Fidem In Discrimen (Poison)

[Eridanus]

Faith and doubt both are needed not as antagonists but working side by side to take us around the unknown curve - Lillian Smith Day 8, Spring of 512 AV Just before nightfall Within visible distance of Alvadas The screams of the wounded and the dying could still be heard even this far out away from the city, amplified by the constant leaking of wild djed mixed with the intangible material that was the illusion of the city. Various monsters, wildland creatures deformed and twisted by this potent mix trampled the area, either turning on themselves or besieging the city with one unified hive mind. Eridanus had heeded the city's call for help and lent his brains and brawn to the defense of the city. Somehow, the abominations that formed the monstrous army invading Alvadas seemed to be much more intelligent, as if they were acting under something under command. A volunteer group made out of adventurers had been dispatched to gather more intelligence on the invading army, but had not yet returned. He had taken it upon himself to seek them out, and he had indeed found them in shallow grove within visible distance from Alvadas but mostly out of line of sight due to the jutting rocky protrusions from the craggy cliff wall that spanned most of the Unforgiving. The group had been ambushed by a band of djed augmented creatures and everyone was slain except two. Breathing jaggedly, they had been hanging on to a thread of life that might go any time soon. With Dira's shadow breathing on his neck, he had no choice but to release a magical flare issued to him by various Silencer lieutenants that acted as centers of authority for the civilian militia. A group of more experienced combatants would be dispatched to him, knowing that he found the scouts but were in trouble. However, it also meant that the monsters would be attracted to him. He had attended to their wounds as best as he could with the first-aid tools that one of them carried. It also helped that the one who was carrying the bandages was competent in emergency medicine and had, at great exertion to himself, instructed Eridanus on the proper way to dress their wounds before fainting. The ethaefal glanced back at the unconscious duo and sighed, flicking dark blue blood from his blades. Kicking the corpse that looked like an amalgam between horned goat and rabbit off his blade, Eridanus glanced around warily for any other monsters drawn to the area. The strategic location of this place meant that there was only a single funnel for entrance, but it also meant that it only had a single escape point. He knew that his comrades were coming, but the only problem was time. Setting his jaw determinedly, he spotted another movement in the shrubbery ahead, raising his blades in a dual wield stance modified from the highly brutal but effective Suvan Swordsmanship style. Regardless of fatigue, these people's lives were in his hands. He would protect them till the end if he had to.

[Poison]

Thick, grey clouds raced across the sky, a sign that rain or a thunderstorm would come soon. The sun could barely be seen. Everything was cast in a kind of twilight. While the day had started pleasantly enough, with the first signs of spring, the temperature had decreased rapidly as dusk approached. There was something in the air. It smelled strange, although it would be impossible for Eridanus to say why exactly.

Before the djed storm that had inevitably changed Mizahar, the grove had been a fairly peaceful place, so close to the City of Illusions. The first green leaves had begun to grow on the trees after the long winter. A few small flowers could be seen on the ground, struggling towards the light among still mostly brown grass. Under different circumstances, the Ethaefal might have heard birds singing, but there was nothing now.

Whatever abominations had attacked the group had chased all normal animals away. There was blood on the ground, staining the flowers, blood on the rocks that hid the grove from sight, blood on the trees. Eridanus could see the marks of claws. The bodies of the adventurers were lying there, among the remains of those they had slain. They had fought bravely. They had managed to temporarily chase their attackers away.

The survivors were a man and a woman. He looked like a bear of a man, tall, with black hair and a beard, a seasoned warrior, while she was short and wiry with bright red hair. The two daggers she carried were covered with blood. She was leaning against the trunk of a tree. A thick bandage was on her leg. Whether she had passed out from blood loss or exhaustion was hard to tell. The man had a long cut running across half his face and countless smaller wounds all over his body.

While their accounts of the attack had been confusing, one thing was clear. It had not been the goat things alone that had killed most of the group.

There was movement in the shrubbery ahead. Leaves rustled. And then – another one of those deformed goat things stepped into the grove. It was a bit smaller than the one whose body was lying near Eridanus. Its fur was stained with blood, and it had something in its mouth that looked like a chunk of bloody meat.

There was something else as well though. If Eridanus looked past the goat thing for a moment, he could see movement, a shadow, something just at the edge of his field of vision. The magical flare had attracted other things besides the deformed goat. The goat had been there all along, deformed and driven mad by the djed storm.

[Eridanus]

People panic in the midst of chaos. It was human nature, and when the situation threw one's senses into disarray it was inevitable that perception gets distorted. The little information he could extract from the fatigued survivors were jumbled and generally meaningless. He could only infer that some form of superior threat descended upon them, which was a conclusion he reached on his own after dealing with the few goat-bunnies that ventured into the grove.

These abominations, while a physically terrifying fight, were confused enough in their own form to be able to be much of a threat to seasoned combatants. There was clearly something more dangerous out there, and if that thing could take out a group of veteran adventurers, a single ethaefal like him would be highly disadvantageous. Sadly, there was nothing he could do. He could not strategize, changing positions or whatnot because of the fragile state of the survivors. The flare had already been fired, and there was little he could do besides defending the site and praying to the assortment of gods he paid homage to.

Priskil, for hope in this possibly hopeless situation. Wysar, for the conviction to see this whole thing through. Myri, for victory over the deformed mutations threatening their very survival. And finally, Yahal for the strength and fortitude to triumph over this crisis.

One of the mutations appeared through the bushes, its nose wrinkling as its new appetite for blood and flesh began to take over its new djed-wrangled body. The further rustling in the shrubbery ahead was not missed though, due to the ethafal's keen senses. He knew that there was something else out there, but he sincerely hoped that it was not whatever that defeated the group earlier.

Taking a single step forward, Eridanus unleashed a fatal flurry of swings and thrusts with his blades, always alternating between his blades as he kept a steady rhythm of attack and parry. It did not take long for the heavily maimed creature to fall, the second life granted to it by the djed storm and warped illusions finally ending.

[Poison]

As Eridanus attacked, the goat thing dropped the bloody meat it had in its mouth and charged, but it didn’t stand a chance. In the end it fell to the ground, bleeding from numerous wounds inflicted by the Ethaefal‘s blades. Its body twitched a couple of times, it moaned in pain, and then it was suddenly still. It was dead. For a moment it was completely quiet in the grove. Eridanus could literally watch as the sky grew darker. It would take another little while until it was completely dark, but the first signs of the approaching night were already there. The world around him seemed to have been drained of all color now.

After a few moments the rustling started again. It was louder this time. Something was rapidly coming closer. He could hear it as it moved towards him. He could hear its breath, strangely loud in those quiet surroundings. And then it stepped into the grove. It was massive. It was hard to tell what exactly it was or what it had been before the wild djed had deformed its body and warped its mind. It mostly resembled a bear, one of the black bears that were common the forests of Kalea, but its fur was long and shaggy, and its head was not shaped exactly like a bear’s should be. There was something strange about the way it looked at him, about the way it almost seemed to survey the grove, the dead bodies that were lying there and the the two pitiful survivors before its gaze came to rest on him.

It stood on its hindlegs and roared. For a moment it seemed as if time slowed down, as if everything happened in slow motion, and then it attacked. And none of the gods he had prayed to, neither Priskil, nor Myri nor Yahal answered.

[Eridanus]

Eridanus neutralized the attacker quite easily, and kicked its mangled corpse to the side, glancing further out to check if there was more rustling. This time, there was nothing. Silence.

He felt a slight tingling within his body, and when an instant burst of clarity hit his mind he reached up to feel the horns that materialized beside his temples. The sky rapidly got darker as Syna acquiesced the rest of her reign to the wild dark beast that was the Moon God, and the grove darkened considerably. The little illumination was provided through Leth's mercy, and even so it lent a surreal quality to the whole situation with colors bleeding away resulting in a world colored with only black and white.

Eridanus rested against the wall of the cliff that graced the side of the grove, his blades grasped loosely in his hands as he watched vigilantly. The rescue team should be here any moment now, unless they ran into something that they could not handle out there. He sincerely hoped not.

There was a sudden rustle, and behold a huge, deformed bear entered the grove, its beady eyes scanning its surroundings intelligently as its grotesquely placed head swiveled in a circle.

Son of a...

It was huge! An already powerful monster further augmented with god knows what by the wild djed in the environment had entered the place, and he knew that the survivors would be forfeit if he ran away. He could escape, of course, using his superior parkour skills to manoeuvre out of harm's way. Yet, he chose to stay. It was the honorable thing to do.

It roared in a chilling declaration of war, then rushed forward to attack the only moving target in the grove.

Eridanus swore and he ducked out of the way, hoping that the bear's sudden acceleration would cause it to be unable to prevent colliding with the cliff-wall he had been leaning on. In his mortal body he might have panicked, the primal human senses of acknowledging the bear as a superior predator might have activated and clouded his senses. In his divine seeming, all of these were gone. Instead, all he had was clarity of thought and cold, ruthless calculations and estimations.

Gripping his blades firmly, he dashed forward lightly, thrusting at the bear's neck with one blade while the other protected his form from retaliation. He kept his footing light in the event he had to duck or change positions, and so he continued with the lightly stepping in and out movement; jabbing and thrusting with alternate blades to increase his speed of attack and attempting to lop off the bear's limbs or head if he could.

[Poison]

The bear – if that was really what it was – stood still for a moment as Eridanus changed form, as if it was confused. For a moment it hesitated and simply stared at him. And then it attacked. It was much heavier than the Ethaefal. It consisted of little more than muscles, but it moved with a speed that belied its size.

Somewhere to the south thunder could be heard, a low rumble that came closer with every passing second. The sun had completely disappeared behind the horizon now. Had this been a normal evening, stars would have begun to appear in the sky, and the moon might have been visible, but there was nothing now.

The clouds that covered the darkening sky seemed to be even thicker now, threatening, ominous. The sky seemed much closer than it had been a few chimes ago.

The bear growled in anger and in pain as Eridanus‘ blades cut into its neck. There was blood now – although Eridanus couldn’t see it - but it did not fall. Nor did it slow down considerably. Its neck was too thick for an attack or two to suffice.

It raised a paw that ended in thick claws – the same claws that had left their marks on the tree – and then the Ethaefal could feel an intense pain in his thigh.

It thundered again, and then lightning illuminated Eridanus‘ surroundings for a moment. He could see the monstrous creature clearly now, every detail of its deformed body.

Behind him somebody screamed. While the man was still completely motionless, the woman had regained consciousness. She was staring at the monster that loomed before Eridanus wide-eyed and fumbled for her weapons, but she wasn’t strong enough to get up and fight again with that massive wound.

As it heard her scream, the bear spun around. A wounded person was much easier prey.

[Eridanus]

The ethaefal cut into the bear's neck with a powerful swing, and logically the bear ought to have been decapitated.

Logically.

The djed storm had mutated the bear's physiology with an unknown twist, somehow improving the abomination's fortitude and rendering its neck the durability of a tree trunk. The killing blow became a glancing blow.

Having placed all his energy into that blow, Eridanus had invested too much to prevent himself dodging unscathed from the continuous onslaught, and winced as he suffered a gash in his thigh.

He resisted the urge to look down to see the extent of the damage. Warm blood trickled down his legs, but he kept his focus on the goal, at the current. There was always time for downtime later on.

A woman screamed behind him, and the bear lumbered around, its small mind somehow telling it instinctively that wounded prey was easier prey. All this time, he had been furiously working on a tactic, and came to the conclusion that his force was not enough. Judging from his thigh wound, there was the possibility that the wound was deep enough to prevent him from engaging in a battle of attrition, and this motivated him towards a quick resolution.

Eridanus immediately dove into the mental layout of his astral body, the immaterial soul that powered his body's movements. He tapped into djed from his major leg muscles, most from unimportant areas like the torso and thigh. Dropping his off-hand longsword to the ground, he directed half of the power from his offhand. Gripping the cold-iron blade in a secure two-handed grip, he directed all these excess energy into his main arm as he strode quickly towards the bear.

PositioningYour words are kinda contradictory, but I'll assume that you meant that the bear is sandwiched between Eridanus and the wounded woman.

With the bear's back faced to him, its hunched position prevented him from gaining acess to its head. He knew that he had managed to make some headway into the bear's neck, and this time a final attack should decapitate it.

Power coursing through his primary arm's muscles, the longsword shivered with pure strength unknown to weak bodies like his. Weak in comparison to the superior strength of Akalaks and Isurs.

When he was within range, he sidestepped quickly to the bear's diagonal right, and from there he launched the entirety of his strength - flux-enhanced and all - guiding the blade into a powerful and precise arc that aimed to completely destroy the bear's neck.

[Poison]

OOCThat’s exactly what I meant. I apologize for being unclear!

Eridanus could feel previously unknown power coursing through his arm.

The bear-like monster ignored him completely now in favour of much easier prey in the form of the injured woman.

She tried to crawl away, to find a place to hide, but every kind of movement sent waves of pain through her body. She could only sit there, clutch her swords that were useless to her in her current state and hope that Eridanus could kill the thing before it got to her or her companion.

As Eridanus sidestepped to its right, the bear moved its head and growled, irritated by the sudden movement. It raised its paw to hit the annoying creature that kept it from its prey again, but this time Eridanus was faster due to his magic. The creature screamed loudly as the Etheaefal’s sword cut through its neck. It opened its maw wide and raised its paw a final time to throw him off his feet, and then its hindlegs gave way, and it broke down in front of him. Its body twitched a few times, and then it lay still.

The injured woman stared at Eridanus wide eyed, surprised by his sudden display of strength, and then she breathed a sigh of relief. They were safe, for a few moments longer at least although there was no telling what else could happen in a world that had been transformed by wild djed before they were rescued.

Eridanus could hear thunder again. The thunderstorm had almost reached them. And then it started to rain. There were just a few drops now, more annoying than anything else, but the rain would likely become more intense soon.

[Eridanus]

Even as his blade swung through the ethaefal knew that the bear's demise was a certainty. There were few in the world that matched his finesse, and the bear was simply not one of them. As the huge corpse stumbled and fell, Eridanus was already pulling back on his djed streams, returning the astral coordination of his soul to its default and optimal self.

A single rain drop fell, and he knew that something had to be done. The rain could not mix with the blood, wounds and bandages. Especially rain that might possibly be still infused with wild djed as a result of the storm 7 days ago. The wild djed in the area was beginning to become manageable, and though it was nowhere near as chaotic as during the first day of spring, it could still deal damage if one is vulnerable.

He could not shift the wounded to the copse of trees in the other part of the grove. That meant that he had to rely on magic.

Concentrating deeply, Eridanus began to extract djed from his body, pulling out a sufficient lump of the formless material in order to form a sphere around the two huddled survivors. Sitting down in the middle of the two, he meditated as he mentally created the shield, trusting the woman who had woken up to alert him if a new danger approached.

Shaping the shield around them, he weaved the astral threads in the shields to primarily absorb djed. The shield would be able to sustain itself without further input from him due to the increased presence of djed in the environment, and thus it was a create-and-forget system that especially suited this instance. The second task he weaved was that of tasking against water. Together, these two instructions would keep the entire dome dry, for both instructions would protect against the djed-charged rain, and at the same time as more rain fell on the shield it would be further strengthened.

That is the true magic of shielding.

Drawing a line on the ground that showed the extent of the shield, he told the conscious survivor, "Stay within this area."

Unlike him, they could not see the shield and so he had to rely on visual aids to inform them. Sitting cross-legged with them, he observed the opening to the grove guardedly now. The rain fell more heavily, but even as the ground around them began to get soaked, they were completely dry for he had formed a complete 360-degree sphere around them, thus the layer of soil and grass they were sitting on remained untouched by the wetness.

How long would the rescue party take? The rain would impede their ability to progress. Would they give up? Or would they soldier on?

Eridanus could not possibly know the answer, but there was nothing he could do about it. All he could do was to play his part, and keep the survivors safe. Until the rescue party came, he could only do his best and invest the rest into faith that the rest would do their part as well.

[Poison]

Just as Eridanus erected his shield, the rainfall became more intense. While the ground around them slowly turned to mud, it was dry inside the shield, even if it couldn’t keep the cold at bay. The woman wrapped what clothes she wore tighter around her body so that she would get a little warmer and gazed at the corpse of the deformed bear. Even in death it was terrible to behold. A less skilled man than Eridanus might not have been able to kill it.

She carefully touched her leg where she had been wounded, wondering how it looked now and whether the bleeding had stopped. She let out a small sound of pain and immediately drew her hand back. Even the lightets of touches hurt. It would be better to let the wound be for now.

Her companion was still unconscious. She looked over to him, but in the darkness that had now descended on them she couldn’t make out any details. To her he looked just like the dead bodies of their comrades. Was he still breathing? Was his heart still beating? Would he survive the night out here? His wounds had been much more serious than hers. She looked at Eridanus who had sat down between them and touched his arms to get his attention, hoping that it wouldn’t interrupt whatever magic he had used to protect them from the rain.

„Do you …“ she began. Her voice was soft, not much more than a whisper. She hadn’t said anything in a while. Before, when Eridanus had found them, she had been half crazy with worry and pain and hardly coherent. „Do you think he … do you think we’ll make it?“

She shivered. During the fight where most of her companions had died and afterwards she had had hardly noticed the cold – she had concentrated only on surviving – but now that the gods had allowed them a momentary break she felt it in every part of her body. There might be more of those creatures out there. The bear hadn’t killed all of them alone. She could only hope that even those deformed monsters sought shelter from the rain rather than looking for people that they could kill.

The night progressed, but there was still no sign of the rescue party. The forest had become completely quiet once more, and the rain continued to fall. Occasionally lightning brightened their surroundings so that Eridanus could see everything clearly for a moment before utter darkness enveloped them once more.