[RP] Brimstone and Fire

[SpidaManz111]

Seria is standing in front of her ornate silver mirror. To her absolute horror, she notices a pimple on her cheek. She wonders if that had something to do with the nightmare about a curse she had....[Soooo. If you're going to curse the good ol' Empire, I need some more information on what is going on. Can someone of you responsible PM me things? What is the nature of the curse? Who enacts the curse? Is it a spell? A god? A demon? Cuz without that, I can't really imagine Seria being affected ]

[Mariana Xiechai]

Damn.

Evirea's eyes watered for a moment, before she adjusted to the little filtration mask on her face. Some blue way mage had given it to her for the purposes of lessening her chances of infection when dealing with the sick, but it was perfectly applicable for navigating a Well of the dead. Of course, if she were found out she'd get banned from the cities for it. All the more reason to be very very quiet.

Of course she'd already searched the sewers and the dungeons with Sarras, without much avail. In the back of her mind she'd presumed that the Well would be an ideal place; out of the way, and some half-rotted hands for Rigwyn to pick through like some kind of  macabre cleptopath. When the quirky, maimed dermorian had walked up to her and muttered that her severed knuckles had started glowing the night before, she'd known something was wrong. And the thought sat in the pit of her stomach like the foreboding of a flu.

There was of course the matter of the “demon” in Allena's head. After encountering the creature, Evirea knew that she couldn't trust it. Sure, being polite to its face was probably the smart thing, taking its advice like it was a saint also wise, just to make sure it didn't get all fire and brimstone inside the poor nolthrir's noggin'. But she'd been hesitant to actually try what the thing had told her, and when she did, the results were rather mixed. Tracing the runes the self-proclaimed demon Vallaar had shown her onto the girl's arm had at first seemed to help, then seemed to do nothing, then seemed to just make it worse. To top it off, it seemed almost to act in protection of the girl, though her experience with it had been negligible. It spun a convincing story. But then, she presumed that such a thing would be a talented liar with a silver tongue.

She hated mixed results. She hated uncertainty. She hated that she didn't know more about demons. Sure, she'd asked for some advice. Gone to Lonirod the Dakkruist and got a blessed axe out of the deal. Maybe it'd make a dent in the Unholy things, maybe not. There was no way of telling until she tried and by the time she tried she'd probably be good as dead.

And then Allena, of course, was an enigma all herself. It took a whole different kind of brutal abuse to make a girl that young mistake pain for pleasure. She had no doubt that she and Rigwyn were on the crux of setting up such a horrid relationship, and with all her motherliness she wasn't entirely sure she'd be able to prevent it or cut it short. Her influence over the girl probably only extended so far; in the end Allena would have to choose for herself to make the right decision, and Evirea wasn't really sure her sway would have the most power.

Pain. That was what Vallaar had told her the symbol on the back of the girl's hand meant. Pain. Pain unending, pain unyielding, pain insurmountable. It'd said there was no cure for that particular rune, and when she'd treated one of the other glyphs tattooed into the girl's skin, that was what the mark had become. But was it because the entity inside of her had tricked her? Or was it because she was so psychologically damaged it was having some kind of impact on the magic?

“I don't know!” She snapped, glaring into the darkness and holding her torch higher. “I don't know I don't know I don't fu...”

Something glinted ahead of her. She stalled, eyes widening, and then hastened towards the circle of crystals deeper in the tunnel's throat. It was exactly the sort of thing Rigwyn had placed on the tavern floor, when she and Chays had interrupted his summoning ritual. There was a bottle of quicksilver at its center, and strangely, a shield in the corner. She paid little attention to the other details as her mind erupted in frantic shouting, all voices vying for her attention at once.

What if Rigwyn had succeeded in summoning Bazaal? What if he'd used Allena to do it, and maimed her far worse than he had during his first torture?

Or was Allena even present at the ritual at all? But then, if she wasn't, why had she been gone from her guild hall, and now wouldn't answer any of the letters she sent?

What if the creature Rigwyn had brought forth was actually Vallaar? Could it be possible that the state the creature had referred to in Allena's head had been reversed, and it was now free?

Or had it all been some sort of elaborate con, and Bazaal and Vallaar were one in the same?

“I DON'T KNOW!” She screamed. So much for quiet. Her voice echoed down the tunnel, and she heard the disturbed shuffle of far off consumers, but none approached. Slipping to her knees, the klyros passed her fingers over the dirt at the center of the ring of crystals, tears stinging her eyes. Tears of hate.

“I'm sick of dealing with your sh**, Rigwyn,” she rasped. “I'm sick of your stupidity. I'm sick of you threatening everyone else with that pea of a thing between your ears you call a brain. And I'm sick of your deplorable insanity.”

Without realizing it, the klyros had pulled out the fine stilleto dagger that Rheos had crafted for her, stabbing the earth repeatedly with its blade. She did not consider herself to be a violent person. Yet at that moment, what flooded her veins was a fury so potent and vengeful that she had to fight the urge to vomit.

She wanted to kill him.

[SpidaManz111]

Seria sat in her cold cell, recalling the dream.... If only, if only. She let herself slack against the wall. She'd really take that pimple back in exchange for her condition.

[Roled]

Roled was worried. The experiment in which Allena had willingly participated, seemingly so benign, had gone unexpectedly, horridly wrong.  To be unable to pull her out of that trance was unnerving, then to be berated by that masked pickpocket Snitch added to his anxiety. When the elf had gone back to check on his experimental subject, she was gone. Vanished. No trace.

The Dermorian casually asked around for Allena for a day or two and then with more insistence for yet another day. Last night he had visited Kada Els only to run into a whole group discussing Allena's disappearance. A ywnwnn woman declared that Roled's Sister, Evirea, had offered a reward for finding Allena and the ywnwnn was determined to claim that prize. A sneering, offhandedly attractive Dermorian youth claimed to have argued with Allena two days before, an altercation confirmed by the barkeep. A young fenki said she had seen Allena just the day before at the Stonehead.  The conversation stopped when that petty thief the one who practiced scying and the Dark arts, stumbled into the tavern, bruised and beaten, and  declared that Evirea herself had been kidnapped!  Roled's passions rose and a clammy foreboding drenched him as the Dermorian thief described the klyros' kidnapping. So the group formed a rescue party, and grew in size as the searchers sent groffels and yulbars off entreating allies to join the hunt.

Clues were discovered with warnings of deliberate contagion planted in Evirea, meant apparently to infect the general populace. The rescuers took great care to cover their flesh, mask their breathing, and set out to try to find and free the kyros healer and their friend. Evirea was found, drugged and agitated, outside the portal into Ojaveda. She was brought back to the House Cheshire where the femros was released from the enchantments encasing her neck.  Even the thief played his part, calming the agitated Evirea. The rescuers had encircled Vire and cast powerful shields of Brown Way magicks to repel the Azure entrapment as the controlling necklace and chain were riven with great care by the Master smithy mage.  That particular evil gem shattered.

What was not shattered, Roled mused, was the plot itself, the abduction of his Sister Evirea. Why? By whom? Who was this Council referred to in the partially burned notes the would be rescuers had found? Why were they burned? And what of Allena? Were Allena's disappearance and Evirea's abduction related? Where was she?

"Poor young nolthrir," Roled thought as guilt seeped back in to fill his sleeplessness. She seemed so vulnerable and yet surprising. Roled remembered his shock as he watched her reverse the effects of magick spells cast, without using any glyphs. How was that possible?

Roled listened to the predawn sounds in the Cheshire Hall- the wheezing of the infected femros and the soft sleeping sounds of friends who had stayed to care for her.  Others had gone the night before to search for an antidote to whatever the vile green contagion might be that the scrying had revealed. He turned events over and over in his mind. Finally he prayed to Xiosia for insight and balance and for advice. A dark blue wisp surrounded Roled's chest and blended into the hall's own shadows.  The answer to that prayer appeared to the elf in an image, almost visceral. The stately form ghosted in his imagination, regal, strong, self contained, forceful.  "The Old Man," he thought, "The Great Mage. I will ask him. No one knows more, or has more insight than he. Aye."  Roled quickly wrote a parchment note in the near darkness. Another wisp arose from Roled's hands and Rusco materialized on the end of the bed wagging his stumpy tail sleepily. Roled scratched behind his ear for a moment then tucked the note into his collar. "To our friend" the elf said. Rusco sat up eagerly, then sprang off the bed and disappeared into the mist of not -yet -morning. Disappeared. Like Allena.

Where is she now?

Roled determined to find out.

[Sorry about the reportorial style of this but wanted to add another angle and spinoff plots in this terrifically complex role play. Thanks everyone for the fun last night. More to come I bet!]

[Candy]

A Diaboli with eagle talons in the place of hands dangled Ilase over a ledge of the Death Realm. Some thick, black substance boiled below him. Something he knew, in the way one just knows things in dreams, would cause his true death. The talons released their grip on his neck, and he fell, his back slapping against the ocean of poisonous gunk. He woke and tried to roll out of bed, his bruised back aching.

"What, are you some kind of do gooder or something?"

Rigwyn's voice rang through the Dermorian's head once more. Was he? He hadn't been sure if he'd wanted to carry out the madman's instructions. Perhaps that was why his only attempt had failed - maybe, subconsciously, he had wanted Evirea to warn the Nolthrir first. He wouldn't have to, now that both were apparently missing. He found himself worried about Allena - she was so young. He didn't take her for a criminal like him. It didn't mean she was any better than him, he reminded himself. Even if she was relatively innocent, she'd still become like all the others, breaking hearts for a cold piece of jewelry or a pocket full of trias. It happened to all of them eventually.

Evirea, though...he looked over her shivering silhouette as he left the infirmary. She was different. He had found himself leading the search party. He allowed people see him scry. He even let a man fling him violently to the ground, all for her. They were friends. How had he gotten this close to a woman? Was it that she was a klyros? Was that racist? Her race certainly factored into it whether he wanted it to or not, but it wasn't just that. He couldn't pinpoint it, but something about her genuinely made him want to become a better person. As quietly as he could, he snuck around the Cheshire Hall, preparing a salve for his bruises. He grimaced as he rubbed it into his back, tender flesh protesting even the gentlest touch. Vire couldn't see him like this; she had her own condition to worry about. Besides, they were only bruises, he hoped.

"I'm going soft because of Vire." The thought caused a guilty pang in his stomach. Guilt felt alien, like a serpent crawling through his innards and tangling them up. "I'll need some time away from her, once I'm certain she's in good hands."

[Cwyn]

Looking back, Cwyn was sure that the day he’d first laid eyes on Allena was the day his luck had finally left him. He had been new in Hydlaa, full of half-formed dreams of a new and better life; and she had been the first person in the city to show kindness to him.

Which is how he learned the very first, painful lesson of his new life: never trust a pretty girl. Falling for Allena’s charm and smiles had gotten him into assisting Rigwyn and ended with the diaboli burning and blistering by Cwyn’s hand.

Back in Hydlaa, Cwyn kept looking over his shoulders, staring at the shadows, straining his elvish eyes into alleyways, alert for a glimpse of either Allena or her frightening companion. The dark curses of a lunatic outside the Kada-Els as he pressed some circles into Cwyn’s hands convinced him that Rigwyn was only half a step behind him. But days went by without anything happening, then weeks, and finally Cwyn told himself that Rigwyn surely had bigger fish to fry than a skinny elf with a propensity for trouble.

And then Allena strolled back into Cwyn’s life.

He had been relaxing in his favourite spot in front of Kada-Els’s fire with some enki friends, with a full belly and a full mug of beer, when in she’d walked, casual as you please. An uneasy mixture of fear, anger, bitterness and a half-baked notion of heroism made Cwyn reckless enough to confront her. But his hopes to expose her fraudulence were brutally dashed, as the enkis gave Cwyn mistrustful looks and reproached him for his accusations. Pride stinging at having the tables turned on him and losing the loyalty of people he’d thought he could call friends, he slunk off to lick his wounded ego.

When he’d calmed down enough to realise that he’s been burning bridges he might need later, he went looking for Allena. She mistook his misguided attempt at protecting people he hold dear for extortion, but in the end her story came out: her alliance with Rigwyn was in the past. Doubtfully, Cwyn settled for an uneasy agreement: not quite friends yet, but not quite enemies anymore.

But then Allena went missing, and even in her absence found a way to make Cwyn’s life difficult. As he prematurely celebrated his diplomatic victory over the whole Allena-problem, an Ylian cornered him in the Kada-Els. She’d been hired by Allena’s friends, and had heard of the disagreement he’d had with the missing Nolthrir. Cwyn’s protestations that it had all been a misunderstanding fell on deaf ears. In Denora’s mind, it seemed, his guilt was clear. Cwyn still held some hope of deploying his charm and quick tongue against Denora, when a rather dashing Dermorian strutted into the tavern, immediately seizing control of the situation – and quite literally of Cwyn, too.

Probably misinterpreting the whole situation, Roled dragged him off on a hunt for Evirea. Maybe the impulsive elf had some idea to use Cwyn as guide, or a bargaining chip, or as a hostage to exchange. Something idiotic, certainly, but Cwyn wasn’t in a position to question his captor. After having his hands cuffed behind his back, being pushed ahead by Roled, having the temperamental elf force confessions out of him at swordspoint and a terrifying pterosaur ride – they finally found Evirea. An apology from Roled for his appalling behaviour set Cwyn on his way, back to Hydlaa.

Here he could’ve happily celebrated escaping with his hide intact, if it weren’t for Roled’s renewed suspicions interfering with his drinks. Somehow the passionate Dermorian was immune against Cwyn’s usual roguish charm. As he slunk off after another narrow escape from Roled’s quick temper, Cwyn really, really wish Allena would turn up soon.

Preferably before he run out of tricks.

[Rigwyn]

Into the Gateway

The iris-like portal had blackened and dilated wide enough to swallow him whole. He gasped in utter awe as he stared deep inside, completely forgetting about the dire and peculiar state of his elven collaborator. For so long, he had been haunted and aroused with wicked dreams that pushed him ever closer to discovering this portal to who-knows-where. It had become an obsession, and now here it was – close enough to taste and touch. He stood at the precipice – not quite knowing what to do next. “Go”, he thought, it was now or never.

He stepped inside and within seconds, his body and mind had faded away.

When he came too, he found himself cramped inside a horribly tight crate or a box. It was much too dark to see. His knees were painfully jammed between the walls and the sides of his head and his arms were strangely twisted and wrapped between his legs. He shouted for help as he struggled to nudge and rock this crate or box, but it was far too strong and oddly, it seemed to be tightening upon him as he fought. As the crushing pain of confinement grew, he heard two familiar dwarven voices cackling somewhere beneath his legs.

“Awe... tell him how to get out”, one chimed.

“No, let stupid figure it out for himself.”

“Oh, come on, you know he can't do that. Let's give Riggy a little hint, shall we?”

The first bald little shrew cackled as she held a long, sharp syringe in her stubby hands. The needle was rusted and quite thick, but it was well out of his sight, and perhaps for the better. The bald, dwarven mistress  pointed the tip at his rump and with a heave and a grunt, gave him a harsh stab.

Rigwyn yelped and jerked, but was unable to move. He shouted, “What are you witches doing down there?”

Amid a flutter of hysterical, sadistic laugher, they injected their foul brew into his flesh – discarding the syringe on the floor when done. They cackled as they hobbled away, “Poison the light, dumbass!”

His crate immediately began to grow – lessening the pressure on his back and folded legs, and before long, he was quite small and could clearly see the walls in which he was bound growing and stretching up around him. What was once a torturous little crate was now a great foyer with an archway leading forward, and a doorway behind. In the distance, the cackling of the two little women faded into silence.

Walking inside, he gazed at the trimmed ceilings and decorated walls. The floors were like a huge chess board, constructed of alternating black and gray marble tiles, and before him was a large, unusually blue carpet that just didn't seem to match. In the distance, a spiral stairway lead up and into the ceiling. The house was clearly crafted for someone a bit shorter than himself given the height of the archway he had passed, but perhaps a bit larger than a dwarf given the height of the steps before him.

Making his way up the spiral stairway, he came across a strange piece of material attached to the wall. Upon it was a symbol that resembled a curve like the letter “U”, but it was pinched and had a droplet type shape in the center. When he touched it, his hand was lightly burned. It was enough to make him recoil, but insufficient to deter him from his quest. Not having a right hand with which to squeeze and soothe the left, he gave it a little shake, and continued on his way.

A hallway lined with closed, wooden doors stretched far into the distance. As he walked in this strange place, with a terribly bewildered gaze, a memory suddenly flashed in his mind . He recalled the ritual that preceeded his entry into this terribly place. He saw Allena in agony upon the murky floor with two daggers in her chest as peals of argent lightning struck and jerked fragile form. He called out for the daemon, “Baazel”, who's name he had come to know, but there was no answer. The house it seemed, was abandoned aside from the various vines and floral growths that were carefully placed throughout this home.

Curious now about the many doors that lined the hall, he placed his palm upon one, then tested the polished brass knob. It turned with ease and the door glided open just a crack. Surprised, he leaned forward to listen, but heard nothing at all. There was only one thing left to do.

[Mariana Xiechai]

[Sounds super neat  ]

[Donari Tyndale]

[So first of all, I like what you guys did there. But please: dAEmons and dEmons are two entirely different things. Being American is no use for uhm....Percy Jacksoning (I'm using a synonym for the r*p* word here.)... Greek mythology. dAEmons are nice and friendly supernatural beings. I refuse to accept perverting that word to suit your sinister intents. dEmons, which are derived from the term dAEmon, a christian take on the old Greek philosophy, carry a negative connotation. I give you that. Using dAEmon instead of dEmon does however not: a) Make demons any bigger part of PS lore (I'm fine with that, though. PS Lore is way too narrow anyway.) b) Make things any more cool. c) Justify the ignorance of Greek mythology. d) Make anyone take this rant too seriously.]

[Rigwyn]

Demons actually are part of ps lore and don't really fit into either the christian or greek definitions. See kran history for an example. In the dark way spell definitions, you'll see the greek spelling, but the demons spoke about are more like monsters or supernatural enemies.

I agree, mixing the two spellings was sloppy on my part.

[verden]

I find this humorous as the ae was just an older way of writing the e sound. Technically speaking, daemon is an old and now incorrect way of spelling that word. We don't generally use the ae anymore in the modern era. But a demon was a very different thing to the classical Greeks, than what it means to us in modern times.

[Donari Tyndale]

Generally! Formulas<formulae. Also. I'm German. I love uebergroessentraeger And thank you for the information about the lore, Rigwyn. That wasn't there in my times (the good old days).

[Rigwyn]

Guess What's Behind Door #1

With a twist of the knob and a hesitant nudge, Rigwyn pushed the door open and stepped inside. Upon entering, the room had transformed. He found himself in a grassy field surrounded by tents. It was clearly Camp Banished, but there was something slightly different about it. It wasn't quite as he had remembered it.

Directly in front of him, a large, canvas tent stood and inside, there was a young, lithe Nolthrir woman  laying on her side atop a table. Her long, black hair spilled over her face, obscuring It from his view. It was clear by the sound of her wails and the cringing and tightening of her body, that she was in excruciating pain. Intrigued by her suffering, he approached to take a closer look.

As she convulsed in agony, she rolled onto her back and crossed her arms over her chest as she held her throat with her slender hands. Gasping and gagging, she turned her head to face him - allowing her hair to slip to the side. Allena's eyes were wide and glassy and her face was radiant, and drenched with ecstatic bliss.

Deeply disturbed and wanting to correct this anomaly, Rigwyn swiftly raised his hand and thrust it down to strike her, but his hand passed right though her, revealing her ethereal form. As he stood there in a state of confusion, a dismal figure which looked exactly like himself attacked her – first draining the very life force from her body, then filling her with magically induced fright. With each round of blood curdling screams, he repeated the process until she was limp and on the brink of death.

Realizing that it was just a vision or a dream, he got up and walked away, but the door through which he had entered was no longer there. He closed his eyes in confusion as he wondered how to get out, but in doing so, he became ever more disoriented. When he opened his eyes, he was back where he started – in a hallway full of closed, wooden doors.

[Rigwyn]

Flinch

Rigwyn tried a second door.

The knob was too hot to hold for more than a second or two. He quickly let go of it upon opening the door, then quietly walked into the dim, lamp-lit room. As his eyes adjusted, he noticed the towering mahogany book shelves that covered the walls, and a few pairs of leather seats with tarnished brass studs. They were conversationally placed, with a decorative plant in between. In the center of the room, a young child sat in a hard, straight-backed wooden chair before a cold, metal table with a book placed on top. Her hair was perfectly brushed, her clothes were impeccably neat and clean.

Alderan, an older, yet rugged man with an ugly face and pointed chin towered over the girl. Behind his thick, glass spectacles, a pair of sore, bloodshot eyes beamed at her with a brutal and unyielding force. In his swollen, chalky fist, he held a long, stiff riding crop with a narrow, leather head at the end - double stitched to prevent fraying. It was the type of striking instrument that one would use to beat a rivnak into a furious gallop or a mouthy slave into submission. In his other hand, he held a thick, leather-bound book -the type that an adult scholar might struggle to get through.

As Rigwyn approached, Alderan spoke to the child - quizzing her on the content of the book. With each correct answer she gave, he flipped though the pages and fired another question at her again. As they became progressively harder, her answers came out slower until he lashed out and struck her legs with the crop. The swoosh and slap alone made Rigwyn leap, then chuckle as he waited to see if she would cry, but Allena's eyes held no feeling other than emptiness and determination.

She kept her gaze fixed on Alderan, refusing to flinch or look the other way. It was a terribly unnatural reaction for a child of her age. She had the determination and coldness of a soldier, but somewhere deep inside, there had to be something soft, frail and warm - perhaps hiding within some corner of her soul.

Having marked her legs between the sock and the knee, he raised his text book again, licked his finger tip, and began to flip though the next few pages one by one as she waited eagerly to defy his expectations.

Knowing that this too was just another illusion or dream, Rigwyn walked away - leaving Alderan to his passionate work, and the young Allena to her miserable fate.

[Rigwyn]

Strangers in My House

As Rigwyn wandered further down the hall, he couldn't help wrestling with the visions beyond the two doors. Just as the house had a strange feeling or likeness to Allena, those two strange rooms were somehow specific to her life. He wondered just where this portal had lead, and why the nagging whispers and nightmares that lead him to this place. Why here? Why all the focus on Allena, and not on the demon and portal he sought.

Suspecting that the answer may lay deeper within, in some boarded up, forgotten doorway deep within this chasm of mind and magic, he began to shout and taunt whatever force had brought him here – tempting her or it to NOT to remember that dark, hidden chamber that he sought.

Instead, he was confronted by a tall, dark figure who casually folded his arms and leaned against the wall. It stared straight though him as if he was not there. His voice was swift and authoritative. His words were few, but terribly precise - leaving no room for equivocation or question.

The figure ordered Rigwyn to leave, but he refused, and when Rigwyn challenged him – calling him by name, and ordering him to obey, the figure grasped Rigwyn by his throat and lifted him two feet off the ground. His grasp was like that of a vice, but with a strange, paralysing effect. He shouted and bellowed at the clearly overpowered diaboli:

"Listen to me and listen carefully. I am NOT that monster Baazel. I am Vallaar and I helped put that monster away. I will not sit by and let him resurface. I --"

Rigwyn felt Vallaar's grip loosen and then fell to the ground as the demon's body collapsed to it's knees.  Behind it, another figure stood. This one was was strangely familiar. As Rigwyn stared with his mouth agape, he intuitively uttered the name “Baazel!”

Baazel's skin was pale and gaunt, his eyelids were affixed to his brow and cheek with large metal clamps that pierced his skin. It appeared to be preventing his eyes from closing. His teeth were disproportionately large, and his mouth was torn and bleeding at the corners as if from forcing his mouth open to scream. He turned his head to the two figures before him and said through a tooth grin, "I thought it was getting crowded in here."

With the twisting of his outstretched hand, Vallaar wailed with the force of an entire choir as his spine twisted and cracked, and his body twisted mercilessly upon the floor. Baazel laughed maniacally at his suffering before finishing him off, then turned his hateful gaze to Rigwyn.