RP:Inside The Fire
This is a Mage's Guild RP.
Summary:
After hearing rumors of a fire elemental in the Xalious Mountains attacking traveling merchants, the Mage's Guild is asked to investigate. Apprentices Quintessa and Karasu follow the screams to discover a curious creature and a terrible reality.
Mountain Path
Carrying on through the mountains, the path you're on heads down from both sides as it briefly winds through a small valley. Even so, the view is still spectacular: High mountains to the north and south, and to the east the beautiful Sage Forest, broken only by the buildings which make up the various cities nestled within it. The road is very well worn, as it is the main trade-route between the cities of the east and kingdoms of the west. To the north is a small shrine, and there are a few devout priests praying inside. It's unclear from here which God they pray to, but the doors to the shrine are always opened and seem welcoming to any weary travelers as a place of rest. Heading west will lead you further into the Xalious Ranges, and the eastern path leads down towards Sage Forest and the various cities which reside there.
Karasu holds her hands up to the campfire, her face pinched into a scowl. "It'll be a good learning experience." She says in a mocking voice. "Even if it is, I don't get why we have to be the bait!" The spell blade looks around at the natural inlet just off the road where travelers stay the night. The road outside is filthy, still covered with discarded wagon wheels, rotted produce that has fallen off of trolleys, and the occasional bone of unknown origin. The feline keeps the hood of her student robes pulled over both pairs of ears as the chilled winds from Frostmaw blow overhead. "Add another log, my dear apprentice." She teases the fellow apprentice before sneezing into her robe.
Quintessa blows a loose strand of hair out of her face, her mixed hued eyes watching the fire burn from over the hexblade's knees. She looks prim and proper today, having taken the chance to bathe and change into her new apprentice robes before the duo set out after this rumor. The changeling tilts her head at her fellow guildmate's request before she grants it with a grumble, lazily flinging a medium sized log into the flame. "We could add a hundred logs to this fire and it won't feel any warmer," she says as she dusts herself off, stands up, and stretches her arms over her head. "When I heard we were gonna be bait I expected it to be exciting. This is plain boring!"
Karasu crosses her arms and nods in agreement. "It really is. There's not even any real evidence of a fire-elemental except some scared drunkards." With a huff, she stands up to go around the changeling to get another piece of firewood. A cross between a roar and a screech erupts from further within the range, echoing off the cliff walls. Karasu stiffens, her hands on her swords. "That... definitely was not a roc." She says quietly. In the distance, a plume of smoke can barely be seen against the moonlight.
Quintessa jerks her head in the direction of the roar, her toothy grin slowly growing. "Doya think that's it?" She draws one of her dark-steel daggers, giggling at the thought of actually seeing a real-life fire-elemental and not just seeing pictures of one in a book. "You can smell that, right? Even I can tell that isn't a fire from an oil lantern spill or anything. I bet you 50 gold pieces that it's the fire-elemental." She starts to kick dirt on the campfire. "I know we're only supposed to be the bait, but I think we can deal with this ourselves. How tough could a fire-elemental be?"
Karasu scales the cliff wall and twists her ears around, trying to pick up any sounds she can. "I don't hear Elio or Master. Where are they?" From the distant west, she hears curious noises. Did something else occur out by the Plains? To the north, where the smoke rises, an undoubtedly human scream echoes. With a nod, she glances down to Quintessa, her expression serious. "Let's go." The half-feline sheds the robe and draws her swords, descending down into the valley. She stumbles at first while her eyes adjust to the darkness, but is soon agile in navigating the murky darkness and the steep cliff. Should the changelings' eyes be similar to that of a human, the glances she gets at light would be reflections of the moonlight off of Karasu's armor, or glimpses of the fire in the distance through the trees.
Quintessa follows the Karasu, "No time to wait for them," she keeps one hand free to grip the edges of the cliff and rock walls as she descends behind her ally into the valley. Aided by the dark gift of her mother, Quintessa sees perfectly in the dark, able to follow the path the more naturally agile half-feline took with ease. As they get closer, the hexblade can hear the panicked screams of more people. "It's just up ahead, " she says, giving a quick glance down the cliff to see how high up they were. They'd never make it in time climbing like this. She pulls a grappling hook from her utility belt and swings it downward into the trees. After a quick tug to check that it was hooked, she grips the rope tightly and drops the rest of the way into the valley. It turns out to be a pretty reckless decision as she breaks through the branches of the trees, tearing her new robes and getting leaves in her hair and mouth. "Blech!" she barely has time to spit the leaves out before she is flung from the rope onto the gravel pathway below, skidding to a halt in a cloud of dust. "Nailed it!" she says, wobbling to her feet to continue sprinting down the path in the direction of the fire.
Karasu nearly drops her swords when Quintessa sails past her. "Tess-- Tess! The TREE!!" Too late. She jumps down the rest of the steep wall, helping Quintessa back to her feet before continuing towards the chaos. Up ahead is an opening in the underbrush, allowing a glimpse into the clearing. A merchant's cart is little more than a skeleton of wood, burning brightly against the landscape. Closer to them, just out of sight, a blackened figure lays motionless as the fire gives way to embers. "Sven have mercy." Karasu whispers, inching forward past Quintessa to examine the body. Right before she reaches it, a screech erupts and a translucent being seemingly made of fire appears from behind the blazing wagon and barrels into the unprepared feline, sending her flying across the field. As Karasu rolls across the rocky terrain, the creature turns its attention to Quintessa and screeches again, intent on taking her next.
Quintessa has only a second to appreciate the beauty of the creature in front of her before it rears back and exhales a torrent of flames at the hexblade. She instinctively hits the deck, avoiding the worst of the flames as she dives out of the way and into a roll. No grin is present this time as she discards her burning cloak. Unluckily for the fire-elemental her clothing had sustained most of the damage. "You're a pretty quick one," she says, the elemental turning to keep the changeling in its gaze, "Let's see how you deal with this-" Quintessa exhales the breath she didn't know she was holding as her cursed aura grew to engulf the entire area around them. Anything alive or intelligent inside her radius would feel uneasy and tense, as if something just wasn't right. "Let's see you try to do that again." She was hoping to buy Karasu enough time to recover. She didn't think she could fight something like this on her own.
Karasu forces herself back to her feet, scrambling to find the swords she dropped in the tumble. The elemental itself tilts its head as the aura engulfs it. If it had eyes, surely they would be fixated on the raven haired girl before it. Unfortunately, the elemental is not a being of reason, and the uneasy feeling the aura creates only makes it more aggressive. It swipes at her with claws of molten lead, one after the other. "Sufocent!" Karasu shouts, raising her swords at it. A torrent of water from an unseen river nearby raises to her commands and aims straight for the burning wagon and the monster. To both their horror, the water passes straight through with no effect!
Quintessa relaxes knowing that Karasu was okay and prepares to evade the onslaught of attacks from the fire-elemental. The hexblade bends luck to her whims creating a barrier of misfortune around herself, protecting herself from the attacks. She side steps one attack, hops back from another, and ducks under a third. It isn't until she sees Karasu's spell have no effect that her concentration is broken and her protection fails. A forth attack sends the changeling flying, burnt claw marks cut into her shoulder. She collides with the ground and rolls to her stomach, her fingertips reaching up to touch her wound. "Ow! Sonuva-" She looks up from her prone position. "Why didn't that work? What is this thing?" Frantically, she reaches into her satchel and searches for her rune. This time she wore thick leather gloves. No more burner herself on her own runes. "Here it is," she calls, pulling her rune out and channeling her raw mana into it, "Let's see if this works!" The rune glows hot as a giant cone of cold energy erupts from the changelings hand, aiming to engulf the elemental.
Karasu sheaths the swords, realizing no good is coming out of this torrent of attacks. As the cold energy bursts from Quintessa’s rune, the bizarre creature shrieks. Somehow, the rune itself seems to be causing some form of damage, but the elemental lurches forward in spite of its visible discomfort. “Tess!” The feline darts between the creature and the changeling to guard from the attack. The next swipe of the red-hot claws burns clean through the brass armor at the shoulder. She gives a yowl, instinctively trying to clutch at the pauldron, then recoiling her hand at the heat. “We need to go, we need to go now!” Karasu grabs Quintessa by the arm and nearly drags her back into the forest from which they came. She looks back after a few yards and sees the creature makes no attempt to follow them. Instead, it stays at the treeline, seemingly watching without a face, waiting to see whether the girls will try to attack again. While she catches her breath, the halfling unclasps the hooks on her pauldron and throws it at the rocky floor with a curse. Doing so triggers a low growl from the elemental, but one that shakes the ground beneath them. “I don’t think we’re dealing with an elemental.” She says quietly, not taking her eyes off the creature. “Look around, do you see any openings in the rocks?”
Quintessa growls as she forces herself to her feet, resisting a bit when Karasu began to pull her back. "I'm not running from this thing!" she protests before eventually being pulled back to the tree line. The hexblade clenches the rune in her hand, trying to lock eyes with the faceless elemental until Karasu suggests to the changeling to look around. "Huh?" The strange girl blinks at her guildmate before her mismatched eyes dart over to the cliff side. Pale fingers idly touch the wound on her shoulder again as she searches for an opening in the rocks somewhere. "You don't think this is another illusion, do you? I'm really starting to get sick of people hiding behind illusions! Wait- There!" The changeling points up, "Behind the 'fire-elemental' there IS an opening, but I think its fox-guarding it... One of us with have to distract the big guy if we want to get inside."
Karasu claps the changeling on her good shoulder. "Good idea, it can't keep track of both of us. Thanks for volunteering, by the way." With that, Karasu slides into the shadows, ensuring the elemental is only focused on Quintessa before she dashes off. To buy her an opening, the feline unclasps the matching pauldron and flings it towards the burning cart, where it resounds with a metallic clang. The creature turns to the cart and screeches as it advances on it. While it is distracted, Karasu carefully starts climbing the loose rocks.
Quintessa grins evilly, a cackle building in her chest. "Good, good..." She says as she slowly exits the tree line, taking a moment to find good footing while the creature was distracted. It doesn't take long before its attention is back on Quintessa and it lets out a tremendous roar. It doesn't phase the hexblade at all, in fact, it causes her to cackle even harder, her magical aura building stronger as she does so. The is something dark and mystical about the way she laughs, something that allows her to tap into the powers that her mother had gifted her. The eerie laughter echoes through the trees and around the rocks. Even Karasu would be able to feel the dark energy building from where she was. Such things didn't bother the fire-elemental as it quickly closed the distance between it and the changeling, attempting to crush her beneath its magma claws. For a moment it looks like it will work, but Quintessa quickly raises the rune and creates a large dome of ice between her and the attack. The claws slam into the dome over and over as Quintessa flees, running around to the side of the creature as she charges an inflict spell on her dagger. Ice chunks fly as her dome is destroyed and a loud screech is heard coming from the fire-elemental once it realizes that it has been fooled. What functions as its head snaps in the hexblade's direction just in time for her to lob her spell directly at its face. "Take that!" she yells, the black energy of the spell almost invisible in the night air. She didn't think the spell would work, but she had to do -something- to distract it.
Karasu shudders as the wave of dark energy envelops her. Her steps slow now that she is relatively safe, and she observes the new apprentice. How terrifying, she thinks, suddenly grateful she did not make an enemy out of the changeling. The creature sounds furious now as it hammers away at the ice, almost desperate to get its semi-translucent claws on Quintessa. Karasu continues her ascent. When the wave of black magic hits, the creature seems to wither for a moment before lunging at Quintessa. Hot claws connect with her side, sending the hexblade almost into the ashen cart. The force causes what remains of the thing to crumble, and causes the cargo left inside to roll out onto the rocky ground. Should Quintessa look at it, she would see what appears to be freshly skinned dragon hides, and shattered jars of dragon meat, though the hides are barely bigger than her own head. The spell blade reaches the entrance to the cave and stumbles back, covering her mouth, her face going white. She turns back to see the scene below her. "QUINTESSA!" Karasu screams as the elemental closes in for a killing strike.
Quintessa's cackle quickly becomes a sharp "Ack!" as she is sent flying into the cart, the remaining debris flying in each direction as her limp body rolls along the ground. Her daggers clatter a couple of feet out of reach, the spell affecting the weapon fading away. It seems like a second like the hexblade was out cold, but a harsh fit of coughing up blood awakes her. She spits out a mixture of saliva and blood as she holds her newly wounded side, trying to focus on the fire-elemental again. After a blow like that she could hardly see anything that wasn't just blurry movements of fire. Blood begins to trickle down her face from a the hit she took from the cart. "This is it, isn't it?" she asks herself, ready to give up. It isn't until she hears Karasu's voice does she snap out of it. "No-" She forces herself to her feet despite her pain, just in time to see the fire-elemental closing in to finish her off.
The fiery creature pauses when something sails in the air between itself and the injured hexblade. Between them, stuck into the ground, shines Karasu’s silver swords. Up by the cave, Karasu is visibly shaking, now weaponless save for her throwing daggers, which she makes no move to withdraw. "M... my name is Karasu Tsuji of the Mage's Guild. That girl there, she is Quintessa of the Black Pond. We are not here to harm you. Please let us help." The elemental growls and abandons the changeling, charging up towards Karasu, but stops right in front of her. Its head turns from her, then into the cave, then back to her. Hazel eyes, illuminated by the fire, shift down to Quintessa. "Let me go to her first." She asks of the creature who seconds ago had been intent on killing the pair. When the creature makes no move to stop her, Karasu jumps down the cliff side and retrieves potions from the various hiding places in her armor, getting ready to treat Quintessa. Her face is pale, and she's visibly shaken as she stops the bleeding. "It's bad. It's really bad up there." She says quietly. Once Quintessa is patched, Karasu helps escort her to the mouth of the cave, where the fire spirit waits motionlessly.
Quintessa is just now starting to get her wits about her after the bout with the fire-elemental when Karasu tells her that something was bad. For once the changeling has nothing to say. She winces when she has to exert herself all the way up to the cave, but all pain is momentarily forgotten when she lays eyes on the fire spirit. "What? What is this?" she asks her companion.
Karasu helps the injured Quintessa to sit at the mouth of the cave. "It's a projection. Kind of like astral projection, I think." The fire spirit follows close by and brightens, illuminating the cave, and the horrific sight. Red dragon hatchlings lay slain and skinned around the mouth of the cave, and eggs lay smashed against the walls of the cave. In the back, a weak groan that shakes the floor of the cave rumbles out of a red leathery mass, a young adult dragon. The thing that was thought to be an elemental walks towards the dragon and disappears into its face. A large emerald eye opens and regards the duo. "Take... him..." It lifts its tattered wing to reveal a single sleeping red dragon hatchling, unharmed by whatever horror took place in this cave.
Quintessa blankly looks around at all the carnage and gore all around them. "This... This is disgusting." she flatly says, her solemn expression never changing. "Such a waste of life... The worst part is that we're going to see much more like this in the coming days, I can feel it." She was of course referring to the atrocities committed by both sides of the saurian onslaught. "The innocent will always be the first sacrificed for the whims of the elites." The hexblade's eyes widen as the wing moves to reveal a dragon hatchling. She looks to Karasu, "We can't leave him here," she begins, "But where can we take him?"
Karasu kneels next to the hatchling, scooping him up in her arms, careful not to wake him. "We will figure something out. There is no reason why he cannot stay among the mages. There is no safer place in the world." Karasu smiles weakly. The dragon curls its lips up in thanks before closing its eyes again. "I'd like that. Goodbye, Berrentam." A haunting silence fills the cavern. The feline turns to the changeling while she cradles the orphan, her expression somber. "I suppose... we go home now."
Quintessa offers the feline a weak smile. "Yes, let's go home. After everything that's happened today I'm glad that we can at least make something good of it." She gives one last look at the dead dragon before turning for the mouth of the cave. "We should tell the Magister Templi as soon as we get back."