Dreadlords Two-legged Race (4.0 Dreadkids)

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Norah

Norah

Scrappy
Member
Where: Outer edge of woods surrounding academy
Who: 4.0 Initiates
What: Two-legged race
When: Sunrise

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A loud, booming voice began to speak from a small sending stone in the middle of a clearing where the initiates had been 'dropped off.' Drugged the night before, bound, and deposited in a field deep in the woods that surrounded the Academy. Some frowned upon these methods but Proctor Plunkard insisted they still fell in line with the new ways. Back in his day, the initiates would've been dropped off in a much more dangerous location with NO rations. At least they had a day's worth.

"GOOD MORNING INITIATES!! This is Proctor Plunkard. You should all be coming to," there was a sputtering on the other end as if he hadn't quite swallowed his coffee right. "HRRRMM. You SHOULD notice that you are magically bound to another student. Don't try to cut or otherwise get out of the line that holds you two together. It will only make the lead between you two smaller - in penalty for trying TO CHEAT. Your objective? WORK WITH your partner to get out of these woods and back to the Academy. You have two days. First pair of students to cross the finish line gets a prize. You may find some traps of obstacles along the way.

BWeehehehehe.

"And your weapons have been stripped but not your magic. Time to use that space between your eyeballs and your ears. GOOOOOOOD LUCK!"

Without further fanfare, the sending stone would still and suddenly dull, looking like an ordinary rock.

Norah's brown eyes slid open to a face full of grass still wet with the morning dew. Her head pounded from whatever drug they'd slipped into their food and drink the night before. Her wrists were bound in front of her and as she lifted her head and swept her gaze to those closest to her, so were everyone else's. The sun was just starting to peek over the Eastern treeline.

She found momentary comfort in the shadowy-darkness still lingering.

As her leg moved, she felt a tug toward someone else. Chin tilted toward who her partner would be in this kreckhole of a 'race.'
 
The bindings at her wrists were not nullifiers.

A triumphant smile graced her lips as this information was then confirmed by the booming voice that belonged to Proctor Plunkard. So rarely did the Proctors allow Vittoria off her leash and leave her to have complete control of her power of decimation.

The night before, a stern faced Proctor had asked for Vittoria to disarm all twelve knives on her person, concealed in rips in her skin and hidden form view. She was dutiful, slowly revealing fourteen blades hidden beneath her skin, and handed them over before turning in for bed. Waking up just now, it was evident they really had disarmed them all.

A magical tug led her gaze to peer over Norah, who stirred and began to groggily find her bearings. The smile on her lips turned to amusement, and in her ocean eyes turned green in this early hour, wickedness.

"Little Norah." She declared, voice soft. "How fortuitous that we are to work together."

The other Initiate was one of the few to balk at the fact Vittoria Larrainth had her attention on them. Like Grendel and King, Vittoria's oddness was no cause for concern. Good. She can work with this girl. "Are you going to win by my side?"

Other Initiates began to put distance between themselves and Larrainth, especially when she lifted her bound wrists and took in the view that lacked nullifiers. It was also for show, alerting her classmates that the formidable Initiate was unrestrained magically.

And they should watch themselves.
 
Fear gripped Runa's neck, choking her slowly, letting her lungs produce nothing but weak, shallow breaths. The ache in the back of her head told her she hadn't been dropped lightly on the forest floor, that there was no consideration where they had placed her. When she opened her eyes, the gnarled tree root beneath her had caused hazy black shapes to greet Roo. The mist felt heavy with earth and moss, mold, and stone. Shallow breaths did little to stop the mounting pressure at the base of her skull.

She moaned soft and feeble. It hurt. This dull pain radiated like a migraine but in the wrong place. Was she bleeding? There would at least be a bump the size of a peach seed that she'd have to be gentle with when washing her hair. Proctor Plunkard's words hardly registered as Runa slowly began sitting up gingerly, afraid she'd find she laid upon a fuzzy spider's home or maybe poison ivy. She shuddered, teeth clattering against each other, and it ricocheted back to that dull, throbbing pain.

Roo had to know if she was bleeding. She needed to see if she would bleed out to death. Fingers shook, breath hitching in her throat, clogged by that fear. What if she felt that warmth, wet and sticky? She gulped, or rather, tried to against that tight knot in her throat.

There was something around her wrist. Invisible but secure. For a moment, she forgot about the possibility of death, looking from her hand to the other she was connected to. She could breathe, the purple that had started to spread around her cheeks slowly dissipating into a cold pink.

"Am I... Am I bleeding?" She rasped to the poor soul paired with her, Runa the skittish, easier to spook than a cat out in an alley.
 
Cormund should have seen this coming.

His dreamless sleep was interrupted by the shouting of a sending stone. He opened his eyes and breathed in the humid air. He only had a moment of peace as per usual before the sights and sounds of the doomed flooded his senses. He took a moment to breathe, pushing the screaming to a subdued level and the horrible sights to the edges of his vision.

He saw a number of initiates around him, but 3 stuck out to him at the moment. Even before he really noticed the person he was tied to, he saw Vittoria. Without magical inhibitors. He winced at the idea of an unrestrained Vittoria, like a wild animal let loose. This Plunkard must not be very prone to doing his homework.

Attached to her was someone he saw every once in a while but whose name he never caught. His visions always acted strangely when looking at her. They seemed to focus on her various fates, pushing out other futures, and none of them were the mundane type of misfortune. All were pushed to the catastrophic extremes. It seemed as if she was horribly unlucky. Even Vittoria would have a hard time pushing through what it seemed this girl continuously endured.

The boy finally turned to his partner in this horrible exercise. He did know of Runa, even if only by hearing her name through the mouths of others. It didn't take a genius to see she had hurt her head from being dropped to the ground with such little regard.

"Uhh, not from what I can see. I-if you are it's probably not too bad. I think."

Cormund, not any braver, didn't want to look closer so he didn't have to break the news.
 
Most initiates would probably squirm at the weight of Vittoria Larrainth's gaze, feeling their mortality like a field mouse suddenly faced with an Obanese cat. Norah just held the taller girl's gaze. Unflinching. One predator to another. A tick of her jaw at little. A slow, feline blink at the question about winning.

Fingers brushed against a sharp rock. And with a swipe of muscle memory, as if she'd done it so many times before, she cut herself from the ropes binding her wrists. The magical tether tied around one ankle to Vittoria's was still there. And she knew better than to go against Proctor Plunkard's instructions. Though, she was seriously considering sprinkling some glass in his food later.

Brown eyes drifted to Vittoria's bound wrists as she pocketed the sharp rock.

The ropes were a joke, especially to Vittoria. And so was the 'no weapons.' Everyone knew they were the weapons. A quick look at the initiates that were still coming to. Those that hadn't already begun toward the path into the woods. Runa who still beat Norah by an inch in height. And Cormund Augur, plagued by seeing shit in the future.

"Let's go, Princess." A serpentine tone as she began walking toward the more difficult terrain. The woods and not the obvious path many others were scrambling up. Norah liked to think some of the initiates were scrambling away from both of them and not just Vittoria.

But in the end it didn't matter. A boon was a boon.
 
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Ysvain began to stir as Proctor Plunkard bellowed "GOOD MORNING INITIATES!!"

A raspy groan followed as Ysvain's eyes opened to see the Proctor yammering through the sending stone. He rubbed his eyes - dark circles having formed beneath them.

As Plunkard continued, Ysvain slowly got up and began dusting dirt off from his well-made tunic. He then spotted the pouch of rations before him, picked it up, examined the contents, then tied it to his hip.

A yawn followed and Ysvain stretched. When Plunkard finished his words, his eyes quickly scanned the scene to see his fellow Initiates and their partners. He then bent down to grab the ethereal chain around his ankle.

His eyes traced the "rope" back to his unwilling partners, who happened to be...
 
Panic had initially struck Yuric as he was roused from a drugged slumber by the shouts of an unfortunately named Proctor. The Initiate had only just gotten used to his lodgings in the academy, and now he awoke in a damp clearing in the middle of nowhere, his mind cloudy with the aftereffects of whatever sedative they'd used on him.

It felt far too familiar to him, the cold and wet earth; Yuric knew how it felt to be buried underneath, knew the weight of the dirt as you slept beneath the surface. Well, perhaps he didn't know these sensations, but those around him did, the specters and apparitions of the beyond realm, the world of spirit.

For a time, Yuric merely stared up at the sky from his back, allowing himself to calm from his initial shock and concern. He'd known there would be tests, he could not afford to fall into a fetter over a mere change of scenery. Plunkard had laid out orders, and now they were to be followed.

Raising a hand and rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Yuric sat up allowed a small yawn to escape him as he looked around at some of the others who'd been dumped here. Vittoria and Norah, Cormund and Runa... His deep blue gaze fell next to the one he'd been forcibly paired with, a young blonde-haired fellow already up on his feet and preparing.

"Ysvain. Perhaps my luck hasn't run afoul after all." Yuric chuckled as he too climbed to his feet and stretched. A flicker of blue light shone behind his eyes as he closed some of the distance between them, raising a hand in greeting. "Truly, I feared I may end up with Larrainth."
 
Bound wrists were proven to be useless when her potent magic made quick work of undoing the knots that were made to keep her incapacitated. It gave her opportunity to show her classmates how easy it was for her to be out of her confines, just like she would force nullifying cuffs past her dainty hands in order to access her full power. But if given enough time to study the runes, to feel and identify the magic they were charged with, she could undo all that with frightening ease.

She did not speak as she got up to follow Norah, curious of their tether for this such occasion, but Vittoria was glad to have been paired with someone that understood drive. Her patience would wear thin if she had to work alongside the likes of Cormund. Or even put up with the presence of the Urahil boy.

"Foolish of them to follow each other like sheep." She noted, jutting her chin and staring in the direction the rest of their class had gone with haste. An easier path, nonetheless, but one she could only assume would be riddled with obstacles and tests so early in their trek to the finish line. Vittoria was happy to allow Norah the first direction of their race, perhaps in order to closely examine the other Initiate she rarely bothered to get to know. She knew she was made of sturdier things than those she loved to play and toy with, like Sabrina.

"I must know, Norah. Are we here to win or are we seeking to revel in playing antagonist?" Either option appealed to Larrainth.

Norah
 
Runa breathed in deep. A new proctor, one who practiced kindness instead of violence, had told her that whenever she felt like she was going to have a panic attack, she should breathe deeply instead of in a particular fashion. There were other things the proctor said, such as identifying the stressor and changing her thought patterns from creating a cycle of fear because of fear, to being proactive and--

But it just wasn't working. Runa knew the stressor: possibly having a bloody gash the size of her fist, which would lead to her bleeding out and dying. Cormund wasn't strong enough to carry her corpse through these woods, even if Runa's frame was delicate and petite and made up of nothing more than little, lithe muscles and tiny, brittle bones. She was going to die, right here and right now, in one of the most pathetic ways possible. He'd cut off her ankle to run away, but no one had any knives on them, so he'd have to get creative.

Would he use a rock, and could he have the knowledge to sharpen a rock in such a way that it could chop instead of stab? No, it was Cormund; he probably didn't have that knowledge, so how would he undo their tie? There was only one possibility, only one way he could manage it on his own without help (because everyone knew that no one would help Cormund because no one helped anyone here without getting something in return, and besides, what could Cormund offer other than Runa's still warm, lifeless body?) He'd have to chew her ankle off.

"Do you have good teeth?" Runa asked in a voice that came in and out, her psychic powers already taking effect in the unusual way they did when her panic attacks were coming on. Her face was blurry and melting, one side of her mouth drooping too low to be normal, and an eyebrow constantly rising up until it was well past her forehead. A surrealistic painting with long, heavy brush strokes and maybe too much water was how her face looked, but Runa felt fine. Minus the panic attack.

She tried to continue with her stupid, useless breathing exercise, thinking how her sisters would never know that an initiate would have to tear through flesh and bone with his teeth. They would think she died heroically, maybe saving a child locked in a tower by an evil warlock. Would it be better if they knew the truth?

Her hand started its journey once again, Runa preparing to feel blood and also preparing for her dying wish. Shaky fingers brushed past her dark hair to find the wound. Runa winced-- though it didn't look as such, her face so distorted at this point-- feeling where it hurt the most. She drew her hand back, needing to check and ensure that what she felt was real.

"Oh." Her fingers came back dry. Immediately, her face returned to normal and she looked at Cormund, partially sheepish mixed with relief. "I'm fine. You should've told me that I wasn't going to die." She wasn't cross with him for not saying anything, but wouldn't he have gotten some sort of foresight about chewing her ankle off or not? Maybe he was still under the drug's haze. "Anyways," She went to get up, wrists still bound but at least without blood. "I guess we should get rid of our restraints first."

Cormund Augur
 
Teal eyes blinked in stupefaction.

"Good teeth? I-uh..."

Cormund rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms, unsure if he was hallucinating from the heavy drugs he was given. For a bit all he saw was his ever present visions on the inside of his eyelids, and when he opened them, Runa's once distorted face was normal again. Huh... really must have been his mind. His lips tightened in an awkward expression between confusion, annoyance and embarrassment. If she was talking about his curse, it's clear she was misinformed as to how it worked. If she was talking about how bad he was at observing what was in front of him, then she was sadly spot on. He decided he would explain just in case.

"I cant... I can't tell if people aren't going to die, only if they are. Or if something else bad is going to occur. And it's not like I'm always right, in fact I'm usually not." Cormund chuckled, recalling something. "Like just last week, I think it was you who I had a vision of a cow falling on top of. Straight from the sky! Funny, right?" His laugh petered out. It was funny, right? Maybe not.

The raven haired boy stood up with his partner, finding himself about the same height. He nodded at her comment on the restraints, having a moment of realization.

"Ah! That's why you asked about my teeth! Uhm, I don't know if they're good enough to get through our bindings, but I can try."

Cormund gnawed for a second, but made little progress, spitting out bits and pieces. He saw Norah use a rock, and thought that might be a better way of getting out, following suit. The boy picked up a whole rock and cracked it against another, splitting it into two sharp halves. He dropped one and used the other to cut open his own restraints before his partner's.

"There we are." He pivoted left and right, seeing only trees and mist. "Now we just need to figure out where the academy is from here. Y-you're a psychic, right? Can you telepathize--telekenesize--float us up there? So we can see the academy? Please?"

Runa Eidolon
 
Ysvain's eyes spotted Yuric as the one at the other end of the ethereal rope. A smile formed on his face as Yuric stood up and greeted Ysvain by word and with an attempted a handshake.

In response, Ysvain gave a by-the-book standard Dreadlord salute to his comrade instead of shaking Yuric's hand. Or at least, as awkward of one as possible with his wrists still bound.

"Initiate Yuric!" he beamed, "By my honor, I'll ensure we pass this trial!"

At her mention, Ysvain glanced over toward Vittoria (and Norah).

"Hmm," he hummed as he saw Larrainth use magic to remove the binds.

Turning his gaze back to Yuric, Ysvain asked, "How's your navigating skills?"

Plunkard neglected to tell anyone the way back to the Academy.

The smell of rain began to fill the air around Ysvain. And burning grass...
 
Norah paused in her light-footed gate. The field from whence they'd come was just visible behind the branches of the wood behind them. She could hear the students scurrying up the path to their left. A glance at her partner.

"Dealer's choice?" Norah flipped a silvered coin through the air toward Vittoria. How it had gotten into the girl's hands so fast or where it came from at all was a mystery.

"Who would you want to target?"

A quiet question even as screaming began from their left. Plunkard's first traps sprung.
 
Yuric's outstretched hand awkwardly shifted to match Ysvain's salute. He truly was an odd one, for an Urahil; He had always been told that their family consisted of cold-blooded perfectionists, the type who would stop at nothing and spare no one to achieve their goals.

Contrary-wise, Ysvain seemed proper and polite. In fact, he was almost excessively by-the-books in how he carried himself. Not that Yuric would ever hold such a thing against him.

"I'm certain we'll have success, so long as we both remain vigilant." He agreed, looking down at the strange magical link binding them together. Yuric tested it with a gentle tug, curious as to the flexibility and tension of an ethereal bond like this one. Following Urahil's gaze, he watched as Vittoria quickly subverted the challenge, with all the smugness she'd become known for. "Tch. She still doesn't understand the point of these trials. It's a shame."

There was no time to worry about Larrainth though. The challenge had begun, and every second he wasted was one stolen from his partner. Looking back to Ysvain, he nodded.

"I can consult with the spirits of these woods. They can guide us through safely, so long as I can reach them."

Ysvain Urahil
 
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Vittoria let out a laugh born from delight, and such a sound would sound melodic if it were not drowned by the bloodcurdling scream. Her eyes flashed, smile turned wicked, and she contemplated on the words Norah asked her.
Norah said:
"Who would you want to target?"
Click to expand...

"I think it best to test the mettle of the Urahil boy and whoever is unfortunate enough to be bound to be his partner." But Larrainth already walked past Norah, her accomplice in what is to come. "Perhaps we give them a moment to acquaint with one another and build trust, and then choose our moment later one."

They had two days to make it back to the Academy. There was going to be times they needed to seek shelter, to earn their meal, and perhaps gain enough movement through this woodland to watch their classmates and determine their fates. It was clear the straight and narrow path would be riddled with traps, perhaps even a few laid out in the roads less travelled, but Vittoria had her uses if anything particularly tricky came upon them both.

Norah
 
"What our peers do has no effect on us, Initiate Yuric!" Ysvain exclaimed.

He said despite the plot developing between Norah and Vittoria Larrainth.

Ysvain then hissed as he suddenly separated his once bound arms. At his feet dropped the smoldering bit of rope that once wrapped around his wrists. He rubbed the palms of his hands with a wince on his face - as if he just got singed.

The smell of rain around the lightning wielding Ysvain began to dissipate.

"With those spirits and my might, we may be first in this trial, then!" Ysvain excitely told Yuric.

Looking around, Ysvain began walking in a seemingly random direction away from Yuric as he asked, "Which way then?!"
 
A cow? Instinctively, she looked up at the sky, half expecting to see a cow falling from the sky. If a cow were flying about above them, no initiate would be able to see it. The interlocking branches were heavy, with green vines trapesing about darker evergreen branches and leaves. She closed her eyes tightly, turning her head from Cormund as he cut through her bonds. When she opened one eye to inspect if she had been cut despite not feeling the stone against her skin, she breathed another sigh of relief.

She got to her feet, a hand pressed against her forehand. She had to take a step back to rebalance herself before she could look around at their bleak situation. Runa shook her head, immediately regretting the action as it made her feel dizzy all over again.

"I could try." She offered meekly, thinking that Cormund couldn't weigh much more than her. "But my magic gets a little... weird, sometimes." Roo looked away from the other initiate's face. It would be very likely that she wouldn't be able to get him up high enough, but even if she could do that, bringing him back down safely would be another issue. "How about we try climbing a tree first? If I can get some eggs, I could make something for us-- like a dragon or a griffin!"

Cormund Augur
 
The screaming beyond the hill began to die off. Whether it was end of life or they'd gotten out of their first shock of misery was anyone's guess. Norah's sharp eyes studied Vitt.

"Runa would be a sure bet." It would be a safer option. That girl could barely stand a gust of wind. And Yuric would fold as soon as a pretty girl flirted with him. Could she convince Vitt to put her lips where it counted?

"Maybe you could flirt with Ysvain," Norah made the suggestion like it was as ordinary as drinking water.
 
Yuric felt himself wince as Ysvain too broke his bindings with little effort. Yuric followed suit, simply causing the bindings to vanish into nothing as he sent them through the veil. Ysvain's optimism was contagious, but he knew better than to assume their classmates would not attempt to impede their progress. Runa and Cormund weren't likely to cause them many issues, but Vittoria and Norah...

He didn't know Norah that well, but she seemed to get along well enough with Vitt.

Still, he smiled at the Urahil's words, nodding along with his boisterous proclamations.

"You're right. We'll accomplish nothing by worrying about our opposition. Not yet anyways." Yuric agreed, looking down at the bindings on his own wrists. "Give me a moment, Ysvain. I'll have our bearings shortly." His partner could supply plenty of morale, but it was up to him to pull the weight he'd promised.

Closing his eyes tightly, Yuric shut out all of the sounds and sensations around him, the voices of his peers, the feel of the breeze on his flesh, and the tug of the binding between him and Ysvain were all lost as he closed himself off from the world.

With a cold chill that danced along his spine like rolling ice, he felt his body cross through the invisible threshold into the realm beyond, and opened his eyes to a forest much like the one he just stood in, enshrouded in a blue haze. The glowing effigies of a family of deer quickly looked his way startled as they fled deeper into the brush. He felt the tiny tickle of insects at his feet, scurrying from the interloper from the living land.

Glitter-Bugs, lost souls that had barely had a chance to be. Yuric was careful not to step on any of them as he walked forward, mindful of the link with Ysvain as he slowly scanned the clearing for any spirits who could guide him. He need only follow the pull of his still-beating heart...

There, hopping across the grass, a little white rabbit with an exceptional light. No ordinary animal, certainly. Something more. A memory. Yuric grinned, dropping to his knees and patting his lap. "Hello, little light." The rabbit quickly turned his head, his ears sticking up straight. "My friend and I need to leave the forest, and get back to the city. Can you help us?"

The rabbit paused, almost as if contemplating the request. Quietly, the furry ball turned and hopped off, down a narrow path overgrown with bushes and weeds.

Smiling ear to ear, Yuric pulled himself back through the curtain, though Ysvain would have seen him there the whole time, seemingly speaking to nothing. He stood and tugged on the link between the two of them gently.

"This way, through the brush."
 
"Maybe you could flirt with Ysvain."

Vittoria threw Norah a quizzical look, something so rare of an expression that only the likes of her best friend King and the Proctor have seen once or twice before. Her lip curled in a way that showed she was not entirely sold on the plan, and the longer she mulled on it, her brows furrowed.

"I think I would rather take on Eidolon and her partner."

She had never gone down the path of leaning into her pretty features to get what she wanted, nor attempted flattery to make others see her way. It was not the way she was taught, that the need to be loved would only cause her to think herself weak. Even King knew this, as they were an alliance first, friends second.

"You can flirt if you wish. Not that I think it is a wonderful plan."
 
Cormund thought for a moment. So she could use eggs to make things, huh? He tugged on their mutual bindings pointedly as he spoke.

"Walking is already hard enough with these things. I don't know if we could shimmy up a tree with them without losing too much time. T-that's not to mention the possible head injuries if we fell."

He took a quick look at his visions, but nothing relevant was showing up at the moment. He'd have to figure things out for himself. Maybe there was something closer to the ground? As Cormund's eyes scanned the dirt, they widened slightly seeing the small hole. It looked like a nest of some sort.

The raven haired boy moved to kneel down and reach his hand deep inside, feeling a sharp sting as he did. He quickly pulled his hand out, with a snake latched on between his thumb and forefinger. After a bit of shaking it off and not a minor amount of whimpering he threw it into the forest.

"Gods I hope that thing wasn't poisonous"

He reached in the hole once more and pulled out a clutch of snake eggs, holding them out to Runa.

"Will these work okay?"


Runa Eidolon
 
They were lucky that Cormund had taken action, going to retrieve eggs and being bitten because of it. If it had been Runa, the process would have been far more arduous and perhaps dangerous, for she squealed when seeing the snake. She reeled back Cormund then, holding her clasped hands close to her chest as if the snake were going to sink its fangs into her next. She didn't relax until Cormund tossed it deep into the wood.

Eyes darted here and there. Outside, there would be so many things hiding and crawling around. Centipedes and spiders, rodents and snakes. She eyed the snake eggs proffered, having to give that a second and then a third look to ensure there wasn't a snake or poisonous worm that would get her right as she took an egg.

She held the egg between her thumb and forefinger gently, twisting her wrist this way and that as she inspected it. She smiled, feeling the pulse of life, the beginning of a cycle. This brought on the question of

"What should I create?" She asked Cormund, a glimmer in her dark eyes. "A dragon? A pegasus? A harpy? Something that could fly, right?" She looked up above them, thoughtful. "But if it has delicate wings, then it wouldn't be able to break through all those branches. Something by foot, something fast like a cheetah or a racehorse...." She trailed off, looking at the various paths that had been taken. The loose stones, tight and gnarled roots, and tightly woven vines and trees were already hiding where other initiates had gone.

"But not too big." Roo turned back to Cormund. "I guess something more simple couldn't hurt. Maybe... a goat? Or a hare?"

Cormund Augur
 
As Cormund heard his options, his head spun a little. There were plenty of things that could potentially go wrong, as he always knew, but he also knew that if every eventuality is dwelled on it would drive one crazy.

He looked at the little egg that Runa held. Was there really that much potential in such a little thing? If they really could become anything, they were incredibly valuable to this pair. Cormund quickly pocketed them before thinking about their best option with the one they had out at the moment.

"Well, what about a bear? Maybe a black bear so it isn't too large, but it should still be strong enough to carry both of us while it climbs. If you've ever seen one of them they're also pretty fast and good for this terrain. I get a lot of visions of people being chased down and mauled by them."

Cormund patted the pocket with the rest of the snake eggs in it, smiling in an attempt to stay positive.

"Worst case we can always try again... heh"

That was a lie, the worst case was them falling from the 100 foot tree and breaking their necks, but he wasn't about to tell Runa that.

Runa Eidolon
 
She blinked. A bear?

“So you want something with claws… and teeth… and lots of muscle?” She bit her lower lip, brows creasing together as she imagined a black bear. Sure, she could make it small, but… would it stay small? Her creations always had a strange way of evolving into something more… and it usually ended up bigger, stronger and more terrifying than it was before.

“Are you able to kill a black bear?” Runa pressed. “Because I can assure you, I absolutely cannot.” As an initiate, she should be able to— many in her class could. But without weapons, and with her magic that wavered between fickle and all out unpredictable, Runa couldn’t promise that she could. This wasn’t going to be any sort of black bear, it was going to be a black bear she created with magic.

And as everyone knows, magic has a cost. A cost that might be paid in the future, just as Cormund suggested— they could be the ones to next be chased and mauled.

Cormund Augur
 
"Wha-Why would we have to kill it? Is it going to turn against us or something?" Cormund reached for his knives before quickly remembering they were gone. " Uhm... maybe if I had my knives on me, but I don't think so otherwise."

The Doomsayer thought hard. They needed something that could carry them to the treetops confidently, but apparently not too vicious. All of a sudden he was struck with an idea.

"Oh! What about a monkey? A big one that could carry both of us. Or an ape if you can't change the size. The orange ones with the big faces...Orangutans! They're usually pretty gentle. I think."

He looked to the top of the thick layer of leaves above them. It was their best way to get a bearing on the situation. He was confident of that at least.

Runa Eidolon
 
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