FFCVIII: Chapter 1: Warrior Chosen by the Crystal's Light.

[Snowy_One]

"We're not told you don't exist. Just that after Hellis broke free from the grip of the outside world everything outside the city got over-run and destroyed by monsters and that the only thing keeping us alive is that we're mages; unlike the 'common' folk." said Thyme in a huff as she crossed her arms. "Course, now I can see why the council did it. Convince us to never leave the city, never find out about even the rest of the land in our nation, and you get an army of brainwashed and loyal soldiers who don't even know where their magical power comes from or the atrocity that they're committing to obtain that power."

She then looked over at the Miqo'te and human as the notion of touching the ears and tail came up. Though, she admitted, they were cute and she'd like to at least pet her ears once in her life, she wasn't interested in violating another persons space just yet. Instead she was more focused on the next town.

"What is a Hellian town like? I would guess not pretty with people being pushed into line and forced to comply regardless of the demand. Do you think they have a way to tell if we're mages or humans?"

[Enaluxeme]

Edward would have liked to help L'Veyi remove the traps, but he had no idea how to. He never used traps to hunt his lunch before: usually he found some little work in a town to buy something. At worst, he would kill something big, like a bear. A sword isn't good to hunt, but against large animals is effective enough.

When L'Veyi finished with the traps, the party started moving again, towards the last trap, a big one. After that they would return to the camp, then go to the nearest town.

"Common folks... Sure Hellis is filled with racism. It's not like humans, Miqo'te and dwarves are worthless. Speaking of which, aren't mages human-elf hybrids? One would think they praise elves, not hate them."

He said nothing when Severine asked to (and later did) touch L'Veyi's hears. The idea crossed his mind sometimes, but he assumed that was an intimate gesture, and would have been at least weird to suggest such a thing.

The group reached the place where the trap was set. A strange smell came from there.

The bait was nowhere to be found, but there was a pool of dry blood in its place. Looking up, there was a deer leg dangling from a tree.

"Ugh... Looks like we catched a deer, but something ate most of it."

After a breif pause to look around, he continued:

"The leg up there seems edible, though. It's even nicely dry."

[Snowy_One]

"It's not like that. We mages are ourselves. The council claims we're better than normal humans but I, personally, never believed that. After all, I've seen lazy, stupid, students burn themselves and blow themselves up with magic while the normal people work hard in the food farms on the lower levels and provided us with food. How can an idiot who doesn't even listen in class when they are explaining the very thing he's supposed to be learning be superior to someone who has survived much harder work for much longer and claim it is because of blood?" she said with a small sigh before looking at the trap and holding her nose tightly at the stench.

It wasn't a normal stench to be certain. She had smelt rotten food before. After all, such a thing was an inevitability in life. However, this was a different sort of 'rot'. Instead of just being spoiled it smelt as if the food had actually decayed through... something... bacteria maybe? Virus spells were not unknown but no animal should be able to cast it. So, if not that...

"Be careful. Severine. You smell that? It's like a virus spell but not quite." she said as she drew her scimitar. "Disease. Rabies." Quickly she reached out for the end of her blade before running her fingers down along the length, igniting the edge with a flame. A moment later a small growl came from the forest outside as a white feline monstrosity, foaming heavily at the mouth, twin lengthy whiskers flowing down to the ground, and a vicious glint in its eyes with the shredded remains of deer and some of the rope dangling from its mouth. It gave a loud roar before it circled the group for a second then charged forwards, it's fangs and claws swinging wildly at L'Veyi.

[Nanami Touko]

It was unfortunate about the monster, but if it wasn't going to show, it couldn't be helping. Heading back towards Hellis would be a mistake, now, so they could only press forward. Meanwhile, Severine smiled a bit, but was confused by what she meant. "You mean touching my ears? Other than being pointy, they're nothing special, I promise. If you must, you can, but I don't see the fun in that." She relented on poking at the girl's ears for now, since they were moving along and it felt like it would be an unnecessary hold up. Besides, Thyme had more to say. Severine felt a bit stupid for being so blind, up until it mattered. She couldn't exactly contest that she thought her life in the city had been fine.

"You'd think so, huh, Edward?" she said with a wry smile. She wasn't sure if that was the truth, but considering the magical nature of her race, she was rather surprised that the Hellians did hate her so, or at least that their council did. She did have a few colleagues in the city who had treated her with respect, but... Well, who knows. What she did know was that they had come upon a rather gruesome scene at their next trap. "Ew..." She'd seen pictures of what monsters could do, but never actually ran into a mess like this. Just went to show how cushy life in Hellis really was.

It didn't take long for her to clue into what Thyme was getting at, though, getting her Rapier back out and already chanting a blizzard spell. "Looks like we found your Bandercoeurl..." She didn't have time to tell people to stay on their toes before it lunged at L'Veyi, Severine hurriedly trying to launch her spell at it mid lunge to knock it off course.

[Ether]

That pungent smell was impossible to mistake, especially to L'Veyi heightened senses. It was the smell of disease and decay, and before they even got to the snare, she had a good idea of what had happened. It was lucky too, as the growl from the underbrush came early to her expectant ears, and the Miqo'te had managed to pull her sword from it's scabbard before the beast had lunged, bringing it down upon the monster to not only repel it's assault, but to also leave it a nasty gash across the snout, lips and nose left bloodied, a large tooth broken off by the impact.

Leaping backward to break away from the frenzied monster, L'Veyi kept her gaze trained on the beast, a low, guttural growl leaking from her throat and out her mouth, accompanied by a vicious hiss, her tail swinging about rapidly as she leaned back into a crouch, almost looking about to pounce herself.

[Snowy_One]

As the sword came down on the beast, cutting into its face, the monster gave its own growl as it stopped and quickly rolled on the ground to change its direction to face right at L'Veyi before springing forwards again, its claws extended and wide to slash at the girl as it tried to catch her in the thigh with its attack. Thyme wasn't about to let the beast have its way though as she charged forwards, her flaming sword overhead and she brought it down hard upon the beast, cutting into its side and hitting the bone as fire licked on up over onto its fur and the wound boiled and cauterized before the beast tried to rip around to swipe at her, only for her scimitar to have already moved into a, admittedly weaker, parry position as she tried to move away.

"Aim for the tail or whiskers! Get it off-balance." she called out as she got her footing again.

[Enaluxeme]

Edward was the first to go for his blade. Not because he realized what was about to happen, but because he noticed L'Veyi's ears rising, and he knew when a Miqo'te rised its ears, danger was approaching.

He drew his sword. Left hand resting on the pommel and right hand just below the guard, with the index gripping it for higher control of the weapon. He always fingered the guard when fighting against monsters, as he didn't have to worry about an opponent's weapon sliding on the blade and cutting his finger.

L'Veyi was the monster's first target. The moment of fear sent a thrill down his spine, but thankfully she avoided the attack, wounding the beast in the process.

He saw Severine chanting her spell while Thyme attacked the monster's side, getting his attention.

Soon after, he moved between the two. Thyme wasn't helpless, and adopted a defencive stance right after attacking. Still, Edward doubted her ability to take a swipe from such an enemy.

The tiger-like monster was right in front of him. By poking it, he gained its attention. Edward got into stance: legs bent, with the right one forward; the sword between him and his opponent, the blade pointing up and slightly to his right.

He waited for the monster to attack. He heard that kind of monster had a dangerous magic attack. If it used that, the only option would have been to roll and avoid it. Instead, the beast attacked Edward physically, swiping the left paw at him.

Edward quickly made a step backwards, still keeping the right leg forward, and catched the attack. His blade didn't oppose the paw. Instead, Edward let his weapon be pushed by it, and used the impact's strenght to his advantage: following the paw, the sword made half a rotation towards the ground, protecting Edward in the process. Then, the swordsman redirected the force to continue the rotation and simultaneously moved sideway to the right, hitting the monster's back with the back edge of the sword.

Edward immediately retracted the sword and, before the beast could react, he thrusted, piercing its side. As the point reached the bone, he retracted the sword again to avoid getting his weapon stuck, and went back to his defensive stance.

[Nanami Touko]

Her first spell missed, but the rest of them seemed to have this whole fighting thing down. L'Veyi's reflexes were spot on, and even Thyme was holding a candle to the monster while Edward chopped at it. She quickly chanted another spell, and while it was dealing with Edward's strikes, aimed the ice at its legs, hoping to freeze it to the ground for free hits... Unfortunately, as the ice began to spread, the Bandercoeurl pulled its paw free, growling madly at the elf. Luckily, her spell had hit both front legs, and while one was free, the other was still being yanked at to pull itself out. But a trapped monster wasn't finished, yet. "E-Everyone, careful for its magic! If it's the right species, it can be pretty nasty!" Severine hoped nothing would happen, because she wasn't sure her cure magic could heal petrification, if it came to that...

Edited March 13, 2016 by Melissa

[Ether]

Well, it seems the others had finally leapt into action, both assailing and freezing the feline monster, giving L'Veyi a bit of breathing room. Honestly, up close and personal just didn't suit her unless she got the jump on her opponent, so she took the opportunity to use her powerful legs to jump backwards, placing the far sturdier swordsman and combat mages in-between herself and the beast as she bounded out of it's immediate range. As soon as the Miqo'te landed, she began to chant under her breath, and after a few moments, unleashed her sleep spell upon the Bandercoeurl.

[Snowy_One]

Sword and ice impacted the beast full-on, freezing it solidly to the ground and cutting into its flesh down to the bone, the bandercouerl roared in pain and fury. Wrenching it's paws about, still frozen by the ice, until the soil in the ground under them came loose. Trying its best to then bound forwards at Edward the sleep spell hit it causing it to topple forwards as its already-weighted legs lost all co-ordination... and wake up as it smashed hard into the ground practically rolling and flipping over. A second earlier or later and it would have been one sleeping kitty. One burned, frozen, and stabbed sleeping kitty. Now, instead, it's whiskers seemed to stand up on end as it took aim at Severine and a white sphere of magic started to form up over its head.

"Look out!" cried Thyme as she quickly dashed forwards towards the monster, not worrying about defense while it was channeling a spell. A spell she recognized, at least in part, from her studies. The orb glowed brighter and brighter as she rushed forwards, her target clear. She raised her sword and, in a single stroke, brought it down hard upon its left whisker, severing it from the body and causing it to land, thrashing wildly about. Then the Blaster went off, aimed at Severine, before wildly pulling up and to the beasts right, shooting right over Edward's head and then in a wild pattern upwards as the trees it struck turned to petrified wood as the creature cried out in pain. Swinging about it slammed its paw into Thyme hard sending the girl flying backwards, almost parallel to the ground, into Edward side-first; thankfully without managing to break her skin and risk the disease.

[Nanami Touko]

Well, that was certainly an angry beasty. It certainly was charging up magic at her. She didn't quite know what to do. The spell wasn't homing, but it did track the target, just a bit. Unfortunately for Severine, she didn't clue into what was happening until Thyme cut off one of the thing's whiskers, shaking her back into reality.

A bit too late, for part of her.

The ball shot off and she managed to throw herself out of the way of it, taking a spill onto the dirt... Upon trying to sit herself up, she found her right arm to be rather heavy. With a quick glance and a whispered curse, she pushed herself up with her left arm, and started chanting again. They'd have to get that fixed in town... But at least it was just an arm. The spell had grazed her hand and spread along the length of her arm, but it could've went through her whole body, if it had been any stronger. Either way, she was out of this one, sending a cure spell off at Thyme instead of trying to fire ice, again. I really hope the town has softs, or a better white mage than me... If not for her background in magic, this would be panicking her a lot more, but having seen many a student do worse to themselves, she knew this much was reversible.

[Acacia Sgt]

Hellis... not the most lively of places, in more ways than one. Still, for someone like Euzzeth, it wasn't enough of a reason to not go, considering what sort of monsters could be encountered. And right on cue, he had begun to hear the sounds of distant battle. Following it, he finally was at what he was looking for: a monster, though already engaged in battle.

The fight seemed to still be undecided. The creature looked to have taken a beating, but so did some of the fighters. Still, one more couldn't hurt their chances, right? Drawing out his sword, he tried to position himself to strike, hoping his prescence wouldn't be noticed by the monster.

[Ether]

L'Veyi had succeeded in putting the beast to sleep before it completed it's charge, but unfortunately it's own momentum caused it to fall, and thusly wake itself right back up. Still, between the ensuing chaos of it charging it's spell, along with Thyme's intervention and attack on it's whisker, the Miqo'te found the time she needed to sneak around and behind the beast, undetected in it's wild thrashing.

Swiftly closing into the back of the monster, L'Veyi sunk her blade into it's hind leg, smashing it down beneath her own foot as it flinched, and harshly grabbed the bandercoeurl's mane so as to avoid it turning and biting at her. Jerking it's head upward, the Miqo'te brought her sword back down, jabbing it into the monster's throat, and piercing clean through. Ripping her blade downward so as to behead the beast, L'Veyi let it's lifeless body fall to the forest floor, careful not to expose herself to the disease the thing was spewing.

"Damn tough bastard, geez."

[Nanami Touko]

"Wonderful!" Severine exclaimed, struggling to her feet with her stoned arm. She managed but not without some difficulty. She made sure to steer clear of the monster and its juices, hoping that being near the disease wouldn't cause trouble. As long as it didn't bite any of them, or they didn't gets its grossness on them, they'd be fine, right? "Does anyone need healed?" She'd already healed Thyme as much as she could, hoping that Edward and L'Veyi weren't that hurt. She couldn't heal all day, but she should've had a few charges left in her. At least enough to fix any minor wounds... Most of all, she really hoped no one would make a fuss over her arm.

Edited March 14, 2016 by Melissa

[Acacia Sgt]

It seems he had arrived to the scene too late, for the monster was brought down without having had the chance to act. He sheathed his sword as he now calmly walked towards the group.

Well, so was that, he thought. It won't be feel as rewarding having not participated in the fight. But well, who am I to complain for that?

[Enaluxeme]

As expected, after being cornered the bandercoeurl used its magic attack. Instead of panicking, Thyme rushed to the monster and severed one of its whiskers.

In pain, the beast pulled back its head, letting its blast at a random direction. That direction just so happend to be Edward's face, but it wasn't too hard for him to crouch and avoid the beam, which hit and petrified a nearby tree.

The warrior stood up, with the intention of dealing the final strike to the creature now that it was supposedly weakened enough. However, the beast was still strong enough to send Thyme flying with a desperate blow. The girl was shoved roughly in Edward's direction, so he quickly abandoned the idea of running towards the monster and braced himself to literally have a girl in his arms. He catched Thyme and cushion her crash with a tree, fortunally not the one turned to stone.

The impact hurt, but neither of them was injured in the process.

"You allright, flying girl?" he said in a joking tone.

When Edward stood up again, he saw L'Veyi riding the bandercoeurl with her blade in her hand, and knew the fight was over.

After the fighting was done, Severine went arount offering to heal the wounded, starting with Thyme.

"I'm fine, thank you for the offfffor the love of- Did that thing hit you!?"

Edward stood there, visibly concerned, watching Severine's arm. He knew he didn't have a remedy for that.

"I'm afraid we don't have a gold needle, and you don't neither, I suppose."

He scratched his head a bit.

"We were going to town anyway, but that definitely isn't comfortable to go around with... If you want help, I'm here."

Edward held out his left arm, but suddently realized he dropped his sword.

"Ehm... Just a moment."

Quickly, he turned around to search for it. It was half way through the spot where he catched Thyme and the three that embraced them so lovingly. Once he reached the weapon, Edward took it up and carefully inspected the edges for any damage. While he did that, with the sword pointing towards him parallel to the ground, he noticed a bright yellow in the corner of his eye.

Looking in that direction, he saw a guy. His blonde hairs shined with the light passing through a spot with no leaves.

"... More company. This forest is more crowded by the day."

He lowered the weapon, but without putting it away. As his father used to say: to trust is good, not to trust is better.

Edited March 14, 2016 by Enaluxeme

[Snowy_One]

Thyme slowly stood up after having been knocked into Edward, rubbing her side and being thankful she hadn't hurt anyone with her blade. The fight could have gone much better. Especially since...

"Severine! Your arm!" cried out Thyme as she rushed to the girls side, trying to grab the arm and lift it up to give a look-over. It didn't look all that bad on the whole. Well. For an arm turned to stone by a rabid animal. Still...

"We need to get to that town soon and find someone with a soft potion or a gold-colored beast needle. It won't get any worse but, unless we do, she's going to have a stone arm and it might cause damage to the rest of her body. First, however, we have two other things."

The corpse of the bandercourel seemed to slowly off-gas a dark energy for a few seconds as, slowly, it began to deflate like a balloon. Down, down, until only the hide remained behind as the rest of the body returned to the chaos whence it came. "Good. It's not getting back up. Second." she looked where Edward was looking at a newcomer, her eyes sizing him up and down. "We have another person here. I hope to the Primals they aren't from Hellis. By the way, thanks, I didn't get hurt too badly thanks to you Edward."

Edited March 15, 2016 by Snowy_One

[Nanami Touko]

Well, they weren't making too much fuss. "I-It's fine, really. Just numb-- I suppose that makes sense, being stoned... I've dealt with things like this before in Hellis, so if we can find a soft or a healer in town, it'll go away. Might be a bit heavy to carry around. If it does, I'll take you up on that offer, Edward." She didn't want Thyme to go poking around at her arm for too long, but it was rather difficult to pull it away from her in its state. She left it, and luckily, the other mage quickly finished her prodding.

None too soon before they could get ready to leave, another body made himself present, Severine sharing Thyme's thoughts on the matter. "So what do we do if he is from Hellis?" she asked Thyme in a whisper, stepping over closer to her. "I doubt these two will help us fight him off... And we can't exactly run, right now." They were low on options, so she just hoped that he was a simple traveler.

[Snowy_One]

"I don't know. I mean, I've been winging it ever since I found out the truth so, if it is the crystals will, I'm sure we'll think of something. Maybe I'll just give him the crystal and we can escape then?" she said remembering what had happened back with the guards. If what had happened back then happened again than handing him the crystal would blind him in a flash of light at least providing for a chance of escape. She hoped Severine would understand what she actually meant and didn't go out mouthing her plan or anything of the sort. "I mean, if we're to escape with our lives..."

[Ether]

It seemed that in the commotion, Severine had gotten grazed by the blaster. It was unfortunate, but it wasn't as though she could do much of anything about it, and based on what the others seemed to be saying, it wasn't too serious. L'Veyi was about to chime in on her own, when the man approaching became readily apparent. Severine and Thyme began whispering to one another, though it wasn't going to hide their words from the Miqo'te's improved hearing. Well, it was nothing sinister, at any rate.

"Oiiii, new guy! I dunno whether you're actually trying to hide or not, but if so, it's not working. You wouldn't happen to have any gold needles on you, by any chance?" L'Veyi called out, stepping over the spot where the monster had been before it dissipated. No use in being antisocial or acting suspicious, after all.

"Friend here got nicked by the damn blaster. Unlucky, huh?"

[Acacia Sgt]

Unfortunately, arriving late also meant the monster was gone without a chance to harvest its essence.

Damn, better luck next time, he thought.

But now with the monster gone, there was now the matter of the group he had stumbled across.

"Unfortunately, can't say I have," he answered the miqo'te's question. "Had I knew I would find these guys before venturing here, would've been a different story. Though not of much use while traveling solo, I'll admit." He looked over where the monster used to be. Quite a shame, would've been quite a boon to have obtained its power.

[SheWhoisWoe]

Elyne sighed to herself, shaking her head in irritation. Farmland #27 had been an utter letdown in a multitude of ways, least of all friendliness. The guards had begrudgingly let her in, and the people had ignored her, or simply acted too fearful and tired to be of much use. How the hell did a town like this even exist? Nobody was even willing to TALK to her, let alone sell to her. Was all of Hellis like this? Not what she expected from a nation of mages, that was for sure!

Well, didn't matter, now it was time to move on, and hopefully find an -actual- town. Maybe with a library, friendly people, an inn that was trustworthy....Well, the inn here didn't seem all that untrustworthy, but the people (and guards. Guards! Enough of them that you'd think this was a prison camp, not a town!) were clearly not happy with her there, and she didn't trust them to not try something while she slept.

Pack hoisted on her back, and she was off down the road. It'd be a bit until she reached the perimeter that the guards enforced, but she was away from the village center and thus most of the people, and finally felt like she could relax a little. Her green eyes were wide, watching for trouble ahead, her sensitive red-furred ears were alert for trouble from around her, and her tail swished side to side as she walked to the beat of a song she hummed.

[AnonymousSpeed]

If not for the intensity with which her curiosity had been raised, and the fact that her course lined up neatly with it, even one as eager for adventure as Yohanna might have ceased chasing after whatever was leaving the trail she followed. It was faint to begin with, and for some time she spent following it only grew fainter as the blood seeped into the ground and dried up. However, after a while longer, something occurred to reignite her interests and supplant the need for the trail of fluid.

From the distance came the sound of a roar, screaming, and battle. It was far off and difficult to immediately make out what was being shouted, but the attentive ear would notice. And while Yohanna's eyes had been focused on the ground for a good while, the noise immediately drew her attention ahead of her, towards the source of the commotion, where a few specks could be seen dancing on the horizon. Surely, that was the source, and it seemed more likely than not the individuals she had been following. Motivated more by the moment than reason, the dwarf pressed her canon against her beard and stormed off towards the scene.

She eventually came within a few meters, able to make out a party of five, the carcass of a beast, and a horrid odor which was easily blocked out by readjusting the hairs on her chin to cover her nose. To approach cautiously, she decided on the fly, would seem quite weak and, if there was nothing to be afraid of, very awkward. So, while she did indeed point her weapon ahead of her, she approached the group with confident strides, as if performing the most casual mugging the world had ever seen. She said nothing, deciding it would be better to enter earshot and perhaps pick on a bit before her presence was known, or otherwise maintain some bit of surprise. Should they notice her as she approached, well...there was some civility in not interrupting another's chat.

[Snowy_One]

"Well... Can you at least help us carry her to whatever town is nearby? My friend and I are very tired, hungry, and... well..." she looked at Severine's arm. "And I am certain our new friends wouldn't mind a bit of help returning as well. By the way have you heard any news from Hellis?" asked Thyme on a gamble. If they were surrounded, they were surrounded and this guy almost knew for certain who she was. If he was a lone mage he would be toast even with Severine out of comission. If he didn't know any better... maybe a new ally? Worth a shot.

Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a shot. Rather, something that could SHOOT something very painful. A short, stocky, thing with a weapon, confident strides, and... Wait? Was that a... dwarf?

"Are you a... dwarf? Why would there be a dwarf in Hellis?" she quickly bent low to Severine's ear "Do you think they managed to put out a bounty and get a dwarf here that fast and looking for us again that fast?"

---

"Hey!" cried out one of the guards as two more came up surrounding Elyne, one from the front, two from behind as the monk tried her best to head on down the road. They were not dressed in the best of gear, clearly hand-me-downs from an apathetic and possibly under-budgeted military commander. "You're that nosey little Miqo'te girl, aren't you? The stranger." He seemed to growl for a moment before slowly approaching her along with his friends. Then, quickly, he bent downwards close to her ears.

"I see you have a medical kit. Please, can you help heal some of our civilians? We don't have enough to go around and there are bandercourel's in the nearby wood. The boss put the budget towards posting bounties for those, but we can't afford to patch people up proper now!"

[Acacia Sgt]

"Sure, it would be no problem," Euzzeth answered. Well, if not to take down the monster, he could still help this group in something.

"Hm, no, can't say I have. In fact, this is my first time in the area. Why do you ask, though? Did something happened?"