Cough! Cough! ... Ahem! Samen does his best to disperse the cloud away.
"Thanks. I think?"
Samen will ready an attack for the next spawn that gets too close.
Wamblee's earth-shaking gambit pays off well - the spawn seem directionless now, hurling themselves toward whoever is nearest. They stumble and writhe on the unstable ground. Their clumsy movement makes it easy for Wamblee to pick off two of them with his whirling longspear.
Marianne picks off the other two trapped in Wamblee's heavy footprint.
Samen, your staff feels lighter, emptier in your grip. Regardless of the odd feeling, it still squashes the spawn that nearly got to you through the shifting rocks Wamblee created.
Samoon, you are distracted as you spray splinters of white light at the piles of tar in front of you. The last spawn slides up to you greasily, and reaches out a tendril of slimy filth.
Round 3...
The spawn begins to flatten and spread, like lard melted on a stove. There is no movement, except tiny ripples of echoed motion caused by the nearby quaking earth.
The touch of the spawn gives you one last bout of agony as a parting gift:
Marianne leaps down from the tree and rushes over to Samoon, graceful in her desperation. She pours water on the remaining traces of acid, and goes about bandaging the sores and burns.
Samoon sprawls in the earth, eyes unseeing.
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Samen considers electrocuting Samoon, but remembers that he doesn't have that particular affinity for elemental energy. Instead, he goes over the Samoon and lies on top of him, attempting to soak the acid into his own skin instead.
The acid absorbs into Samen's skin with a faint tingling sensation, like dead nerves. Samoon is still breathing, shallowly.
"Well, I'm not taking my eyes off our brother anytime soon - I'll take first watch." Marianne tries to make Samoon more comfortable, propping his head up with a bedroll. "Sleep well, and dream of better times."
"We all lived, a relief! I shall pace the area before rest."
Wamblee does a search of the perimeter, seeking traces of any darkspawn that held back.
He also takes the time to shake the filth from his spear tip.
You wake around bright--probably, as it is impossible to tell for certain with the Horns blocking Volcano--and the morning is wet and misty. Pine needles drip in the cold wetness, drinking deeply one last time before winter sets in.
Wamblee surv:
Samen surv:
Marianne suv:
Samoon suv:
None of you has ever been in this part of Forest before in your entire lives, but some instinct--or perhaps a snatch of knowledge from Root-- guides Wamblee to take a slight detour from the path. After a minute or less of walking, you come upon a tree with a small pile of freshly fallen leaves.
The size is deceptive - by the time you actually reach the tree, you see the leaves are wider than Wamblee's shoulders. Wordlessly, he picks up one of the leaves and places it upon his back, with the tip of the leaf acting as a hood. The waxy exterior works admirably well to keep the persistent drizzle off.
Samoon's eyes open with a start.
"I dreamed I was with Bree," he says. He totters, weak, still unwell.
After talking amongst yourselves, it turns out no one knows exactly where to go from here. Samoon took the Charcoal Desert--far south of here--to reach Light. Wamblee stayed exclusively at Root, and heard only snippets of news from the east trails. Marianne may have roamed a time or two to the very edges of Forest, but never this far. Samen would prefer to be in a quiet library, alone.
A moment of silence, of indecision.
Wamblee makes sure that the woven-branch armband, the spoils of battle, is still affixed to his arm, as he looks about, and then breaks the silence.
"I know not the way. I suggest that we *briefly* visit Branch to find a guide to Ceder Smoke, or anywhere else."
"Samen, is that thing that was pretending to be an air elemental gone? I haven't seen your staff glowing lately." She pops an acorn into her mouth, talking around it. "Or, you know, any bloated monster-els floating around."
Samen nods. "For now. It would seem that absorbing something out of Erret was of some benefit to her. She said she'd meet us again at the breathless valley, which she called a 'hyposphere'."
He pauses a bit before continuing, unsure whether it's worth bringing up. "She said there were other beasts of her ilk in our other artifacts. A 'witless turtle' in the crystal, 'arrogant light' in Samoon's thing, and a not-earth-based 'bruised ugly thing' in the woodcut. I could try to release them too, but it might be better to have a clearer idea what we're doing first."
Marianne, Wamblee, and Samoon take turns scouting. Marianne is completely at ease among the tall pillars of trees. She has a way with them, thanks to her faint trace of oread blood. Her sylphan grace allows her to jump and swing from branch to branch now and then. She whoops after landing a flip.
Samoon is reminded of his long treks through Forest during his years at Light. The trees' leaves here are decidedly broader and waxier, but the feel of the them is the same: ancient, well-spaced trunks; the spongy feel of fragrant fallen leaves; sparrows in the nearly-bare branches.
Wamblee lets his feet walk themselves - after all these years in Forest, he trusts them not to trip. He focuses his own attention downward, to the cracks, veins, and seams, caves, rock, and streams of the ground below. He hears the far, far distant rumblings of a herd of stone elephants, and advises his family to turn briefly northward, avoiding them entirely.
Marianne murmurs, "That woodcut must be quite something to be called an 'ugly thing' by that volcing soith."
"That creature's opinion on beauty might be quite different to ours.", muses Wamblee, as he feels the stone beneath his feet.
Marianne scoffs at you, looking for an argument. "Of course it's different. If that's what elementals are like, they're all monsters. Maybe you were right, Samen - we should destroy these things." Her tone is more bitter than angry now.
"We have one example, Mar.", Wamblee replies, patience in his tone.
"That is not enough to condemn them all."
Samen pipes in again. "'Monster' might not even be the right term. She definitely has a different sort method of determining right and wrong. She may be as alien to us as the dark is, but the speed with which we label 'monster' says more about us than those we label."
He takes a few more steps along the trail before continuing. "Of course, monster or not, we may need to kill them all if we want to survive. I just wish we knew why we were doing it more often."
Samoon takes a fizzy looking extract, then another, over breakfast.
"One more to spare, and a lesser healing extract to boot," he says, feeling his bruises and cuts knit and disappear. "Well, I'm somewhat better, but that was a close turn. Thank you, Marianne." He rubs his cheek a few more times, then looks at the surveying staff.
"Arrogant light, eh? Sounds like an avatar of the City of Light," he says with a trace of a smile. "These almost sound like other types of elementals. I'll do my best to communicate with mine. Perhaps it will be less, you know, capricious and murderous. I'll take that thing's low opinion of our other riders that they could be more helpful."
He twirls the staff, and thinks at it, eyeing it, attempting to sense the power in it.
"Perhaps there is something to this. After Samoon's attempt is finished, one way or the other, I will attempt to communicate with mine. But one at a time."
He watches Samoon carefully, for signs of...difference.
Samoon continues to peer at the narrow T-shaped staff, then does a double take and squints at Wamblee. "Are you...oh volcing Sky. Actually, not a bad idea, Wamblee. If I start acting like a psychopathic puff of wind, stake me down." He returns to the staff.
In Sylph, just a whisper in your mind,
"Tired. Fire too bright."
"How can I help? And who are you?" Samoon does his best to subvocalize in return.
He holds up a hand, deep in concentration.
"I used to be in Sky. A million tiny brothers and sisters, gems in Her crown. Take me to the place you call the breathless val ees. I can shine there."
Marianne patrols the perimeter of your camp and beyond while the brothers speak to relics and watch for insanity. Occasionally, she touches her beltpouch, then tightens her fist, as if remembering an old wound. "If any of you get killed due to this, I promise I'll go to the underworlds to bring you back, just so I can punch you in the face." Her left hand glows a celectric blue for a moment, then dies down.
Wamblee continues to look on, but seems less tense.
"I will attempt to commune with the elemental within my relic. I shall leave my weapons down, just in case."
Wamblee sits, cross-legged, the relic in his lap.
His eyes close and he focuses.
"...it's a Sky-thing. Not air, per se. Something that radiates energy. It wishes to go to the breathless valleys.
'Fire too bright.' The fire from Volcano? Something else, perhaps."
Samoon thinks. "We'll need protection from the lack of air there. We shall have to figure that out..."
Hooootaaaaaahhhhhh...
Within this one long, tumbling word, you see flashes of memories- Hotah as a younger elen, your mother by his side ; the ritual of secrecy he placed upon the relics ; the strong box clicking closed ; and the box clicking open again, but this time your watchful face.
Hooootahhhh nowwww....?
Samen watches his brothers communing, sighs, and sets down his pack. "Guess we're taking a break, huh? Fair enough."
He pulls out the wood carving and thinks at it in the way that Abby taught him. Abbigailiwy doesn't seem to like you very much. Any chance you can be less cryptic than she was about what we'll find in the breathless valleys?
Samen opens his Sight, but cautiously this time.
Death. Asphyxiation. Blindness. Cold. Death.
There is a dry, coughing laughter beneath the words, heavy like grave dirt shoveled onto a corpse.
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Samen drops the woodcut with a start, as if it were Dark itself. Malicious laughter echoes and resonates in his head like a mosquito in the ear. As is the way of elens, primal terror, ushered by pride, gives way to unbridled rage. He is filled with the desperate need to utterly destroy.
His heart races beyond what an Oread's should, matching tempo with the mocking laughter. He screams the choicest of High Ifritan curses at the woodcut... and then bursts into flames.
His wrath, interrupted by a flaming hiccup, gives way to sanity clawing at the edge of his mind. He's on fire. This fact requires certain higher order faculties to evaluate.
"Samen!!" Marianne sprints over and starts dumping water skins on you, which hiss and steam. The sound is actually quite loud so close to your ears.
Wamblee flicks his eyes open, his concentration now utterly fixed upon his floating, *FIERY* younger brother.
"SAMEN!!", he yells as he rises to his feet, the woodcut - for now - forgotten. He runs at Samen, fully intent on bringing him to the ground and putting out the fire.
Samen's higher order functions examine the situation, giving it the sober consideration it deserves before deferring to more primal instincts.
"AHHHHH!!!"
In his panic, in no particular direction, he begins running as if, well, as if his hair were on fire. And other important parts too.
After a few excruciating moments he realizes that while he feels warmer than normal, he is not in pain, nor is he being consumed by the flames. He tries to calm down and center himself. "uhh... I think... I'm okay?" He looks at his arms and hands, as if to convince himself.
A moment of head-shaking incredulity from Marianne, and, "Well then put yourself out and stop scaring us, you big dolt!"
Samen continues burning, but gets defensive. "I'm sorry! I can't help it! That thing is spiteful beyond understanding. It makes Abbygailiwy look like choir girl. It's sending us to the breathless valley to kill us."
Samoon remains transfixed by Samen's new appearance. "Well, flames may not work in an area devoid of air."
"Our lungs may not work in an area devoid of air." She turns back to Samen. "Did it say it was trying to kill you?"
Samen takes a breath and tries to quiet the flames down to a smolder. "No, not as such. I asked what waits for us at the valley, and it hatefully described our deaths in five or six different ways. What's worse was the laughter. It wants us dead. I mean all of us. Not just the four of us, but all elenity. If I thought destroying the physical object would do anything but release it, I would."
When Wamblee heard Samen calm down, he stops his rush.
"That was frightening to witness, Samen. And it sounds a spiteful thing. Be careful. But perhaps it let slip knowledge desoite itself. Did it say ought else?"
From the ground, the woodcut grins with four purple teeth - the same breathless valley smile it has shown you before.
Wamblee percep:
Samen percep:
Marianne percep:
Samoon percep:
Marianne and Wamblee sense a change in air pressure just a second before it hits, warning their siblings to cover their faces-
-a withering blast of rough grit envelopes small path you are all resting on. The sharp edges search out your eyes...
Wamblee fort:
Samen fort:
Marianne fort:
Samoon fort:
The dirt and dust linger in the air, making it hard to see. Between the four of you, you spot three of the things. They look like huge-eyed, pig-nosed bats mixed generously with pale, translucent maggots. Their xylophone ribs heave against emaciated stomachs as some last clods of dirt dribble from their betusked mouths. They giggle like hyenas from the branches.
Samen shields his eyes while still trying to get a look at the creatures. A sense of dread grips his heart as he recognizes them. "Those are demonic harbingers! Dust mephits. They're not strong, but it takes magic to hurt them. Strong earth or air effects should do the trick."
Samen slams his staff into the ground, vaulting him into the air. He moves up and close to the nearest mephit, ready to engage in aerial combat.