The Syzygy The Syzygy: Rise of the Abyssal

[Ronja]

The Delta

Sand shifted, made malleable by water. But there was no joy in her victory, only pain, one made greater as she watched a stranger sink their teeth into the large creature’s flesh. The ashes in the vial about her neck shifted, like bristling with disgust, defying gravity.

“ No, no, no! “ She roared out, unable to watch, her forehead pressing against the sand. It felt cool like the underground, a kiss of the grave, making her realize she was burning. The snakes within kept biting, twisting and folding over each other, caught in a battle of all against all.

Exhausted, she fell on her back and stared at the great darkness above, feeling infinitely small. A blade of grass, a grain of sand, the pain all consuming like it would never end. Perhaps it never would, unless—

In a blink, something dawned. She needed to cut them out, release what so longed to be free. Hand shaking, she reached for her knife and brought it over her stomach. It’d be a great shame about her dress, but— She could get new ones, mend the hole.

Maybe make a little embroidery there, for memory. At least the knife was sharp, so the cut would not be frayed at the edges.

She grit her teeth and brought the blade down, straight for the pain. To her surprise there was no blood, just a rush of movement— a wriggling? Something was screaming and it wasn’t her. So she stabbed again.

 

[Dingo]

​

---

Spoiler: The Cortosi Coast

Aboard the V.A.S. Relentless

---

Down came the ax. On sailed the ship. Howl did the winds, to speed the Relentless along. Forward. The only way out was through.

So through the Abysall’s head went the ax. Snagged on the rubbery skin. Gripped by a flesh that turned to iron vice, then gave. Parted as clean as a fisher’s knife through a trout’s gut when the blade came to find the proper slip.

There was a crunch. Something like bone that thrummed through the Anirian steel. But the weapon came out the other end. Gore clung in the notch, as trophy snagged betwixt horrid beak.

The Abyssal lay in ruin at Ivan’s feat. A heap of rubbery mess. Second handle to the black water blade fell to the deck.

Turn, and crunch went the silver crab. But its dart of a mouth spat out. Stung the flesh. Its sharp pronged legs twitched and thrashed as the last of its life sloshed across the deck. Its parting gift, a spidery web of dark veins, that spread from where blood welled on Ivan’s hand.

The only way out was through.

The guardsman headed the call, as Lorain and those sailors made fast the Relentless. Its hull, battered, splintered, still held on as the great eye loomed larger and larger before them.

“The only way out!” one guardsman cried out. His axe cleaved through one of the Abyssal, a spear stuck him through the neck.

“Is through!” another cried hot on the heels as he lunged forward, mad as a rat with nowhere to run. The spear, still stuck in the last Anirian, still gripped by stubborn human hands, held tight the weapon as a cutlass sliced free tentacles.

The last Abyssal gazes wide against the ragged score of guardsmen. Where there was once a Dozen sons and daughters of Vel Anir, only a tattered handful remain. Glass eyed stares as the dead and reanimated lay about them.

The wind howls. The sea sprays. The great eye of the titanic kraken stares wide at all aboard the ship.

The only way out is through. The winds whisper to all who would hear it. The distance closes, and closes. The Relentless aims to ram through the great beast’s eye.

---

Aboard the V.A.S. Fearless

---

Below Deck, at the Hull Breach

---

Sunfire blooms across the Priest’s weapon. Its heat is near blinding to those eyes not used to such candescence. The gelatinous thing upon the floor writhes and gathers itself up. Undulates away, swifter than anything so slimy has the right to be.

What was once a gathered body of ooze, spirals and writhes in upon itself. Clinging to the hull walls. An arm snaps out, sticks to the ceiling, and the mass swings itself forward. All tendrils and lash. It goes for Yelva. The Anirian snarls, and winds her ax back with both hands, swings from low to high.

The thing splits in two and falls to the sides of the party there gathered. Sailors shout, and watch the masses with wide eye. One of them bounces forward with tendrils that whip snap about wrists. In a blink, the half-thing slips up the arm and spreads its horrid membrane across the man’s face. It pulses as he screams. Glugs to try and go down his throat.

Desperately he tries to rip it off.

“Burn it off him, Pretty-boy!” Yelva shouts with horror, hand tight about her axe.

The other half, lost in the shadows, gathers upon itself and crawls up along the walls. Slimes its way across the ceiling.

The sound of water splashing onto the floor in a gush. Something hard knocks heavy against the wood. A thing like bone and plate sits folded upon itself before the great beak.

Another gush of water. Another strange boney shape. Barnacled and covered in spines.

The first one unfolds. Rises as tall as those gathered round. Its three black eyes seem to take in the scene before it. One arm ends in a horrid crusher, the other, clawed and leggy. Black water spills from the seams of its organic plating. It raises its claw-like appendage, which opens like a toothed maw. A black fluid oozes there betwixt the two halves.

It snaps shut.

A black jet of water streams out from the long clamp. A black thread, as thin as silk, slices clean through one sailor unlucky enough to get caught. Cuts through the wooden wall behind him. He falls. A narrow line from which blood oozes fast dashed across his flesh.

---

Top Deck

---

“Keep them off the water line, sailors!” Lindis hollers over the churn of chaos.

Steady hands and disciplined bodies slowly beat back the flames.

With wrath, Lindis takes an ax to tentacles anchoring onto the railing. The writhe and shrivel and fall back into the sea as the Fearless cuts forward through the water. She glances over and seas the ugly thing still stuck to the hull of her ship. She grunts.

The forest of tentacles rises before them, and ships of Cortos fire their ballista off into the horizon.

Some bolts strike true. Splinters upon the monster’s flesh. It thrashes, and ships starboard ring their bells, turn away from the falling arm.

The great appendage breaks across the surface of the sea. Sets waves to swell the waters.

“Turn to Starboard!” Lindis calls as she fights herself up.

The command is echoed in report, but the ship turns slow. Slower than she should.

Lindis grunts. Grabs a rope, ties it fast about her waist, and is quicker than a fiddler crab’s as she works the knots. “Oy!” she calls out to the horned man with six eyes and four arms. “You, big ugly fucker!” she throws her line to him. “Secure my line!” without another word, she takes her harpoon, and hops over the railing. The slack of her line runs fast.

---

​

---

Spoiler: Virspoke

Death roils all around.

Those men and women of House Vexion stand as they can against the horrors. But mortal flesh has its limits. Those brought by the sea, borne of the brine, fight with tireless abandon.

One falls to the blade of a Vexion guard captain. Ser Belkian. Rips his hammer out from the dead creature’s skull, blood run down his own brow. His helmet lost in the crash.

A hedge mage manifests a gale of wind that blows down a score of foes. The guardsman push into the gaps. Slip blades through armor, half sword to better guide the blade, turn the weapon to smash with hilt and pommel like hammer blows.

But they did not see those things that rose from the wakes. Scuttlers and barnacles, washed onto the mud and made for the corpses. The Barnacles burrowed through bone. Spread their tendrils through flesh. Made the dead walk again

“Retreat!” Ser Belkian called out. “By ranks, guard the retreat, and give aid to the villagers!” the elven officer cried out. Though it pained him. He would do what he could to save those he could.

The Brineborne before Aderyn sees his skull split through. The sharp tool in the wrathful witch’s hands. Black ooze spills out from its fresh wound. Like blood. Like water. They slump, lifeless to the ground with a hard wet smack.

Other horrors skitter and scuttle about. One zigs and zags toward the witch, a silvery thing with too many legs and snapping claws. Larger and uglier than any cat you’ve ever seen.

The hulk of greyed flesh that barreled toward Arthur catches a spear in the knee. A shout and a growl from throat. Bone fails with pops, and ligaments rip apart with snaps. The Brineborne falls to the ground.

The red haired villager looks around, wide eyed. Finds Arthur, a harpoon still in her hand.

“You alright?” she asks, looks back to the clam-headed mass that works itself back up with some effort. Its helm, a bronze clam-mouthed thing, points its strange mouth back in Arthur’s direction. Sali pushes the youth back with one hand, and her feet follow fast. “Run!” she warns, but something shuffles toward her from the flank.

Slow and shambling. It looks like the old man who had spoken to Arthur on the ship.

---

​

---

Spoiler: The Delta

A symphony of gnashes and moans. Growls and screeches as the Madonna tries to whip itself about. Its many tendrils writhe and squirm as bits and pieces of her flesh are taken. Bit by bloody bit.

Her mouth, there amidst the churn of agony, opens wide and splays its countless teeth with a horrid scream. A thing that comes from down in its core. A thing that sets all to quiver and shock. The air itself turns electric.

Cynefin, so engorged with her, sees not but white in his eyes. Head full to explode. Stars burn bright in the back of the mind. The more you take. The more you give. The more you become one.

Insides squirm. Shift. Become more. New. Something swells deep down in the pit of your being. At the roots of your spine. It wants out.

Again. A cry that pierces out. A cry that comes from the Madonna’s throat as all her arms go rigid, as all her limbs thrash out. They buck at cynfin. Smack and scrape and try to tear him off.

The spear glints silver in the darkling night. Its head unveiled from the cloak of rippling sea.

For Cynefin: The Filthy, Hungry Child ​

A single word sinks into your mind.

"Hold."

For Ronja: The Witch Who Howls, Cries, and Shakes ​

The energy on the wind boils inside of you. Your body, your magicks, wind and whip about like countless strands of spider’s silk that anchor you to the horrible dance upon the shore.

Your knife cuts through the fabric.

Inside. A new life.

---

​

Spoiler: Malakath

On and on the silver mountain crawls. Onto the shore. The creatures, scuttle and plod, climb into the things head willingly.

The General brings his black dragon down onto the beach. It lands with a heavy thud, and he looks out to the gargantuan thing that goes on making its terrible way. Spewing its black cloud.

“Valimir!” He called out. “Ready for a rescue!” he cried. His dragon, still untouched by the billowing storm, watched as Nymbos discharged a bolt of breath towards their enemy.

Nothing. He laughed.

The other rider of the support squadron made to try and assist the rampaging blue. Their own Earendel looked half ready to snack at the blue’s neck as the blue thrashed about and snapped at anything that got too close. Its eyes still covered in the black tar of the smoke screen.

The beach nearly empty of the little creatures and their strange mounts, all hidden away, or retreated back into the silver thing, the mountain came to stop with a horrid whine. Smoke still billowed about its flanks. But through it all, one could still see its strange maw.

It seemed to glow. Ever open as the little creatures ran into it.

 

[Ivan Skender]

A short lull in the fight saw him examining his own hand. Dark veins sprang forth, from where that damned crab had bit him, in an unnatural web pattern. He remained unconcerned. Poisonous or no, it would be something any old healer should be able to fix easily.

"Well, except Perrine Urahil." - He thought. Useless as she was, the Proctor would, as likely as not, end up getting him killed over a minor wound.

His attention returned to the battle. The ship moved full-sail ahead, the wind carrying straight through to their destination.

The only way out is through, it seemed to say, as though it sought to grant them their blessing in this - most auspicious - of undertakings.

A stir grabbed his attention, and his gaze turned to that last remaining Abyssal on deck. He looked around at the very few countrymen that still stood with him.

- "Fall back!" - He ordered the few remaining Anirians that still remained with him. - "To the stern castle, fall back!" -

The kraken approached, their eerily-smooth sailing taking them right into the jaws the beast. The few last men remaining scattered throughout the main deck offered him a puzzled look.

- "Protect the helmsman." - He replied, without need of question, nor remark. - "Keep this ship steady!" - He tightened his grip on his axe.

- "Close ranks, grab a harpoon and shoot anything that comes onto our ship!" - He bellowed once again, before muttering to himself:

- "I'll deal with that last one." -

His weapon locked, and his stance tense, Ivan then charged at the Abyssal.


Dingo Edward Lorain​

 

[Jensen]

M A L A K A T H

"I'm never eating fish again," Jensen muttered to his dragon as they watched the scuttling crabs retreat back into the maw of what looked like the underside of a bloated, decaying whale. The tsonye dragon snorted a plume of smoke in agreement and shifted on the black sands. What had happened to the blue dragon had unnerved Valthor and whilst he had been full of courage to take on the crustations, the thing before them that could blind a dragon and disjoint their bonds was a whole different beast. Jensen was loathe to make his companion do anything he didn't want to, especially when he tended to share the sentiment, but leaving was not an option. That thing couldn't be allowed to exist.

"Perhaps if we set up a perimeter General?" Jensen nudged the green next to the much larger black dragon. He pointed towards the smoke and made a circling motion. "We could keep enough of a distance not to touch it, but if enough dragons flew fast enough around the smoke it might keep it contained and skyborne leaving the thing more open to attack."

 

[Jens]

Aboard V.A.S. Fearless

On instinct he turned to the Captain’s loud call, what with the rather literal nature of the moniker. He just about managed to snatch the end of the rope from the air afore it hit him square in the face, steps already fast approaching.

“ Yes, Captain. “ He responded, voice elevated despite the fact she was hardly listening, already harpoon in hand and going for the railing.

Well— Fuck.

On the floor, the line was escaping rapidly like a watersnake to the depths. There was no time to make it around the mast and Gods knew what she even planned to do, possibly needing all the slack she could get.

His eyes picked out a sturdy, yet unbroken part of the railing. Around it, he looped the end thrice, two hands keeping enough slack for a secure knot. Halfway into the task the rope became taut in a wild jerk, but the weight attached to it wasn’t anywhere near enough to pull him overboard, as per the Captain’s clever prediction. Why else—

Huffing a curse, he finished tying and turned, glaring across the deck at the ongoing fight. On the floor next to him, someone was dying, in their hand yet a sword. So he pried it out for himself, against the feeblest of resistance.

“ Sorry, mate. “

But also, not really.

---

Cliffsnotes:
- we just doing as the captain commands -- LIFELINE = SECURED.

 

[Faye Valimir]

M A L A K A T H

“Valimir!” He called out. “Ready for a rescue!” he cried.

Faye turned round to heed the call, looking between the General and the other medics that began setting up their gear.
To the medics, Faye handed them her supply of Ransa tears. It was hard to keep their own supplies in stock on the Wall, but Faye had her own means of obtaining them. Without another thought, she smiled grimly. "Pray we do not need use of these." The tears held healing properties, potent levels of it when not diluted or mixed into a salve.
On her person, Faye kept two vials. One was for herself, and the other for Cathán should they ever run into trouble. Valimir pivoted round, returning to her awaiting blind dragon who grew overwhelmed without his bonded rider's link top use her eyes to see. Faye soothed him with her voice before mounting up to the saddle, hands and voice guiding her dragon to obey her commands and get closer to the General.

"The riders I can help, but Cathán is too small to carry the weight of a single dragon. Unless you wish for me to begin treatment out there, I'm going to need assistance on the retrieval." Faye lifted a dark brow. She was not one to practice formalities, but the woman could not turn away at the idea of helping those in need.

And right now, they had a moment clear to help those that flew too close to the suffocating clouds from the anomaly.

Evirea Nymbos Jensen

 

[Ronja]

The Delta

Growling, all muscles taut against the ache within, she reached with both hands and dug into the tear at her middle. Beneath the scream and thrash of the ocean behemoth, the great struggle looming in the periphery of her attention, was but a slick twisting like that of eels.

It didn’t feel like eels, something sharp and solid in the midst. She yanked and something came loose, was released out along with a pressure. The movement of the thing in her hands became rapid as the firelight hit it, like lightning had been injected straight into the many tendrils. In a startled shriek she tossed the mass away as it begun clutching her wrists, ends of tentacles burning her skin, trying to bury a grip in.

There was a clatter, like a clam shooting open or crustacean turning inside out, followed by a call. The most hideous sound she had ever heard.

Breath held in her chest she swallowed the will to cry and wail, hands rubbing together in a feeble attempt to rid them of the sting. Blinking rapidly against the water in her eyes, she keeled hear head to take a good hard look at what yet shambled on the sand.

 

[Edward Lorain]

Cortosi Coast​

So, Edward had not expected his words to light a fire like it did. He supposed that the winds were helping him in that regard, but even so, the Dreadlords and Anirian sailors seemed a little battle crazy to him. They were insane...Ed could not help a small smile tug at his lips as the energy of the crew also drove him forward.

The gargantuan eye now loomed before, he could not see the reflection of himself or the boat, but instead, the eye felt like it was staring into his very soul and it made his knees weak. His instincts told him to run, to hide from this natural predator whose goal in life was that Edward Lorain would meet his end.

He wanted to buckle, but the wind at his back and the shouts of the crew kept him upright like strings being held by the maddest of puppeteers. At this moment he knew, it was not only the Kraken's eye upon them but all the eyes of the world were unknowingly watching this battle.

Ed gripped the wheel so tightly that he could feel his hands bleed from splinters, as he gritted his teeth in defiance.

"Brace!" He yelled as the ship flew above the waves towards its ultimate destination.

Dingo Ivan Skender

 

[Zara Soltanis]

Zara descends into the ship just in time to see the armored creature from the abyss. She bares her teeth at it as her opponent is set in her mind. She hefts the axe into her right hand as she stomps forward. The chaos around her was largely ignored.

Without any words or challenges, as she doubted such a monstrosity would care for her words, she charged the creature making an overhand swing as her free fist swiftly followed behind aimed for the thing's abdomen.

In the narrow confines below deck, some might be worried about using to much strength and damaging the ship even further. That was not Zara. The simplest way to stop the destruction of the ship was to kill this thing, and that meant using her full power to pulverize this thing.

A furious roar echoed within the ship asserting her dominance.

Dingo

 

[Aderyn Verchtegid]

Virspoke

---

The Brineborne that had attempted to kill Aderyn instead received the broken spar thrust up through its skull, splitting bone and flesh alike. It died with a final breath of ocean, rotting fish, and blood, speckling Aderyn's face with some droplets of its vital fluids.

Her heart was still racing, and her eyes darted around to see what was next as her enhanced strength left her at least for the moment. There were just so many of them, she had to run just like everyone else. She spotted some kind of silvery ... crab? Whatever it was, it was the size of a dog with myriad legs and claws that looked like they could rip her leg off if it got to her.

She turned to run as it scuttled toward her, slower than her only by virtue of its inability to charge directly at her. She leapt from the pier onto the beach, her ankles screaming at her to stop risking their wellbeing, and scrambled forward, scooping up a handful of sand as she did so. Her thumb rubbed anxiously on the worrystone, the well into her Fury beginning to open again, but instead of that, she tapped into something she had never done before.

There was in her a deep reservoir of Avarice, always being poured into by merchants and others who expected payments she could never afford or who simply wanted what she had against her will. She always negotiated, always talked them down and away from their intent on enriching themselves - it was a skill like any other as far as she had ever considered. But in so doing, she pulled their greed out of them, absorbing it and pushing it down having never felt a need for nor understood its use.

With the scuttling nightmare nearing as she sought to catch up with the others to the line of soldiers that already looked as though it would break, she threw the sand into the thing's face. At the same instant, the Avarice conjured long crystalline darts sharper than her makeshift club could have ever been. They released alongside and within the sand, the spikes seeking crab shell and flesh.

Dingo

 

[Arthur Wilde]

Virspoke

---

The pain Arthur was expecting never came. His face was shoved into the shoulder of the child he'd picked up as though their roles were reversed. When he looked up, he saw the creature fallen to the ground and the dull, red locks of a woman whose lips moved to talk to him. He could barely hear her voice. He definitely couldn't make out what she was saying. Arthur's ears were ringing. There hadn't been an explosion, but in all the stress his body was overloaded. Arthur simply nodded his head and rose from the ground. He hiked the child up in his arms, pressing them against his chest.

He looked back at the creature, watching as it stood. The spear was stuck in its leg, right above the knee, but it moved as though it wasn't affected in the slightest by its wound. It might as well not be a wound at all. Arthur groaned, his head hot and pounding. He regretted ever coming here. He wondered why it even mattered so much that he chase after a story at all. If he ever got home, he vowed never to see the outside of the Allirian Inner City walls ever again.

Then, he looked closer. He recognized the face under the shell, rotting and green. Yes. He'd just spoken to that man.

The thrumming in his head returned. His heartbeat strummed against his skull. The water was calling to him again. Arthur still had Aderyn's bag, but couldn't reach into it to find the crystal she'd given him before to calm his nerves.

No. He'd just have to keep running. He'd have to keep running and not look back at the sea.

 

[Farren Lóthlindor]

The Delta

The sudden onslaught of pain had been too great. And for what felt like an eternity, Farren blacked out. She floated in a place where she was detached from self and kin. There was no sound, there was no magic, and there was almost no light. None besides a pinprick of white light that lay, what she directionally assumed was, far below her.

But like a frayed string being forced through the eye of a needle, Farren could feel her conscience being relentlessly tugged towards it and had no strength to fight this force of nature. Inwardly, she fell. Spiraling so fast towards a pinpoint of light that some part of her was afraid she would be impaled from sheer velocity. Instead, Farren hit that light and screamed as it consumed her in a split second of blinding agony.

Farren had collapsed at some point, but startled awake when that scream carried through her vision and came out a harsh strangled cry from her lupine maw. Memories of the night flitted back. Friendship found at the edge of a campfire and a strange marine monster she could not fathom. Whining deeply in concern, limbs shook and ached as she attempted to stand on all four legs. A strange sound from behind her pulled her attention to the crumpled form of the orc woman she had just met. The scent of fear and pain accompanied the salty tang of tears.

The wolf stepped forward, but a strangely familiar weight on her head made her freeze. No. It can't be. But how? For giving an experimental shake of her head, she confirmed the weight of antlers growing from her skull. The same she sported when Farren took the form of a mighty elk. Yet here, two of her shapes had merged. Predator and prey. This had never happened before, it should have been impossible. And yet, Farren could feel and see her body with her own two eyes. This reality was true and these antlers were real. The only explanation she could think of was the eclipse. It had messed with her magic and trapped her in her wolf body. So why not also should the other parts of her shapeshifting go haywire as well?

She had little time to continue brooding over these new changes when a cry tore from Ronja and she tossed something from her body. An indescribable tentacular blob landing in the sand. Coated in slime and undulating perversely.

Even from only feet away, Farren could feel the wrongness in its form. It felt parasitic and hungry. A crime against nature herself.

Finding new strength in her outrage, Farren lunged forward with a snarl. Great ivory teeth snapping like daggers, tearing into this foreign creature. Ripping with tooth and claw, she ignored the taste of brine that flooded her mouth and burned her tongue. Gagging through blackened blood that was alien to her. Pieces lay scattered around her. And only when each of them stopped moving was the wolf satisfied.

Her sides heaved as blood dripped from her snout and her gray eyes bore challengingly into the sea.

Ronja

 

[Cynefin]

THE DELTA:

Hold.

He held.

Grasping with his fingers and lips and teeth. It was excruciating, holding back and holding on at the same time. On the precipice of yearning and distancing, Cynefin felt it then. Something else in him, something that was not him, something that was not her. Deep in his gut, back in the swirl of obscure monism, something cut through his noetic state.

The pain came back, a scream of agony ringing in between his ears. His blood, his kin, struggling away from an inhumane monster. A hand went to hold his lower gut, pressing reassuringly against the pale skin.

Feel my warmth. Feel my power. I will protect you. He promised. But it needed more, more than what Cynefin could provide. He breathed the Madonna of the Sea deep into his lungs, tangy salt and tannic brine. He couldn’t hold on, unfortunately, the little ones needed him.

The reborn was too slow, and with a whimper, he felt the string of oneness snap. Another painful kiss, all bruised lips and teeth, made to devour and claim. He’d protect his kin from these monsters, all he needed was a little more.

Ronja Farren Lóthlindor

 

[Dingo]

​

---

Aboard the V.A.S. Relentless

Wind filled the sails. Hulk that she was, the Relentless smashed through the break.

As the guard moved to the rear, stabbed crab and louse clean through with spear and cutlass. Hacked them down with axs, and beat them down with clubs.

Ivan charged forward. The Abyssal Lowered its spear, jabbed as it darted back. Fast and quick and sure footed as all the ship’s deck rose and fell and lurched free of the water.

But fury guides the young Dreadlord’s ax. Vengeance grants him strength, as the winds boil about him.

The only way out is through.

Lorraine’s call to brace comes clear across the ship.

What resolve had steeled the guards prior, leaves them hollow and empty as they see it. The great eye of the Kraken that stares back at them.

One man screams. Hot as he grasps his sword. A woman shouts fire as she throws her spear at it.

“Through!!!” A ragged throat cries out.

First went the bowsprit. Crack and thunder. The bow. The hull. Boards buckled, planks snapped and hissed splintered as all the ship rammed forth. Into the eye.

---

The Child of Kiva, Kalamek

The Great beast blinked. The chittering grind of carapace that was its mouth opened, and a horrid screech broke out across the water. It thrashed its great arms about. Churned the water to boiling froth as all the sky turned black. The Island lurched away.

Caused waves to crash and surge and spray in a maddening torrent.

It sank away. With slow pulses of its limbs that seemed to shift the currents of the bay itself, it left as suddenly as it had appeared.

---

Aboard the V.A.S. Fearless

---

Topdeck

---

Captain Luck grit her teeth as her lifeline came taut. Her feet braced against the slick side of her ship, and she held tight the spear in har hand as she stared down at the churn of the water. The whip of strange limbs, the shimmer of silvery flesh.

“Ugly fucking thing,” she cursed as she scanned the creature. Laughed. “Just a giant fucking squid?!” she cried out. Spat. The thing was large enough to eat her whole, she had no doubt of that.

Some part of it shined different than the rest. Looked round and wide as it caught the light of the fire against the darkening sky. She grunt, and threw down the spear.

A wave crashed against her. Set her feet to slip and her bones to bounce against the hull, pendulum stern to bow. She bit down hard as the momentum came to settle.

Gave a sharp whistle out. Hoped the big man would hear. “Spear!” she hollered out.

Then the kraken cried out. Set the whole sea to shift as it sank beneath the waves.

---

Below Deck

---

The ax swing comes down. The creature raises its strange claw. The steel beak bites down against the carapace of the armored appendage. A mighty fist pounds against the chitin shell of the creature.
Through bones and knuckles, you feel pain shoot up your arm. But you also feel cracks form in the outer shell.

The armored thing leaks black water from where the ax cracked down against its claw. It lets the axe glance away, stumbles back.

The second thing in armor stands tall, next to the first. It too has the strange claw. It too scans the room, and raises its weird weapon. The chitinous jaws open. Black water shimmers lightless and dense within its jagged teeth.

Ylva shouts as she brings her own ax down against the armored horror. Two handed, overhead. All her blow does is knock the armored thing back.

One of the sailors below deck tries to pry the strange gelatinous thing off of his crewmate’s face. The other half that crawled along the ceiling shrieks and dives down onto the crewmembers back.

---

​

---

The village of Virspoke

Greed. Avarice. The want to take at any cost. It rips through scuttling horrors that dadda-chum and dadda-chee to their last. Carapaces pierced through, split open. Their claws and legs scramble, snap and scratch at anything they can reach.

A soldier grasped betwixt crusher claws turned to horrid mess.

A villager grabbed and screaming, kicks and bashes at the claw that holds him down and pull at him with dismembering strength. Nonsense spewing from his mouth as pain wracked him and fibers threatened to pop.

A shout. A heavy shield comes down at the joint of the carapaced arm, Breaks the joint. Comes down again and again until the wet crunch of chitin splits and splinters. Viscera sprays about as the clawed limb falls to the mud.

“Can you walk?” Ser Belkian asks, helping the man up. He shakes his head, whimpers a silent no. Belkian grits his teeth.

His men hold back what they can, holding formation as they beat a retreat. Discipline, a thin and frayed chord that binds them.

But the day is lost. With the twin moons high upon the black sky, pitched in their eclipse. The day is lost.

Belkian sees the healer. Nods. Beats to retreat. Even as horrors drag fresh villagers back into the drink. Back into the depths.

A sound stirs the air. A blast. Low and primordial as thunder. A sound that shakes the bones and twists the insides. It came from the fog. It came from the deep.

Belkian clutches at his ears, half bent over. Weapon fallen to the ground.

It blasts again. That dreaded sound. Like the teeth of the sea itself gnashed and ground and wheezed through all the cracks.

A spire. Tall and narrow as a spear, pierces through the distant darkness. Pierces through the shrouds of mist. All can see it from shore, should they but look.

A tower that shimmers and shines, technicolor as it bends the mind. Tall as the towers of Alliria themselves. It shines and shimmers. Blurs into the black sky of the Syzygy. The twin moons, eclipsed, its crown.

---

​

---

The Delta

Slither and squirm, that thing did. Inside its new home. Slither and squirm, that thing did. Inside the new wolf. Farren.

Suckers, toothed, latched onto the walls within the dark beast’s gut. Chewed. Drank. Sapped at the great power of the moon eater. Took its magicks. As it slithered and squirmed inside its host. From one cocoon, to another.

Through those same great teeth that had gnashed and torn, reckless in their abandon. Sickness spewed forth. Life, come again. Wriggling with wrath. Full of a strength it so rightfully robbed. It screams. That same piercing song of its mother.

It robs the wolf of its strength.

For all the blood and brine that coated mouths. Toothed. Wet lipped. Run over with ichor and spattered by gore that steamed fresh. A foul sickness stirred within stomachs. Opened or closed. With mouths of red, and mouths of black. Mottled skins. Black furred. Pale as death.

But one held firm. One fought on. The Eldest Child of the Madonna. How he held.

Come the swift spear. Silvered lightning pierced through the great mother’s heart. So did her thrashing cease. So did her life spill unto the sands. Gushed in relief. Mixed with the surf. So did her strength pass on to that Son of hers that ate up all the love she had given. The Madonna writhed in the last throes of her life.

The pale form manifests from a shroud of shimmering mist. Black coated spear in hand.


A pulse in the eldest child’s mind. Cynefin. I follow you now, Of Royal Blood.

---

​

---

Upon the distant shores of Malakath

High Ascendant Draxton kept his sure cocked smirk crooked at the corner of his lip. “Emergency Measures, Valimir!” he shout out over the din of the raging wind. “You’re a rider of the Thunder!” he said, contempt at her caution hardly masked. “You and your Ransa have command of the medical team!” his grin widened, wicked as it was gleeful. “I trust you to figure it out,”

A sun dragon and a white dragon landed nearby. Their riders gave salute to the healer and they awaited her command.

Upon hearing Jensen’s tactic, General Draxton smiled all the more. His great black dragon, Carnifex, rumbled with shared delight. “We’ll need the big lungs for the attack,” he nod. “Riders of the Sixth!” The twin Reds bristled at the call. Spines fanned, and scales shimmered. Their riders on alert.

The Sixth Storm of the Thunder was a tested unit. Their dragons. survivors of old campaigns and many a skirmish.

While the winds were full of foul magic, and the air stank with the putridity of death and rot. Their training and discipline kept them solid.

“We will beat the winds about that beast, and funnel its putrid cloud around it!” Carnifex raised its tooth maw up, and let out a trumpeting challenge that shook the air.

The smaller reds snapped their jaws and thumped their tails as they flared their wings.

“Rain fire down upon this overgrown bottom feeder, as soon as the chance presents itself.” he cried with excitement. “To the skies!” the General cried out, and Carnifex set forth across the sands. Four legs tearing up the soft earth before the proud span of its massive wings splayed out, and beat the air beneath them.

With a lurch, a leap, and powerful strums, the proud gods of Malakath took to the midnight sky once more.

 

[Jensen]

Jensen ran a hand through his tussled curls as he watched the High Ascendant and the healer argue back and forth. Valthor dug his talons into the black sand then retracted them, mimicking Jensen's agitation. It was never wise to piss off the person who might very well end up being the one to patch you up. They'd never refuse to treat you - it wasn't a medics way - but they could make it hurt. They could make it hurt badly. He grimaced and rubbed at his arm unconsciously, reminded briefly of the day they had given up on saving Danika's arm.

He was almost relieved when he was given an order.

"Stay and help Valimir," the High Ascendant nodded towards the blind dragon and its rider. "Valthor can handle the weight of most of those dragons, don't let them hit the water." Jensen shared a grimace with the commander; neither of them wanted to see what would happen if that thing ate a dragon. The Lieutenant snapped off a smart salute then glanced to the healer.

"I'll bring the injured dragons to you, pray there won't be many," he'd seen too many battles to know there would never be none. With another nod he nudged the tsonye dragon into the air, after the Sixth.

 

[Faye Valimir]

M A L A K A T H

The High Ascendant's face had been etched into her mind, his name known to her, but it was his face she pictured with terror once Carlyle Arevalo catches wind of what was said to her. This little morsel of spite allowed the woman to stalk past and set her gaze to fallen riders and dragons. Oh, she will figure it herself, alright...

A plan was being made, as foretold in the slight indentations above her brows, scowling in thought as the Araelor male approached her and offered to be the one to fetch the dragons. Dark green eyes fixed him with doubt, but the stony expression fell away.

"Thank you." She replied simply. Perhaps he would have an easier time than a command of dragons retrieving the larger bodies.

Medics, and there were a number of them, had approached the glassblower, bidding her to remain here and allow others to go out for body retrieval.

Faye's lips twisted and skewed, unhappy that such a responsibility of being in command was placed upon her.

"Someone tell me the inventory we have." She barked out, turning around and heading back to the triage point.

 

[Edward Lorain]

Cortosi Coast​

Now was not the time to grow weak Edward.

He could hear the wind whisper in his ear, but it was somehow easy to hear even over the chaos around him. That was easy for her to say, the Kraken was not about to eat the winds. It was about to eat him.

There was a shaking of his legs that was only lessened when he felt the weight of his body lighten. It was that brief moment of weightlessness when the ship only barely touched the waves as it rose into the air. That moment seemed to pause as Edward wondered if this was what it was like the fly. Then came the application of gravity as his body slammed back to the deck.

A cacophony of snaps, crunches, and even a sickening wet squelch as he felt the ship buckle beneath him and then burst as it finally against the weight of its own attack against the creature.

Edward quickly felt that weightlessness only to realize he was being thrown forward, and then...

Darkness.

Dingo

 

[Ivan Skender]

Spoiler: OOC

So, as discussed with Dingo over discord, I decided to roll for magic, since it is very unreliable in this setting. As agreed, a 0 roll would be equivalent to nothing happening, while a 100 roll would be a catastrophically out-of-control bout of Ivan's decay magic going absolutely ham on everything around it, and, well... you can see for yourself below. Enjoy the fireworks!

A few blows exchanged. His axe cleaves, slashes and hacks back and forth as the deadly match between him and the accursed Abyssal unfolds. Usually the way the wind blows in combat was easy to determine for him.

Not so much now.

This time it is not so clear. As the two lock in combat, the balance of power is shaky, inscrutable as each of their fortunes seem to ebb-and-flow, with one going on the offensive, and the other unleashing a cutting sweep the moment after. Neither of them is backing down, for they know what will happen if they do.

Then, in a moment, it's over.

As the Relentless finally rams into the Kraken, he is swept-off his feet. He lands on the broken deck just in time to dodge the dark blade of the Abyssal, though as he rises to his feet, he is confronted by a distressing sight. He can only watch on as the seemingly thousands of sea creatures that inhabited the shell of the Kraken seemed to converge onto the Anirian vessel, now that the two had finally made contact.

- "Abandon ship!" - He bellows, his voice rising even above the thundering waters, and the raging beasts converging on their position. The rest of the Anirians, faced with the oncoming horde of foes, falls back. On their way out, they are sure to try and rouse Edward Lorain from his slumber, though should that fail, they would opt to jump in the water carrying him on their back.

Back on deck, Ivan turns to the oncoming onslaught. What could he even do against odds such as this? Alone against a legion? A lost Anirian boy facing off against the full wrath of the depths.

He took a deep breath.

"Come what may..."

He reaches for a small gem on his figure. Amos Savren's gem. The artifact seems to come alive when he holds it, it's purpose to imbue him with more power than he would have otherwise been able to wield.

A black aura appears around his right hand. He projects it forwards, expecting the usual beam of darkness to materialise. What springs forth is much more than that. A veritable storm of flames erupts, though this is not the usual blaze that comes with fire. It is dark in coloration, black and grey, and instead of emitting light, it seems as though it absorbs what little brightness there is left. The magic is gloomy, darker even than the raging waters below, or the blades of the Abyssal.

The arcane display settles, as it takes shape, surrounding the blonde as it starts to turn around him. It comes to resemble a black fog, as much as it does a conflagration, though it is clearly much deadlier than either. It expands, quickly corroding everything it touches in its path.

Its conjurer looks sanguine. He keeps projecting the charm, even as his gem's power starts to dwindle, fully bent on delivering unholy chastisement on this filth of the depths.

But then, pain.

The magic, unreliable as it was, and imbued with additional puissance by the gem, turns on Ivan. He feels his body being slowly eroded; his skin turning pale and dry, as veins pop here and there with the strain, a dark coloration about them. Slowly but surely he starts looking more and more like a corpse.

He tries to pull his arm back; to stop the spell until he comes to a horrifying realisation: he's no longer in control.

The magic rages, the black winds twisting and turning around him as they coalesce into a veritable tornado rising into the sky, corroding all in its path.

The Relentless is wiped out, its meagre wooden planks no match for the full might of the decay arcane. So too are some of the Anirian sailors too slow to escape the rapidly expanding magic, their dying cries of anguish echoing in the wind, as their flesh and bone are corroded away to oblivion. Such a gruesome fate is seemingly shared by the horde of sea creatures that had found its way to the Anirian vessel. Silver crabs, lice and all the other pests disappear from sight, beneath the unsurmountable tide of dark arcana coming towards them.

The magic continues to take its toll on Ivan too, as his body starts to feel the full strain of the unconquerable magic display.

Black veins spring forth from his arm, and underneath, he can fully feel it as his decay magic corrodes his own flesh. He lets out a cry - as much of pain, as of determination - as he fully focuses his power on the great eye in front of him.

The tornado wanes and waxes, corroding away the last bits of the Relentless, before the blonde's last bid for command turns it towards its target. He is not controlling the magic, but rather conducting it, shepherding it against his foe.

With what little energy he has left, with his vision clouded by pain and decay alike, he extends his right arm forth, directing the magic towards the colossal eye of the Kraken.

The dark hurricane bellows and turns, its shape now like that of a wave, facing off against the Kraken, and aimed for the kill.

Then it plunges, towards the heart of the beast.

Dingo​

 

[Ronja]

The Delta

A shape of midnight swept about, a great dark blur.

“ What — have you done. “

She couldn’t but stare, cheek resting on the sand, eyes like the glazed ones belongs to dolls. A newborn was torn, shredded, all to the tune of a mother’s wailing. It resonated through the skin and deep into the flesh, clutching a clawed hand around the heart, but the grip was lifeless. Slain.

In her body, she felt terribly still. The sand beneath her was cold, a little damp, something to sink into. Would it embrace her if she asked it to? Distant waves splashed, transmuted to salt dust that coated all. A strange peace was upon her as she turned her look up at the dark firmament. The edges of the wound burned, melting into a dull ache that had burrowed itself deep into the softness at her middle. Was this what apples felt like when a grub would consume their core, eating away at the sweet flesh.

The vial at her breast shifted, glinted with firelight. Ashes within rolled to one side, flattened like they meant to be closer. A loving touch, kept away by glass. Carefully she drew breath and realized she’d dug her fingers into the sand at her sides, clutching.

A grave. They’d need a grave. Nay—

“ The sea thy home— “ She started, hand reclaiming her knife and stabbing it into the ground. By it, she dragged herself to her side, teeth grit.

“ The water thy healing. The abyss thy grave. “ The fire yet burned, reflected from her eyes as she glared about. There wasn’t telling if anyone even understood, fey and wordless as they’d all appeared to her.

“ To the waves with the dead and dying. Bury us. “

Farren Lóthlindor Cynefin

 

[Farren Lóthlindor]

The Delta

Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrongwrongwrongwrongwrongwrong. The word chanted endlessly in Farren's mind, consuming her with blinding panic while white hot pain ripped through her gut. Her body felt frozen and out of her control. The sand shifting beneath her shaking legs. What was happening? What was this? What could she do, whatcouldshedowhatcouldshedo?!

Tremors racked her body and hot saliva dripped from Farren's maw, the whites of her eyes rolling as she began to heave. Sharp, stabbing, transformative pain creeped up her chest with her retching. It felt like something was crawling out of her, instead of her expelling it. And that fact alone had her desperate and scared.

If she could have spoken, Farren would have begged for a sword to give her mercy. Ronja's cryptic mutterings her only eulogy.

Instead, the wolf's gagging was serenaded by the primal dying shrieks of the Madonna. Her last screams echoed into an eerie silence that fell over the Delta.

With a final heave that used the last of her strength, Farren felt her throat coat in a viscous slime as a foreign clump of mass writhed its way up her throat. Searing her insides with the same burn of brine that she had suffered from only moments before. Small squirming tentacles began expelling from her yawning jaws, grabbing the edges of her mouth and slithering from the cocoon of Farren's body. Horror unlike any she had felt before washed over her in a cold wave as she felt this thing pull itself from her body and fall into the sand at her feet.

No. No. No. No. Nononononononononono. This wasn't real. This couldn't be real.

But it was. Oh gods, but it was. And that reality shook her. Shook her unlike anything she had faced before.

The cold of shock began to creep over her pelt and it was all Farren could do to wander listlessly to the fire and collapse next to it. The strength gone from her body. The light of the moons seeming so far from her grasp now. The normally bright lunar eyes of the sky, gone and replaced with an eclipsed emptiness. Like the dark sockets of a skull that leered back at her.

And she could feel that darkness beginning to fray her sanity.

Ronja

 

[Cynefin]

The Delta:

The final goodbye was hard to swallow, but Cynefin did his best, as if manners were needed in a situation such as this. There was nothing graceful about the Madonna of the Sea as she fell, nothing beautiful about the black that spread across her pale form like a inkwell had been knocked over, staining her like the night above them.

When the Eldest stood, confused by the warmth in his gut and the feeling in his heart that was so visceral and deadly, he was greeted by another. Also fair like the Mother, but built without her beauty. Cynefin eyed his spear, seeing more ink drip and spatter onto the thick, bleached fingers that held it.

He wiped his mouth delicately with his fingers, not realizing that all he had done was smear dirt and grime across his small, tender lips. His mouth had suddenly gone dry, his tongue heavy. His teeth felt sore and for a moment, the soreness became so intense that Cynefin considered pulling them all out, root and all, so his own blood could quench his thirst.

“Yes, you will.” The power was coursing through his veins, spreading from his blood to his wiry sinews and well-made bones. “There’s something we must do.” A hand once more was put protectively over his gut. “Those who dare mistreat us should pay. At the very least, they should be scolded.”

Ronja Farren Lóthlindor

 

[Dingo]

​

---

Aboard the V.A.S. Relentless

Beneath the midnight sky, before the twin moons, aligned, the winds of magick howl and whip as if let loose from ten thousand throats, and pushed out from ten thousand mouths. They howl.

Power. Unbridled and untamable. Strikes through the young initiate. Ivan’s body is a conduit so channeled, that every fiber of his coil gives what it can. Holds within it, all the voices of those ruined souls, lost to this sea. The gem betwixted his withered hand shatters to dust.

An armada of ruin. Of decay. Sets sail across the waves. Surges forth, black behind the beam as dark as the false night’s expanse. Billowing there betwixt the swells of wild magic. Shapes like ships. Like sailors, with swords drawn and fury high upon their rusted color.

All they touch turns undone. Crab. Louse. Abyssal. Turn to so much murk amidst the brackish.

All crash towards the beast. Towards the Kraken, whose eye had come shut, and whose mass began to surge away.

The wave connects. Each ship of the Ruin’s Doomed Fleet crashes against the living island, like wakes of the surf.

A cry pierces the sky. A calamitous thunder that shatters the mind.

But before any of the Relentless can see what came of the wicked spell, the sea itself swallows them up. Cold and uncaring. They fall into its depths. The Relentless is no more. The proud ship turned splinters and rotted lumber. Gave all it had for the cause.

The colossus dives beneath the waves in a surge. Having felt something like pain, the Child of Kiva makes away, with great surges of its arms to drown itself down into the sea’s fathomless embrace.

It’s eye, ever open. Half eaten away, the flesh about it, still hisses with the dark tongues of magic. Skin peeled and flesh thrashed. Already, it bubbles and seethes with the slow stitchings of new life, combating the corrosion of mortal magic supercharged by celestial event. But Kalamek staresthrough the darkness as it drifts further and further away.

For as great as the beast was. It was a hunter. And it would rather learn , than take needless risk.

Its weight pulls all those in the water down. Down. Down beneath the crushing weight of the sea.

Silverfish sail weightless beneath the drink. Their luminous golden eyes aglow as they hunt, and their large bodies, the size of small sloop, dart with alarming speed.

Their arms snatch up drowned sailors, and drag them into their maws.

---

Aboard the V.A.S. Fearless

Off the side of her ship, Captain Luck dangled like a piece of bait at the end of a line. The crash of waves, and the cry of the beast dazed her, while her line too-and-froed with the rhythms of the wrathful sea.

Be it claw, barnacle, or sheer bad luck, the line frayed. She could feel the rope pop, as strands gave way and the tension slacked.

“Oy!” she called out, trying to heave herself up. “Pull me-” the rope gave way, and Captain Luck went wide eyed, as she fell down toward the churn of sea and beast below.

The Fearless had lost her captain.

---

​

---

The eyeless night stares down upon those gathered on the shore. The stars whisper to one another, and the wyrd winds of magic stir.

Voices echo behind the skull. Visions plague the mind. Wolf and Witch, see visions of things far beneath the waves.

Silver mountains that crawl along the aphotic floor. A horrid growth upon one. A caldera, ready to burst. Deeper still the visions go as insides twist and blood and bile spill.

Beings like the Madonna. Beings like the spear bearer. Hundreds. Thousands. They ride within the mountains. Ships laden with strange life.

Life. Sickness. How the two mix in the sands.

The flames do little more than warm the skin. But it is the bones that feel cold. Like stone.

That thing, twice spat out, wriggles and writhes in the dark. It squirms, as it drags itself across the sands. A thing born from sheer chance. A manifestation of the celestial event. It crawls back to its mother. It crawls back to Ronja.

The spear bearer nods to the Eldest, and points its weapon toward the fire. His pale form shimmers with all the cold colors of the lapping sea. He is seemingly gone, though a phantasm stands where he stood. A thing that bends the darkness about it.

It skulks toward the flicker of fire.

---

​

---

The rider of the sun dragon takes stock. “Fresh water, an apothecary kit, and three vials of Ransa tears, ma’am!” the young man calls out.

His beast, a small and whip bodied thing, is laden with supply packs tied down to its saddle.

The white dragon turns its head toward the beached mountain. Its rider’s eyes narrowed as it looks on to the others of the Sixth Storm in flight.

With the powerful surge of wings, beating in choreographed unison, the dragons of the sixth twist the winds themselves. Turn the billowing black clouds of the huge creature’s strange smoke into a funnel.

High Ascendant Draxton laughs, wild with excitement from atop his dragon, Carnifex. “Loose fire at will!” He cries out, and signals with a pump of his hands and a cut of his fingers.

The reds waste no time in it. Red white flame sears forth. Splashes against the curtain of black, as if smashed against a wall. The flames fan out, flicker and splash into nothing.

Again, and again they let loose their breath. But the smoke disperses each blast.

Carnifex trumpets a cry, and rears back their horrible horned head. With a whip and a thrash, they let out a stream of green flame. It whips and turns,a shimmering serpent come coil around the twisted storm of ink.

There, in the mantle of the twister, comes an opening. A window through which the Crawling Mountain comes clear to Jensen and Valthor.

 

[Edward Lorain]

Cortosi Coast​

A punch to the gut brought Edward back. No, it wasn't a punch the chill and sudden impact of water had snapped him awake. It did not take long for Edward to realize where he was. It was dark, almost like his unconscious that he had just returned from, but this was the ocean.

That was enough to make him panic, he had no idea which way was up. The ship was surely gone if he found himself here, and the ocean was one of the places where the wind could not immediately reach him.

He had to force himself to try and stay calm. This wasn't the first time he had ended up overboard, but it was the first time he was overboard in the middle of abomination-infested waters.

Oh, and one other major problem. He had finally realized which way was up, and he was going in the opposite direction. Something was pulling him down. Edward swam with all of his might, but it felt like he wasn't making much progress. Then he saw a nearby body, it was the Dreadlord, and he was sinking much faster because of his armor. Edward would kill himself if he drowned from trying to save this guy, but he kicked off and let the pull bring him down level with Ivan. Then, with all of his might, he tried to swim towards the surface.

Dingo Ivan Skender

 

[Jensen]

Jensen let out a shaky breath when they were a safe distance away from the healer and ran a hand down his face.

"Why do I feel like we just escaped being marked?" he muttered to his dragon who rumbled his agreement. He'd heard of the blind dragon and his healer rider of course, but her husband carried far more weight on the Wall. His dragon's temper was only second to the beast Nyxondra who he had witnessed with his own eyes, eat a rider whole for scoffing at her rider. He had no doubts Mr Valimir would have done the same to Jensen if his wife had asked.

Valithor gave a quiet series of huffs his rider had come to learn was the beasts version of laughter.

The bonded pair reached the outer circle The Sixth had formed about the monster moments before they launched their fiery attack upon it. Jensen's fist clenched on the reins and he leaned forward, eyes narrowed against the heat and light as he tried to see what - if any - impact it might have. His hope guttered when the first strike seemed to do nothing.

"What is this thing.." he slammed his fist down upon the horn of his saddle. The tsonye's snarl echoed his frustration.

The Sixth drew back and then the blue dragon launched their deadly green flame. If this did nothing then...

"There!" Jensen cried both in his mind and aloud. Valithor spotted what his rider had a second later and with one shared thought they surged forward like an emerald spear, vanishing into the belly of the beast.

Belatedly, Jensen wondered who there was to catch his body should it fall.

 

[Faye Valimir]

Three vials of Tears? That and her own supply may not be enough. One vial was enough for a single rider, but several tears could be needed for a dragon. Faye did not let her worries etch into her face as she turned around to find this single apothecary kit.

"Supplies are on the way imminently, Lad--"

"No titles." She bit out. Faye was a glassblower; she knew where all her tools were kept, knew how to set up her workshop and prepare in the first stages of preparing her next work of art. Healing was the same to her.

The first few riders were now making their way in to the triage tent, another medic directing as Faye made a basic tonic that would give strength to the patients coming in.

"Riders are your responsibility. I will take lead on the dragons." She was not the first rider to have learned how to care for dragons by working on her own. Many were too apprehensive to deal with the colossal beasts they may come across, but Faye wondered the Wilds for her work for years without a dragon's protection. "If they can manage getting them out from there."

She turned to look in the far distance, teams working together to battle against the mountainous curiosity and attempts at approaching extraction of dragons they could get to.

"Look! Over there! A Ransa Dragon!"