As Chisille makes her way out of the building, she literally bumps into Lyudmila, who wasn't paying attention. Lyudmila looses her footing and falls face-first in the snow. She doesn't lay down for quite a while however. The snow is just a wee bit too cold to be taking a nap in, especially with an empty stomach.
"Oh, hey there. Sorry for not looking where you were going." Lyudmila says as she notices Chisille. Her eyes then fall on the jar. "Did you find that?"
With the sudden unexpected impact, Chisille's nose gets uncomfortably squished, causing her to accidentally drop the jar to the ground and quickly back off a few meters in case of danger. She relaxed slightly as she realized what she had hit was Lyudmila, but the relaxation stopped when she saw she caused the witch to fall over from the impact. 'Whoops. I'm going to have to be more careful... She probably hates me now.' she thinks.
This was not the case though. Lyudmila was the one to apologize to her instead! Chisille doesn't say anything, since she didn't really know how to react in a situation that was her own fault, yet the others involved were the ones to say sorry to her. She just didn't understand it.
Her eyes fell to the jar slowly freezing in the snow. "Yes... I found that. Not sure what it is. Better then all other stuff, so I took it." she replies as she walks back towards it.
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Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
As Arin walks through the greenery he keeps his eyes peeled for anything edible (If anything is edible he harvests it). He reaches the snow-capped land and trudges through hoping to find something above the snow.
Annie keeps one arm wrapped tightly about Ei's waist. She rests her head upon her shoulder devotedly.
"You need not bother with me..." She speaks softly into her neck; "I don't want you to be hurt on my account. They won't stop..." She pulls away and stands back full of sincerity as the red glow of her eyes match Ei's. "We shall not kill him. They are smarter than that. They are..." She blinks slowly to consider her words. "..Even if we stop him, others will come in his place. As long as they are after me, no one is safe. But for now I have led him astray, he chases only a sprite of my existence... for now. You should not be with me when he comes. I will not let my only friend be hurt."
Having said these things, a tear is clearly present in Annie's eye, though she quickly wipes it away, fakes a smile and turns back to Ariel. "In the meantime, let's have some fun while we can." Distracted by the aforementioned thoughts again, she glances at Ei, and confides. "I'm sorry I can't tell you everything...To do so would make things worse for me... and for you."
Ei listens to Annie carefully, hoping to pick up anything that would hint at who 'they' are, but Annie seems to be choosing her words very carefully. Ei can appreciate Annie caring for her, but doesn't entirely agree with her.
"Annie, you can tell me everything. Don't worry about making things worse for me, I've had enough big problems that more big problems are nothing I can't handle. I can handle getting hurt, but I can't handle seeing you get hurt. I've seen people close to me perish before, and I don't want it happening again."
Ei sighs, and shakes her head, before smiling at Annie.
"But you're right. Let's first have some fun with Ariel. And when they show up, I'm confident that, if we work together, they won't be a threat. So please, let me help you."
"And if there's anything you need or want, just ask me. Maybe I can arrange it for you. Be it information, powers or items."
As Arin walks through the greenery he keeps his eyes peeled for anything edible (If anything is edible he harvests it). He reaches the snow-capped land and trudges through hoping to find something above the snow.
Arin's search through the clearing proves to be fruitless, both literally and figuratively. No edible berries on any of the bushes, no fruit on any of the trees, and no wild animals to hunt show up either. There seems to be nothing hidden under the snow either, making this clearing useless.
Perhaps searching further up ahead in the snow-covered lands will result in Arin finding something useful?
With the sudden unexpected impact, Chisille's nose gets uncomfortably squished, causing her to accidentally drop the jar to the ground and quickly back off a few meters in case of danger. She relaxed slightly as she realized what she had hit was Lyudmila, but the relaxation stopped when she saw she caused the witch to fall over from the impact. 'Whoops. I'm going to have to be more careful... She probably hates me now.' she thinks.
This was not the case though. Lyudmila was the one to apologize to her instead! Chisille doesn't say anything, since she didn't really know how to react in a situation that was her own fault, yet the others involved were the ones to say sorry to her. She just didn't understand it.
Her eyes fell to the jar slowly freezing in the snow. "Yes... I found that. Not sure what it is. Better then all other stuff, so I took it." she replies as she walks back towards it.
"Ah, can you open it, or do you want me to open it for you so we can see what's in it?" Lyudmila asks, smiling while she does so and wiping bits of snow off of her face so she doesn't look as silly.
"Ah, can you open it, or do you want me to open it for you so we can see what's in it?" Lyudmila asks, smiling while she does so and wiping bits of snow off of her face so she doesn't look as silly.
"No. Can't open the jar. Lid too tight..." Chisille sighs and goes to sit down, once more getting too cold from the snow and having to abort it. This lack of comfort, along with the jar refusing to open and bumping her nose agitates her more and more. She's now visibly irritated by all of this, though it would be hard to tell unless the others can recognize it well.
She gently moves the jar a bit closer to Lyudmila with her paw so she can grab it. Since the lid has been in her mouth, it's all covered with dragon spit that's going to make it harder to open. It might also not be the most pleasant substance to touch either, but the main thing is it's slippery.
While someone opens the jar, Chisille inhales deeply and blasts a bit of fire at the ground, melting the snow so she finally has a spot that won't freeze her feet. She sits down on that spot, gently nipping an itchy bit on her scales while she waits.
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Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
The Meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
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"Well, if you're as hungry as you say, then I think we can stop dilly-dallying and start looking," says Renard, eyes scanning the area around them. Renard brings his hand to his chin, rubbing it to look like he is thinking. Not particularly bothered to search very thoroughly, he immediately points at the nearest house that doesn't seem to be obviously looted at first glance.
"After deliberating over our choices and making several calculations, that's definitely the jackpot."
Renard begins trudging through the snow to his chosen location while a continuous shrill sound comes out of his mouth, becoming apparent that it is just a sad attempt at a whistle.
OOC: Sorry for not being around a lot! Enough said! Back to business.
OC: Betty is pleasantly surprised that the others don't really mind the massive cloud of butterflies. She follows Gwen, Lyudmila and her cute little Chissy in search for lunch, and finds the slobbery jar very funny.
"Here, allow me the honors!" Betty tells Lyudmila. "I know a fun trick my dad taught me for opening items!"
Smiling happy to please, Betty babbles off a few words in Latin and points at the jar. The jar suddenly starts shaking in Lyudmila hands then flips a few times as the glass flex's and bulges unnaturally. It then sits still, right before the lid pops off and flies high in the air, so high in fact that it disappears spinning wildly into the sky while the contents of the jar erupts like a volcano and splatters beetle guts all over Lyudmila's face.
"Oh gosh O my O heck on a perfectly fine Monday morning!" Betty says; "I'm so sorry about that.... I guess I need to brush up on that particular spell." She looks around for other food options. "But maybe there's something else we can eat - wait! I have an idea!" She looks at Chissy; "You like rabbits, right?" And before even getting an answer from the dragon, Betty rattles off a whole bunch of other words causing twenty brown bunnies to appear. Unfortunately all the bunnies are dressed in golden helmets and armed with tiny silver swords... and Betty has no idea why. She just shakes her head, hands on hips, wondering how all of her spells could go so wrong.
"Well... I guess lunch is going to be a battle."
"So, guys, should I prepare a fire for the roast?"
Betty is pleasantly surprised that the others don't really mind the massive cloud of butterflies. She follows Gwen, Lyudmila and her cute little Chissy in search for lunch, and finds the slobbery jar very funny.
"Here, allow me the honors!" Betty tells Lyudmila. "I know a fun trick my dad taught me for opening items!"
Smiling happy to please, Betty babbles off a few words in Latin and points at the jar. The jar suddenly starts shaking in Lyudmila hands then flips a few times as the glass flex's and bulges unnaturally. It then sits still, right before the lid pops off and flies high in the air, so high in fact that it disappears spinning wildly into the sky while the contents of the jar erupts like a volcano and splatters beetle guts all over Lyudmila's face.
"Oh gosh O my O heck on a perfectly fine Monday morning!" Betty says; "I'm so sorry about that.... I guess I need to brush up on that particular spell." She looks around for other food options. "But maybe there's something else we can eat - wait! I have an idea!" She looks at Chissy; "You like rabbits, right?" And before even getting an answer from the dragon, Betty rattles off a whole bunch of other words causing twenty brown bunnies to appear. Unfortunately all the bunnies are dressed in golden helmets and armed with tiny silver swords... and Betty has no idea why. She just shakes her head, hands on hips, wondering how all of her spells could go so wrong.
"Well... I guess lunch is going to be a battle."
"So, guys, should I prepare a fire for the roast?"
As the jar of stuff violently explodes from Betty's spell all over Lyudmila, Chisille is a little disappointed that the contents of the jar wasn't very edible. In fact, it smelt revolting. As if it were the pickled insides of some insect or something. She wanted to cover her nose, but she didn't really have time, since Betty was talking to her.
Rabbits. She definitely did like to eat rabbit. They ran quite fast on their little hippity hoppity legs, but with her wings giving her a boost during her run she was sometimes able to catch up to them and take them as her lunch. They had many little bones everywhere and not much meat, but it was still a fine meal compared to some of the other things.
"Yes I..." she began to say, but was interrupted by the sudden appearance of 20 little rabbits, each armed with a weapon and helmet for protection. They would've looked cute in their little getup if it weren't for the fact they were about to become her meal. She didn't care that they were armed, since the swords would be able to do nothing but melt.
She breathed in deeper then the moment before as her flames gathered up within her. If the others looked closely, they could see a small amount of orange light forming at the back of her throat, a sign of what she was about to do to the squadron of bunnies. Her body straightened as she let forth a jet of flames. Turning her head left and right she sweeped the field to catch every rabbit in her inferno, purposely avoiding getting the spots where the others in the group were.
The flames only lasted a few seconds, and when she was finished she huffed from the effort. "Did I get them all?" she asked.
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Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
"Don't call me that," Silas growls. "I will always be a lone wolf."
Silas continues to stumble in this unknown direction, not really caring about the consequences. Of course, he is still heading for the town, but he clearly is either avoiding the others altogether or exploring some different part of the map. But what is his goal? Frankly, even he doesn't know.
Silas, though Annie remains unseen, feels her hand slip into his as he walks along.
“Do you like the touch of my hand? Is my skin nice to you?” She asks. “It sure is nice to have a partner… isn’t it?”
Ei listens to Annie carefully, hoping to pick up anything that would hint at who 'they' are, but Annie seems to be choosing her words very carefully. Ei can appreciate Annie caring for her, but doesn't entirely agree with her.
"Annie, you can tell me everything. Don't worry about making things worse for me, I've had enough big problems that more big problems are nothing I can't handle. I can handle getting hurt, but I can't handle seeing you get hurt. I've seen people close to me perish before, and I don't want it happening again."
Ei sighs, and shakes her head, before smiling at Annie.
"But you're right. Let's first have some fun with Ariel. And when they show up, I'm confident that, if we work together, they won't be a threat. So please, let me help you."
"And if there's anything you need or want, just ask me. Maybe I can arrange it for you. Be it information, powers or items."
"Well, if you're as hungry as you say, then I think we can stop dilly-dallying and start looking," says Renard, eyes scanning the area around them. Renard brings his hand to his chin, rubbing it to look like he is thinking. Not particularly bothered to search very thoroughly, he immediately points at the nearest house that doesn't seem to be obviously looted at first glance.
"After deliberating over our choices and making several calculations, that's definitely the jackpot."
Renard begins trudging through the snow to his chosen location while a continuous shrill sound comes out of his mouth, becoming apparent that it is just a sad attempt at a whistle.
Annie is disturbed by Ei’s kindness. It was troubling, somehow. All she knew of life was horror and violence, bestowed upon her by a dark serving mother under the influence of the Order. She had never been allowed fiends. Her childhood was stricken to the confines of her mother’s house, wherein the only social interaction consisted of her mother’s visitors, most of whom would forevermore be cursed, others tortured and killed as sacrifices to the Order before ever getting the opportunity to leave the house. At times, certain male visitors, the ones her mother favored for… more pleasurable purposes, would abuse Annie in secret. At one point, Annie had mentioned this discrepancy to her mother, who blatantly called her a liar in response and tied her a bed for three day without food or water. Annie never again spoke out against any of her mother’s favorites. Alas… Annie had rarely glimpsed the kindness she received from Ei, such a thing conflicted with fundamental nature of who she was born to be. It tore at her heart, argued with her mind and yet, although her instincts told her to forsake Ei – to kill that lying wretch - she just couldn’t help but give into the kindness. It was… a novelty to her… A curious notion that was opening up a whole new range of stimulating emotions that made it close to impossible not to take every opportunity to touch her… taste her… explore every sensation these alien feelings had to offer.
At that point, however, her thoughts were not interested in pursuing the matter of the Order with Ei, she simply steered away from the topic by saying; “I like illusion. Do you like illusion? My mother was good at that.”
She smiled, using her finger to ask Ei to follow her into a nearby house neighboring the one that Renard entered. But she was already getting bored with the hot and cold spell Ei had inflicted upon Ariel. “You should remove that spell now.” She suggested, I want to see their natural reaction when they mistake decaying flesh with freshly cooked meat.”
Inside the house was a well decayed corpse of a man laying mangled upon a table near the unlit fireplace. She suggested that Ei start a fire while she climbed upon the table, knelt before the corpse and hovered her hands over it, repeating the words she had heard her mother speak so many times. Before long the rotting corpse was the irresistible false vision of a roasted pig, complete with a side dish of vegetables, all neatly arranged on a silver platter.
“Too much?” She asked Ei with a playful wink. “It won’t be long now… the sweet smell will draw them in – I just can’t wait to see how they react!” She jumps from the table and wraps her arms around Ei. “Imagine their faces when they realize they are eating a dead man.”
OOC: Sorry for not being around a lot! Enough said! Back to business.
OC: Betty is pleasantly surprised that the others don't really mind the massive cloud of butterflies. She follows Gwen, Lyudmila and her cute little Chissy in search for lunch, and finds the slobbery jar very funny.
"Here, allow me the honors!" Betty tells Lyudmila. "I know a fun trick my dad taught me for opening items!"
Smiling happy to please, Betty babbles off a few words in Latin and points at the jar. The jar suddenly starts shaking in Lyudmila hands then flips a few times as the glass flex's and bulges unnaturally. It then sits still, right before the lid pops off and flies high in the air, so high in fact that it disappears spinning wildly into the sky while the contents of the jar erupts like a volcano and splatters beetle guts all over Lyudmila's face.
"Oh gosh O my O heck on a perfectly fine Monday morning!" Betty says; "I'm so sorry about that.... I guess I need to brush up on that particular spell." She looks around for other food options. "But maybe there's something else we can eat - wait! I have an idea!" She looks at Chissy; "You like rabbits, right?" And before even getting an answer from the dragon, Betty rattles off a whole bunch of other words causing twenty brown bunnies to appear. Unfortunately all the bunnies are dressed in golden helmets and armed with tiny silver swords... and Betty has no idea why. She just shakes her head, hands on hips, wondering how all of her spells could go so wrong.
"Well... I guess lunch is going to be a battle."
"So, guys, should I prepare a fire for the roast?"
As the jar of stuff violently explodes from Betty's spell all over Lyudmila, Chisille is a little disappointed that the contents of the jar wasn't very edible. In fact, it smelt revolting. As if it were the pickled insides of some insect or something. She wanted to cover her nose, but she didn't really have time, since Betty was talking to her.
Rabbits. She definitely did like to eat rabbit. They ran quite fast on their little hippity hoppity legs, but with her wings giving her a boost during her run she was sometimes able to catch up to them and take them as her lunch. They had many little bones everywhere and not much meat, but it was still a fine meal compared to some of the other things.
"Yes I..." she began to say, but was interrupted by the sudden appearance of 20 little rabbits, each armed with a weapon and helmet for protection. They would've looked cute in their little getup if it weren't for the fact they were about to become her meal. She didn't care that they were armed, since the swords would be able to do nothing but melt.
She breathed in deeper then the moment before as her flames gathered up within her. If the others looked closely, they could see a small amount of orange light forming at the back of her throat, a sign of what she was about to do to the squadron of bunnies. Her body straightened as she let forth a jet of flames. Turning her head left and right she sweeped the field to catch every rabbit in her inferno, purposely avoiding getting the spots where the others in the group were.
The flames only lasted a few seconds, and when she was finished she huffed from the effort. "Did I get them all?" she asked.
"Ah, can you open it, or do you want me to open it for you so we can see what's in it?" Lyudmila asks, smiling while she does so and wiping bits of snow off of her face so she doesn't look as silly.
Prints in the snow prove a temporary decoy for Annie’s use. She leaves in her wake a twisted and variously repeated trail between buildings before coming to a wooden panel propped up on a barrel at one end, which she climbs to the apex of and leaps to a nearby rooftop. From there she uses chimney’s, having a great amount of fun gliding randomly from rooftop to rooftop, creating a maze of possible directions for her pursuer to consider. At long last, feeling a little warn out from the extraneous exercise, her misleading adventure comes to an end as she finds herself awkwardly gripping to the upper branches of a tree and peering down upon the activity taking place below.
From her perch she can see for quite some distance, however closer to her location is a gathering of peculiar interest; Chisille, Betty, Gwen and another lady she could feel great magical energy from, are conversing over the topic of a jar of food. She cocks her head in an effort to listen more closely to the words being said.
The rabbit incident unfolds as she observes and then, oddly enough, Annie’s ability to concentrate on the task at hand is interrupted by the smell of freshly cooked meat. Her dragon instincts became dominant, mouth watering as she focused on the outlay of food. Needing to eat, yet having enough mind not to simply jump down and alarm the group with her sudden presence, she reaches out to a small branch and applies pressure, causing it to snap, attracting the attention of those below....
"Well, if you're as hungry as you say, then I think we can stop dilly-dallying and start looking," says Renard, eyes scanning the area around them. Renard brings his hand to his chin, rubbing it to look like he is thinking. Not particularly bothered to search very thoroughly, he immediately points at the nearest house that doesn't seem to be obviously looted at first glance.
"After deliberating over our choices and making several calculations, that's definitely the jackpot."
Renard begins trudging through the snow to his chosen location while a continuous shrill sound comes out of his mouth, becoming apparent that it is just a sad attempt at a whistle.
Maras giggles at Renard's failing attempts to whistle, but stops once he notices the food inside the house.
"Wow. That's a very fancy meal if I've ever seen one. I think it's best to not let it go to waste. What do you guys think?"
Maras doesn't really wait for a response and takes a seat at the table, looking at the food with a watering mouth.
OOC: Sorry for not being around a lot! Enough said! Back to business.
OC: Betty is pleasantly surprised that the others don't really mind the massive cloud of butterflies. She follows Gwen, Lyudmila and her cute little Chissy in search for lunch, and finds the slobbery jar very funny.
"Here, allow me the honors!" Betty tells Lyudmila. "I know a fun trick my dad taught me for opening items!"
Smiling happy to please, Betty babbles off a few words in Latin and points at the jar. The jar suddenly starts shaking in Lyudmila hands then flips a few times as the glass flex's and bulges unnaturally. It then sits still, right before the lid pops off and flies high in the air, so high in fact that it disappears spinning wildly into the sky while the contents of the jar erupts like a volcano and splatters beetle guts all over Lyudmila's face.
"Oh gosh O my O heck on a perfectly fine Monday morning!" Betty says; "I'm so sorry about that.... I guess I need to brush up on that particular spell." She looks around for other food options. "But maybe there's something else we can eat - wait! I have an idea!" She looks at Chissy; "You like rabbits, right?" And before even getting an answer from the dragon, Betty rattles off a whole bunch of other words causing twenty brown bunnies to appear. Unfortunately all the bunnies are dressed in golden helmets and armed with tiny silver swords... and Betty has no idea why. She just shakes her head, hands on hips, wondering how all of her spells could go so wrong.
"Well... I guess lunch is going to be a battle."
"So, guys, should I prepare a fire for the roast?"
Lyudmila doesn't wait long with wiping away the insect guts, and chuckles at Betty's failing attempts to cast spells in Latin.
"That's the risk behind using such an old language, Betty. Bad Translations can really mess up your day. Perhaps you should look into a more modern magic language?"
Annie is disturbed by Ei’s kindness. It was troubling, somehow. All she knew of life was horror and violence, bestowed upon her by a dark serving mother under the influence of the Order. She had never been allowed fiends. Her childhood was stricken to the confines of her mother’s house, wherein the only social interaction consisted of her mother’s visitors, most of whom would forevermore be cursed, others tortured and killed as sacrifices to the Order before ever getting the opportunity to leave the house. At times, certain male visitors, the ones her mother favored for… more pleasurable purposes, would abuse Annie in secret. At one point, Annie had mentioned this discrepancy to her mother, who blatantly called her a liar in response and tied her a bed for three day without food or water. Annie never again spoke out against any of her mother’s favorites. Alas… Annie had rarely glimpsed the kindness she received from Ei, such a thing conflicted with fundamental nature of who she was born to be. It tore at her heart, argued with her mind and yet, although her instincts told her to forsake Ei – to kill that lying wretch - she just couldn’t help but give into the kindness. It was… a novelty to her… A curious notion that was opening up a whole new range of stimulating emotions that made it close to impossible not to take every opportunity to touch her… taste her… explore every sensation these alien feelings had to offer.
At that point, however, her thoughts were not interested in pursuing the matter of the Order with Ei, she simply steered away from the topic by saying; “I like illusion. Do you like illusion? My mother was good at that.”
She smiled, using her finger to ask Ei to follow her into a nearby house neighboring the one that Renard entered. But she was already getting bored with the hot and cold spell Ei had inflicted upon Ariel. “You should remove that spell now.” She suggested, I want to see their natural reaction when they mistake decaying flesh with freshly cooked meat.”
Inside the house was a well decayed corpse of a man laying mangled upon a table near the unlit fireplace. She suggested that Ei start a fire while she climbed upon the table, knelt before the corpse and hovered her hands over it, repeating the words she had heard her mother speak so many times. Before long the rotting corpse was the irresistible false vision of a roasted pig, complete with a side dish of vegetables, all neatly arranged on a silver platter.
“Too much?” She asked Ei with a playful wink. “It won’t be long now… the sweet smell will draw them in – I just can’t wait to see how they react!” She jumps from the table and wraps her arms around Ei. “Imagine their faces when they realize they are eating a dead man.”
Ei takes notice of Annie's reluctance to talk about the subject, and decides to not ask further. Ei knew Annie probably doesn't like the subject, so trying to get her to talk about it would require a different approach.
Ei follows Annie and goes along with her plans. Causing a fire in the fireplace and removing the spell she cast on Ariel, though the way she does it is unique. Instead of casting another spell, Ei seems to grab something unseen next to Ariel, and seemingly rips it apart, the ripping sound being audible only to Ei, Annie and Ariel.
Ei smiles and giggles at Ei's words, and wraps her arms around Annie in return.
"That'll get that Half-Fallen Angel in a lot of trouble, wouldn't it? Maybe he won't even be let back in anymore!"
Ei giggles as she comments on Ariel's possible fate, but soon falls silent.
"There's a reason why I don't like Angels. It's their connection to the gods. I told you before I've had big problems before, and I wasn't lying. I said and did things long ago that angered various deities, and have suffered the consequences. Those who I cared for were torn away from me, never to be seen again, and I myself suffered from the wrath of the Gods, only to survive for reasons I cannot figure out. Perhaps they left me to suffer, perhaps they thought I died."
Ei sighs, and rests her head on Annie's shoulder.
"That's why I care about you. Just like how you said I'm your first friend, you're my first friend in a long time."
Jack doesn't have a lot of time to focus, as more debris flies towards him, apparently aimed. If he doesn't dodge he'll go splat against the wall that is headed towards him at an alarming speed.
As the debris is launched towards him, Jack leaps out of the way, breaking into a sprint- or as much of a sprint as he is capable of in the snow- towards where he left his crossbow, taking a curved path in an attempt to keep as much distance from the source of the thrown chunks of tower as possible as he closes in on his ranged weapon.
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"Against all the evil that Hell can conjure, all the wickedness that mankind can produce; We will send unto them... only you."
Colored text indicates in-character statements/actions. Because Forum Games has basically just been a big open RP for a long time now and it's the only place I ever post anymore, when I post at all.
Prints in the snow prove a temporary decoy for Annie’s use. She leaves in her wake a twisted and variously repeated trail between buildings before coming to a wooden panel propped up on a barrel at one end, which she climbs to the apex of and leaps to a nearby rooftop. From there she uses chimney’s, having a great amount of fun gliding randomly from rooftop to rooftop, creating a maze of possible directions for her pursuer to consider. At long last, feeling a little warn out from the extraneous exercise, her misleading adventure comes to an end as she finds herself awkwardly gripping to the upper branches of a tree and peering down upon the activity taking place below.
From her perch she can see for quite some distance, however closer to her location is a gathering of peculiar interest; Chisille, Betty, Gwen and another lady she could feel great magical energy from, are conversing over the topic of a jar of food. She cocks her head in an effort to listen more closely to the words being said.
The rabbit incident unfolds as she observes and then, oddly enough, Annie’s ability to concentrate on the task at hand is interrupted by the smell of freshly cooked meat. Her dragon instincts became dominant, mouth watering as she focused on the outlay of food. Needing to eat, yet having enough mind not to simply jump down and alarm the group with her sudden presence, she reaches out to a small branch and applies pressure, causing it to snap, attracting the attention of those below....
Once the flames has extinguished themselves and the heat had mostly risen away except for the charred remains of the rabbits, Chisille thought she saw one or two of them bound away from the conflict. 'No use going after those ones... We got enough food here to last a bit.' she thought to herself and took several steps forward towards the freshly sizzled meat.
Snap. The sound of a branch breaking on an overhead tree triggered Chisille's somewhat keen senses to danger again and she instinctively looked up, leaping over to where Betty was as well. She wasn't entirely sure why she did that though, but she didn't have the time to think about that. Her green eyes moved from branch to branch in the tree until suddenly she saw what must've caused it.
Something grey and yellow, with a similar green eye colour to hers. It was strange... with the grey scaled legs and body... that yellow underbelly, the wings and the snout it was almost like she was looking at another dragon. "Hold on... that... IS another dragon...!" she whispered to herself in disbelief. Her heart began to beat faster as excitement and nervousness flushed through her body, tingling all the way from the tip of her smooth nose, through her legs to her feet and down her spine to the end of her spike-tipped tail, so much so that she didn't connect the dots that she was looking at an exact copy of her. Such a thought just didn't occur within her overwhelmed mind.
Lyudmila doesn't wait long with wiping away the insect guts, and chuckles at Betty's failing attempts to cast spells in Latin.
"That's the risk behind using such an old language, Betty. Bad Translations can really mess up your day. Perhaps you should look into a more modern magic language?"
"You know, I was having that very same thought lately, Ly-Ly, and I've gotta tell ya, you might have a point! After all, that butterfly spell worked by speaking English, so I guess I can do things that way... I'm just not quite sure what I was thinking at that time to make it work. To be perfectly honest, it normally doesn't."
Once the flames has extinguished themselves and the heat had mostly risen away except for the charred remains of the rabbits, Chisille thought she saw one or two of them bound away from the conflict. 'No use going after those ones... We got enough food here to last a bit.' she thought to herself and took several steps forward towards the freshly sizzled meat.
Snap. The sound of a branch breaking on an overhead tree triggered Chisille's somewhat keen senses to danger again and she instinctively looked up, leaping over to where Betty was as well. She wasn't entirely sure why she did that though, but she didn't have the time to think about that. Her green eyes moved from branch to branch in the tree until suddenly she saw what must've caused it.
Something grey and yellow, with a similar green eye colour to hers. It was strange... with the grey scaled legs and body... that yellow underbelly, the wings and the snout it was almost like she was looking at another dragon. "Hold on... that... IS another dragon...!" she whispered to herself in disbelief. Her heart began to beat faster as excitement and nervousness flushed through her body, tingling all the way from the tip of her smooth nose, through her legs to her feet and down her spine to the end of her spike-tipped tail, so much so that she didn't connect the dots that she was looking at an exact copy of her. Such a thought just didn't occur within her overwhelmed mind.
Betty hears the snap as well, but seeing she ain't as paranoid about every little sound around her, she only realized something had happened when lil Chissy jumped on over by her side with a little fright.
"Hey their little sweetie, whats all that drama about?" Following Chissy's line of sight up into the branches of the tree, Betty sees the other dragon as well. "Oh my O my O my, color my overalls a bright shade nasty pink!" Betty shakes her head with amazement. "Well ain't that just another dragon if I've ever seen one! And by golly, wouldn't ya know it - That there dragon is the splitting image of you, Chissy - Who knew that all dragons looked exactly the same??"
Betty doesn't waste any time though. She called on up to that cute little dragon right away. "You get on down here now, you little dragon cutie - no sense in hiding up there in that big ol tree, now is there?" She points to the food on the ground. "As you can see, we have enough charred bunnies for everyone! So get on down here, silly, don't be shy! We ain't gonna a hurt ya none."
The Meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
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Renard stared at the meal sitting before them, dumbfounded. He'd just picked the first building he saw; was it just a coincidence? Was luck shining on them? ...No. This was Waise. Coincidences didn't happen in Waise.
Renard shook his head and recovered from his shock.
"H-Ha," he uttered, "told you guys it'd be jackpot. But, uhh... save me some. Gotta find the clown who lives here. Fireplace's still lit, after all."
At that point, however, her thoughts were not interested in pursuing the matter of the Order with Ei, she simply steered away from the topic by saying; “I like illusion. Do you like illusion? My mother was good at that.”
She smiled, using her finger to ask Ei to follow her into a nearby house neighboring the one that Renard entered. But she was already getting bored with the hot and cold spell Ei had inflicted upon Ariel. “You should remove that spell now.” She suggested, I want to see their natural reaction when they mistake decaying flesh with freshly cooked meat.”
Inside the house was a well decayed corpse of a man laying mangled upon a table near the unlit fireplace. She suggested that Ei start a fire while she climbed upon the table, knelt before the corpse and hovered her hands over it, repeating the words she had heard her mother speak so many times. Before long the rotting corpse was the irresistible false vision of a roasted pig, complete with a side dish of vegetables, all neatly arranged on a silver platter.
“Too much?” She asked Ei with a playful wink. “It won’t be long now… the sweet smell will draw them in – I just can’t wait to see how they react!” She jumps from the table and wraps her arms around Ei. “Imagine their faces when they realize they are eating a dead man.”
Maras giggles at Renard's failing attempts to whistle, but stops once he notices the food inside the house.
"Wow. That's a very fancy meal if I've ever seen one. I think it's best to not let it go to waste. What do you guys think?"
Maras doesn't really wait for a response and takes a seat at the table, looking at the food with a watering mouth.
Ariel hears the sound beside him and is pleasantly relieved when the spell of temperatures subside. He is also quickly taken by the smell of fresh roast coming from the house, which he follows into after Maras and Renard, wasting no time at all to sit down at the table to start noshing in. He didn't even bother to look around and see if anyone was actually home.
After swallowing down the first few mouthfuls, a sudden strange feeling came over him. Though his body remained at the table, he was actually paused in a moment of time, frozen still in the act of shoveling another helping of food in his mouth, while his consciousness went somewhere else (everything else around was also paused in that moment and therefore wouldn't have noticed). From his own point of view, the meal in front of him shifts out of focus, replaced by a bright purple light, but he was otherwise surrounded by a dark void.
As soon as he found himself there, Ariel knew what had happened.
The bright light spoke: "Hello, Ariel, do not be afraid. My name is -"
"Yeah - yeah," Ariel interrupts the grand holier-than-thou opening speech; "I know who you are, and please don't try and pronouncing your name, I sure as hell don't want to hear it again. But what are you actually calling yourself these days?"
"Well gosh, Ariel, why you wanna ruin my fun like that? You know how I like my introduction...." The purple lights sighs a long sigh, and continues; "In any case, I now go by the name Revel, as of... well, just a few hours ago. What do you think?"
"Meh." Ariel shrugs. "I've heard worse, I've heard better. So what do you want, you great old terrible God of mischief?"
"Well, you don't have to be sarcastic about it. Why you angels always so sardonic anyway?"
"Boredom?"
"Is that a question?"
"I guess?"
Revel Sighs again... "Well okay then. Anywho, I heard you've taken a nasty fall of late."
"Nice pun." Arial rolls his eyes. "But what's that to you?"
"Not much in the broad scheme of things, really, just thought I'd mention it...." Revel chuckles; "Has Ariel been a naughty boy?"
"Seriously? You've brought me here to mock me?"
"Well, not just mock you, of course, there's something else I want to say as well." Revel clears his throat. "For instance, I might just know a few things you don't know about this nasty little town...."
"Duh, of course you know what's going on, we were made by the same guy, remember? Only you were made a God, and I was made an angel, Angels aren't meant to know certain things." Ariel throws his arms up in the air dramatically; "We both know just how much more powerful you are than me. Whoopee! What's even the point of mentioning something we both already know?"
"I just wanted to rub it in. You know, a joke? Isn't that what you angels do, sit around on the clouds with your superiority complexes and make fun of people?"
"Pls..." Ariel laughs a little, knowing it was true in a not so literal sense.
"Hey now! that's the spirit!" Revel seems pleased that his humor was appreciated; "I'm really not such a bad guy when you get to know me - But you know what, seriously, that always struck me as kind of odd, wouldn't you say - How that dad of ours has so much power but really doesn't do anything about it - I mean, sure, he creates a lot stuff like Angels, Demons, other Gods and the like... But what, you may ask, do his creations end up doing every time? They run off and cause all sorts of trouble around the universe, that's what, it happens every time without fail. It does makes me wonder just what his grand plan really is...."
"Don't bother dwelling on it," Ariel tells him; "You're never gonna come up with answers. We angels stopped wondering what dads grand plan was a long time ago - So why don't you just cut to the chase already, Revel? I was actually enjoying a nice meal until you turned up. What, you're going to tell me what's going on around Waise, or something like that? And just what do I have to pay for that information, I sincerely wonder...."
"No-no-no-no-no!" Revel laughs; "Why would I want to ruin all the fun? No, you got me all wrong, I would never do something so boring. You see, I just thought maybe you and I could come to some sort of... wellllll... arrangement?"
"Oh no, that can't be good." Ariel lets out a long moan... "But ok, you've got me here now, so what's the plan?"
"O-Goodie! You're willing to hear me out - nice!" Revel pauses while the sound of a crowd cheering can be heard in the distance. The cheering grows quiet before he continues: "You see, it just so happens that I recently restored the life of a resident lady in town in the hope that she would provide me some much needed entertainment. But it hasn't quite turned out as I had planned. I was wrong about her, to be honest, she's no entertainment value at all. It's like watching an overrated movie without the benefits of popcorn. So here is what I have to offer you, young Ariel. I want you to forget all about that dad of ours, and serve me instead. That's right! I want you to do anything in your power to turn this town into the craziest party I've ever seen! Do all sorts of weird and nasty stuff, which oh, I know you can."
"Uhh...." Ariel isn't really surprised, since he was talking to the God of mischief, among other things. "...and just what do I get out of this, exactly? And also, just why the hell would I?"
"Because it's fun! And fun is what you get out of it! Look - two birds with one stone! Oh - but there is just one other thing I'm willing to offer to sweeten the deal."
"Which is?"
"If you agree to this..." Revel slows his tone for dramatic affect; "I might just step in and... uhhh... help you out every now and then. Stop you from getting killed or something boring like that. And hey, you never know, I might even be willing to say, ermmm, you know, give you a hand with that little girl problem you have? I mean really, there's nothing more embarrassing than to be outdone by a little girl with mother issues. Am I right or am I right?"
At that point, Revels proposal was sounding kinda attractive, at least to the point of Ariel willing to give it a shot. "Fine, you win, I'll agree to this, but first only as a trial basis. If I'm not happy with the way things are turning out after a few days, I'm calling it off. Agreed?"
"Absolutely!" Revel was delighted. "You never know, I might even throw a few cool powers your way once we're done with this town. And also, just to prove to you that I'm a God of my word, I will start by giving you a little heads-up right now!"
"Oh... and what might that be?"
"Mhmmmm," Revel laughs slyly, and tell's him; "You may want to take a second look at what you're eating right now. Those humans really do taste a lot like pork. Oh - and hey, sorry about letting you eat the first few mouthfuls before I cut in, but you have to admit, it is kind of funny. That girl sure does have a wild sense of humor. Anyway! Be seeing you around, and thanks for coming!"
With that said, Ariel's vision of Revel shifted, replaced once more by the view of his meal, which he now saw for what it really was: On his plate was well rotted, worm infested human foot.
Screaming out in horror, he shot from his chair, gagging and dry reaching at the foul taste of rotten human meat as he ran to the corner of the room and attempted to vomit it all back up. What he didn't realize, of course, is that Revel only broke the spell for him, Maras and Renard would have still been seeing the delicious pork roast on the table. So his sudden outburst would have only come across as nothing more than Ariel acting crazy for no reason.
As the debris is launched towards him, Jack leaps out of the way, breaking into a sprint- or as much of a sprint as he is capable of in the snow- towards where he left his crossbow, taking a curved path in an attempt to keep as much distance from the source of the thrown chunks of tower as possible as he closes in on his ranged weapon.
Boris stands a little confused about the events taking place, since he sees a lot things being thrown around, but cant spot a single cause of it. Still, he is very impressed at the speed Jack moves, chuckling admirably as he watches him.
With that said, Ariel's vision of Revel shifted, replaced once more by the view of his meal, which he now saw for what it really was: On his plate was well rotted, worm infested human foot.
Screaming out in horror, he shot from his chair, gagging and dry reaching at the foul taste of rotten human meat as he ran to the corner of the room and attempted to vomit it all back up. What he didn't realize, of course, is that Revel only broke the spell for him, Maras and Renard would have still been seeing the delicious pork roast on the table. So his sudden outburst would have only come across as nothing more than Ariel acting crazy for no reason.
"Oh, man," remarks Renard, "you're ruining the decor."
Renard glanced at the meal. "There's somethin' in that meat, isn't there? Poisoned, I bet. Whoever lives here is gonna get their face blasted full of lead..."
"Oh, man," remarks Renard, "you're ruining the decor."
Renard glanced at the meal. "There's somethin' in that meat, isn't there? Poisoned, I bet. Whoever lives here is gonna get their face blasted full of lead..."
"Oh hell - that's not even the half of it," Ariel gags between trying to catch his breath; "Just don't eat that food. I'm telling you now, that isn't any roast pig, it's a rotten human corpse. Seriously," He then beckons Maras just before projectile vomiting all over the wall. "Stop eating that!"
Arin's search through the clearing proves to be fruitless, both literally and figuratively. No edible berries on any of the bushes, no fruit on any of the trees, and no wild animals to hunt show up either. There seems to be nothing hidden under the snow either, making this clearing useless.
Perhaps searching further up ahead in the snow-covered lands will result in Arin finding something useful?
He runs as best as he can through the snow. Only leaving footprints behind him.
Prints in the snow prove a temporary decoy for Annie’s use. She leaves in her wake a twisted and variously repeated trail between buildings before coming to a wooden panel propped up on a barrel at one end, which she climbs to the apex of and leaps to a nearby rooftop. From there she uses chimney’s, having a great amount of fun gliding randomly from rooftop to rooftop, creating a maze of possible directions for her pursuer to consider. At long last, feeling a little warn out from the extraneous exercise, her misleading adventure comes to an end as she finds herself awkwardly gripping to the upper branches of a tree and peering down upon the activity taking place below.
From her perch she can see for quite some distance, however closer to her location is a gathering of peculiar interest; Chisille, Betty, Gwen and another lady she could feel great magical energy from, are conversing over the topic of a jar of food. She cocks her head in an effort to listen more closely to the words being said.
The rabbit incident unfolds as she observes and then, oddly enough, Annie’s ability to concentrate on the task at hand is interrupted by the smell of freshly cooked meat. Her dragon instincts became dominant, mouth watering as she focused on the outlay of food. Needing to eat, yet having enough mind not to simply jump down and alarm the group with her sudden presence, she reaches out to a small branch and applies pressure, causing it to snap, attracting the attention of those below....
"You know, I was having that very same thought lately, Ly-Ly, and I've gotta tell ya, you might have a point! After all, that butterfly spell worked by speaking English, so I guess I can do things that way... I'm just not quite sure what I was thinking at that time to make it work. To be perfectly honest, it normally doesn't."
Betty hears the snap as well, but seeing she ain't as paranoid about every little sound around her, she only realized something had happened when lil Chissy jumped on over by her side with a little fright.
"Hey their little sweetie, whats all that drama about?" Following Chissy's line of sight up into the branches of the tree, Betty sees the other dragon as well. "Oh my O my O my, color my overalls a bright shade nasty pink!" Betty shakes her head with amazement. "Well ain't that just another dragon if I've ever seen one! And by golly, wouldn't ya know it - That there dragon is the splitting image of you, Chissy - Who knew that all dragons looked exactly the same??"
Betty doesn't waste any time though. She called on up to that cute little dragon right away. "You get on down here now, you little dragon cutie - no sense in hiding up there in that big ol tree, now is there?" She points to the food on the ground. "As you can see, we have enough charred bunnies for everyone! So get on down here, silly, don't be shy! We ain't gonna a hurt ya none."
Gwen's head snaps around, turning slightly farther than one would think it should. Slowly, she turns around, narrowing her eyes up at the new dragon, her fingers twitching as though being restrained from strangling them then and there.
She takes a few steps backwards. "Don't come down!" she snaps at the new arrival. "She trusts you, but I don't!"
As the debris is launched towards him, Jack leaps out of the way, breaking into a sprint- or as much of a sprint as he is capable of in the snow- towards where he left his crossbow, taking a curved path in an attempt to keep as much distance from the source of the thrown chunks of tower as possible as he closes in on his ranged weapon.
Niamh guesses that she is out of the trajectory of the rubble. She just stands there a bit longer until it's all settled.
Once the flames has extinguished themselves and the heat had mostly risen away except for the charred remains of the rabbits, Chisille thought she saw one or two of them bound away from the conflict. 'No use going after those ones... We got enough food here to last a bit.' she thought to herself and took several steps forward towards the freshly sizzled meat.
Snap. The sound of a branch breaking on an overhead tree triggered Chisille's somewhat keen senses to danger again and she instinctively looked up, leaping over to where Betty was as well. She wasn't entirely sure why she did that though, but she didn't have the time to think about that. Her green eyes moved from branch to branch in the tree until suddenly she saw what must've caused it.
Something grey and yellow, with a similar green eye colour to hers. It was strange... with the grey scaled legs and body... that yellow underbelly, the wings and the snout it was almost like she was looking at another dragon. "Hold on... that... IS another dragon...!" she whispered to herself in disbelief. Her heart began to beat faster as excitement and nervousness flushed through her body, tingling all the way from the tip of her smooth nose, through her legs to her feet and down her spine to the end of her spike-tipped tail, so much so that she didn't connect the dots that she was looking at an exact copy of her. Such a thought just didn't occur within her overwhelmed mind.
"You know, I was having that very same thought lately, Ly-Ly, and I've gotta tell ya, you might have a point! After all, that butterfly spell worked by speaking English, so I guess I can do things that way... I'm just not quite sure what I was thinking at that time to make it work. To be perfectly honest, it normally doesn't."
Betty hears the snap as well, but seeing she ain't as paranoid about every little sound around her, she only realized something had happened when lil Chissy jumped on over by her side with a little fright.
"Hey their little sweetie, whats all that drama about?" Following Chissy's line of sight up into the branches of the tree, Betty sees the other dragon as well. "Oh my O my O my, color my overalls a bright shade nasty pink!" Betty shakes her head with amazement. "Well ain't that just another dragon if I've ever seen one! And by golly, wouldn't ya know it - That there dragon is the splitting image of you, Chissy - Who knew that all dragons looked exactly the same??"
Betty doesn't waste any time though. She called on up to that cute little dragon right away. "You get on down here now, you little dragon cutie - no sense in hiding up there in that big ol tree, now is there?" She points to the food on the ground. "As you can see, we have enough charred bunnies for everyone! So get on down here, silly, don't be shy! We ain't gonna a hurt ya none."
Gwen's head snaps around, turning slightly farther than one would think it should. Slowly, she turns around, narrowing her eyes up at the new dragon, her fingers twitching as though being restrained from strangling them then and there.
She takes a few steps backwards. "Don't come down!" she snaps at the new arrival. "She trusts you, but I don't!"
Annie's new found hunger is persistent, yet she is also somewhat annoyed by Gwen's lack of trust since, at the moment, there was no substantial reason for the lack of trust, however she understood there was no current reason to find trust in the new arrival either. Nevertheless, she needed to come out of that tree, partly to satisfy the insistent hunger, but mostly to establish ties with this group in order to fulfill her plans. The puzzlement of this dilemma was illustrated clearly on her dragon face, but only appearing as wanting acceptance from the group, showing hope in Betty beckoning, hunger for the food, yet troubled by the discrimination of Gwen.
Her need to participate won the battle as she slowly began her descent, keeping a keen focus on Gwen, and periodically distracted by the charred Rabbits on the ground. Coming to rest tentatively on the lowest branch of the tree, she saddens her eyes as she regard Betty, Chisille and even Lyudmila with the question of reassurance that she may be kept safe from the advances of Gwen.
"Oh, man," remarks Renard, "you're ruining the decor."
Renard glanced at the meal. "There's somethin' in that meat, isn't there? Poisoned, I bet. Whoever lives here is gonna get their face blasted full of lead..."
Ei takes notice of Annie's reluctance to talk about the subject, and decides to not ask further. Ei knew Annie probably doesn't like the subject, so trying to get her to talk about it would require a different approach.
Ei follows Annie and goes along with her plans. Causing a fire in the fireplace and removing the spell she cast on Ariel, though the way she does it is unique. Instead of casting another spell, Ei seems to grab something unseen next to Ariel, and seemingly rips it apart, the ripping sound being audible only to Ei, Annie and Ariel.
Ei smiles and giggles at Ei's words, and wraps her arms around Annie in return.
"That'll get that Half-Fallen Angel in a lot of trouble, wouldn't it? Maybe he won't even be let back in anymore!"
Ei giggles as she comments on Ariel's possible fate, but soon falls silent.
"There's a reason why I don't like Angels. It's their connection to the gods. I told you before I've had big problems before, and I wasn't lying. I said and did things long ago that angered various deities, and have suffered the consequences. Those who I cared for were torn away from me, never to be seen again, and I myself suffered from the wrath of the Gods, only to survive for reasons I cannot figure out. Perhaps they left me to suffer, perhaps they thought I died."
Ei sighs, and rests her head on Annie's shoulder.
"That's why I care about you. Just like how you said I'm your first friend, you're my first friend in a long time."
While listening to Ei, feeling seemed to slowly drain form Annie’s face, leaving her pallidly jaded. When Ei rested upon her shoulder, she moved her head systematically to place a kiss upon Ei's head before responding in a vapid tone, unfitting of a child.
“There, there….”
It was then that Ariel, Maras and Renard entered the house, yet Annie’s apathetic countenance changed very little, barely paying them the respect of even being noticed as she gently worked free from Ei’s embrace. Stepping back, her hand slid slowly down the contours of Ei’s arm to where their fingers became briefly entangled in a cumbersome effort to detach as Annie turned away.
“No one is invulnerable. One fools themselves in the belief that their existence is more valuable… more secure than others. In reality we are all nothing, we are feeble …insignificance is what we have in common.”
She takes seat upon a chair in the corner of the room, placing her hands on her lap in a genteel, refined manner to continue.
“You urge me to confide in you, but you do not know what you ask. To learn of the Order without being one with them, is to invite your own demise. The Order has remained hidden since before man drew his first breath, they take… honor in their obscurity. Their doctrine and principle stature relies on the foundation that they will not be sought. They will not be found. However… I now feel inclined to forsake my former restraint, but not because you ask me, but because I no longer care.
You see, Ei… What the Order does not know, is that each day my mother would inflict the teachings of the Order upon me. I would learn it, or I would be punished. So I learnt it. I was… a good student.”
She lifts her chin just a little, vaguely reassured of herself and brushes aside a dangled hair from her forehead, briefly acknowledges Maras and Ariel as they sit down to eat, and then proceeds to divulge the indoctrinated secrets of the Order:
“Before life, before…” She looks around in reference; “All of this, the universe was chaos, consisting of a single entity, be it both dark and light, both matter and incorporeal. Though the darkness was one with the light, the twain would never meet.... There came a moment, devoid of time, when this entity acknowledged its own existence, became aware of its consciousness, and looked upon that that it was. Alas, it was not pleased, nor did it take pleasure in the conflict of its structure. It therefor removed the darkness and pushed it asunder, keeping the light for itself. In that, it found pleasure, it found solace. It then spoke to the darkness, and said; “Go, do what you do, for I am that I am.”
And so the darkness went forth seeking that which it could not find, until the light brought forth the foundations of creation. In its hunger, the darkness coveted the creation that the light had made, yet it caused only damage, pain, for it knew nothing more. Nevertheless, the light had mercy upon the darkness and decided henceforth that darkness, by no knowledge of its own, would serve as the necessary evil to birth a new balance in a universe that would have otherwise been without discord, without lesson, without growth, without difference….
Soon, there was born a small people, powerful beings who referred to the light as the great Master, the spawn of all things – and yet they despised the knowledge of what the Master had done. They saw the original creation of peace and harmony as the creation that should have been, not the one that it became through the interference of darkness. They could, however, not punish the darkness for its actions, for it was ignorant and knew nothing but its own nature. In short, the Master’s acceptance of darkness in establishing dissonance within creation, was seen as no more than the Master refusing responsibility for the suffering that the darkness inflicted upon life.
Henceforth, this small group of beings, who came to inaugurate themselves as the Order, knew they would never kill the Master, for one cannot kill that that cannot be killed, but they made it there ambition – nay, their sole purpose of existence, to inflict misery upon all those born of the light – not for the sake of malice, rather in the hope that one day their infliction's would bring the Master forth to repentance. They want nothing but to have the Master acknowledge and accept responsibility for the crimes against his own creation.”
Annie pauses to observe Ariel as he gets from the table and starts vomiting, but then continues to ignore him, taking her jaded look back to Ei to complete her story in an undying lack of emotion.
I am the direct bloodline, spawn of the Order. In me is the inherited gift of countless generation, fashioned and evolved over eras. Don’t make the mistake of seeing me as the only one, the end strain of the bloodline, for there are many branches to the Orders tree. I am merely the end of one branch – you see, they now know I have forsaken them. That they will not, can not, tolerate that, for the safe continuation of the Order pends greatly on the secrecy of their existence. They are scared of me, because as I age my strengths will mature… that is life, and this knowledge unfortunately leaves the Order with a small window of opportunity to kill me before doing so becomes too difficult a task – But I don’t damn well care about their beliefs!” Her voice suddenly raised, born of bitter emotions. “I don’t care for their objectives! I care for nothing! My life has been nothing but sorrow for the aid of their filthy doctrine! They destroyed the life of my mother and in turn she destroyed mine!!”
Tears now flowed in a river down Annie’s face, her lips trembling with rage as her pupil’s sparked blue with fire.
“But you know what the sad thing is, Ei? Do you know what I realized on the day I watched my mother die?” She yells, rises from her chair with her little hands clenched in fists of rage – “It was all for nothing! Because nothing matters! Truth belongs only in the heart of the believer! So there is no truth! There is no lie! There is nothing but the insignificant claims of the petty and pathetic lives of all of them – everyone – floating around on the same aimless breeze! I hate them all! I never wanted this life - I never asked for this life! I will have no part of it! - NO!”
Annie’s final word claps like thunder for even Maras, Renard and Ariel to hear as the roast pork feast reveals itself to everyone as a rotten corps, the walls of the house shutter and the timber floor is carpeted in blue flames, burning the feet of everyone inside.
Meanwhile, the group that had followed Vernon, accumulate on the shore of the island and he knocks on the door of the house, at last.
With the sudden unexpected impact, Chisille's nose gets uncomfortably squished, causing her to accidentally drop the jar to the ground and quickly back off a few meters in case of danger. She relaxed slightly as she realized what she had hit was Lyudmila, but the relaxation stopped when she saw she caused the witch to fall over from the impact. 'Whoops. I'm going to have to be more careful... She probably hates me now.' she thinks.
This was not the case though. Lyudmila was the one to apologize to her instead! Chisille doesn't say anything, since she didn't really know how to react in a situation that was her own fault, yet the others involved were the ones to say sorry to her. She just didn't understand it.
Her eyes fell to the jar slowly freezing in the snow. "Yes... I found that. Not sure what it is. Better then all other stuff, so I took it." she replies as she walks back towards it.
Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
Meet Ashen the shoulder dragon!
((I sure do hope you make it into town soon :3 ))
Ei listens to Annie carefully, hoping to pick up anything that would hint at who 'they' are, but Annie seems to be choosing her words very carefully. Ei can appreciate Annie caring for her, but doesn't entirely agree with her.
"Annie, you can tell me everything. Don't worry about making things worse for me, I've had enough big problems that more big problems are nothing I can't handle. I can handle getting hurt, but I can't handle seeing you get hurt. I've seen people close to me perish before, and I don't want it happening again."
Ei sighs, and shakes her head, before smiling at Annie.
"But you're right. Let's first have some fun with Ariel. And when they show up, I'm confident that, if we work together, they won't be a threat. So please, let me help you."
"And if there's anything you need or want, just ask me. Maybe I can arrange it for you. Be it information, powers or items."
Arin's search through the clearing proves to be fruitless, both literally and figuratively. No edible berries on any of the bushes, no fruit on any of the trees, and no wild animals to hunt show up either. There seems to be nothing hidden under the snow either, making this clearing useless.
Perhaps searching further up ahead in the snow-covered lands will result in Arin finding something useful?
"Ah, can you open it, or do you want me to open it for you so we can see what's in it?" Lyudmila asks, smiling while she does so and wiping bits of snow off of her face so she doesn't look as silly.
"No. Can't open the jar. Lid too tight..." Chisille sighs and goes to sit down, once more getting too cold from the snow and having to abort it. This lack of comfort, along with the jar refusing to open and bumping her nose agitates her more and more. She's now visibly irritated by all of this, though it would be hard to tell unless the others can recognize it well.
She gently moves the jar a bit closer to Lyudmila with her paw so she can grab it. Since the lid has been in her mouth, it's all covered with dragon spit that's going to make it harder to open. It might also not be the most pleasant substance to touch either, but the main thing is it's slippery.
While someone opens the jar, Chisille inhales deeply and blasts a bit of fire at the ground, melting the snow so she finally has a spot that won't freeze her feet. She sits down on that spot, gently nipping an itchy bit on her scales while she waits.
Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
Meet Ashen the shoulder dragon!
"Well, if you're as hungry as you say, then I think we can stop dilly-dallying and start looking," says Renard, eyes scanning the area around them. Renard brings his hand to his chin, rubbing it to look like he is thinking. Not particularly bothered to search very thoroughly, he immediately points at the nearest house that doesn't seem to be obviously looted at first glance.
"After deliberating over our choices and making several calculations, that's definitely the jackpot."
Renard begins trudging through the snow to his chosen location while a continuous shrill sound comes out of his mouth, becoming apparent that it is just a sad attempt at a whistle.
OOC: Sorry for not being around a lot! Enough said! Back to business.
OC: Betty is pleasantly surprised that the others don't really mind the massive cloud of butterflies. She follows Gwen, Lyudmila and her cute little Chissy in search for lunch, and finds the slobbery jar very funny.
"Here, allow me the honors!" Betty tells Lyudmila. "I know a fun trick my dad taught me for opening items!"
Smiling happy to please, Betty babbles off a few words in Latin and points at the jar. The jar suddenly starts shaking in Lyudmila hands then flips a few times as the glass flex's and bulges unnaturally. It then sits still, right before the lid pops off and flies high in the air, so high in fact that it disappears spinning wildly into the sky while the contents of the jar erupts like a volcano and splatters beetle guts all over Lyudmila's face.
"Oh gosh O my O heck on a perfectly fine Monday morning!" Betty says; "I'm so sorry about that.... I guess I need to brush up on that particular spell." She looks around for other food options. "But maybe there's something else we can eat - wait! I have an idea!" She looks at Chissy; "You like rabbits, right?" And before even getting an answer from the dragon, Betty rattles off a whole bunch of other words causing twenty brown bunnies to appear. Unfortunately all the bunnies are dressed in golden helmets and armed with tiny silver swords... and Betty has no idea why. She just shakes her head, hands on hips, wondering how all of her spells could go so wrong.
"Well... I guess lunch is going to be a battle."
"So, guys, should I prepare a fire for the roast?"
As the jar of stuff violently explodes from Betty's spell all over Lyudmila, Chisille is a little disappointed that the contents of the jar wasn't very edible. In fact, it smelt revolting. As if it were the pickled insides of some insect or something. She wanted to cover her nose, but she didn't really have time, since Betty was talking to her.
Rabbits. She definitely did like to eat rabbit. They ran quite fast on their little hippity hoppity legs, but with her wings giving her a boost during her run she was sometimes able to catch up to them and take them as her lunch. They had many little bones everywhere and not much meat, but it was still a fine meal compared to some of the other things.
"Yes I..." she began to say, but was interrupted by the sudden appearance of 20 little rabbits, each armed with a weapon and helmet for protection. They would've looked cute in their little getup if it weren't for the fact they were about to become her meal. She didn't care that they were armed, since the swords would be able to do nothing but melt.
She breathed in deeper then the moment before as her flames gathered up within her. If the others looked closely, they could see a small amount of orange light forming at the back of her throat, a sign of what she was about to do to the squadron of bunnies. Her body straightened as she let forth a jet of flames. Turning her head left and right she sweeped the field to catch every rabbit in her inferno, purposely avoiding getting the spots where the others in the group were.
The flames only lasted a few seconds, and when she was finished she huffed from the effort. "Did I get them all?" she asked.
Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
Meet Ashen the shoulder dragon!
Silas, though Annie remains unseen, feels her hand slip into his as he walks along.
“Do you like the touch of my hand? Is my skin nice to you?” She asks. “It sure is nice to have a partner… isn’t it?”
Annie is disturbed by Ei’s kindness. It was troubling, somehow. All she knew of life was horror and violence, bestowed upon her by a dark serving mother under the influence of the Order. She had never been allowed fiends. Her childhood was stricken to the confines of her mother’s house, wherein the only social interaction consisted of her mother’s visitors, most of whom would forevermore be cursed, others tortured and killed as sacrifices to the Order before ever getting the opportunity to leave the house. At times, certain male visitors, the ones her mother favored for… more pleasurable purposes, would abuse Annie in secret. At one point, Annie had mentioned this discrepancy to her mother, who blatantly called her a liar in response and tied her a bed for three day without food or water. Annie never again spoke out against any of her mother’s favorites. Alas… Annie had rarely glimpsed the kindness she received from Ei, such a thing conflicted with fundamental nature of who she was born to be. It tore at her heart, argued with her mind and yet, although her instincts told her to forsake Ei – to kill that lying wretch - she just couldn’t help but give into the kindness. It was… a novelty to her… A curious notion that was opening up a whole new range of stimulating emotions that made it close to impossible not to take every opportunity to touch her… taste her… explore every sensation these alien feelings had to offer.
At that point, however, her thoughts were not interested in pursuing the matter of the Order with Ei, she simply steered away from the topic by saying; “I like illusion. Do you like illusion? My mother was good at that.”
She smiled, using her finger to ask Ei to follow her into a nearby house neighboring the one that Renard entered. But she was already getting bored with the hot and cold spell Ei had inflicted upon Ariel. “You should remove that spell now.” She suggested, I want to see their natural reaction when they mistake decaying flesh with freshly cooked meat.”
Inside the house was a well decayed corpse of a man laying mangled upon a table near the unlit fireplace. She suggested that Ei start a fire while she climbed upon the table, knelt before the corpse and hovered her hands over it, repeating the words she had heard her mother speak so many times. Before long the rotting corpse was the irresistible false vision of a roasted pig, complete with a side dish of vegetables, all neatly arranged on a silver platter.
“Too much?” She asked Ei with a playful wink. “It won’t be long now… the sweet smell will draw them in – I just can’t wait to see how they react!” She jumps from the table and wraps her arms around Ei. “Imagine their faces when they realize they are eating a dead man.”
Prints in the snow prove a temporary decoy for Annie’s use. She leaves in her wake a twisted and variously repeated trail between buildings before coming to a wooden panel propped up on a barrel at one end, which she climbs to the apex of and leaps to a nearby rooftop. From there she uses chimney’s, having a great amount of fun gliding randomly from rooftop to rooftop, creating a maze of possible directions for her pursuer to consider. At long last, feeling a little warn out from the extraneous exercise, her misleading adventure comes to an end as she finds herself awkwardly gripping to the upper branches of a tree and peering down upon the activity taking place below.
From her perch she can see for quite some distance, however closer to her location is a gathering of peculiar interest; Chisille, Betty, Gwen and another lady she could feel great magical energy from, are conversing over the topic of a jar of food. She cocks her head in an effort to listen more closely to the words being said.
The rabbit incident unfolds as she observes and then, oddly enough, Annie’s ability to concentrate on the task at hand is interrupted by the smell of freshly cooked meat. Her dragon instincts became dominant, mouth watering as she focused on the outlay of food. Needing to eat, yet having enough mind not to simply jump down and alarm the group with her sudden presence, she reaches out to a small branch and applies pressure, causing it to snap, attracting the attention of those below....
.............................................................................
Maras giggles at Renard's failing attempts to whistle, but stops once he notices the food inside the house.
"Wow. That's a very fancy meal if I've ever seen one. I think it's best to not let it go to waste. What do you guys think?"
Maras doesn't really wait for a response and takes a seat at the table, looking at the food with a watering mouth.
Lyudmila doesn't wait long with wiping away the insect guts, and chuckles at Betty's failing attempts to cast spells in Latin.
"That's the risk behind using such an old language, Betty. Bad Translations can really mess up your day. Perhaps you should look into a more modern magic language?"
Ei takes notice of Annie's reluctance to talk about the subject, and decides to not ask further. Ei knew Annie probably doesn't like the subject, so trying to get her to talk about it would require a different approach.
Ei follows Annie and goes along with her plans. Causing a fire in the fireplace and removing the spell she cast on Ariel, though the way she does it is unique. Instead of casting another spell, Ei seems to grab something unseen next to Ariel, and seemingly rips it apart, the ripping sound being audible only to Ei, Annie and Ariel.
Ei smiles and giggles at Ei's words, and wraps her arms around Annie in return.
"That'll get that Half-Fallen Angel in a lot of trouble, wouldn't it? Maybe he won't even be let back in anymore!"
Ei giggles as she comments on Ariel's possible fate, but soon falls silent.
"There's a reason why I don't like Angels. It's their connection to the gods. I told you before I've had big problems before, and I wasn't lying. I said and did things long ago that angered various deities, and have suffered the consequences. Those who I cared for were torn away from me, never to be seen again, and I myself suffered from the wrath of the Gods, only to survive for reasons I cannot figure out. Perhaps they left me to suffer, perhaps they thought I died."
Ei sighs, and rests her head on Annie's shoulder.
"That's why I care about you. Just like how you said I'm your first friend, you're my first friend in a long time."
As the debris is launched towards him, Jack leaps out of the way, breaking into a sprint- or as much of a sprint as he is capable of in the snow- towards where he left his crossbow, taking a curved path in an attempt to keep as much distance from the source of the thrown chunks of tower as possible as he closes in on his ranged weapon.
Once the flames has extinguished themselves and the heat had mostly risen away except for the charred remains of the rabbits, Chisille thought she saw one or two of them bound away from the conflict. 'No use going after those ones... We got enough food here to last a bit.' she thought to herself and took several steps forward towards the freshly sizzled meat.
Snap. The sound of a branch breaking on an overhead tree triggered Chisille's somewhat keen senses to danger again and she instinctively looked up, leaping over to where Betty was as well. She wasn't entirely sure why she did that though, but she didn't have the time to think about that. Her green eyes moved from branch to branch in the tree until suddenly she saw what must've caused it.
Something grey and yellow, with a similar green eye colour to hers. It was strange... with the grey scaled legs and body... that yellow underbelly, the wings and the snout it was almost like she was looking at another dragon. "Hold on... that... IS another dragon...!" she whispered to herself in disbelief. Her heart began to beat faster as excitement and nervousness flushed through her body, tingling all the way from the tip of her smooth nose, through her legs to her feet and down her spine to the end of her spike-tipped tail, so much so that she didn't connect the dots that she was looking at an exact copy of her. Such a thought just didn't occur within her overwhelmed mind.
Current Avatar: Matt the Pirate Knight (Bullet Heaven 2)
Meet Ashen the shoulder dragon!
"You know, I was having that very same thought lately, Ly-Ly, and I've gotta tell ya, you might have a point! After all, that butterfly spell worked by speaking English, so I guess I can do things that way... I'm just not quite sure what I was thinking at that time to make it work. To be perfectly honest, it normally doesn't."
Betty hears the snap as well, but seeing she ain't as paranoid about every little sound around her, she only realized something had happened when lil Chissy jumped on over by her side with a little fright.
"Hey their little sweetie, whats all that drama about?" Following Chissy's line of sight up into the branches of the tree, Betty sees the other dragon as well. "Oh my O my O my, color my overalls a bright shade nasty pink!" Betty shakes her head with amazement. "Well ain't that just another dragon if I've ever seen one! And by golly, wouldn't ya know it - That there dragon is the splitting image of you, Chissy - Who knew that all dragons looked exactly the same??"
Betty doesn't waste any time though. She called on up to that cute little dragon right away. "You get on down here now, you little dragon cutie - no sense in hiding up there in that big ol tree, now is there?" She points to the food on the ground. "As you can see, we have enough charred bunnies for everyone! So get on down here, silly, don't be shy! We ain't gonna a hurt ya none."
Renard stared at the meal sitting before them, dumbfounded. He'd just picked the first building he saw; was it just a coincidence? Was luck shining on them? ...No. This was Waise. Coincidences didn't happen in Waise.
Renard shook his head and recovered from his shock.
"H-Ha," he uttered, "told you guys it'd be jackpot. But, uhh... save me some. Gotta find the clown who lives here. Fireplace's still lit, after all."
Ariel hears the sound beside him and is pleasantly relieved when the spell of temperatures subside. He is also quickly taken by the smell of fresh roast coming from the house, which he follows into after Maras and Renard, wasting no time at all to sit down at the table to start noshing in. He didn't even bother to look around and see if anyone was actually home.
After swallowing down the first few mouthfuls, a sudden strange feeling came over him. Though his body remained at the table, he was actually paused in a moment of time, frozen still in the act of shoveling another helping of food in his mouth, while his consciousness went somewhere else (everything else around was also paused in that moment and therefore wouldn't have noticed). From his own point of view, the meal in front of him shifts out of focus, replaced by a bright purple light, but he was otherwise surrounded by a dark void.
As soon as he found himself there, Ariel knew what had happened.
The bright light spoke: "Hello, Ariel, do not be afraid. My name is -"
"Yeah - yeah," Ariel interrupts the grand holier-than-thou opening speech; "I know who you are, and please don't try and pronouncing your name, I sure as hell don't want to hear it again. But what are you actually calling yourself these days?"
"Well gosh, Ariel, why you wanna ruin my fun like that? You know how I like my introduction...." The purple lights sighs a long sigh, and continues; "In any case, I now go by the name Revel, as of... well, just a few hours ago. What do you think?"
"Meh." Ariel shrugs. "I've heard worse, I've heard better. So what do you want, you great old terrible God of mischief?"
"Well, you don't have to be sarcastic about it. Why you angels always so sardonic anyway?"
"Boredom?"
"Is that a question?"
"I guess?"
Revel Sighs again... "Well okay then. Anywho, I heard you've taken a nasty fall of late."
"Nice pun." Arial rolls his eyes. "But what's that to you?"
"Not much in the broad scheme of things, really, just thought I'd mention it...." Revel chuckles; "Has Ariel been a naughty boy?"
"Seriously? You've brought me here to mock me?"
"Well, not just mock you, of course, there's something else I want to say as well." Revel clears his throat. "For instance, I might just know a few things you don't know about this nasty little town...."
"Duh, of course you know what's going on, we were made by the same guy, remember? Only you were made a God, and I was made an angel, Angels aren't meant to know certain things." Ariel throws his arms up in the air dramatically; "We both know just how much more powerful you are than me. Whoopee! What's even the point of mentioning something we both already know?"
"I just wanted to rub it in. You know, a joke? Isn't that what you angels do, sit around on the clouds with your superiority complexes and make fun of people?"
"Pls..." Ariel laughs a little, knowing it was true in a not so literal sense.
"Hey now! that's the spirit!" Revel seems pleased that his humor was appreciated; "I'm really not such a bad guy when you get to know me - But you know what, seriously, that always struck me as kind of odd, wouldn't you say - How that dad of ours has so much power but really doesn't do anything about it - I mean, sure, he creates a lot stuff like Angels, Demons, other Gods and the like... But what, you may ask, do his creations end up doing every time? They run off and cause all sorts of trouble around the universe, that's what, it happens every time without fail. It does makes me wonder just what his grand plan really is...."
"Don't bother dwelling on it," Ariel tells him; "You're never gonna come up with answers. We angels stopped wondering what dads grand plan was a long time ago - So why don't you just cut to the chase already, Revel? I was actually enjoying a nice meal until you turned up. What, you're going to tell me what's going on around Waise, or something like that? And just what do I have to pay for that information, I sincerely wonder...."
"No-no-no-no-no!" Revel laughs; "Why would I want to ruin all the fun? No, you got me all wrong, I would never do something so boring. You see, I just thought maybe you and I could come to some sort of... wellllll... arrangement?"
"Oh no, that can't be good." Ariel lets out a long moan... "But ok, you've got me here now, so what's the plan?"
"O-Goodie! You're willing to hear me out - nice!" Revel pauses while the sound of a crowd cheering can be heard in the distance. The cheering grows quiet before he continues: "You see, it just so happens that I recently restored the life of a resident lady in town in the hope that she would provide me some much needed entertainment. But it hasn't quite turned out as I had planned. I was wrong about her, to be honest, she's no entertainment value at all. It's like watching an overrated movie without the benefits of popcorn. So here is what I have to offer you, young Ariel. I want you to forget all about that dad of ours, and serve me instead. That's right! I want you to do anything in your power to turn this town into the craziest party I've ever seen! Do all sorts of weird and nasty stuff, which oh, I know you can."
"Uhh...." Ariel isn't really surprised, since he was talking to the God of mischief, among other things. "...and just what do I get out of this, exactly? And also, just why the hell would I?"
"Because it's fun! And fun is what you get out of it! Look - two birds with one stone! Oh - but there is just one other thing I'm willing to offer to sweeten the deal."
"Which is?"
"If you agree to this..." Revel slows his tone for dramatic affect; "I might just step in and... uhhh... help you out every now and then. Stop you from getting killed or something boring like that. And hey, you never know, I might even be willing to say, ermmm, you know, give you a hand with that little girl problem you have? I mean really, there's nothing more embarrassing than to be outdone by a little girl with mother issues. Am I right or am I right?"
At that point, Revels proposal was sounding kinda attractive, at least to the point of Ariel willing to give it a shot. "Fine, you win, I'll agree to this, but first only as a trial basis. If I'm not happy with the way things are turning out after a few days, I'm calling it off. Agreed?"
"Absolutely!" Revel was delighted. "You never know, I might even throw a few cool powers your way once we're done with this town. And also, just to prove to you that I'm a God of my word, I will start by giving you a little heads-up right now!"
"Oh... and what might that be?"
"Mhmmmm," Revel laughs slyly, and tell's him; "You may want to take a second look at what you're eating right now. Those humans really do taste a lot like pork. Oh - and hey, sorry about letting you eat the first few mouthfuls before I cut in, but you have to admit, it is kind of funny. That girl sure does have a wild sense of humor. Anyway! Be seeing you around, and thanks for coming!"
With that said, Ariel's vision of Revel shifted, replaced once more by the view of his meal, which he now saw for what it really was: On his plate was well rotted, worm infested human foot.
Screaming out in horror, he shot from his chair, gagging and dry reaching at the foul taste of rotten human meat as he ran to the corner of the room and attempted to vomit it all back up. What he didn't realize, of course, is that Revel only broke the spell for him, Maras and Renard would have still been seeing the delicious pork roast on the table. So his sudden outburst would have only come across as nothing more than Ariel acting crazy for no reason.
Boris stands a little confused about the events taking place, since he sees a lot things being thrown around, but cant spot a single cause of it. Still, he is very impressed at the speed Jack moves, chuckling admirably as he watches him.
"Oh, man," remarks Renard, "you're ruining the decor."
Renard glanced at the meal. "There's somethin' in that meat, isn't there? Poisoned, I bet. Whoever lives here is gonna get their face blasted full of lead..."
"Oh hell - that's not even the half of it," Ariel gags between trying to catch his breath; "Just don't eat that food. I'm telling you now, that isn't any roast pig, it's a rotten human corpse. Seriously," He then beckons Maras just before projectile vomiting all over the wall. "Stop eating that!"
He runs as best as he can through the snow. Only leaving footprints behind him.
Gwen's head snaps around, turning slightly farther than one would think it should. Slowly, she turns around, narrowing her eyes up at the new dragon, her fingers twitching as though being restrained from strangling them then and there.
She takes a few steps backwards. "Don't come down!" she snaps at the new arrival. "She trusts you, but I don't!"
Niamh guesses that she is out of the trajectory of the rubble. She just stands there a bit longer until it's all settled.
- C.C.
Annie's new found hunger is persistent, yet she is also somewhat annoyed by Gwen's lack of trust since, at the moment, there was no substantial reason for the lack of trust, however she understood there was no current reason to find trust in the new arrival either. Nevertheless, she needed to come out of that tree, partly to satisfy the insistent hunger, but mostly to establish ties with this group in order to fulfill her plans. The puzzlement of this dilemma was illustrated clearly on her dragon face, but only appearing as wanting acceptance from the group, showing hope in Betty beckoning, hunger for the food, yet troubled by the discrimination of Gwen.
Her need to participate won the battle as she slowly began her descent, keeping a keen focus on Gwen, and periodically distracted by the charred Rabbits on the ground. Coming to rest tentatively on the lowest branch of the tree, she saddens her eyes as she regard Betty, Chisille and even Lyudmila with the question of reassurance that she may be kept safe from the advances of Gwen.
"Hungry..."
While listening to Ei, feeling seemed to slowly drain form Annie’s face, leaving her pallidly jaded. When Ei rested upon her shoulder, she moved her head systematically to place a kiss upon Ei's head before responding in a vapid tone, unfitting of a child.
“There, there….”
It was then that Ariel, Maras and Renard entered the house, yet Annie’s apathetic countenance changed very little, barely paying them the respect of even being noticed as she gently worked free from Ei’s embrace. Stepping back, her hand slid slowly down the contours of Ei’s arm to where their fingers became briefly entangled in a cumbersome effort to detach as Annie turned away.
“No one is invulnerable. One fools themselves in the belief that their existence is more valuable… more secure than others. In reality we are all nothing, we are feeble …insignificance is what we have in common.”
She takes seat upon a chair in the corner of the room, placing her hands on her lap in a genteel, refined manner to continue.
“You urge me to confide in you, but you do not know what you ask. To learn of the Order without being one with them, is to invite your own demise. The Order has remained hidden since before man drew his first breath, they take… honor in their obscurity. Their doctrine and principle stature relies on the foundation that they will not be sought. They will not be found. However… I now feel inclined to forsake my former restraint, but not because you ask me, but because I no longer care.
You see, Ei… What the Order does not know, is that each day my mother would inflict the teachings of the Order upon me. I would learn it, or I would be punished. So I learnt it. I was… a good student.”
She lifts her chin just a little, vaguely reassured of herself and brushes aside a dangled hair from her forehead, briefly acknowledges Maras and Ariel as they sit down to eat, and then proceeds to divulge the indoctrinated secrets of the Order:
“Before life, before…” She looks around in reference; “All of this, the universe was chaos, consisting of a single entity, be it both dark and light, both matter and incorporeal. Though the darkness was one with the light, the twain would never meet.... There came a moment, devoid of time, when this entity acknowledged its own existence, became aware of its consciousness, and looked upon that that it was. Alas, it was not pleased, nor did it take pleasure in the conflict of its structure. It therefor removed the darkness and pushed it asunder, keeping the light for itself. In that, it found pleasure, it found solace. It then spoke to the darkness, and said; “Go, do what you do, for I am that I am.”
And so the darkness went forth seeking that which it could not find, until the light brought forth the foundations of creation. In its hunger, the darkness coveted the creation that the light had made, yet it caused only damage, pain, for it knew nothing more. Nevertheless, the light had mercy upon the darkness and decided henceforth that darkness, by no knowledge of its own, would serve as the necessary evil to birth a new balance in a universe that would have otherwise been without discord, without lesson, without growth, without difference….
Soon, there was born a small people, powerful beings who referred to the light as the great Master, the spawn of all things – and yet they despised the knowledge of what the Master had done. They saw the original creation of peace and harmony as the creation that should have been, not the one that it became through the interference of darkness. They could, however, not punish the darkness for its actions, for it was ignorant and knew nothing but its own nature. In short, the Master’s acceptance of darkness in establishing dissonance within creation, was seen as no more than the Master refusing responsibility for the suffering that the darkness inflicted upon life.
Henceforth, this small group of beings, who came to inaugurate themselves as the Order, knew they would never kill the Master, for one cannot kill that that cannot be killed, but they made it there ambition – nay, their sole purpose of existence, to inflict misery upon all those born of the light – not for the sake of malice, rather in the hope that one day their infliction's would bring the Master forth to repentance. They want nothing but to have the Master acknowledge and accept responsibility for the crimes against his own creation.”
Annie pauses to observe Ariel as he gets from the table and starts vomiting, but then continues to ignore him, taking her jaded look back to Ei to complete her story in an undying lack of emotion.
I am the direct bloodline, spawn of the Order. In me is the inherited gift of countless generation, fashioned and evolved over eras. Don’t make the mistake of seeing me as the only one, the end strain of the bloodline, for there are many branches to the Orders tree. I am merely the end of one branch – you see, they now know I have forsaken them. That they will not, can not, tolerate that, for the safe continuation of the Order pends greatly on the secrecy of their existence. They are scared of me, because as I age my strengths will mature… that is life, and this knowledge unfortunately leaves the Order with a small window of opportunity to kill me before doing so becomes too difficult a task – But I don’t damn well care about their beliefs!” Her voice suddenly raised, born of bitter emotions. “I don’t care for their objectives! I care for nothing! My life has been nothing but sorrow for the aid of their filthy doctrine! They destroyed the life of my mother and in turn she destroyed mine!!”
Tears now flowed in a river down Annie’s face, her lips trembling with rage as her pupil’s sparked blue with fire.
“But you know what the sad thing is, Ei? Do you know what I realized on the day I watched my mother die?” She yells, rises from her chair with her little hands clenched in fists of rage – “It was all for nothing! Because nothing matters! Truth belongs only in the heart of the believer! So there is no truth! There is no lie! There is nothing but the insignificant claims of the petty and pathetic lives of all of them – everyone – floating around on the same aimless breeze! I hate them all! I never wanted this life - I never asked for this life! I will have no part of it! - NO!”
Annie’s final word claps like thunder for even Maras, Renard and Ariel to hear as the roast pork feast reveals itself to everyone as a rotten corps, the walls of the house shutter and the timber floor is carpeted in blue flames, burning the feet of everyone inside.
Meanwhile, the group that had followed Vernon, accumulate on the shore of the island and he knocks on the door of the house, at last.
.............................................................................