Duel:Valentin v Zyren
Background
It wasn't often a rambunctious dragon came to Cenril challenging all comers. The red dragon Zyren did just that.
Valentin, somewhat concerned about the structural wellbeing of his shop if the dragon decided to raze part of the city, decided to meet that challenge.
If he was lucky, he might even get a bit of meat or something off the draconic git.
Zyren and Valentin faced off in the Cenril Arena
OOC Details
Judges: Tanya, Svilfon
Post Limit: 12 minutes
Stakes: A couple of Dragon Scales for Valentin if he wins, and 5000 gold for Zyren if he wins."
Setting: Grand Cenrilli Arena
This grand Arena appears to be the focal point of the recent restoration work. Marble Columns and arches awe and amaze your eyes as you enter through one of the two large archways, metallic gates are swung open on either side permitting entry. Your eyes fall on some of the ancient stone seats that have been lined with material in specially sealed off areas for the well off. The Arena appears to be better off than it was a month or so ago, the god of light that had descended and announced his protection from those that may spread chaos reassuring the people of Cenril so that they may return to the fights, one their favorite pastimes.
Valentin weren't none too chuffed on the idea of tangling with a blimmin' dragon, but then again, he knew the head of the assassin's guild had it in for him, and would probably be sending him off to deal with a dragon sometime soon in the hopes of getting him well fried. Zyren's challenge was fortuitous in some regards - a bit of a practice run'd help the burly necromantic butcher decide if dragons were too much of a hassle to mess with for future reference. Valentin stood at one end of the Arena, a grotesquely oversized cleaver held in his right hand, his sleeves rolled back to reveal the runes and sigils carved and scarred into the flesh of his arms. In his left hand was dangled by the scruff some mongrel off Cenril's streets. Valentin, Scleratus of the Necromancer's Guild, chanted as shadows danced around him to lay a pattern in the form of a ritual circle. With a a sussurating crescendo, the shadows light up with black flame to burn the pattern on the ground, and the butcher runs his cleaver along the mutts four legs, letting the blood drop onto the ritual circle. Crimson shackles flare about the pup, and its life energies start to get drained into the circle - a twisted variation of Vandon LeRouges Crimson Shackles. Cutting his own thumb, Valentin lets a drop of his own black blood hit the sigils, and the dog's energy is fed to him as pure mana. With a hoarse shout to end his cantatus, Valentin binds shadow to the cryumbral tides, and an array of sorcerously solid and needle-sharp shadowice spines emerge from the butcher's shadow, spearing towards the dragon and aiming to pierce the dragon's wings and flesh. "Let's dance, y'blimmin' flyin' lizard!" Even as those icy shadowspears fly towards Zyren, Valentin starts on a new chant.
Zyren gazes at the enemy with mild interest suprised that the man had actually agreed to the fight, supposing that while still covered in scales and obviously a dragon, his smaller, more human-like form must have made him seem less frightening. He casually stretches the gigantic wings, carefully taking in the man's ritual. Strange man. As the blood drips and the ice speres fly, Zyren launches into the air, sending gusts towards the man and knocking the icey stakes off course. "You came." With those words, he propelled himself towards the butcher, launching fireballs ahead of himself and engulfing himself in flames in his quest to burn and crush his opponent.
Valentin had not wasted time. Knowing as everyone does how much dragons like to roast folks, Valentin drew heavily on the dog's life energy, and it expired with a mournful whine as Valentin chanted to further bind shadow with the cryumbral tides. As the dragon's fireballs rushed in, Valentin encased himself in a sanctum of shadowice, matching the dragon's element with its shadowy opposite. However, Valentin was no Joliette or Leifong - his barrier warped and hissed and melted and reformed around him, and the necromancer bellowed as flames from the final fireballs started to lick and push through, searing his undead flesh around his ribcage and left leg. But Valentin kept chanting, sibilant verses like snakes writhing against each other, starting to draw on his own magical reserves to shift the form of the shadowice sanctum. As the dragon barrelled in after his fireballs, Zyren would find his incredible momentum carrying him directly towards a large entrenched spike of shadowice, and Zyren risked impalement on its magical and supremely cold sharpened tip if he could not pull up in time or otherwise avoid it. Whether the dragon was impaled, or if the dragon somehow halted its forward momentum, Valentin had a second surprise: he had dropped the dead mongrel and took a two-handed grip on his cleaver as he continued chanting. Two shadow tendrils with icy blades at their ends whip out and around at Valentin's direction, attempting to slash at and entangle the dragon's wings to temporarily prevent the dragon from flight as Valentin chants and braces himself for the next assault.
Zyren chuckled to himself as he was about to burst through the icey shield, suprised at how easy this fight seemed to be and regretted it moments later. Zyren swerved to the side, resulting in a nice sized gash in his abdomin. Thankfully the flames surrounding his body had dulled the tip. He quickly turned to realize that the danger wasn't over. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the icey vines wrapping around his wings. Once again only being saved from the most severe damage because of the protective barrier of heat. Instinctively deciding that the best route was to get rid of the source, he quickly turned towards the necromance, forgetting about the entangling ice and wounds, he let out a desperate burst of fire hoping that at this close range, he might fatal wound the man or at least make him retreat and lose concentration on the spells.
Valentin wasn't going to move very far or with a lot of grace given how seared his leg was - and undead or not, seared flesh was damned uncomfortable even for a vampire like Valentin whose twisted sire had been adept at inflicting such discomforts. So when the wounded dragon veered off course and was gashed on his shadowice extrusion, Valentin took the most expedient route: straight towards the oversized lizard bastard. He chanted as he moved, wrapping his own shadow around him and binding it with the cryumbral tides to armour himself with ice, and launched himself into a crude diving roll underneath the spray dragon's breath. The outer edge of the dragon's breath scorches through the shadowice at such close range, but the sorcerous shielding keeps the damage manageable, although the surface flesh is charred and Valentin would need a new duster. At the conclusion of the roll Valentin gets to his feet, and starts to hack at the dragon's legs with his oversized mithril cleaver, using his vampiric strength and butcher's knowledge of anatomy to try and target the joints to try and further slow the wounded dragon down. As Valentin brutally chops and slashes with grim purpose at the dragon's limbs, he begins a final chant: a shadowbinding Valentin had mastered many decades previously and which had saved him on numerous occasions.
Zyren bellows in rage that the man would actually think he could overcome a dragon with brute strength. The fire surrounding his body immediately burns with a greater intensity, his eyes glowing with anger and determination. Using a combination of the heat and his strength, the dragon shattes the ice that binds him and flaps his wings sending him backwards and once again a gust of wind at his foe, however painful it may be. Taking the short moment to clench his wound before the outrage fully sets in. Judging his wing temporarily unreliable, Zyren tucks them at his back, crouches and charges the butcher a final time. Concentrating the flames around his hands into a horribly hot blue flame, he charges the man.
Valentin found it hard to focus on both swinging his cleaver and the cantatus of shadowshifting, and his own attacks dwindled as he focused on getting out of the way when the Dragon's heatshield reached an intensity which threatened to melt his own shadowice armour. As the dragon temporarily retreated, Valentin focused on his chant: the necromantic verses fall from Valentin's lips in a dissonant sussuration, and the shadow wrapped around Valentin seems to seep into the burly butcher, until the butcher himself appears as a shadow. As the fiery dragon once more barrels towards him, Valentin lets slip the final canta, and the vampiric wielder of the Black Tides whose talents had earned him rapid promotion within the Necromancer's Guild becomes incorporeal shadow. Valentin pools into inky darkness and an ethereal scream is heard as the flames lick over the shadow. Valentin spreads out and away from the dragon's flame with the speed of a snuffed candle as around him an echo of another stanza intrude upon the aether when the necromantic butcher summons the Hidden Whispers - an aspect of phobomancy Valentin had twisted to more practical uses. As Valentin glides around the Arena to avoid fiery dissolution, the Hidden whispers complete the Cantatus of Shadowlinking, and the necromantic butcher's shadow shoots out a tendril to the dragon's own shadow, then seems to blend in with the dragon's own. Valentin temporarily disappears into a hiding place which for now should protect him from destruction. It wouldn't last long, but long enough to find a more suitable place to regroup.
Decision and Aftermath
Svilfon said, "ooc We have lost Firewing, but if Tanya and I can't agree we can look for a third.
Svilfon said, "ooc Tanya and I have reached an agreement. The winner of this duel is Valentin. Thanks, comrades; it was an entertaining read! Congratulations and commiserations respectively."
Zyren grunts and after a moment of rest, he stretches his wings and painfully searches for a place to recover.
As the dragon flies over the grandstands, Valentin disattaches himself from the dragon's shadow to take cover in the stalls. When the dragon is gone, the charred butcher heads back down to the arena where a glint had caught his eye: a trio of large dragon scales dislodged by his cleaver during the fight. Picking them up, Valentin begins the slow and painful walk home.