Quest Catch a Falling Star

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde had long since grown used to kelvic's and their abrupt transformations. At times he pondered on how such a thing worked, clearly magic of some type though more specifics eluded him.

His own attempts at morphing his body were crude at best, whereas the kelvic's change seemed instantaneous and easy. Of course as it was carried by blood it was clearly bred into them, but that didn't make it any less clearly magical.

However while Clyde might prefer to ponder magic and such things, he had a much more mundane problem drawing his attention.

After fighting them for a bit it became obvious that they were attracted by the light Sayana had spread on the horse.

However clearly more was about than simply some insects, as he noticed one full of food pop in half and divide into two new instances of the creature. That, Clyde assured himself, wasn't natural if nothing else but the speed at which it occurred.

Deciding to take on two tacks at once Clyde extended out a pair of aura tendrils from the flesh of Cha, grasping a few of the newly split off creatures. He couldn't inspect them all, but perhaps he would notice something about them with a deeper inspection which might inform him of their nature or how to combat them properly.

Just after his aura tendrils latched onto the bugs he commenced his second plan, exuding his res from Cha's flesh into a fist sized bit of misty substance.

If light attracted them, he reasoned, perhaps firelight would do the same. Moving the fire in an arc away from himself and the others Clyde ignited the outermost layer of the res sphere into fire, using the rest to hold the flames in place and as a core of fuel to slowly burnt by transmutation into further fuel for the flames.

An aspect of himself out of his body Clyde absentmindedly sent the ball of res arcing and weaving away, moving it as easily as a non-mage would weave their fingers in the air throw a wind when bored, avoiding any trees or other obstacles and hovering it four or five feet off the ground in a slow but constant passage away from them in hopes of leading light seekers away.

The greater bit of his focus was on reading the slugs auras for whatever they might tell him.

[Faradae]

Faradae Instead of ignoring Sayana’s horse after Faradae had hidden the luminous spot on its neck, the bugs continued their way up its neck, rendering her cover useless. In fact, she would not even be able to don it afterwards, given the holes the bugs were eagerly eating into it. It seemed that the light had not been the goal of their journey, but simply what had sparked their interest originally. Now that they were here, they were content to eat anything they could reach. In this case, all attempts she could make to dissipate their attention were futile, so she had to pull herself together and join the others in picking bugs apart one-by-one. She pecked at a bright green bug that was busily taking a big chew out of her pant leg at the speed of lightning, blocking out the sound its carapace made when it cracked. It left a bitter taste when she spit it out, but she had no time to dwell on the novel experience. Using her wings, she swatted at a couple of slugs, but they had just finished their meal and were dropping off the horse voluntarily. As she looked down after them, she could see them both split when they hit the ground, and four new, small, hungry specimen restarted their climb up Mt. Horseback. The track would take them a moment to make, so Faradae had time to look around. To her relief, the others had already taken care of a majority of critters, so these duplications would be a nuisance, but no serious threat. They simply had to work methodically and eradicate them all, one after another. She watched with interest as Clyde produced what looked like a floating ball of fire that slowly drifted into the forest. She wondered whether it was actually capable of setting things on fire, or if it was more like an illusion and another attempt to lure the bugs away. She hoped they would not start a wildfire tonight, but up to now, Clyde had struck her as someone who usually knew what he was doing. The slugs had reached the lower end of the saddlebags by now, or what was left of them, and they had brought a few friends. Faradae sank her talons in one of them and plucked it off the leather, then shook it off her foot and sent it flying to the ground. She nudged the others in much the same way, and with small plopping sounds, they had to adjourn their dinner one by one. The horse became increasingly nervous, shifting from one hoof to another, bristling, snorting, and shaking its head and tail. It squished a reasonable amount of critters on its own before they could reach its legs and climb up. Faradae jumped down from its back, picked out additional snails on the ground and crushed their shells against stones, doing her own small part in fighting them off. Not much battle talent required here, but mainly endurance. She was grateful for it; she knew how little use in battle she still was. Nevertheless, even this small encounter reminded her that she needed to seek out a trainer when she was back to more civilized areas to teach her some basic understanding of combat and, perhaps, how to hold a knife. These bugs may as well have been ten times bigger, for all she knew, and her beak and talons would have been of little use then.

[Sayana]

A mosquito whined in her ear. The Eypharian swatted it, along with a few of the slugs. They seemed to be easy pickings, squished with a good hard slap, but the forest was infested and they were multiplying. Most unnerving was the sickly feeling of them sliding up her skin and all in all, she had become rather distracted in finding dry wood, let alone a proper shelter.

There had clearly been some interest in the glowing poison, but Faradae’s cover seemed to help keep the bugs at bay. Sayana made attempts to swat them away from the food, when she suddenly realized that a decoy might help. She still had some of the violet glowing poison left. But even as she considered the prospect and wondered what bit of food to sacrifice, Clyde had already beaten her to the punch. The mage’s hovering ball of fire was at first startling in the dim light, but soon she realized the intent to either draw the bugs towards it, or to burn them alive in the process.

The Eypharian felt scatter-brained, as if trying to do too much, while still holding random bits of kindling in her arms, now rather damp. As the raindrops continued, they hissed upon the reimanced flames created by the mage. It felt like the rain was getting heavier and they’d need to take refuge. Plus the slugs had to die. Both she could do.

“Clyde, I’ll be persuading the slugs towards your fire. I’d like to see them burn and cease being a nuisance.”

She had since learned that it was better to give the mage a heads up about any magic, rather than startle him. Plus it was more than appropriate if they were going to use magic together in any way.

Sayana breathed in deep, reaching for her djed, when she suddenly stopped. She was fully prepared to sing a song of hypnotism when she realized the distinct possibility that it might influence Clyde by mistake. Faradae she could warn, but Clyde… An alternative was to make eye-contact with the slugs but that seemed nigh impossible as they didn’t even have eyes and there were so many of them in the dim light.

For a couple of ticks she was transfixed, unsure of how to accomplish such. Then keeping her eye on the fire, she started to make distance between herself and the mage, an idea in mind. With the softest whisper, she channeled her djed to her lips, and focused on the urge to move towards the fire. “Fire so bright, go to the light.”

Her words and magic only covered a small radius, but it was probably just as well not to take on too many beings, despite the frailty and simplicity of their minds. “Fire so bright, go to the light.” Several times she whispered her suggestion, her command, being sure to stay out of earshot of the others. While she did this, she searched out a suitable place to set up tent. The woods were pretty dense, but there was a place not too far where the trees grew taller and inhibited the undergrowth. It was also reasonably flat and not yet drenched with rain.

Stopping her magic, she returned to the group. “If you can keep the slugs at bay, I’m going to set up tent. I think it’s going to pour. Unless anyone wants to continue onwards in the rain.”

Sayana took the reins of her horse and headed over to the spot she had found earlier. It was still ever so dark which made it hard to set up the tent despite having done it many times before. The rain didn’t help either, making everything slippery and wet. At least she managed to find a couple of suitable trees to tie ropes to, in order to secure the tent’s structure. The tarps were the most important. One on the ground to keep the water from seeping in, and one over top to create a shelter from the rain.

[Languish]

Between the alluring light of the flame and the soft sound of Sayana's voice, the majority of the slugs began to wander in the direction of the fire. Even as each withered in the heat, they continued forward, their small brains unable to comprehend the danger that lay before them.

Although their auras would seem rather average- small, mundane, and faintly sentient- there would likely be something more interesting that caught Clyde's eye.

Just off to the side where Sayana would head to set her tent, between the trees and soft mossy ground, there lay another aura. It was small in size, as if belonging to a tiny creature, but the magic intensity that emanated from the creature was overwhelming. Besides its aura, there were precious few hints to its presence.

The squelching sound of the rainy mud under its' feet was faint, and would attract only the attention of the most observant. The creature's head poked just above the rock in an almost comical attempt at camouflage, like a child playing hide-and-seek. What was revealed was a smooth blue-green head. Closer inspection would find a creature about the length of a forearm, knelt on all fours behind a rock.

Once Sayana finished her Hypnotic whisper, the creature first exposed itself fully. Appearing disturbed or frightened by something, the creature shortly reared up on its back feet, hissing and whining as it toddled forward. Its luminescent orange eyes blinked rapidly, as if clearing its vision to better see the group. Indeed, a fine mist had begun to settle around the area, bringing not only a difficulty seeing, but also a more labored breathing. As the creature began to breathe more and more quickly in fear, the fog gradually thickened. Without intervention, it would leave the adventurers lost, and hard-pressed to fight off any other disturbances that might emerge under the dark and damp forest.

OOCHopefully this should be a little more interesting as we move along. But I told Prophet I didn't plan on any injuries at this point, so y'all gotta be careful.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde's original plan had been to simply lead the things away from them, that way they could move along away from them or have them lose interest in them. Others of his party however seemed focused on killing them, with the kelvic trying to fight a one bird war on them, and Sayana wanting to use his flames as a point of death.

Letting out a sigh Clyde decided to go along with their plans, a simpler reaction than pointing out problems or finding another alternative.

One by one, by groups and alone, the slugs were dried out and burned, left dead by the spot of flame. To add tot he effect Clyde also broke off a small bit of res and formed a ring above the ball of burning res, once he noticed the effect the rain was having on the fire. Pulling water via a secondary bit of attraction outward in all directions towards the ring above and outside the ball of flame, Clyde redirected the rain in the small spot and kept the ball of res and flame dry. Cheaper, djed and res wise, than replacing the fire killed by water with more transmuted flame.

However as he worked he noticed something else, in the middle of glancing off towards Sayana to see how she was doing with her task. Along with the echoes of djed tinging the air, he felt another aura of some great intensity, odd as it marked something normally much larger than anything he could easily visibly see.

A large or intense aura off something so small in and of itself said some things, firstly that it was no stupid or simple animal or bug.

Pulling back his aura sense so as to not look directly at it, Clyde kept the edges or faintest traces of the aura in his awareness so as to vaguely know the source of the location, trying to find it with his mundane eyes to no avail.

After a bit Clyde found it, an odd blue, green, orange, colored thing, small but odd.

Pointing a finger for the others to see what he'd noticed, Clyde indicated the thing.

“What is that? Its... Something is odd about it... Or interesting. Different.”

Clyde might have gone himself, but finishing off the slugs as he was he couldn't divide his attention that much, not when controlling his res at such range and also keeping the aura in his peripheral awareness.

“Someone go find out.”

[Sayana]

She was glad as the slugs sizzled to their deaths. They had bitten and oozed up her skin, not to mention crawling up her horse, and she cared nothing for the bugs other than to see them gone and dead. On the other hand, she wasn’t doing all that well with the tent. It was up, but it was only big enough for Clyde, Fara and herself, and not for their animals. Not to mention that the ground was damp and muddy from the rain. The ground cover helped protect against the mud, but it didn’t keep it out completely.

The Eypharian came out from the refuge of the tent and squinted about in the unpleasant weather of the woods. Rain dripped off of leaves and as she led her horse to be tied up near the tent, she could see that the horse was also plenty wet. At least the slugs were dealt with.

However, as the fog began to creep in, Sayana half wondered if someone was pulling a prank. First the dark storm clouds making it almost as dark as night, and now this fog? Did fog even come after rain? As a native of Ahnatep, she wasn’t as acute on her knowledge of rain and clouds, but it did give her pause. And she hoped it wasn’t an actual mage pulling a joke, or a trap.

“Clyde, that better not be you making the fog. And if you really want to go find whatever it is you see, then go yourself. I can’t see a damned thing in this fog. I’ll be waiting here, nice and dry, for your return.”

Even as she spoke, she could hear the bitterness of her tone. She didn’t see much point in pressing onwards given the current situation. It would be more dangerous to get lost and separated rather than waiting it out. There had been days in which travel had been difficult and not worth it, whereas other days where they made up the time.

The Eypharian instead took a seat in the tent she had quickly made up and went about making it drier and more comfortable. With half a glance towards Faradae, she concealed her hand somewhat as she focused on conjuring res. The fog was coming in thick and she was glad that if nothing else, Stardust remained in sight. Slowly she focused on excreting more res until she had a small cupped handful in her palm. Muttering softly to herself she willed her res to pull at the surrounding water. Not just any water, mind you, but she brought it near the muddier parts of the ground which the tent sat upon and she pulled the water away. Halfway through she realized it would be more effective to pull the water downhill, so she noted the general slope of the ground and brought her hand with the res to the lower side of it.

By the end of her magical endeavours, and when her res ran out, the largest puddles were no longer though the ground was still damp and a little wet in places. It would have to do and it definitely beat wandering aimlessly in the fog looking for goddess knows what Clyde was after.

[Faradae]

Faradae The slugs were following the others’ self-made will-o’-wisp, fluttering and crawling after the pretty ball of light. As the assault on the equipment gradually ceased to be a problem, Faradae could stop clawing at critters. She would need some water to wash their sour taste of her tongue, later. It was still pouring, and Sayana had already started setting up camp. Faradae did not linger long enough to spot the movement of something blue behind a rock. She was too busy snatching her clothes from the packhorse once more and ducking into the tent the Eypharian had erected. She had just shifted and was wriggling into her uncomfortably damp clothes when Clyde announced sensing something odd. Personally, Fara would not call anything they had encountered up to now stranger than Clyde himself, but she kept that thought silent and stepped back out into the open even before Sayana started focusing on the water. She was wet already; it hardly mattered to her at this point whether or not she was out in the rain a little longer. Clyde was pointing at a rapidly gathering mist, and Faradae had to squint just to notice the different colours shining through. Most prominent was the orange gleam of eyes, the colour reminiscent of a cat’s, slowly moving forward. Faradae approached with caution, walking past where Clyde stood, careful not disturb whatever he had found or getting herself in trouble. The air was wet, cold and thick on Fara’s lungs, making it harder to breath and causing her to sneeze once or twice. The rain had already soaked her through, but in the fog, droplets of water were collecting on her arms and her feet shifted wetly in her boots. The creature was small, maybe a third of her wingspan from head to toe tip, but Fara was aware that small did not always equal tame and harmless. The Kelvic bent her knees and waded closer, slowly, while the creature blinked frantically, as if afraid. If it was an animal, it was not one she had ever seen before. She tried a soothing sound, but was not sure quite how to address this little...creature. “Don’t be afraid of us, little friend. We mean no harm.” OOCI apologize for the shortness of this post, but I'm having a hard time with this creature...whatever it is. I'm lacking description to properly place it and react to it, but Fara would investigate, not ignore it.

[Languish]

OOCWell,
Aerius changed his mind and backed out of the quest, so we march on.

The creature's tiny, round blue head tilted left and right, examining the approaching Kelvic with a mixture of fear and curiosity. Its orange eyes flickered up and down her before peaking over her shoulder to address the others of the group. Finally it let out a small whimper, slapping its heavy tail against the ground in something resembling a temper tantrum.

Upon closer examination, small gills could be seen emerging from the fog on the center of the creature's face, followed quickly below by a handful of small tentacles dangling from its jaw. When the creature opened its mouth and yawned with a hungry, half-growling sound, rows upon rows of teeth were exposed, not unlike that of a shark's mouth.

Though clearly a child, and a lonely one at that, the spawn was not without protection. Panels like paving rocks or a tortoise's shell covered its back, protecting the soft squishy flesh of its torso and allowing only the partially stiffened spines from its back to pierce through. Waddling forward on heavy feet, the creature spilled over like a toddler, landing on four legs to continue crawling.

Seemingly deeming the group a non-threat, or at least less of a threat than its impending starvation, the creature moved on, brushing past Faradae to get to its destination. The contact with the creature would create a sudden loss of breath for just a tick before it passed, and the heart of the fog followed it. The feeling of Djed would be almost palpable to the Aurists as it neared, the the creature carefully avoided contact with them.

Being interested in either the fire or the freshly roasted slug meat, it sat itself down to watch the former and devour the remainder of the latter by the handfuls. While it ate, the creature made soft sounds, chirping and humming gently. Its eyes reflected the orange of the djed-based fire each time it looked up from its meal to judge the surrounding encampment.

[Aerius]

Aerius spent an extended period of time on his own and far away from the remainder of the group. Navigation was not one of the skills he possessed, and he certainly was foolish in his decision to vanish into the night. The immortal hated the thought of making a mortal decision, and mistakes were often heavily punished by consequences. In this case he was surrounded by a dense “mist” far more thick than he expected it to be. His visibility was lowered to the point of him having the inability to see arms-length before himself. Luckily he did not require the human need to breathe: Choking, and heavy breathing due to the level of moisture in the air was all he thought would come from the mist.

He was drenched, and incredibly wet; not to mention ice continued to spontaneously generate on his flesh. The fog did nothing but assist the ice in its formation across his skin with cool water droplets being scattered about his frame. He heard sounds, and what were obviously people speaking off in the distance. All he needed to do was follow the sound to the correct destination, right? Navigating through mist could not be that difficult with sound as a guide, right? Wrong, with each and every other step he took: the immortal crashed into various Trees. By the time he arrived within sight of the group he would likely be the most dirty among them all.

Leaves and other small vegetation managed to stick to his clothing. He was not very durable, and the moment he heard the voices grow closer he ran. The run however was short lived: Aerius stepped on something, and crushed it. Yet, as he paid closer attention to the ground they were everywhere. Creatures without shells, but with bodies similar to the far smaller shelled creatures of Sahova. Were they a different species? No, that was not what he needed to be concerned with; Aerius sighed as he realized just how “mortal”he could be at times. Why did he allow curiosity to get the better of him and separate him from the remainder of the group? Foolish decision after foolish decision made him realize how stupid he could be. Aerius would rather die than make another mistake, and he charged again ignoring the disgusting sound of the creatures he stepped on.

With the final series of strides he very quickly found the remainder of the group, and right as he attempted to stop the worst came. Not only was he wet, and covered in filth, but he somehow managed to slip only to fall. Aerius managed to fall directly in front of a large horse, and the moment he did several of the slugs covered him. He looked up only to see the familiar face of one of the women from the night that the object fell from the sky. The immortal proceeded to peel one of the slugs off of his face, and quickly found his feet.

“Petch... I got lost....” He spoke aloud and attempted to shake off several more slugs while he made an attempt to travel with the group. Going it alone was not the safest, nor the most intellectual route to take in the wild. If one were to look closely they would see an intricate pattern of ice covering both his cheeks, and going across his forehead almost as if he wore a helmet.

Secret :

Aerius will come in very fast, and only miss Sayana and her horse by a few inches. Don't be afraid to get startled and attack! Sorry for the absence, the military called me unexpectedly but I promise to be back in full swing.

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde let out a sigh, his mind slightly fragmenting in his attempt to split his focus. He was finishing the slugs, keeping a tendril of awareness outward bonding to the bit of res, that bit of him resonating back in its actions of pulling and guiding. He kept his eyes on the new thing, another tendril of awareness and aura sight out towards it.

And of course he had a bit reached out for the star, and another few stretched out to Far and Say to keep him aware of them as they all moved for fear of striking them by mistake.

He was also watching, viewing, breathing, looking, listening, and considering their next motion and plan. Blinking.

Letting out a cough and realizing he'd forgotten to breath, he inhaled deeply and suddenly and tried to pull himself and his spreading mind in with the intake of air.

Giving up on trying to do so many things, Clyde instead decided to rely on his aura sight, knowing it was simpler with his skills to extend out a few more aura tendrils than to try to look, listen, and blink normally along with other things. Instead he simply closed his eyes and focused on his djed and res and auras.

If they'd been moving that might have been a dangerous thing, but as they were still, and as he assumed he'd see any sign of danger from the auras of his companions or perhaps of a danger in and of itself, he wasn't too worried.

Cha acted as the center point, the magic dancing along out of her like water falling into a funnel and flowing out the bottom. An analogy that perhaps entered his mind from the feel of water on his skin, seeping and soaking, along with down Cha's face.

Focusing on fewer things without other distractions, Clyde felt his hold on what he still focused on strengthen.

A small peripheral bit of his awareness noted the small shine of djed coming off of Sayana, though without deeply inspecting it. She did some magic of some sort, he assumed, as he focused on breathing and working his res and auras. Perhaps meditating, or perhaps simply expunging his mind of unimportant things, he let Say fall into the background as a peripheral noise, not directing his main attention at it but still aware if something "loud" enough occurred.

Another bit of his mind noted the kelvic as she headed for the thing he'd pointed out. A twinned pair of tendrils split off from his sight, feeling touchers reaching out for the peripheries of what he had trouble directly seeing due to the things brightness. If you couldn't look directly at a light then you looked at it out of the side of your eye, Clyde attempted a similar aura technique or as close as such physical metaphors allowed.

If he could he'd look closer within his aura sight, if he could, though he wouldn't press to hard in the attempt if he found it painful or blinding. He wasn't sure what he'd find in it, but he knew in general things with strong auras were interesting. If nothing else he could tell from it that the thing was djed rich, though why or in what manner he wasn't sure.

Along with the fogging of water and rain he could feel the touch or pressure of its djed, a strong sense upon his and Cha's face like the beating of the sun.

The Clyde that was the bit of res coated in flame and avoiding water noted the thing in tandem with the Clyde that stood on his legs upon the ground, ground that wasn't Clyde, reacting and avoiding close contact with it while it continued slowly burning away, slowly dying and fading moment by moment but focused on the task at hand of importance to itself due to the importance it had to his other self.

As he focused on other things part of his mind noted sounds, though not enough to draw his main attention. It wasn't until he noted through one of his companions auras their reaction to the new thing approaching that he reached out with another tendril of aura sight, noting almost at once as his aura wrapped around the familiar sense of the other member of their party who had wandered off.

After that he gave him no mind, focusing instead on other things he felt more important. Like breathing, and the blank emptiness of his mind minus his aura visions and the bit of his awareness within his res.