge. When the darkness falls suddenly, however, the werebear is very nearly expecting it, having studied his foe since the last round of the tournament. He keeps moving, meaning to bull into the enemy before he can make his attack. What the big man bulls into, however, is the spear, planted in the ground. He strikes it with one leg, a blow perhaps able to crack the haft, and so he stumbles to one knee, barely refraining from grunting in pain. This blunder saves him, however, as the first dagger passes overhead, while the second one lands along his shoulder, instead of his kidney, the small blade piercing through the middle of a mithril ring to stick into the meat below. Like a snake, albeit less swiftly, the barbarian rises and turns, he opening the last two fingers of the hand holding the seaxe to release a small object, which tumbles to the ground, where it remains for a split second until the big man's huge foot lands on it, crushing the clay shell, revealing the object for what it is: a light pellet of a special variety, got from Tiphareth D'Artes. Eboric shuts his eyes at the moment of impact, a dangerous action in combat, but he takes the risk all the same, protecting himself from the waves of blinding light that erupt from the ground at his feet, cutting through the darkness in the immediate area and hopefully temporarily blinding the drow. At the same time, a horrendous sound blares out, screeching and cracking, deafening in volume. Eboric, expecting this, only waits until the light has faded and steps into where he assumes the drow will be, if the darkness remains, using the horrible noise to mask the sound of his footsteps on the icy ground. Once within the last few feet of Kuzial, he lashes out with the bundle of ropes, which unfurls to reveal itself to be a heavy net, weighted around the edges and aimed to wrap around the possibly disoriented drow, entangling him in a mesh of thick hempen cords, while Eboric swings around behind his foe, slamming his seaxe forward in a vicious thrust meant to spear upward into Kuzial's side, slicing guts and spearing organs in a spray of blood.


Kuzial snarls in vicious agony as the waves of light obliterate his globe of darkness and tear into his sensitive eyes, sending him reeling backwards. Ignorant of the fact his dagger struck flesh, the drow is about to leap further away when the thunderous noise rings out, adding further to his disorientation. Before he can hope to react, the heavy net is thrown and its prey caught. But Kuzial is far from beaten. The moment he feels the heavy rope around his body, he enacts through the soulstone insignia around his neck the powers of levitation all drow possess. Violently does he rise above the arena, taking the thrust of Eboric's seaxe in his leg instead of his stomach. Blood pours as a strangled cry of pain is torn from the patron, but this merely adds to his ever-present rage. Eyes open, then; barely able to see through the pain and water, but enough to make out his opponent below. Shifting himself mid-air, he pulls the net from around his body and drops it down, hoping to ensnare the barbarian in his own trap, before he releases his spell and falls in its wake; both daggers held ready to tear into the man in vicious downwards thrusts if he's captured within the net...


Eboric dances back to one side, if such a term can be used for such a massive man, as his prey seems to float away from him. He follows the flight as best he can, but makes his first true mistake for, as the net drops, he slashes with his seaxe in an attempt to catch or cut through the ropes, which results only in the net tangling around his weapon so that, as he shakes it rather ineffectively to try and free himself, the drow's daggers punch down, sliding through rope and flesh alike to rend massive tears in the hefty arm. Dropping the seaxe like a sack of turnips, Eboric draws his sword, Eidhur, revealing a broad blade made of some black metal, sharpened to a keen edge on both sides and tapering to a point at the tip. Patterns of gold wire glimmer from the hilt and base of the blade as the werebear gives it an experimental swing. As the blade cuts the cold air, it emits a strange sort of sound, like a soft sigh for, as the weapon is bared, the soul of Alimer stirs within the barbarian, calling out to the vengeful spirits that roam southwest of the colosseum. They rush to swarm the area, invisible to mundane eyes, intangible, but undeniably there, able to be felt by a hateful, fearsome presence. The barbarian again closes with his foe, snarling now as the mumbling voices of the spirits both without and within his mind, offering what they think to be help, drive him close to madness. Acting on sheer instinct, he drops low, lashing out with a booted foot toward the drow's shin, meant to either snap the bone like kindling or, perhaps, force Kuzial to jump, so that Eidhur, lancing up and out in a savage thrust, can find purchase in the enemy's groin, where it can punch in, twist, and tear back out, while Eboric explodes upward with a roar, swinging his maimed arm like a club, with the elbow bent and on a crash course for the drow's face.


Kuzial lands with another snarl of rage as his daggers tear through the flesh of the barbarian. His leg almost collapses from beneath him, the wound still pouring large amounts of blood down his chainmail leggings, but the drow does his best to ignore the pain. Without his usual languid grace, he steps back as the werebear pulls forth his sword, and without second thought discards his two daggers onto the ground below. Kuzial wastes no time in reaching up behind his head and pulling from the scabbard between his shoulder blades the katana Shattered Dream. If the drow at all notices the spirits he pays them no mind; his rage is drowning reason, such things can be ignored. He prepares to leap forward and meet the charge of the barbarian, but instead finds betrayal in his wounded limb; it buckles beneath him, meaning the kick aimed for his lower leg instead strikes his upper thigh, sending him hurling backwards, thankfully away from the vicious thrust of Eidhur and out of distance for the club-like swinging of his arm. The drow lands on his face, but wastes no time in pushing his hands beneath him and getting to his feet once more. He stands there for just a moment before screaming an obscenity in the drow tongue. Shattered Dream is lifted above his head, and without thought for his own safety he charges at Eboric. He ignores any threat of the man's own weapon, ignores the vicious agony lacing into his leg, and instead pushes forwards with an awkward gait - his intent to drive Shattered Dream into the man's stomach, even if it kills him...


Eboric bares his teeth in a feral grin as the drow charges again, and runs to meet him as before. When the enemy's sword snakes out, the barbarian swings Eidhur around in an almost scornful swing, striking Shattered Dream even as it lances out. However, restricted to only one arm and already tiring from the combat, the deflection only manages to knock the blow away from his stomach, forcing it to instead break through the mail along his side, baring the white of a rib bone as it slides past, that brief flash quickly hidden by a rush of red. Snarling, the big man tears away, scattering rings from his hauberk as he does so. In pain, mind filled with voices not his own, the warlord can take it no longer. His sword drops to the ground, fingers crooked in a spasm of what might be pain as they reach up, tearing his helmet free to throw onto the ground alongside the abandoned weapon. The hauberk follows shortly thereafter, but that is all the big man manages to do for, in a similar way to his oathed follower shortly before him, his body begins to shift, sprouting fur as the bones and flesh move and expand, snapping the remaining armor like so many twigs until, with a bestial roar, a hideous combination of man and bear stands on the arena floor. Slaver runs from his gaping jaws as he eyes the drow, pure hatred in his eyes. His attack comes in a sudden burst, with the uninjured arm coming around in a powerful sweep, aided by the momentum of the charging bear. The clawed paw is aimed to take Kuzial right in the side; no flares, no frills, and no feints. Rather, the man-creature seems intent on shattering the drow's smaller body and sending him into a head-over-heels spin. Regardless of whether or not the bear has to chase this new meal, he still follows through with a vengeful snap of his mighty jaws, meant to latch onto an arm and, with a twist of his thick neck, tear it free of bones and tendons alike!


Cyllth watches intently from a seat near the rear of the stands that, somehow, no one seems to have noticed him sit down in.


Kuzial screams again as his attack fails to kill the pernicious barbarian, and as the transformation takes shape, the drow can only snarl in impotent anger. He eyes Shattered Dream for just a moment, before returning the weapon to its sheathe. Unarmed, the patron rests his weight on his good leg and waits for the brazen attack. It comes by way of a typically savage slashing of claws towards his body. Instead of attempting evasion, the drow hops into the air, letting the vicious claw slam into the scabbard of the E' et-Nilah Blade. It sends him hurling across the arena, though he is saved from broken bones. Without breath left in his body, the drow shifts his psychotic gaze to the werebear as it chases after its fallen prey, jaws extending to latch onto his arm and tear it free. But the drow would not allow his feral opponent its prize. As the cavernous maw snaps out, Kuzial rolls to the side. He feels Eboric's teeth grate against the mithril chainmail he wears, tearing them through the flesh beneath, but thankfully not puncturing him themselves. Rolling again to get away, the drow twists himself awkwardly to his feet and stands there drawing in ragged breaths; his face every bit as savage as the beast before him, no hint of defeat etched into eyes that burn with defiance...


Cyllth chuckles a high-pitched, old-man laugh. "Betcha one of 'em loses an eye. Nothing like a good bloody fight for a maiming."


Cyllth idly taps his cane on the floor as he peers at those around him through the eyeslits on his mask.


Winner: Eboric


Eboric feels the strength waining from him, and with it the fury of the bear. Even as he persues Kuzial, the form slips from him, returning him to his normal appearance, although his clothes are torn and barely decent, and he is still bleeding profusely from both his side and his arm. Even so, the warrior's spirit is such that he manages to pick up his seaxe, tearing it free of the rope that still encumbers it and advances the last few steps to his foe. His seaxe swings out in a last-ditch effort, and this time succeeds in its intended goal, for the heavy back edge batters Kuzial to the ground, where Eboric promptly sits on his chest, holding his arms at his sides. With his teeth gritted in pain, the barbarian uses the seaxe's sloping tip to flick Kuzial's eye from its socket. Picking up the gory trophy, the warlord points his blade at Satoshi and, without a second though, pops the eyeball into his mouth, chews, and swallows. He grins, showing teeth covered in blood and eyeball goop, and stands up. Collecting his weapons and what armor he can salvage, he leaves the arena.


Satoshi holds out her hand to Kasyr with a wiggle of fingers suggesting he pays up after Eboric devours the drow's eye. The look on the kit's face, couple with the roar of the crowd, makes it obvious all present were thoroughly impressed with the entire display.

Kasyr gave 1000 gold to Satoshi.


Kuzial screams in frustration as he's pinned down by the large warrior, but it soons shifts to a cry of agony as his eye is torn from its socket in a spray of blood and gore. The drow misses the man consuming it, he misses everything beyond the blinding pain tearing into his mutilated head. But the cry is enough; born upon the wings of his powerful soulstone insignia, the cry reaches the mages of House Stavret who appear through a shimmering portal that slithers into existence in the arena floor. Without looking at those who watch, they drag the wounded patron back, taking him to the Underdark so he can heal, leaving nothing in their wake but a bloody trail that abruptly stops when the portal vanishes....


Redovian watches the gore, and the pleasure it brings the frostmawian crowd, with well hidden disdain. The paladin's turns away and leaves the arena..


Kasyr casually drops a coin purse into Satoshis hand, before he slips from his seat and casually meanders off, " Well, Cherie. I;m off to Vailkrin, anew."