Personal opinions after saving our hides. (Wren)

[Ximal]

The onslaught of pounding thuds raged furiously as the maddened reimancer before them spray the balls of fire like a man possessed. Liro took the brunt of the fire balls with the door he was using to shield himself the thuds on the door chipping away at the solid planks. singeing the wood work and heating the metal. Liro could feel the smouldering heat on the other side. Sweat poured from his forehead as he endured the raging blasts. Shrouds voice rang out from down the hall as Liro held the door firmly. Telling him to charge the fire mage? Foolish. What would be better... Drawing the axe he picked up off of the brute from before he charged the human torch. the searing fire whistling past and over the door. Splinters of solid wood fragmenting over the frame of the door. Liro closed in on this insane mage hating mage. The weight of the axe in his hand, liro poked the edge out from behind the door scoring it along the wall to help himself from being pushed back by the fire bolts. Two searing balls of scorching blaze sailed left and right of him. The mage clearly wasn't aiming just hurling fire-bolts down range. Closing in Liro hunched his shoulder into the now buckling door. Hope racing through him and a wishing for this ploy to work. the full weight of the door and his combined shoulder slammed into the mage's outstretched arm. The sound of wood splintering and bone snapping. As liro has smashed the door into the reimancrs arm, it buckled and with a single sharp biting snap his arm sheared, taking the full force of a door and a two hundred pound man. The reimancers fractured bone protruded splintered and jagged from his skin. Swinging the axe around from his side he slammed the full weight of the head of the axe into the reimancer. Knocking him clean off of his feet. Liro was pre occupied with getting past him as opposed to killing him. Liro could see something was wrong after all. The petchers hair was on fire. Having knocked vellos into the room he came from Liro ran past leaving the now cracked shard and splintered door behind. Liros deep black blue eyes fixed on shroud. Priority one. Secure an escape route. Priority two, get the shyke out of there. Liro could feel his hands shaking. His shoulder had been burned, not too badly but enough that it would be notice able, and leave a nasty mark. Sprinting upto and past wren liro spoke very little. "Option one, run. Option two, by some miracle you wouldn't happen to have some way to beat this human torch? From what i can tell you've got little to no energy left and i've got just enough for two maybe three bursts of flux, other than that both of us are in the shyke. " Liro had no clue as to what was going on but right now, they had to leave. Either that or both of them would be char-grilled. Liro could hear a groaning from behind. Vellos was getting up. The damned flame man, if nothing he was persistent. [color=#FFFFFF]You get us killed, i will personally see to it that you do not rest even as a dead man. Taking a deep slow breath Xi locked his mind onto his target he was still poor with his axes but his opponent was stunned all Xi would have to do would be hit him hard enough to kill him. Xi took scope, thirty paces, he'd need a stroke of luck to land this strike, that and a perfectly mediated blast of flux. Xi gritted his teeth and spun on his heel, slamming his foot down into the ground. He sot towards vellos. twenty five paces. Xi felt the weight of his axe. he'sd need to aim this perfectly. Then vellos' arm raised. A ball of bright heart stopping fear surged out. the fire bolt went wide, but it took the head of the axe clean off. Twenty paces...xi dropped the useless handle, balled his fist and sprinted harder. He was useing a lot of his saved stamina for one strike. He's need to hit vellos hard enough to snap his neck with one punch. Fifteen paces...Xi pulled his flux, calming his mind he could feel the flow through his body. he could feel the motions of his energy. It was moving slowly but Xi needed control and speed. Xi forced the enrgy into his arm, forcing it into his upper arm muscles. His fingers clenched into his palm. His fist was gripped so hard that his nails drew blood. Ten paces, vellos shot another fire bolt sailing wide it skimmed past Xi's face, he could feel the heat along his cheek. Five paces... Visible panic now brewed on vellos' face his eyes widened as Xi drew closer. His steel plated fist now reinforced with flux. The surge of power peaking. With three paces to go the surge was perfect Xi could feel the branch of energy within his arm at border line crossing. Xi left his fist fly. Two paces...The steel clad fist covered the distance with more speed than Xi thought possible. His steel fist crashed into vellos' jaw and cheek bones. Vellos braced himself for the blow when he should have rolled. The punch veered upwards at the last second slamming into his temple transferring all the momentum of the run, his full body weight and the flux enhanced speed into one punch. The blow connected the force was enough that vellos flowed with the punch until his head connected with the wall. An audible crunch echoed through the hall as Vellos' skull cracked and fragmented into his brain. Shards of bone piercing and cutting his brain stem. vellos' rage and hate filled eyes still leering up at Xi as his body fell limp. Crashing to it's knees, then slamming it's chest on the floor. Those malice filled eyes, going blank and empty, the very spark of life in them falling dead. Xi could feel his hand swelling lightly he must have fractured something on impact. He could feel his hand throbbing and each clench sent bolts of agony through his arm to his elbow. Gritting his teeth he turned to face Shroud. Consider that torch...extingushed. Walking over to Shroud, Xi could feel the toll the battle had taken, burnt shoulder, headache, possibly a fractured hand. This was ironically one of his 'better' days. Looking down at shroud. his dark black blue eyes narrowed. You do know that that makes it five against four. Veeery good. Hahahahaha, you were listening. Did you really have to kill those two that slowly? No, But by the gods it was over whelming fun. Xi sighed, as he offered his hand out to shroud, his left hand. "i don't know about you. But i'm ready to get out of this hell hole."

[Wrenmae]

Always silence in the aftermath. No groans, no escaping breath of dying soldiers. In the wake of murder, only silence held vigil. It was by that silence that the mage knew Vellos was slain. He took a few moments then, leaning against the wall and sliding down on his back, narrow chest rising and falling in swift, pressing, beats. His palms were sweaty, his chest burned with the seared skin left by the passage of fire and magic. Gingerly he tore the cloth away from the wound, pulling the bits away from the flesh before they had time to stick and fester. He'd need medical assistance after all this, but he wouldn't let that stop him from what had to be done. Ximal approached from the open door and down the hall, more burned than Shroud, but still very much alive. So much for killing two birds with one stone. As the man approached, lit by the embers of Vellos's last ditch effort to destroy them, Shroud gathered Djed into his eyes and mouth, pulling along the thinnest vein of concentration he had left. Much more and he'd overgive, maybe too far, and already he needed to rest. This, this however, was important. He took the hand offered to him, noting how Ximal's chest rose and fell with the same exhausted frequency. Pulled to his feet, Shroud shook his head and nodded back to the room they had come from. "Oil in the room," he muttered, panting, "We can't leave any evidence of us being here...or others like Vellos might come seeking retribution. Dead men tell tales, but ashes say little. Help me cover the room with the oil and light it ablaze, then we can leave." Letting the hand go, he limped back into the room where the steel cage sat quietly, chains along the bars limply clinking. Shroud passed those and went to the barrels, straining and grunting as he pushed them over and rolled them toward the door. "Be careful," he warned, pushing his barrel to one end of the room and knocking loose the peg that held the contents, pushing it end over end to spill its damning liquid on the ground, to write lines of destruction in the abandoned storehouse. "You set this ablaze now, and you damn us both."

[Ximal]

As shroud pulled himself up on Xi's hand he spoke. The dead tell tales? True but it's usually the ghosts that would do the talking. Still Shroud made sense. they didn't want to leave any evidence of what had gone on here. Xi folled shroud back to the room where they'd been kept. Xi was half faking half truthfully exhausted. He had about one more good flux use left in him. Beyond that. He didn't want to chance it. He'd used a lot of his stored energy delivering that blow. The barrels of oil were large, but bearable, shroud was visibly struggling with them. Though that didn't mean Xi would show his hand just yet. Xi'd taken more injuries but he'd also managed to stay more fuelled. Trudging in behind Shroud Xi acted more exhausted than he was, rolling the barrels out and around whilst listening to Shrouds explanation and warnings telling him to be careful. Xi rolled the barrels down the hall and into their positioning leaving a line of oil out so they could all be lit from the same spot. Xi kicked the corpse of the dead reimancer back into the room just to get him out of the way. Set the oil ablaze from the door as they made their escape. Brilliant. Though Xi still had an uneasy apprehensive feeling about Shroud. Something just didn't sit right. As Xi returned to get another barrel to roll into place He turned to face the door, his strength was starting to wan now. His energy exertion was starting to catch back up with him. He leant on the door frame to catch his breath a second. Over exertion was a problem with him. His energy lay fine, but the wounds were starting to catch up to him and the damage coupled wit the energy usage gave him pause to catch himself for a few moments. Breathing slowly he took that time to collect his plans. Liro remained oddly silent. Almost as if he'd over exerted control. Xi pondered a few moments. He couldn't help but wonder what the heck was going on within him. Today though he'd witnessed so many new magics. Each one with different applications and use's However the most dangerous one was the reimancer. Xi saw what the man became. His hair ablaze his body bubbling with his energy, it made Xi's skin crawl the thought of that being him.

[Wrenmae]

"You fought well," Shroud offered, his voice echoing through the room as Ximal moved the oil. On it a trail of Hypnotism laced into Ximal's mind. It spoke of exhaustion, wearieness, the weight of his wounds pushing down on him. With slow and methodical emotional surges, it began to eat away at his apprehension and fill him with a sense of calm. After all, Hypnotism was the art of subtle manipulation. Shroud only used what already existed, more awareness of his injuries, the burns on his body and shoulders, the exhaustion leeching away the strength of his will. Honestly, this was the purest form of manipulation. No battleborn uses in the thick of combat, that always seemed too messy, too...desperate. He much preferred this subtle manipulation now. "I suppose that explains how you escaped the crowd." Pushing the oil barrel to the door, he let the contents run out till only a drip followed from the spout. From there he backtracked to the steel cage, pushing it back against the far wall with grunts of effort. "You wanted lessons on my magic, did you?" The mage chuckled, pressing the exhaustive influence of his magic through his voice. Seep, pierce, tear, convince, and he tasted copper in his mouth. "Tell you what, let's take a break and set the fire after...I'll teach you a bit of magic." He beckoned Ximal toward the cage, sliding down and resting against it. "You like you could use a breath of relaxation."

[Ximal]

Shaking his head Xi couldn't shake the feeling of exhaustion and pain like he usually did, something was pressing the pain harder. His burn seared as if it ha just caught blaze, his hand throbbed with pain and th smack on his head pulsed with a heavy rage of pain. Normally he would shrug this off and just get on but his injuries were raging. Something tugged at his mind it wasn't sure if it was Liro tugging him towards listening but it was something. Xi'd spent too much time with his mind in a fragile state and now he couldn't tell when Liro was tugging at him lightly or when he was just influencing him. Xi listened to shroud his voice oddly calm, a touch of exhaustion but his tone wasn't normal. Where was the air of contempt? The air of hatred for him in his voice? The mocking tone? Something was off Xi could feel it. Still something told him this was just the air of relief that was playing with his tone. Xi replied to the comment with a snide remark. "Hardly, if I'd of fought well i wouldn't be in this sorry state and not quite, even your mob didn't do as much damage as those last two. I'll say this I'm not fond of the fiery bastard. You called that reimancy? I'm guessing it has more too it than just simple hurling balls of fire. That and what the heck did you use to slice those wooden bars?" Offered magic? A chance to learn a touch more magic, the chance to supplement his own arsenal with a touch more power. After the assortment of magic he'd been exposed to today, he realized needed something extra to have to his advantage. With his head ringing a shroud speaking of a rest coupled with the chance to learn a little more sounding good. Xi didn't argue though, normally he would have instead Xi simply spoke back. "No offence but i'm not going anywhere near that cage. I've spent long enough inside it, and i don't intend to spend anymore time next to it." Xi propped himself up against the wall. and slid down it. The pain in his body now really taking it's toll. The feeling of over exertion grating against him. He was feeling light headed, short of breath. Xi kept his eyes locked on Shroud, something chiselling away at his apprehension of him. Still Xi didn't trust shroud any further than he could throw that a steel cage. But he felt some pull of loosened animosity. He didn't like shroud, nor would he probably ever, but he had a shred more respect for him.

[Wrenmae]

Shroud smirked, closing both eyes and laying his head back against the bars. “Don’t be a coward,” he called over to the giant, “I didn’t spread oil over here for a reason. If it makes you feel better, you can have the key.” Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the key he’d taken off the guard and tossed it at Ximal. It caught the light of the lantern near the door before hitting the ground and skittering over the surface. “I’m exhausted, and if you’re too afraid to set your back against some bars than you can consider your magic lesson canceled, I don’t teach the spineless.” He took a few moments to breathe, just letting the air enter and leave him. His muscles screamed at him, his burn hissed brands of pain across his consciousness. Instincts instructed him to make haste from this place, take the mizas and weapons he’d looted from the bodies and just begone, especially with the head he’d saved for the bounty. But there was still unfinished business to take care of, the last bit of necessity before he could put this whole incident behind him. He couldn’t look at Ximal without feeling some shred of hatred for the man. He existed in contradiction to the laws of Sunberth, he existed in contradiction to survival. He held himself at a level he didn’t deserve and had almost torn apart the Crimson Edge by virtue of existing. Everything he was seemed to directly contradict himself. Even tonight, in all this, Shroud saw no spark of potential, no shining example of humanity or purpose. Ximal was just a thug with an invisible friend, a brute with tattered honor and a sad excuse for meaning. He had to die…but it couldn’t be just death. It had to be worse than that. “Initiation into Hypnotism is difficult,” He said, frowning, “It requires you to allow me to enter your mind and shift your perceptions…otherwise you’ll never achieve the correct Djed pathway.” He used no Hypnotism now, saving it for when he had Ximal. It didn’t really bother him if the man was too much a coward to submit to the curiosity of magic. There were other ways to skin a cat, so to say, but that would require just killing the oaf and being done with it…a far less interesting fate than he could design now.

[Ximal]

"A coward ? Honestly. I thought you'd have a better insult than that. What happened to that fabulous wit of yours?" Xi smirked knowing full well that he'd likely irked shroud. He still hated him but at least he had a shred of respect for him. Xi pulled him self up off of the door frame and as he did he kicked the key across the floor slyly, masked by a scuffle of his boot. The burn on his shoulder seared with pain as his hand pulsed. Hobbling over he sat on the opposite side of shroud. the thick steel bars against his back four almost five of which pressing against him and digging into his back. Xi simply sighed the pain now digging into him. "Couldn't we do this outside? After all it would be better to set this place on fire, let it burn, put this behind us and go back to hating each other? Since you and i don't exactly see eye to eye. In more than just height." S the pulsating pain of his hand roared thunder into his skull, he could barely hear Shroud over the pounding of his own head. A Djed pathway? Was that what the energy Xi used was called? Djed? Xi opened and closed his left hand, simply wiggling the fingers of his right. Note to self. Next time want to bring down a crazy fire-spraying lunatic. Pad fist before crushing his skull. "So this Djed...It's the key to all magic right? And from the looks of you. It takes a lot of the users energy to utilize it. So get on with whatever your going to do. Though I'd recommend getting on with it quick as you said yourself and from how you look. Your utterly exhausted." Xi waited for shroud to do what he had to. He'd need every bit of assistance he could get his hands on to bolster his own arsenal. This hypnotism would be a good asset to his options. Better to end an even without blood shed. "Can we get a move on? I've gotta be somewhere, I'm heading to the spires later. And don't worry i wont tell cade about your "magically inclined self". Heck i won't even mention this whole venture. I'd like to put this behind me. So get on with it." Xi didn't like the idea of learning anything from Shroud. But he needed the help. Xi closed his eyes took a deep intake of breath to offset the pain and focused. He was listening to himself feeling the flow of energy around his body and it was taking an effect on him. Feeling the flow, flowing with it for the next few seconds he would be completely oblivious to the world around him. His energy passed around himself and he could feel the quantity. He only had a few uses left like he feared, at best two uses of flux before he would begin to feel that he could give no more. Or rather Want to keep using it.Xi opened his eyes slowly and tried to keep a grip on the flow of the "Djed" around his body. Whatever it was his energy, djed or whatever it may be was running low. He could feel the flow for a brief fleeting moment before it slipped through his grasp.

[Wrenmae]

His words brought a sickly smile to Shroud's lips, even his insults seemed quiet and foolish now, the yapping of some small animal in the wake of the serpent's coils. "Here is convenient, here is quiet, don't you hear...Ximal? Only the dead have right to judge us now, and they won't speak a word." Standing, running his hands across the steel bars, Shroud circled around to Ximal and slid down into a kneel, staring the giant in the eyes. "Relax, Ximal, let all those worries slide out of your mind. The slavers, the Spires, the Sunberthians, all of it, there is nothing more important than your relaxation..." Hypnotism was thick on his voice, a slithering magic seeping into his ears and eyes as the murderer spun it. "You're relaxed, completely and utterly, you're tired, but you don't care. So long as you exist within this state, nothing will alarm you, nothing will bother you...do you understand what I'm saying?" Ximal's eyes were drooping, he nodded lethargically, hardly concerned with whether he answered Wrenmae's questions or not. Volunteering for a hypnotic state, perfect. Shroud stood, snapped his fingers a few times and then sighed, cracking his neck. "You will remain in this state until I tell you to awake, Ximal, and while you're here...you can answer me a few questions." Striding away from Ximal, Shroud took the ropes and chains still attached to the cage and around the warehouse and began tying the man to the cage bars. Thick, doublethick, he used every means available to him in order to bind the giant. Both arms to the bars, his legs to eachother, and all the time he asked slightly probing questions, engaging the calm thug as he secured him. "Tell me, Ximal, why did you come to Sunberth?" "What is it you fear most? Hate most?" "What is it you hope to accomplish here?" "Ximal...what do you desire most in life?"

[Ximal]

What the heck? Xi listened to Shrouds words, slithering out slowly. thickly, and some what persuasively, is mind began to sway back and forth between the borders of concious and sleep. A semi-aware state where he could not think not help but follow what was asked of him. In this half dreamlike state Xi could feel nothing, his limbs were numb. His mind drawing a blank, he couldn't even see. He was just able to make out the words that were being asked of him. Barely able to respond. "I didn't come to Sunberth...I was born here." What the shyke, what was he saying. More importantly why was he saying it?! He could feel his mouth bubbling out more words and he felt no power to stop them. "What i fear most? I fear liro...What i hate most? I hate slavery..." Xi wanted to stop this, he count help himself what he felt was pouring out of him. He wanted to snap himself back into control back into the land of recognition to be out of his mind again. But this was his mind...Wasn't it ? No it couldn't be this place was dark and devoid of anything. His mind was grey and bleak but at least it had structure some substance there. "I hope to accomplish helping those who need it." What the petch was going on. Why couldn't he stop himself? He wanted to burst loose from this mental shackling. Xi roared inside this black abyss in his own head. Nothing...Emptiness. Until. Poor boy. You know whats going on here? if you don't i wont tell you. I just enjoy watching you suffering. and of course whilst your not in control of your own actions...I can fill that void. Nehehehehe. Liro that bastard. Xi struggled and strained to regain his own mind set,still to no avail he couldn't help himself out of this situation. " That's simple...Freedom." At his last comment his mind chuckled his mental awareness laughing at it;self. The one thing he truly desired he could never have. After all...No man is ever truly free. Not even from his own mind. not the gods not other men not even life and death. He was shackled a play thing of what this world had in store for him and he despised ever single second of it.

[Wrenmae]

Finishing the last of the knots and winding chains, the hypnotist stood back from his handiwork. Only another bell or two till morning, the sun was hot on the heels of night. He took a moment or two to bask in the present, the smell of oil rising around him, the flickering of the lantern casting pallid ghost-shadows across the warehouse floor. Ximal lay chained to the steel cage, tied in more ways than might have been necessary...but this was how it was to be. "Ximal," Shroud crooned, "I'd like you to become aware of every sensation you feel, every word that I say, but remain in your relaxed state. I want you to feel like a prisoner in your own mind and remember, oh do remember, that none of this would be possible had you not opened your thoughts to me." Drawing his long dagger, he cut the front of Ximal's shirt, tearing it away and exposing his chest. It rose and fell, the soft embrace of life in all its calm simplicity. Ximal was forced to feel this way, forced to remain in the hypnotic state he'd been placed in. At his level of power, Shroud had little difficulty holding his mind there...now that the fool had given it to him. He took the blade and pressed it against the brute's chest, puncturing the skin and carving down, leaving lines of angry red, seeping. The cuts were slow and deliberate, deep enough to scar, but not to kill. He wanted the man marked before his death, he wanted him to know what he was...what he truly was. "Born in Sunberth and still a mage? My, my, but do they grow hypocrites large these days. Well don't you fret, Ximal, I won't let you suffer long. You see, I'm going to burn you alive in this place, right down to your charred bones. No one will mourn for you, no one will bury you, your remains will be pushed to sea where Laviku will shrug them from his mighty shoulders." Another few cuts, sweeping designs, Shroud chuckling, "You will be dirt, Ximal, ashes and dirt...from whence you came is to where you will go." Shroud stepped back, admiring his handiwork. SLAVE was carved across his chest in seeping crimson. Slave. Marked forever by the name he despised. "Slave, Ximal, that is what you are. And now that your mind is mine, I will take this one step farther." He stepped forward, grasping Ximal's chin by his hand and pulling the mans face up toward his. Shroud's black eyes punctured Ximal's and Djed poured along that conduit, smashing into his mind with all hints of subtly removed. It might throw him out of the trance, actually, most probably would, but this sort of conditioning was impossible to ignore and with no formal training, he'd be forced to accept its ramifications. "Your name is Slave, and whomever uses it will have your loyalty. You will feel compelled to follow their orders, their desires, their wishes...so long as they call you by that name, you will be theirs. Until such a time that you accept your name and accept a master, and then, Dear Ximal, you will owe them your loyalty exclusively...whether they want it or not." Leaning down, he slipped the gold ring of Ximal's finger, holding it up in front of him before depositing it in his pocket. "A souvenir, I think, something to remember you by...or at least something to sell. Dead men need no trinkets, after all." He laughed, bringing his fist around and cracking it against Ximal's face, snapping him out of the trance completely. As the brute struggled, Shroud walked across the oilslick ground and took the lantern, Holding it up over the oil. How the fire danced then, shifting over the multi-hued spill toyingly, dangerously. "You're an eyesore, Ximal, a worthless collection of muscle and stupidity. I'm not sure how it came to be that you so profoundly got in my way, but I'm ending it...in one way or another." A song came to him, the tunes of which stretched from the wretched Sunberth all the way back to Alvadas. It was only a verse, maybe a refrain, but it seemed appropriate. "Oh little child, Lost in Alvadas Clinging to your eyes When your vision is gone Oh little child Lost in Alvadas You could never see Through the illusions he wove." He tossed the lantern. The flames roared, lighting the old warehouse in flickering corpselight. Shroud turned and walked out, the bag with the severed head and all the loot at his side. He didn't look back.