• PM To Join • The Smallest Flame Burns Brightest

[Kasoria]

Not so fucking easy as before, is it?

The bitter, bloody thought makes Kasoria smile. It is not a lovely thing.

The rams had caused merry fucking hells among the ranks of Knights and militia alike when first they assailed the walls. They all had, those monsters the nameless, faceless intelligences beyond the Stormwastes had unleashed upon Storm's Edge. They killed a dozen men for every one of theirs. Only teamwork and magic and sheer balls of Adamantite had driven them off. But each time they'd come back, it had been the same bag of tricks. The same tactics and approaches. The humans, though? The mortals? They had learned.

Now he watched a line of Knights stand shoulder to shoulder, shield to shield, and face down the bellowing Ram that crashed into them... and did not break the line. The moment the impact faded, spears and swords thrust and stabbed and slashed, driving it away with screams and arcs of steaming, hissing blood. The Worm was dead, top half crushed almost flat by a warhammer, squashed to death with a sound like a hot boulder being smashed open. Kasoria shook his head as dark shadows invaded his vision for a moment.

Couldn't hold that wall for long. Already starting to feel-

"No time fer that shite."

"S-Sir?"

Kasoria didn't bother with an explanation, an answer, or even look at the man's way. He simply pointed to the commander, voice a dry, ugly croak.

"Concentrate yer fire on that fuckin' thing! Wait 'til its away from the Commander!"

To his credit, the younger man didn't ask any further questions. It wasn't just the training and the magicks the lizard had given them coursing through their muscles and their eyes. They'd seen horrible, terrible things. Things that had killed their friends and family, the Knights they'd always believed were the match of any foe. And they'd killed those things. Seen them die in a dozen different ways. Watched them bleed, learned their tricks and their ways. The young man didn't panic or question. He notched a fresh bow, and soon the other volunteers were with them, including-

"Mat?" Kasoria was already jogging away, pulling another arrowing and nocking it as he went. "Take two a' them an' help the shield wall!"

He spared a quick glance at the clutch of Knights. They were already surrounding the Ram, four of them focusing its attention on them, the other two folding their flanks around it. Bold yet effective, and he wanted to make sure they had support in case the fucking thing broke out of the snare. Yet it wouldn't be from him. He had eyes only for the towering lizard, the monstrous fucking midget hanging from the commander's horse, and then-

-the leaping Ram, coming at him from a blind side, and Kasoria-

-raised and drew and fired in the same instant, Runes of Focus and Sight used and abused in such a tiny window of time that he felt the slam of a headache the moment the arrow was loosed-

It was worth it.

The Ram screeched as the arrow took it in the eye. Not deep enough to kill, but the spasm of agony threw off its jump. Instead of slamming straight into the Ithecal, knocking him down and setting him up for a beautiful, simple, agonizing goring, its head crashed onto the tower shield instead. Still enough to send Prae staggering, but not down, and now, of course, it had the little business of an arrow in the eye-

There was an awful sound. A shriek, a scream, yet not one of a dumb animal. This sound was one of outrage, of indignation. There was an intellect behind it, of a cunning plan thwarted and being thwarted by inferior beings. Kasoria turned his head and locked eyes with two burning round eyes set into a face made of clacking, hissing plates of volcanic rock. Even from that distance, he could feel the malice radiating from the Magnim.

There's a mind in there. Not just instinct and counterfeit life. There's a soul in there that wants you all dead. And can think of a way to do it.

The thing snarled and turned to the man pinned under a dead horse. The Commander was squirming, not to get away but get to reach his weapon, thrown onto the sands next to him. The Magnim's teeth curled back in a hideous grimace and with a single, almost clinical slash of its claws, it opened the horse's throat down to the bone. Ceasing the frenzied struggling and whinnying. Kasoria knew why. It wanted a clean kill, no thrashing around to ruin its strike. But he also suspected, the Magnim wanted to enjoy the moment. To savor the futile struggles of the human.

He put an arrow into its back.

He forgot about Prae, though the Ithecal's lumbering, crashing, sun-blocking fight with the Ram was always occupying the corner of his eye. This mattered more. With this thing dead, the Rams would either flee or be surprised for long enough to be put down quickly. So he focused on the Magnim, and the child-sized creature howled again in outrage even as its impossibly-hot body turned the wooden arrow to ash and the tip to slag and then it whipped around-

-Kasoria throwing up his arm just in time-

-to be sent staggering as a fireball smacked into the Shield he thought-pulsed into existence just before it hit him. His vision went from spotty to swimming in darkness, and the Raggedy Man went down onto the scorching sand. Things monstrous and human bellowed around him. The ground shook and his body started to get up, even as his mind struggled to remember where he was.

Shit, his mind grunted, as he saw the Magnim turned back to the Commander, arrow apparently not even slowing it down. "Shit..."

He spat blood and got back up. Leaving his bow behind.

[Mathias Blackwood]

Mathias Blackwood
The Smallest Flame Burns Brightest
23 Ymiden 720

Big horns, hot head, hot feet, legs... LEGS! Mathias's mind raced through what is saw when Praetorum's gust of wind pushed away the dust that the monstrous rams had been kicking up. If you wanted to stop a man from running away or running at you, you shot him in the legs. No self respecting hunter would say they tried to shoot their prey in the legs, Mathias hoped, but he wasn't really concerned with killing the rams, he just wanted to stop them. Other people could do the killing once the horned bastards were immobile. Mathias drew the bowstring back to his cheek quickly and aimed at the ram's, just about where he thought their ram-equivalent of a shoulder would be. The fools crashed into Kasoria's wall and everything seemed like it was going according to the plan. Then the ram broke through which was less pleasant but still manageable and Mathias put an arrow in it's side.

Mathias grabbed another three arrows from his quiver as the fire ram charged at Praetorum. He wanted to help but was moving far too slowly. He could see, he could process, but he couldn't quite keep up. Then he heard Kasoria call out to him. Thank the fates that there was a steady hand to guide Mathias through the chaos otherwise it would have been the end of him. He could see, he could understand, and he could even try to make a decision about what to do, but he didn't know what was best and the doubts were going to paralyze the young archer before he did any real good. But Kas gave him simple instructions to follow.

While Kasoria moved to help Praetorum, Mathias moved to help the knights who'd boxed in a fireram with their shields. He thought it would be easy pickings. They were slowly chipping away at the beast but by the time Mathias found a good vantage point to pepper the ram with arrows, it had apparently chipped away enough at one of the knights. The ram whipped its head suddenly to the right and struck just inside the knight's shield with it's curved horns. The ram impaled the knight in che stomach and then flung him aside before charging at another knight. It tried to maneuver much like the one carrying the Magnim had, seeking to leap from the knight's shield, back into the fray. However when the beast took to the air, Mathias put an arrow in the side of it's leg.

With it's leg injured in the middle of the jump, it couldn't support the ram's weight when it landed. The fire ram's leg buckled and it stumbled forward slowly enough that Mathias could put another arrow into it's side. The enhanced arrow was so sharp it buried itself in the ram nearly half way to the fletchings. The ram began it's limping charge towards Mathias who reached for his quiver and pulled a single arrow in haste. He nocked it just as the ram reach him and the archer leapt aside. The ram's horns crashed into a broke a chunk out of the tree behind Mathias and the transmuter scrambled away across the ground.

His bow had fallen from his hands which were now pressed against the floor looking towards the fire ram as it turned from the tree to Mathias. "Come on, you ugly bastard." Mathias grumbled as the ram charged at him. In a trill, a large stone blade shot up from the ground beneath the ram, impaling it under the chest and growing large enough that it pushed the ram off it's feet and into the air where another knight quickly moved in and took a meaty swing at it's neck. The knight swung again and again until the ram's head fell onto the floor which Mathias thought was unnecessary but he didn't focus on it. He would have been thoroughly distracted by it if not for the runes Praetorum I enhanced him with.

Instead, Mathias heard Kasoria and turned to find that whatever battle was being had with the Magnim was not going well. Impulse struck and Mathias pressed his hand into the ground again to do what he had done to the ram. A bow was only one type of weapon in the hands of a transmutation mage. The world was another. Mathias established a pathway again, pushing his ether through the ground towards the Magnim with thankfully no trees in the way to interrupt the effect. When the Magnim reached the commander again, two slabs covered in sharp, jagged stones would shoot up around the Magnim like an iron maiden.

Status of the Battle

6 knights and 10 volunteers - 1 Knight impaled in the stomach, most volunteers burned or harmed by the ram.
4 knights - 3x Strength, 5x Endurance
Kas & Mat - 3x Sight, 7x Focus

2 Fire Rams - 1 Ram dead, 1 ram fighting Praetorum
1 Inferno Worm - Dead.
1 Magnim - Fighting Kasoria, attempting to kill the commander

Human Male

Transmutation Mage
Glowing Silver Hand Veins

“The archer is the true weapon; the bow is just a long piece of wood.”
~ Sebastien de Castell

[Praetorum]

Date: 23rd of Ymiden, Arc 720

Status: Vaguely horrified

Weapons: Shield, Halberd

Armor: Plate-like Leather

Current Magical Effects

Rune of Focus on head
Chained Runes of Strength/Endurance on limbs and tail
Taithir - Serpents Hood
Taithir - Nobility's Endurance

Years of training were all that kept Praetorum on his feet as the ram's full bulk came bearing down on him. Ether enhanced muscles were all very well and good, but an impact like this had nothing to do with strength, and everything to do with speed and weight—both of which the ram had in abundance, and Praetorum did not.


What Prae did have over his opponent, however, was a well honed sense of battlefield positioning, and more than one functioning eyeball. 



Horn scraped against metal as Prae shifted the angle of his shield, feet skidding across the ground as he used the creature's own momentum to redirect it off to the side, away from the rest of their band; he wasn't going to give it a chance to cause chaos in their ranks. 



The ram let out an bleating shriek of rage as it was forced off course, and whirled around to charge again at him, only to find Praetorum already charging towards its blind side at a steep angle. He'd never fought a ram before, but he'd had to brace his shield against mounted lancers, and the same basic principles applied; the worst thing he could do was give it room to charge full force at him. As the ram turned mid motion to try and face him, he continued to circle around it, forcing it to turn instead of gather speed as the two spiraled towards each other. 



This time, when the ram slammed into him, its momentum had been dampened enough that Prae was able to stand his ground, locking its horns against its shield just for a moment. That was all Prae needed—his arm shot out, the prongs of his trident catching fur and fire and flesh. But the creature was far nimbler than its size would suggest, and it leaped away before Prae could sink his weapon fully into its neck, leaving only a scratch along its hide.



Prae followed after it, and—seeming to realize that Prae wasn't going to give it the space to charge—the ram changed tactics, ducking its head to the side and trying to sweep Prae's shield out of the way with its curved. Before it could finish the motion, though, Prae thrust his trident at it's face, forcing it to back away again, narrowly avoiding losing its other eye. 



Scowling, Prae his options. Twice now, he'd had a good opening, and it had gotten away with little more than a flesh wound; evidently it was too tough and fast for him to land a clean blow with reflexes alone. He could restrain and attack it with defiance, but his ether reserves had taken a hit, and there was still the magnim to contend with. With that battle still going on behind him, Prae wanted to finish this quick, clean, and without magic.



Which meant it was time to make good use of the blind spot Karim had made for him. 



This time, as it came in towards him again, Praetorum shifted his grip on his shield, and attacked, trident feinting towards the ram's good side, while his tail whipped towards its blind side. As he'd hoped, the creature saw only the trident, and leaped, directly into the path of Prae's long, sinuous tail. Without missing a beat, he wrapped his tail around one of its horns, and wrenched its head to the side. 


He'd hoped to unbalance the creature entirely, but it was too sturdy and heavy for that—still, he managed to make it stumble, which was all the opportunity Prae needed. Again, his trident lashed out, and this time struck true, catching the ram in the shoulder and sinking in deep. The ram let out a shrieking noise, and began to thrash with such ferocity Prae was forced to relinquish his tail's grip on its horns. But the trident was a vicious weapon, barbed to keep whatever it had impaled from slipping off easily, and each movement it made only dug it deeper into the joint of its shoulder. 



The creature stumbled as its forelimb weakened, and Prae stepped to the side, the trident vanishing with a thought from him. Before the creature could right itself, Prae charged, giving his enemy a taste of its own medicine as his shield slammed into the ram's side and sent it sprawling onto its' injured shoulder



The ram started to struggle to its feet, but Praetorum had already summoned another weapon, a massive two handed halberd that Prae brought down into a cleaving strike onto the ram's side, severing its spine just below the shoulders. 



Prae wasn't sure that the thing was dead yet, but shouts from behind told him that he didn't have the time to check. It was heavily incapacitated, and that had to be good enough. He whirled around, just in time to see two slabs of stone rise into the air and slam together, with the magnim between them. The sound of crackling flame in his attunement spark shifted into a note he didn't recognize, but did not extinguish. Prae grimaced—of course, that would be too damn easy. 



Before he could even begin to shout a warning, though, a patch of air near the stone wavered, and then burst into flame. And then the magnim's frequency...


The only way Prae could think to describe it was that its frequency skipped a beat, as it vanished from between the stone, and emerged from the newly formed fire to drop onto the ground a short distance away. 



Faldrun be damned. The bloody thing could teleport.

Status of the Battle

All Allies - Nobility's Endurance (Endurance boost)
6 knights and 10 volunteers - 1 Knight impaled, volunteers burned or harmed by the ram.
4 knights - 3x Strength, 5x Endurance
Kas & Mat - 3x Sight, 7x Focus
Commander - Still stuck under his horse RIP

2 Fire Rams - 1 dead, 1 incapacitated and dying
1 Inferno Worm - DED
1 Magnim - Teleporting back into the fray

[Kasoria]

Best for last and all that shite.

Kasoria growled, as if to stifle his mind's own whimsy. Quaint observations were naught but a waste of time right now. Their enemies were decimated but the last standing was by far the most dangerous. A monster with the speed and toughness of those damned rams, married with the cunning and power of a mage... and oh good, it could also skip across reality at will.

"Uh?"

The Etzori made that noise as the stunted Magnim seemed to shimmer for a moment and then, in the time it took him to blink, vanished entirely-

-only to appear with a hiss and pop like lava falling into water, stepped out of a flame sputtering on the dirt a dozen or so yards away. The brutal yet effective trap Mathias had crafted slammed shut on empty air and then just stood there, an obelisk split in half and smashed together and now forgotten. Kasoria didn't even think of using his own Transmutation in such a fashion. In that regard, the archer was by far his superior, and yet-

He blinked. The thought came to him swiftly. Traveling through fire. By fire. Only by fire. And as he looked around, he saw a plethora of flickering little flames around the battlefield. The Magnim could hop out of any of them, avoiding the killing blow time after time, unwilling to stand around and suffer their magic and arrows and halberds and swords. Grind them down. Pick them off. Unless-

Kasoria blinked again. At the best of times, his mind was a tactical machine. Not gifted to him but earned, constructed, forged by decades of what was best described as urban warfare, in many cases. Now there were Hone runes driving that machine almost to the point its wheels fell off and the axels split, yet they did not. In the handful of blinks it took for the Magnim to reemerge and turn its ire on his comrades, Kasoria crafted a plan.

Looks like I'll find a use for it after all.

As long as the others keep it busy.

Which, he soon realized, would not be an issue. Whatever else they were, the lizard and the lying little shit were not cowards. They kept the Magnim busy, although he was sure they'd not call it that. "Fucking for our fucking lives" would have been more accurate. But no matter. It gave Kasoria time to get to one knee, plans both hands onto the earth, and call his Spark-

Not you, he muttered mentally to his Abrogation. The new one.

Slower than the elder but still eager, his Transmutation Spark came when summoned. He pushed it into the ground and felt his ether spread out across it. Not actually casting at that moment. Just moving exploring. Expanding. Kasoria didn't even need to close his eyes: the runes of focus were doubling then doubling again his usual mental clarity, and the runes of sight-

Kasoria found every one. Every fire around the Magnim for a hundred yards. And as he found each one, he sent a pulse of his ether under it. The ground turned from solid to... not liquid, but a loose sand that sucked the flames down into the choking ground. One by one, they blinked out, and already Kasoria had sweat on his brow. His Transmutation was not nearly as gnarled and toughened as his Abrogation; it taxed him harder with less, and when it came to the last flame-

No. Not that one.

With a grunt he disengaged. Called back his ether. Left that one flame very pointedly still standing. Maybe ten yards from the Magnim. Then he delved dep into his Abrgoation, called it forth again even as it growled in protest. That bloody little flaming fuck had hurt it before; battered it and him down into the dirt. But it was a mirror of the Etzori, grumbling and snarling and fractious but not a coward. It came as he ordered, and as he vomited forth his power into the air before him he bellowed-

"OI?! DIS WAY YA WEE CUNT!"

The Magnim turned and saw the unkempt manling from before throw out his arms towards it. Only now there were rippling tentacles of shocking, Shackling ether flying towards it. It turned from the Knight it had just turned into screaming meat and melting slag, sparing a moment's pause to see this new threat coming. Worn down and still besieged by its other enemies, the Magnim calculated in a fraction of a moment, didn't like its chances, and teleported to the nearest-

-and only-

-way of-

Gotcha.

Kasoria killed his Spark and whipped a pair of daggers from their sheath and hurled them before the Magnim had even fully reappeared. It had only one place to go (which he had ensured), if it wouldn't stand and take the lashings of his magic (which he guessed it wouldn't). He'd corralled it neatly enough, but what good was that if he couldn't capitalize on such a strategy? So the last part truly was a gamble. A bet made before the game had even started, as it were.

The throwing knives streaked through the air without any target before them save the fire burning on the brackish ground below. But just as they flew closer-

-the Magnim unfurled itself from the flame, standing up to glare at the-

SH-SHUNK

Kasoria grinned as the knives slammed home into the Magnim's shoulder and chest. Sinking deep into flesh that was not flesh, gouging into whatever passed for organs in such a monster. The Magnim howled in outrage and agony, staggering, frothing bubbling blood like sparks from a smithy's furnace. Blood spewed out from the wounds and Kasoria was moving again, unlimbering his ax and gladius. He called his Abrogation back, and felt tremors through his skin as he did.

I know it hurts. But it's almost done. He glanced briefly as Prae and Mathias. Now the monster's ire was on him. Now he'd given them a chance, them and the Knights rallying at their sides. The vollies, the plebs, the peasants and sellswords like him... well... the had their own agonies to endure. But it won't be much longer now.

One way or another.

Status of the Battle

All Allies - Nobility's Endurance (Endurance boost)
6 knights and 10 volunteers - 1 Knight impaled, 1 Knight immolated, all volunteers combat ineffective
4 knights - 3x Strength, 5x Endurance
Kas & Mat - 3x Sight, 7x Focus
Commander - RIP

2 Fire Rams - DED
1 Inferno Worm - DED
1 Magnim - Wounded but not mortally, now limited in teleportation by lack of standing fires

[Mathias Blackwood]

Mathias Blackwood
The Smallest Flame Burns Brightest
23 Ymiden 720

Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! That was about all Mathias could think when he saw the magnim appear across the battlefield in a different flame. He'd really been hoping to catch the beast by surprise but instead he'd only forced it to reveal another one of its abilities to them. He scrambled across the ground quickly while chaos continued to rage around him, searching for the bow he'd dropped when he dodged the ram. Kasoria had insisted he learn some of the sword but impulse and a lack of discipline made Mathias seek out his bow instead. He felt better shooting arrows than he did swinging a sword and he wasn't sure how many more times he could try to use shape craft to kill the magnim before he ran out of ether. With Kasoria nearby, his initiate, there was a little more ether to pool between them but that worked both ways. When Kasoria cast his spells, Mathias felt it was a little like watching water drain from a tank. Mathias found his bow and got onto his feet just as everything came to a head.

One thing was clear, Mathias was not fit to fight the beast on his own. Even enhanced with all of the magic running through him, Mathias was just not quick enough, sturdy enough, and clever enough to keep up with the magnim's tactical prowess. Fortunately Mathias didn't have to be. In simple terms, Praetorum and Kasoria were the siege engines of the team- tanks. Mathias was just a sneaky little shit with a bow, decent aim, and a strong jaw.

Kasoria forced his magic through a wide pathway to seek out every fire he could find and Mathias occupied his time running his fingers along the fletchings of the remaining enhanced arrows in his two quivers. He'd used a lot but he still had roughly a dozen to shoot before he needed to worry about salvaging from the dead. Mathias nocked another arrow on his bowstring and drew it back, aiming at the spot where the magnim had appeared but holding because he knew the magnim could teleport now. What would an arrow do? It could be out of that spot in an instant and somewhere else. Mathias didn't make the connection that the beast could only travel through fire. He thought the beast was creating the fires when it emerged from whatever portal it created. Kasoria didn't seem to care, launching an ether-draining attack against the beast- a ploy.

Mathias didn't realize the genius until two daggers struck the magnim and the younger mage quickly adjust his aim, firing an arrow that would have struck the magnim center-mass if it hadn't suddenly jerked to the left, dodging the arrow as it came in. The beast was smaller and faster than any man Mathias had met but it was moving towards Karim now. Mathias lowered his bow slightly as he considered trying to impale the magnim with the earth around its feet again but a moment later he decided Kasoria would make better use of the ether. He knocked his arrow as everyone charged in to attack the little beast and his eyes scanned the ground around him for any flame that cropped up or escaped. The moment the magnim moved from the mass of knights and savaged charging at it (who Mathias did not want to risk shooting in the back), Mathias would try to put an arrow through it.

Status of the Battle

6 knights and 10 volunteers -1 Knight impaled, 1 Knight immolated, all volunteers combat ineffective
4 knights - 3x Strength, 5x Endurance
Kas & Mat - 3x Sight, 7x Focus

2 Fire Rams - Dead
1 Inferno Worm - Dead.
1 Magnim - Wounded, pissed, and powerful

Human Male

Transmutation Mage
Glowing Silver Hand Veins

“The archer is the true weapon; the bow is just a long piece of wood.”
~ Sebastien de Castell

[Praetorum]

Date: 23rd of Ymiden, Arc 720

Status: Exhausted

Weapons: Shield, Halberd

Armor: Platelike Leather

Current Magical Effects

Rune of Focus on head
Chained Runes of Strength/Endurance on limbs and tail
Taithir - Serpents Hood
Taithir - Nobility's Endurance

As the magnim stepped out of the flame, Prae's mind whirled, the focus rune on his brow working hard for its ether as Prae took in the situation. 



Their numbers: Two knights down, four scuffed up, but battle ready—Savior purred in smug satisfaction at the fact that three of the four were the ones he'd placed runes on earlier—while the volunteers were all injured, incapacitated, or visibly struggling, with three exceptions—Mathias, Karim, and Prae himself. 



The battlefield: All four knights out of position, the fight with their ram having drifted away from the magnim. Three struggling to their feet, one frantically spanning a crossbow. Mathias was scrambling for his longbow, and Karim was taking a knee for reasons Prae couldn't quite make out. The magnim turning to face the archer, perhaps suspecting that he was the one who had forced it to teleport. 



The fight: Prae had no idea what Karim was doing, but he was sure the man was doing something. The melee knights out of position were exhausted and in heavy plate; they would probably take some time to run back in their direction. That left just Prae to stand between Mathias, and the magnim glaring viciously at him. 



Prae was also out of position, having deliberately dragged his fight away from the others, but that was alright. 



The halberd vanished from Prae's grip, and was replaced with a quarterstaff. As the magnim took its first step towards Mathias, Prae started to spin his staff. 



Fire started to flicker along one end of the staff, while wind writhed along the other, and as the weapon started to pick up speed, both elements started leaving trails behind them—but only for a moment. Just as the magnim started at a run towards Mathias, each element began to collide with the trail left by the other, and as they did, both started to shift—the soft air grew sharp, and the red flames went blue, and then Praetorum was spinning a wheel of blue lightning, the awakening on his back beginning to crackle with static in response. 



Between his claws, the lightning grew and grew in a matter of heartbeats, until the moment the Magnim leaped high into the air, claws outstretched to rip Mathias from neck to navel—and Praetorum swung his staff as hard as he could. 



A bolt of lightning pierced the air, and slammed directly into the magnim's chest; a fraction of a moment later, Praetorum vanished, and reappeared along the path of the lightning bolt right in front of the magnim, staff still swinging with all the power Prae could muster.


The force of the blow slammed the creature down onto the ground below, and the wind pulled Prae down to follow, helping him land lightly as the magnim struggled to get to its feet. Whipping his tail at it, Prae grabbed one of its small legs, and a shadow emerged out of the tip of his tail to feed. The magnim felt nothing, and shot a fireball at Prae to force him to step away, but the damage was already done.

So fast, so yummy. Sap retreated back into Prae, and set to work beginning to digest its speed. Against a creature like this, every little advantage helped.

His quarterstaff smouldered where he'd hit the fiery creature, and Prae passed a hand over it, claws dampened with water. As he did, water started to flow over the whole length of the weapon, caressing it with the coolness of a lake in winter.
 He was on the verge of overstepping, he could tell, but still he pushed on. They had to end this thing here.


Behind the magnim, Prae could see Karim, still on one knee with his hands on the ground, and around him....


Ah. The fires were the key to the magnim's teleportation. It only made sense; Prae's ability was much the same, as he could only appear along the path of his own lightning. So Karim was cutting off its escape routes one by one; and he was halfway done too. Prae just needed to keep its attention a little longer.


An arrow sank into the magnim's shoulder, before immediately crumbling to ash in the flames, and Prae amended his thought. He and the others had to keep its attention a little longer. The knights seemed to realise they couldn't shoot the thing without risking friendly fire, and were moving in to fight up close, but their shields were wood and their armour torn—he couldn't let the magnim focus its fire on any one of them for too long. 



The creature shrieked in rage and pain, and tried to leap and Prae to claw at him, but it was barely half the size of his tower shield, and couldn't get through. Yet, every time it tried to turn away from him to claw at an attacking knight, a worse blow from the water caressed staff forced it to face him again. It was quick, and the knights only managed to land a few shallow blows, but they were successfully keeping it busy. And with each passing moment, more and more of the flames around them faded into nothing, until there was just one fire left, flickering temptingly a few feet away. 



Prae couldn't help but smile as Karim's plan became clear; a conventional tactic—leave an opponent only the path you wanted them to take—in a deeply unconventional way. 



Karim shouted, drawing the creatures attention, and Prae took a gamble, stepping back and beginning to gather lightning once more. This maneuver was more complicated, and Prae's head began to throb as he increased the amount of water caressing his staff, all the while weaving fire and air together into lightning. Once he did, the lightning began to gather to one end of the staff, and the water to the other, both rapidly draining Prae'd ether. The battle and all the magic he'd used in it was taking it's toll; he would have to end it here, or risk overstepping beyond what he could handle. 



The creature vanished, and Praetorum launched another bolt of lightning, this time past the fire. He didn't need to hit anything; he just need it to get where he wanted to be. 



The magnim reappeared directly into the path of two daggers; Praetorum appeared a moment later, staff still spinning. Only this time, instead of hitting the magnim with it, he launched the water gathered on his staff towards its chest.


If the creature screamed, it was muffled as the water enveloped its body, a fine shimmering layer of wet smothering the flames. It wasn't the killing blow Prae would have wanted—an immortal's flame was not so easily snuffed out—but it incapacitated the creature just long enough. 



The quarterstaff in Prae's hand turned once more into a halberd as he raised it above his head. And this time, when the weapon came down, slamming the magnim into the ground, it did not get up again.

Status of the Battle

Finished.

[Kasoria]

Some had said before that Kasoria fought like a man ready to die. As if he had some courage or iron in him that shook away the fear of dying in a fight. Even when the odds were stacked against him, through numbers or skill or just bad luck, he never seemed to quaver. They assumed it was some inner peace he might have found; maybe an acceptance that blood begat blood and one who lived by the sword, blah-blah-blah. Others speculated that perhaps the dour little killer secretly relished and yearned for death. That only in Crossing could he find the relief and judgement he secretly craved.

They were all wrong. Kasoria was never ready to die. He was, however, always ready to fight like a right bastard to stop it happening.

Looks to be one of those times.

Kasoria readied what ether he had left in him as the Magnim turned its literally fiery gaze on him. His daggers were molten, dripping trash now, trailing off it like quicksilver across a cooled blade. Puddles of steaming metal were left in its wake as it stalked towards him. The human hefted the ax from his back and tested its weight. His muscles ached from the exertion, the magic, the numbing hiss of overstepping promising to arrive shortly. His free hand was raised, and started to glow as he summoned his Abrogation Spark.

Painfully.

Two. Maybe three good hits. That's all it'll stop. Then you won't have any left. Make it count. Head. Limbs. Heart. And then-

The Magnim screeched anew as something huge and scaly materialized next to it. A gout of water engulfed it a moment later as the spinning staff held by the Ithecal emptied over him like a tsunami packed into a two-foot wide tube of air. Steam billowed from where it stood, hissing and burning the air, making Kasoria sweat even from feet away. He backpedaled swiftly, not questioning his luck. Admirably, the Ithecal had no interest in a duel or noble combat. While the Magnim was still flailing, his weapon changed in his claw, and when a halberd came down-

CRUNK

It was somewhere between a stump being chopped and a cow getting beheaded. Through the cloud of steam, Kasoria could see a brief flare of molten orange, as if the blazing innards of the monster were exposed to the world, halberd splitting it from shoulder to navel. The child-sized creature mewled pitiably, falling back and clawing at the sky-

Which was suddenly not there. Instead, four furious and merciless Knights were. So were their weapons.

Kasoria watched what followed. Steel and iron rose and fell and rose and fell. When they stopped, there was little left to identify the beast. A finger here. A rib there. A torso cleft and rent, scattered around and scorching the armor it was splattered on. But he swore that it was only after the thing was fully ripped in half and its heart crushed by a warhammer, that the light in its eyes finally died.

About time.

The Raggedy Man allowed himself to the luxury of an undignified slump to his knees. Fates, but he was fucking tired. Adrenaline as spent as his magic, exhaustion crashed into him like a body blow. He swayed for a moment then caught himself before he fell back. Iron will and brutal discipline snapping his eyes back open, shaking the sweat from his eyes. There were men wounded about him. All the vollies. Some of the Knights, and the others-

"Nice job."

That was all he said to the Ithecal. Inclining his head as he spoke it, eyes a-glitter with curiosity about such... interesting feats of magic. Something to chat about later, maybe. Mathias got a similar nod. Even shorter, curter, and with a scowl, of course. But he still looked the boy over to make sure he wasn't bleeding out or missing anything crucial. Once he was satisfied, "Karim" walked over to the nearest wounded volunteer. A farm boy with a rough beard (likely his first), trying to staunch the flow of blood from his battered chest with his hands.

"Well," the sellsword said as he laid out his healing kit. "This'll make a tale fer the kids, eh?"

"I d-d-don't have any-"

"Aye, s'a fuckin' expression, jus' hol' still, will yeh?"

[Avalon]

Review Rewards

Praetorium

Name: Praetorium

Points awarded: 15
Magic exp: 10

Knowledge:
Hone: Taking adjustment time into account
Taithir: Using Nobility's Endurance on a shield wall
Tactics x 3
Polearm x 3
Shield x 3

Renown: 10

Skill Review: All Skills used appropriate to level

Rune magic is such a different beast than the rest of the disciplines. You did a great job breaking it down so that a reader that might not understand it could follow along. The way you described the skills used was straight-forward and creative.

Mathias

Name: Mathias

Points awarded: 15
Magic exp: 10

Knowledge:
Mathias Knowledge: Ranged (Short Bow) x 4
Transmutation (Shapecraft) x 3
Transmutation (Pathway) x 1
Hone: Lucis runes can be written on other people
Tactics: If something is blocking your view, remove it

Renown: 10

Skill Review: All Skills used appropriate to level

Archery is an interesting (and hard) skill to write. You did a great job of making it realistic and how to use weapons/magic concurrently. It was fun to read his internal dialogue!

Kasoria

Name: Kasoria

Points awarded: 15
Magic exp: 10

Knowledge:
Deception: Using Dust Plumes to Hide Fieldcraft: Scouting Terrain
Hone: A Magic of Power Held in Runes
Hone: Vastly Increases Focus and Eyesight
Hone: Runes of Focus Can Speed Thinking, Both Mundane and Magical
Tactics: Using Abrogation Shields to Protect Comrades in Battle
Tactics: Maneuvering an Opponent Where You Want
Transmutation - Quality: Adamantite
Transmutation - Shapecraft: Transmuting Soil to Smother Flames

Non-skill knowledge:
Magnim: Monstrous Midget Fire Mage
PC Praetorum: Runic Mage

Renown: 10

Skill Review: All Skills used appropriate to level

The way you write the imagery in your posts is amazing! There was a lot going on and you did a wonderful job making it clear what was happening at each step. I could feel the pc's weariness at the beginning which was a great touch!

Loot: Flameborn bodies (Ewwww..)

Injuries/Overstepping: Lots of soreness (particularly Prae and Kas) as this was a tough battle. They should be used to that by this stage in their evolutions though.

Magic xp: (Note: Please remember to identify which magics for which pcs)

Notes:

Well done all! Combat is one of my favorite things to read and all three of you brought it in this thread. I appreciated the attention to detail that was present. There was a lot going on and each of you made sure to keep things clear and conscience so the reader could follow along. The overall tone of the thread was heavy (as combat usually is) but the moments of levity were great!

A wonderful read!

If you have any questions, comments, or concerns regarding this review, feel free to PM. Enjoy your rewards!

Avalon