Fate - First Reply Big Bloody Break

[Diaz]

Free City of Harkoth, South Western tip of Sheketh, at the mouth of the Ixchel Strait

Hits on Church assassins were rare.

After all. They were one big happy family. Brothers and sisters, all made to serve the Mother, and revere her. Guided by the teachings of her absolute darkness. The shadow that bound them all. That mended their fractured soul. Blessed their flesh, and made them whole again.

Diaz clicked his teeth. Let out long hot breath as he stared at the thing before him.

Father Lament. B Rank. His Menessis Lambskin coat in tatters. Slick still with the fresh blood of the kill he hacked, and hacked, and hacked at. Grabbed up a piece of stringy flesh, and opened his sharp toothed maw wide. A strange, hungry click echoed from his mouth as the wet strip of flesh steamed and dripped into his mouth.

Gnashing teeth tore at it. Bit by bloody bit.

Assassin Fredrich had expired with his eyes wide open. His chest was cracked and splayed, like a spatchcocked chicken. Broken ribs busted out like desperate fingers.

Diaz' hand went for his sword. His stomach turning and churning and rolling with a rabid hunger. He bared his teeth in snarl.

"Oh-," came a voice, layered in two. Three. As one. Bit of tattered flesh hung from the corner of the changed man's mouth. Father Lament's eye was wide and white and feral. He slurped down the meat. "Another- sweet- son- of- the- shadow- blood-," he dragged his heavy cleaver bladed sword across the stone of the alleyway.

With lurching steps, the thing turned to face him. Lament's frame loomed wide and half a head taller than Diaz. Steam swirled from his mouth. From the still warm corpse, and from those places so covered in Fredrich's ichor.

The thing that was Lament took in a deep breath through his nose. "Ah-," he smiled wide and sharp toothed. "Another- wolf-," he laughed. "Yes-, yes-, your- blood-, your- shadow-, they- have- the scent-," a satisfied rumble shook from his throat. "How- dark- and- bitter- it- will- taste-," Massive as he was, he burst forward with swing of chopping blade. ​

 

[Sannoru]

Sheketh, the accursed land.
Why have you kept going south, Sannoru of the thousand valleys?
And now see what you have witnessed!

Two emerald rings with a sheen rather wild peered from behind a block. Back against a wall, their owner glanced at the curious sight
So you heaeven't left? Why do you keep looking.
Does it remind you of something?

»How uncivilised, how careless, the world is your witness, « spoke the nocturnal elf, not stepping out just yet.

 

[Diaz]

Down came the blade, heavy swing behind it. The thick bone-cutting cleaver clattered against the flat of Diaz' long curved sword with a harsh CLANG. The shock shook him through his bones. Only his wolf's strength kept the weapon in his hands, his frame flex and tensed as he sprung back.

Breath shallow, sweat rolling down the side of his face. "Fuck," he cursed through gritted teeth, as the figure of Father Lament remained lurched over. Ragged breath pulled in an pushed out of his toothy maw.

Hunched and twisted, with beastial fur ripping through patches of pocked and tattered skin, the former Assassin, turned killer of kin. From beneath the wide brim of his menessis lambskin hat. "Tell- me , young eater , what is it , they tell you ?" his voices rumbled, whispered, whined all the same. He laughed in chuckling trail. "No , no , they don't , they don't . Obey , yes? Obey for Dear Mother's sake..."

How uncivilized, how careless, the world is your witness,

Diaz grit his teeth, held his blade strong in both hands as he re-raised his guard, knees bent as his feet readied to move. "He's mine!" he barked out, head thrashing, with the volume.

Father Lament's head snapped toward the sound of the newcomer's voice. A sharp breath drawn in through his nose that rumbled in his throat. "Another?" the strange figure raised its head and sniffed the air with a nose that looked half snout. "No... no... bloody , yes , strong ," he licked his long crooked teeth with a long twisted tongue. "Yes ," Lament's teeth clicked twice. "All are the shadow's witness , all the shadow's whisper..."

"What the fuck, are you even talking about?!" Diaz growl-shout as he dashed forward. Sword low like a tail behind him.

Lament's head turned. His strange white eye, lit with the moons' light, fixed onto the young assassin. His toothy maw spread wide as his body hunched down, legs bent with power as clawed fingers regripped the handle of his hatchet. He lurched forward, hatchet blade swung low to high in horizontal arc. It lopped a chunk of Diaz' shoulder muscle right off. Blood spurt and sprayed in a red mist.

A flash of sliver in a counter cut. Teeth grit as he drove the lopping blade down. Struck strange and changed bone. Father Lament howled, his thick arm still whole. His off hand raked at Diaz, as the young assassin tried to drive his sword down. Lament's claws gashed fresh wounds across Diaz' chest. Grabbed firm against his ribs and let claws dig in with pointed clutch.

Diaz bared his teeth and sunk them into Lament's neck. Thrashd his head as blood gushed through his teeth. His wounds, slowly sealed up. The flesh at his shoulder, slowly grew back. Diaz let his teeth come shut. Ripped out a hunk of meat and tossed it up into the air before he snatched it tween his teeth in blood snarl.

Lament howled, and ripped him off. Threw him hard against a cache of barrels and crates that smashed loud. The changed assassin breathed ragged. Laughed. "Good... yes... good... my blood... is your blood... your blood... is my blood..."

Diaz, face red, chewed down the hunk of flesh and passed it down his throat. He go up. Wiped his mouth off with the back of his wrist. His wounds healed faster.

Sannoru

 

[Sannoru]

Sannoru once more peered past the corner at the abomination ahead. Its grinding gnarling gutwrenching groaning felt like a tremor one so fine-tuned could feel it in his very own body. Thought the fellow, Diaz seemed no less a mirror to the beast. Though who wasn't shady in such a world?
A discrete motion already gripped at the handle of a blade with two misplaced prongs, what an unsightly device.
-
"All are the shadow's witness, all the shadow's whisper..."
...
"What the fuck, are you even talking about?!"
-
»Cares not for how much word spreads from the hidden onlookers I see« Sannoru remarked, still observing the conflict unfold. It was flurry of movement that was primal and raw in nature, a short exchange.., but perhaps, questions were to be asked later...
Sannoru, not unnerved came forth from the corner's distrusting shade. Hand tightly gripping that old sword of theirs.

»Deranged, one more than the other.«
The glance shot at Diaz, however, was amicable.

 

[Diaz]

Diaz growled. "What the fuck do you know?" he snapped. His teeth clicked to punctuate his question. "Deranged? And what are you?!" he shout. "Just fucking watching us," he spit some glob of blood that splat against the cobble-stone alleyway.

Father Lament laughed. Mulitchordal and strange. Sorrow mixed with joy, mixed with knowing. "Yes... Yes. Of the same blood. Yes. Of the same malady. The same... curse." he laughed. His flesh stitched together slowly. The soft rasp of organic fibers being restored, squelched and slipped wet together.

"I'm not like you!" Diaz shout.

Father Lament laughed all the more. "All the more. All the same." his frame bounced to a cruel rhythm. Unforgiving. Unconcerned. Understanding. The changed Lament dashed forward. A wake of air swirling mist behind him. Tinged red and dark, his cleavers sought flesh. Sought bone.

Sword flashed once, twice. Clangs, harsh and wailing. The metal at the point of breaking held together only just as his arm flexed and bled and hurt. He grit his teeth, absorbed another cut against his guard, his twin's sword there to bolster hid defense. The abysall shadow added its strength to his, a form, negative mirror of his own, crossed blades as the cleaver came down, and together they caught it. Turned it.

But the Father only laughed. Spun wild, cleaver axed across in cruel arc. Diaz and his shadow blocked, but were blown down to the ground with the force of the blow. He crashed against the stone, his twin fell with him. Crumpled in the wet piss and stink of the alleyway.

Sannoru

 

[Sannoru]

»Measure twice and you cut without mistakes« It was somewhat unclear if it was lined as a threat or an explanation for the gnarly situation, but by now it should've been a clear image of any aggressor, even though the supposed victim stank unsavoury.
They couldn't have been any closer than now though, as Thrashed San's way.

»Need a small shield, a little shine of light?«
One of the prongs of that blade of his scratched against the cobblestone in sparkling glory rather intently.
In just two strokes it was deliberate and clearly some kind of rune or letter of magical nature in the making.

 

[Diaz]

Diaz pushed himself up from ground, one hand still tight around the handle of his weapon, the other, stiff, fingers unresponsive.

He growled, as he got to his feet. Spit some copper tinged saliva from his mouth. His right wrist was bent wrong. Not swollen yet, but the pain was-

"Light?" He grunt. "You're going to use-"

A spark of light. A wash of gold.

His twin snarled and hissed and threatened to snap and slash at the stranger. But reason had it retreat, it his beneath Diaz, who hisses through his teeth and covered his eyes and turned away.

Father Lament howled in agony. Blinded by the brilliance.

Sannoru