GAME: June spends 2 Glamour
With Summer having withdrawn the night previous to come back in better order, their return is-- it must be said --much more orderly. In theory. In practice, the group arrives looking something like they're casting the demons out of Jenny through the laying on of hands, spurting unceremoniously from the bark of one of the gnarled trees in the marshland surrounding the focus of the evening's mission.
The landscape here is water logged. They are decidedly off the trod, in the middle of thorn rich swampland. For all that the thorns above the water are a constant struggle, the ones under the water are far worse. Unable to really tell where one is about to step, the thorns take a heavy toll on bare feet and unarmored legs. The armored themselves suffer from the weight of it all. Those unable to walk above the water, bog down into it. Every armored step is a struggle. Falling over could be a threat to life, as the mud and mire swallows such an unfortunate up.
Not far from the arrival point, a mound of dry land rises like the back of a tortoise shell from a ring of clearer, deeper water. That ring of water itself is bridged by a cascading series of downed trees, seemingly purposefully laid down into the water to form a precarious bridge to the island at the lake's middle. And on the island itself, a ruin of an old round keep. The walls crumbled and tumbled inward, overgrown with briars and thorns. It looks something like a squat, malevolent mushroom rising from the marshlands surrounding them.
Unceremonious? Heaven forbid. Vorpal might be Wizened, but his magical tendencies lean distinctly Fairest, and while he might have to skitterstep to catch his footing on the surface of the water, the rather vain side effects of one of his contracts helps him do so gracefully, more like hopskotch than trip-rocks. He swirls to a stop on the surface of the water like a wire-fu warrior, the surface dimpled beneath his feet just so. He adjusts the satchel he's got over one shoulder and looks around, doing his best to spot any immediate danger while the others catch their feet as best they can.
Invisible, but resting on the surface of the water with Separation, Teagan walks out to the edge of the lake itself. A boat appears! No, literally, a boat appears out of nowhere, because Teagan is - as always - Light-Shy. Vorpal will recognize the boat as the one he bought for Teagan earlier today -- a sturdy vehicle, not that fancy, but capable of carrying the whole group. "Don't get in the water," they inform the group. "If you can't Separate or fly, get in the boat; there are piranha here. Whatever we're here to hunt has made a big pile of broken weapons out there at the angry penis-head in the water." Oh Teagan. Well. It looks like a mushroom!
June tumbles out ungracefuly into the water with a lot splashing and spluttering as the very short, very heavily armored, and very clumsy red panda girl immediately gains like 15 pounds from her fur soaking the water up. She looks like she's miserable, and also trying her best not to look miserable. But really, a shield as big as you are and scale armor made of metallic blue flower petals aren't really swampwear. She does her best getting over to where the boat is, too determine to keep her head above water to worry about talking.
Graceful, thy name is not Malachi. The tall, muscular stoneskinned ogre barely catches himself before falling sideways into the water and muck. Already, it pulls at his boots, threatening to take them off if he doesn't keep moving. No reason not to be ready, so he has his great sword already out and held lazily in his right hand, turning around to help anyone who might need it. "Nice. Wet. " He climbs into the boat as it appears, no questions asked.
Glitch stands by the water's edge as the boat appears and approaches. He's wearing a familiar black hoodie and jeans, but has accessorized for the marsh trip. Dull gray strips of duct tape wrap in layers around his shoes and pant cuffs, cinching them tight at the ankle and sealing all the way up to his knees. His hands are gloved, and similarly taped up to the elbows. With his hood up and another layer of dark cloth hiding his face from the nose down, the only thing that peers out are his pixellated eyes. He steps into the boat without hesitation once it appears, sliding down to a seated position near the rear and letting more weighty people reach the center. People like Malachi. One hand slips back to grip the handle of his sword as they prepare to storm the keep.
The normally tipsy dryad is apparently unaffected by the discombobulation of this mode of transport, Jenny laughing. "Actually got a boat? Nice. I'mma hang back though. Not much for the actually stabbing things part. I'll swoop in when it's time to head home or if shit goes sideways, yeah?" So saying, she rummages through her knapsack, pulling a little red capsule out of a plastic baggie.
There are times when being really tall has its advantages. Wading through deep water is one of those times, and though the sand that makes up Paz grows darker as she gets wet, it doesn't seem to bother her very much and continues to swirl in a way that churns the water around her.
She wades over to the boat, shoving her way through the water, and that's when one of the times it's not great to be huge comes into play. She takes up more room in a boat. "I'm glad I decided to wait a while on getting big," she comments on her way over. "I don't think I'd fit in the boat at all. Anyone over there would also see me coming a mile away, though, so I'll save it." She watches June struggling through the water and says, "you're doing alright on your own, but if you want a lift just let me know. This looks like nearly your worst case scenario." It's not teasing or taunting, just sympathetic. And also, as usual, her voice sounds like someone rubbing two pieces of sandpaper together with a spanish-Philly accennt.
Sigrun tumbles out of the tree in good order, staggering out onto the water rather than into it, her feet rippling over the surface as only a fairest in plate armor carrying a spear, a battle axe, and a roundshield the size of a small boat can. Her ravens take to the air immediately upon arrival, croaking complains as they aim for the trees so as to be rid of these annoying lost and their noise. Sigrun then steps across the water towards Malachi, offering him down an armored forearm as a means of steadying himself and making sure he doesn't slip under the water. "I've got you," she assures him, trying to help him over and into the boat. "June, you good? I'll help you in a second, here."
Vorpal paces next to June, looking a touch worried for the struggling furball as she squirms through the mess, popping open the satchel to doublecheck a few things and tug out a length of stabapple. This occupies his free hand with something that costs him nothing should he need to drop it in a hurry while he watches June's back. "I was thinking much the same," he intones to Paz, his voice dripping sympathy- and a touch of concern while the panda wriggles through the piranha laden marsh. ARE they in the marsh? Or just the clear water? He's not at all sure. "If anyone gets nipped, let me know. I've got a lot of cordial, and- well, they probably know we're here, between Paz and I- everything within 500 feet or so knows there's some crazy-powerful stuff over here." He nods thankfully to Sigrun when she directly offers June help. "I'll keep watch while we get situated."
If June was full of pride she might bristle at Paz offering to carrry her or something. Fortunately June isn't the prideful sort. She gives a grin at everyone who is showing concern and then tells Paz, "honestly, that would be awesome. This is some world-class sucking." She tries to takea step toward Paz and halts. "Speaking of sucking, I think my boot is stuck in the mud."
June also slides the elemental fire that surrounds her up to her head, so that it's not a danger to her friends unless they decide to try to pick her up by her hair. Plus, having your head on fire looks awesome.
"Juney," comes Teagan's voice, "You really need to learn to Separate, my love." Other people are helping June, and Teagan's holding the boat steady, even if no one can see them doing it, so they just give advice. Also, like, they have their Darkness up around them, so they warn, "My hand's on the front of the boat, be careful. Got my armor up." 'Warn me before you touch me.'
"No sweat," Paz says, sloshing over through the water to June and carefully grabbing hold of her to carefully lift her clear of the water. She does it gently, less because it's hard to pick June up and more to make sure the boot comes along. It's hard to tell where the Elements armor that surrounds her really is, because it's sand and she's sand and it's all sand all the way down, but there's no harm done so it's probably in a safe place, like on her feet. June gets hefted from the water and then put on Paz's shoulder, and thus conveyed to the boat and then set into it so there's no need to try to climb up and in. "I'm not sure I'd notice if the fish tried to nip me or not," she tells Vorpal with a chuckle. "I'd rather not find out, though."
Sigrun steps up onto the boat's rail and up towards the prow, her weight not registering one iota where the attitude of the boat is concerned. She raises her shield and settles her spear over the top of it, one knee on the prow, and one foot in the belly of the boat. Yes. The Valkyrie is prowling in the literal sense and waiting to raid the opposite shore in the most stereotypical manner possible. Oh, she's pumped and ready for action for sure.
Malachi grips the side of the boat, reaching his hand out to Paz to help bring June onto the vessel safely and then moves let Paz have some space as well. He grips his sword with both hands now that his feet are steadied on something flat and he watches out to the island for any movement.
"Are you offering to teach me?" June asks Teagan with a laugh, not that she NEEDS to be taught. When Paz picks her up she does her best to make it easy, but it's not like the ogre is likely to have much trouble with her. Her armor and shield weigh nearly as much as she does, but she doesn't weigh much. "Thanks," she says when she's put in the boat, and she looks quite a bit happier now that she's not in the water. In the process she managed to give a little of her magic to Paz, one of the benefits of being nice to the Truefriend. Once she's in the boat, though, she checks her gear then settles in.
Vorpal literally- visibly- has to check himself when he starts to take the lead. He takes a step, jerks to a halt, stares at his bag, and takes a deep breath, patting the satchel and holding firm where he is, -beside- the boat instead of in front. "Oh. I should mention. Under -no- circumstances are any of you to even jokingly attempt to pat me, strike me, punch my shoulder playfully- don't do it. The Jabberwock is on duty and it has no sense of humor. I cannot stress this enough. Do not do this thing. You could die. Touching is fine. Impact or violent grabbing of any kind, not so much. I'm here to back everyone else up and help patch wounds after- preferably, I'm not going to need to fight."
"Which means no playful spanks, either," he further clarifies.
Which of course is Teagan's prompting to invisibly, gently, touch Vorpal's butt.
"Of course I'll teach you, Juney."
Jenny bites down on the red capsule. Red squishes between her teeth, turning to black, sprouting into black lines that seem to fracture all across her form like a jigsaw puzzle. And then it breaks apart, the Moon courtier dissipitating into a cloud of bats that circle up and into the treeline, staying near the boat but well above it.
Paz gets herself into the boat without too much difficulty. "On the reverse side of that, don't worry too much about whether you might accidentally hit me," she says with a soft laugh. "Especially once I start to... well, you'll see. Just try not to hit me with anything on purpose and we'll be fine." She sounds like she thinks all of this is just the most fun she's had all week. Or month.
It's a nice thing to be Separated: you can be an invisible ferryman. The boat seems to move of its own accord, but what's really happening is that Teagan is behind the boat, leaned into it with a shoulder, pushing it over the surface of the water. All their hardest work is never seen. And across the lake they go...
Glitch nods. "We've got a high level party," he mutters idly, looking around at his boat companions. There's a pause as he sees Jenny bite into the capsule and crack apart into a colony of bats and flutters off. Seated at the back of the boat by sheer happenstance, he leans his head back towards where the Mirrorskin must be, since the only other person who's been here before is now a shrieking cloud of animals, and asks the empty air "We know anything about what the fuck's in there?"
"Things to hit. Don't matter much else, does it?" Malachi grumbles and twists his wrists to bring his blade perpendicular, looking along its rocky surface as rivulets of red blood seep and then disappear randomly. "Someone else does the talking and knowing part. My job is simple." The swordsman shrugs broad granite shoulders and lets out a smile that looks maybe happy, but maybe a little mad.
Once the prow of the boat nears shore, Sigrun rocks back onto her rear foot and kicks her knee up from resting on the prow to rest her boot there instead. And when the prow actually contacts land, she uses her innertia to propel her up onto the prow and over it, leaping off the boat onto land with her shield leading the way, spear warding off whatever might decide to leap out at them. She peers over the top of her shield, scans the shoreline, and begins to advance cautiously up towards the crumbled wall, steps still light over the grasses. "Teagan?" She defers to the one who was here prior.
June still looks ridiculous, with mud up to nearly her knees and soaking wet. Big fluffy fur plus wet is a bad mix. She also gets a lot more serious as they near the island, and triple-checks all of her equipment. Her debarking from the boat is far less graceful than Sigruns, more of awkwardly clamboring over the rail and onto land, but once she's there she gets her shield strapped into place (it's a huge shield even for someone who isn't her size) and then draws her longsword. "Okay, ready," she says.
"This is where we stopped," comes Teagan's voice. "I couldn't see if any of the weapons were -- something I recognized. We figured we'd come back with a bigger, more-informed group." The Mirrorskin's broken-mirror eyes swing slowly, scanning the island more carefully, and less looking for Squire Tokens, this time. Their weapon lands in their hand as easily as breathing.
As the boat is nearing the shore Paz says, "well, time to start getting serious." Except that she really doesn't sound serious. When the prow hits the land she hops to her feet and follows Sigrun over the keel, where she kicks some mud off of her boots, straightens her leather jacket by the lapels with a quick jerk, and as she's doing this she gets bigger. And bigger. And bigger. She's about the size of a car when she stops, except that it's a car standing up on its bumper instead of flat on the ground, and made out of furiously swirling sand.
Malachi hops over the side of the boat, his boots hitting the land with a thump. "Not sure on more well informed, but bigger, for sure." He jerks his thumb over at Paz, in case he wasn't clear. "Good thing that surprise wasn't Plan A." The sword wielding ogre steps to his right o make way for other to disembark from the craft. "Let's go have some fun!"
Glitch nods to all, slipping out of the boat carefully, stepping lightly over the prow for now. There's no theatrics or acrobatics from the swaddled sprite just yet, just a hand roaming back near his sword and a head tilted to the side as if looking for something that isn't there nearby. "Long as we stick together and don't do anything stupid we'll be fine," he mutters.
GAME: Teagan spends 1 Glamour with reason: WHAT WAS THAT YOU WERE SAYING GLITCH?
"Going in through the thorns to look around, bee arr bee," comes Teagan's voice, and then they start clambering up what used to be the walls of the round keep. I mean, there is a front door, but that's where people expect you to come through, right? Doot doot, it's fine, just Teagan invisibly climbing away from the group to go look at things.
The cloud of bats flutter up overhead. Contrary to what some VERY RUDE PEOPLE suggested, they are not screeching at all, and in fact noticeably quiet for bats, just fluttering and circling and doing some light aerial reconaissance.
"Just don't ask me to scout," June says with a bit of self deprecating humor, as she goes over to stand next to Vorpal. When she gets to him she says, "don't be nervous. I'll keep you safe." She tries to sound like she's not joking, but she's bad at it and can't help a smile.
GAME: Teagan spends 1 Glamour with reason: seein' in the dork
"You laugh, but I could seriously use the persistent reminder that is your-" He pauses and peers down at the soggy panda, immediately abandoning the adjectives he had in mind. "-reassuring, muscley self to remind me that I'm not the one supposed to be doing the work. Or scouting ahead. Or reshaping the Hedge to be more suitable. Or worrying about Teagan's sneaky ass heading in. I dunno which is worse. Being -unable- to assist, or -just not doing it.-" Pause. "No, it's definitely inability, this is just sort of aggravating, I'd be fucking terrified if I was helpless to make sure anyone got out okay."
says Vorpal.
"Does anyone know anything about this place?" Paz asks, though as she gets larger her voice seems to be more of a rasping rumble of sand sliding over itself and less of a normal voice. "In other words, does anyone particularly care how in tact this place is when we're done with it? If it's some important monument or architectural marvel, I don't want to just knock it down by accident. I'll try to restrain myself if anyone's worried about it, and don't worry, I don't plan to drop it down on any of us."
Normally, Malachi would have already run into the place by now. It is taking most ounces of his self control to fight back his headstrong nature. That and he's not alone or in charge, so also reasons not to be as brash as usual. He is moving around in small steps, keeping his energy at a certain level, eyes moving up top where Teagan went and also over to the entrance. Hands squeeze at the hilt of the sword, his body almost aching to do something.
The cloud of bats drops out of the sky, swooping down near the back of the party and suddenly breaking their silence to start chittering annoyingly, especially at Vorpal and Glitch.
"I do not," Sigrun asides to Paz. Only to have to aside it in a diagonal fashion a second time and towards the sky, where Paz has decided to be. "I do not," she answers louder. With Teagan having snuck off to do her job in the form of scouting on Summer's behalf, Sigrun ticks her head towards the southern and more obvious entrance. And therefore exit. "I'll cover that end. I'm slower than the rest of you, I imagine." In all of that equipment, this is probably true. She stalks away, shield still up and spear at the ready, moving to position herself a few yards from the mouth of the keep with her spear set against her instep and shield lowered to the ground as she makes herself a much lower target, set to receive a charge.
Some people whistle or call or whatever. Teagan announces their return by grabbing June's butt, and declaring, "It's terrible in there; June's butt is much nicer." Thanks, Teagan. They pause when the bats start chittering annoyingly, and then press on, standing right next to the red panda, albeit invisibly, "So, there are a fuckton of briarwolves in there. Like, they're nested in there like those spiders that build the big community webs? A lot of them. Which is super weird."
"It'll be fine," June says, turning to look up at Vorpal. "It's the waiting for things to start happening that's always the worst." She seems to genuinely be trying to reassure him. Truefriends! Then she yelps because of sudden Teagan and lets out a laugh. "That is super weird," she says after, still giggling. "Maybe we should see if Paz can just knock the building down on them. I kind of want to see that anyway."
Malachi says, “So long as I still get to smack one or two and Paz doesn't get all the fun?”
Deep breaths. Deeeeeep breaths. It's gonna be fine. They're just briarwolves. Fight'em every day, just about. It's FINE. June does seriously help, and he lets out that deep breath slowly as Teagan returns. "Hedgin' nesting wolves. Like Russian nesting dolls, but both far more and far less creepy, all at once."
says Vorpal.
Glitch eyes the cloud of bats swarming near him, and then June's butt, as it is apparently grabbed by a ghost. Fascinating to watch, if the armor isn't blocking it completely. He holds out a hand palm up towards the bats, gloved, and looks vaguely towards Teagan's voice, or where he thinks it is. "If there's nothing in there we need, might as well. Might be stuff hidden in there though. Something in the rooms, or passage underneath." He nods. "They wouldn't be crammed all in there if there wasn't something worth finding."
Figuring no one is actually going to start turning bat, the cloud swirls together in a frantic and disorienting work of reassemblage, the dryad re-emerging and brushing her vines back, offering a grimace, "Ain't just wolves. This island's been cultivated. Thorn pattern ain't natural at all, yeah? Think this is like... a kennel, or something."
"Well, apparently we have a plan A," Paz to all of this, letting out a chuckle. "Does anyone have a plan B, before we just go straight to implementation? I'm sure plenty of them will come scurrying out of the rubble to be chopped down. Nothing ever goes that neatly. And it's true there might be stuff, and digging through rubble is boring work." She spreads hands of churning sand.
"You're weighing the risks of engaging directly with the risks of losing resources or information by engaging indirectly," murmurs Vorpal. "Tricky question, especially when the resources and information are uncertainties. What to choose. What. To Choose."
"Literally with the levels of this party, no, I think we're good with plan A," Teagan drolls. Two Sublime people, and ... yeah. "Johnny, I'm so not wanting to dick around with trying too hard to get information this time." They nod to Jenny. "That's kinda what I was thinking, yeah. Someone's keeping them. But we can't leave them."
"Once the area is safe, at least for the Hedge, we can probably get people to come help clear away stone to explore," June points out to all of this. "Someone probably knows a way to just get things to move on their own with magic, or something. It doesn't help if stuff gets crushed, but it also means we might not have to fight all of those things."
Glitch rolls a shoulder. "Paz's Plan A is knock the place down." He turns to those present and arches a brow slightly. "If you guys want to just knock it down, sure, but..." The sprite takes some tenative steps forward, though not past Sigrun, towards the entrance, considering it. "Other ways to get them all without much effort. Form up in front of the door and draw them out, cut them down in the chokepoint. Or get some fire in there."
"Dooon't got no opinions on that." Jenny offers, sighing as she fishes another capsule out of a mostly depleted baggie, "Almost outta these things. Gotta get the new place set up." Grumblegrumble. The weedling dissolves back into bats and skedaddles to their aerial post.
Paz listens to the talking, but enough people seem to be in favor of her Plan A, so she turns and charges toward the wall without any further preamble. By the time she covers the distance to it she's the size of a lorry stood up on its butt, towering over the field, a howling torrent of furiously churning sand. When she hits the wall it explodes as if it were hit by a bomb, and the force ofo the collision is enough to send chunks of stone as big as the more ordinarily sized members of the party flying through the center of the structure. Some of them even fly out the far end of the building, and dust spreads out in a billowing cloud while bits of rubble keep raining down for a good fifteen seconds. "I found another door!" she bellows.
The immediate fallout of what Paz has done is that, yes, a dragon-sized channel has been plouged through the remains of the stone wall on the western side of the structure. The breach is complete, which means nothing is really holding the canopy up on that side, so it sags downward slowly with a cracking of wood and straining and snapping of fibrous vines. A few shadows fall from the canopy, vaguely humanoid shapes, tumbling down into the still tumbling gullet of stone and riprap that Paz has created within. The powder and dust mingles with the shadows for a portentious few seconds of stillness. Then a cacaphony of howls rises as one, and the shadows within begin to move like the writhing of snakes. It's a black furry foam of murderous rage that starts to move their way.
Sigrun, watching the door on the south side of the structure, begins breathing deeper and deeper, her body coiling in preparation. As the first shadows begin to appear in the corridor of the entrance she screams back at their howling, "VICTORY OR VALHALLA!" She holds that final vowel in defiance of the tide of enemies.
GAME: Sigrun rolled 8 + 4, putting herself on the initiative roster at 19.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf2" on the initiative roster at 10.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf3" on the initiative roster at 10.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf4" on the initiative roster at 11.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf5" on the initiative roster at 11.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf6" on the initiative roster at 12.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf7" on the initiative roster at 14.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf8" on the initiative roster at 14.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf9" on the initiative roster at 14.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf10" on the initiative roster at 14.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf11" on the initiative roster at 15.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf12" on the initiative roster at 15.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf13" on the initiative roster at 16.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf14" on the initiative roster at 16.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf15" on the initiative roster at 17.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf16" on the initiative roster at 17.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf17" on the initiative roster at 17.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf18" on the initiative roster at 18.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf19" on the initiative roster at 18.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf20" on the initiative roster at 18.
GAME: Sigrun directly set "Bwolf21" on the initiative roster at 18.
Game: June takes 1 Bashing damage.
Game: June takes 2 Bashing damage.
Jenny flaps around, although the cloud is drifting towards June while careful to stay out of likely reach of any ground-based attacks.
The torrent of briarwolves seem to get the drop on the party for the greater part. They pour at and around Paz, reaching Malachi and June to her rear. Sigrun, on her loan on the right flank of the group, seems only too happy to hide behind her shield and ward off the attacks as best she can. June takes a beating as the wolves pile onto her, and Sigrun herself beats the first wolf to reach her with her shield, knocking it back with a stagger. When she tries that maneuver a second time, it claws her clean upside the head, rocking her to the side as she's briefly driven to one knee again. The wolves that try to attack Paz just... fall away, clawing at sand proves to be futile.
GAME: Sigrun removes "bwolf13" from the initiative roster.
Game: Malachi takes 1 Bashing damage.
Glitch stands and stares as the keep begins to collapse, and hordes of briarwolves come pouring out. His eyes still, shifting into a simple blank stare. Moments later, the melee slams into them, snarling bodies piling against Sigrun's shield. To his side, the wolves pile onto June, and he takes one long step over towards her, grasps the handle at his back, and pulls. His other hand held up in front of him, the panda girl sees his sword chop down through the wolf that's actually laid hands on her, cleaving it apart to topple to the ground on either side of her. The first down, but with many more to come.
From the mass of roiling sand, vaguely shaped like a woman, reaches a clawed hand that scoops one of the briar wolves from the ground as if the creature is nothign but a stuffed animal. Holding it by its shoulders, Paz's other hand grabs its haunches and clawed fingers dig into flesh as she pulls. And pulls. The briar wolf might as well have been made out of cotton and thread for all the resistance it seems to give the Noble Champion, only the stuffing that comes out of this one is blood and entrails. With a roar she hurls first one half and then the other at nearby stones, and the remains of the body splatter against the unyielding surface. "Is this all?" she challenges. "If you're the pets, where's the owner?"
More wolves roil out of the crumbling keep. A trio try to finish the job of taking Sigrun to the ground, but meet quite an opposite result. She recovers her wits and swings her shield up and hard, batting the first wolf away forcefully with bone crunching force. She spins hard, smacking a second away with the shaft of her spear, right behind the knees, only to duck her knees and shoulder into her shield, slamming it into the third Briarwolf and pushing it back towards the mouth of the original entrance to the keep. She seems to have recovered well. Two more slip past Paz and claw at Malachi, one of them actually clipping the Ogre's shoulder.
It's time for Teagan's favorite artistic pursuit: painting with arterial spray! The Mirrorskin -- completely unseen, wrapped in Smoke -- brings their machete down on one of the briarwolves who had the temerity to hit June. Don't they know that unkindly touching June's butt leads to being bisected by a vengeful Shadow?
Well, one of them knows now, in the 'disemboweled and falling over to bleed out and die' way.
GAME: Sigrun removes "bwolf15" from the initiative roster.
GAME: Sigrun removes "bwolf3" from the initiative roster.
Malachi doesn even try to avoid the rush of snarling, thorny beasts, but instead stands against the tide with his great sword held overhead.
GAME: June spends 1 Glamour
Malachi doesn't even try to avoid the rush of snarling, thorny beasts, but instead stands against the tide with his great sword held overhead. One misses as it tries to go for his leg and then another two come at him, one getting in a lucky bite through his armor, but just a good bruise to show off later. And another wave, this one jumping with fangs bared as Mal sidesteps the ugly creature and brings his great sword down with all of his strength, cleaving the briarwolf in two, messy halves that fall to each side of him, spraying his lower body with blood and ichor. He releases a loud, savage yell and turns to prepare for the next.
In her defense, June comports herself well in battle. She doesn't panic and run, or cower, or anything like that! She wields her massive shield effectively, keeping the worst of the attacks off of her from the briar wolves and just getting banged around in her armor a little. But when she finds a chance to counter-attack and lets out a battle cry, she comes up short. Her long sword swings in an arc with all the strength it should need, but she trips on a rock and nearly falls on her face.
Vorpal was trying to be good, REALLY he was. He's been standing there right by June and letting her do all the fighting and defending and Glitch and Teagan pitched in to take the heat off her while mountains of wolves throw themselves at mountains of dragonsand and Valkyrian steel!! But... but then June trips and there's still two with her in their sights and she's already been chewed on some and that's GOT to be embarassing and whoops hold on has that one always had a hole connecting the top of its head and the underside of its jaw?
Well, it does now. How'd THAT happen?
In an unrelated string of events, Vorpal wipes some blood and brains off the sharp end of the thorn he's wielding and calls out, "If you start sustaining too much damage, work your way towards my voice or call out MEDIC!"
GAME: Jenny spends 1 Willpower
GAME: Jenny spends 4 Glamour with reason: That Which Trespasses
The bats reassemble into a Maenad behind Johnny as he stabsapup, Jenny glancing over at June as the beloved-but-ineffectual-summer-mascot gets jumped by like a gazillion wolves. With an uncharacteristic look of concentration, the weedling is sprawled on all fours amidst the muck and grim and mud, vines writhing as the thorns and earth themselves seem to come to life in a wide radius all around, as if nature itself has turned against the wolf pack, thorns clawing and entangling, clods of dirt shifting and entrapping, roots tripping.
When a patch of the battlefield having rebelled against them, and their waves of attacks bouncing off the enemy without any real effect, the whole host of the briarwolves takes a momentary pause. Another howl sounds from within the shadows of the crumbling keep, and almost as one the briarwolves begin to scatter in all directions away from the attacking host. A great many make for the log bridge, though most simply spring from patch to patch of thorns on the water, or climb up tendrils that reach the thorn canopy overhead. It's as though they'd turned over a brick covering an ant nest. They can mop up a little, but there's no chance of clearing this den entirely now.
Jenny tries to kick a wolf in passing.
Jenny fails >:(
"KNOCK THE BRIDGE! MOTHERFUCKERS KNOCK THE BRIDGE!" This from Teagan, and the rage of the Mirrorskin isn't quite enough to do what they yell about, though the log does get nudged. No briarwolves fall. It would have been cool.
When the wolves that surround her start to run Paz laughs, a rasping sound that reverberates through the ruins she left of the wall of the building. "And here I thought you wanted to play," she says, and she surges forward and brings a foot down on one of the briarwolves. It looks a lot like seeing someone jump on a ketchup packet, but that's not ketchup.
GAME: Glitch spends 2 Glamour with reason: Omen 2
June doesn't trip! The briarwolves are fleeing, and unprotected flanks are great targets for stabbing. That's just what she does, with a surge forward that's almost heedless of what danger it might put her in. They're running, it's not like the risk is that high. This time she catches a wolf that has already been injured by the aura of fire that surrounds her, and the burned wolf finds that the deep laceration the blade leaves is too much for it. It collapses a couple of feet away from June.
One of the wolves realizes that there's this stickish guy in the back, hanging out with the floppy snack. The how had directed them to scatter, but surely it'd be fine to get a mouthful for the road. What's he got, a sharp stick and a big bag? Sure, he's Wyrd, but not ALL Wyrd things are dange-
What June, and Glitch, and Jenny see is something barely visible, the ghost of a ghost of a -creature-, something too stretched out and misproportioned to be a proper dragon, something ragged and tattered and full of holes, flickers into being for just the barest instant of violence. The briarwolf lunges towards Vorpal, jaws open, and the phantom blips into being and -swats- the wolf with a single swipe of a decrepit, rotting tail. The briarwolf cracks and folds in on itself the moment it's struck and goes -flying-, rocketing a good thirty feet before striking a moss-ridden tree and popping like an overripe tomato.
"So, -that- is why no touchy," explains Vorpal calmly. "Who's hurt? I've got juice boxes~"
Sigrun doesn't quite know what to make of what's happening at first. She had been quite thoroughly surrounded. Holding her own, yes, but that and little more. When some of the creatures she'd beaten on begin to scatter, she spins about, trying to get her bearings on the pulse of the battlefield. "WHY WON'T YOU FACE ME!?" She slams her spear against her shield as she stalks after the fleeing wolves that are passing around her for an entirely different reason now. She hurls insults at them in norse, now, screaming her fury at the top of her considerable lungs. And then Teagan is calling for help and Sigrun is off at a run. It doesn't occur to her to slow down, she just puts her shield down and charges straight at the log bridge. She doubles down on Teagan's effort, slamming the end of the bridge loose of its foundation and sending it spinning into the water, dropping a pair of wolves into the water.
Which begins to roil and churn, and bubble red.
Sigrun pushes back up to her feet, bracing herself with her spear haft and flicks her head back to snap her braids against her back with a wide and hungry grin. A few more beats of her spear against her shield and she screams up at the sky, "FREYJA!" There are more words spoken, but that's the only one that stands out with an obvious english analog. She is gesturing about the battlefield with her spear, however, indicatively, thrusting it back at the sky again.
The area around Jenny still crawls with menace, the very way the light catches, that shadows fall, every angle of thorns and brambles and mud and water seeming to but cut out of a horror movie. But with the wolves fled there doesn't seem to be anywhere to direct this macabre energy, the weedling flopping back on the ground, gingerly avoiding any of the broken weapon bits or anything. "Welp. Guessing they do got a master, then?"
Paz is ready to go help with the bridge, but Sigrun seems to have it. The towering giant of a sandstorm looks around, finding nothing but corpses and allies, and then looks down at Jenny. "Not for long," she says.
And then there's a Mirrorskin there, flicking blood and gore off of their blade. "Something called from inside the keep thing, and that's when they scattered, so, yeah, they got a fuckin' boss," Teagan answers, looking off after Sigrun when she goes off on a rage. "Let her be. When she goes from cursing to saying 'heck' again, you can approach her. Understanding The Heck Threshold is an important way to not get speared by a Valkyrie."
"I'm good," June says, even though she got more knocked around than anyone else did. "Nothing a little nap won't fix." She looks around her. "Thanks for all the teamwork to keep me safe. I guess they thought I looked like the weakest member of the herd or something."
Glitch stands still among the chaos for a while, watching with almost awed eyes as the wolves all flow around him, the eye of the storm passing over him as wolf and claw all crash against everything else. Paz rampages in the background, Teagan and Sigrun hack their way through their enemies, Vorpal murders a wolf without lifting a finger. Even June gets in a gleeful little kill. With the vines still grasping and writhing around everyone, Glitch locks eyes on the nearest wolf scrambling for its life. "More XP," he mutters, breaking from his calm trance into a run, springing after the wolf. He takes a fluid hop past Teagan and Sigrun, landing behind the wolf right as it slows near the edge of the water. The sprite ducks into a roll as he hits the ground, and ends it in a kneel, his sword projecting straight out to impale the briarwolf and erupt from its chest.
Jenny fishes around in her knapsack, tossing a baggie full of some dried goblin fruit at June. "So um. Wild segue, but who feels like taking the scenic route back to camp?"
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