#almost Rough i guess?? with her spellcasting

[ruvviks]

BONES, i don't know if you''re still doing that ask meme, so how about a wildcard ask: which of your DND ocs would win in a fight?

OUHHH THANK YOU SO MUCH!! this one is very tricky because all three of them are very powerful in their own ways. i think erytheia would lose first because she's a cleric and thus more of a healer than a fighter, and despite having some strong spells in her arsenal she wouldn't be able to keep up with the other two :(

between hindsight and juniper... i feel like they both have an equal chance to win i think! hindsight is a gunslinger fighter and juniper is a great old one warlock, so it's trickshots versus eldritch blast and both have a LOT of potential; hindsight is very versatile and can switch over to fighting with a scimitar just as easily and he can land a lot of combos because of his extra attack, but juniper's eldritch blasts are INSANELY powerful and would very easily blast him off his feet

i think it would mostly depend on who gets the upper hand first; hindsight can choose to get close to juniper with melee combat, in which case he would win because she doesn't have a very high HP total. but if it comes down to ranged combat, then juniper would win because of her eldritch blasts, which would chew through hindsight's HP total pretty quickly

[occult-roommates]

The human and the spellcaster

Akva had her baby, which meant it was time for someone else to close a chapter of their life. Early that same morning, right before work, Dawud invited Daniele’s to the San Myshuno art museum. They have so many good memories there like uh...That time Daniele almost crashed his broom or when they took a selfie there and it’s how Dawud’s mom found out he had been lying to her for months...But this time it’s the right time, and the museum will officially be their special place.

Daniele: Kinda crazy she hid from her parents the entire pregnancy. Like, it’s not like me who just cut ties with my parents, Akva is still close to them. Must have been rough to not see them for nine months...Well, I guess in the early months you can hide it to them. I don’t know, I didn’t asked her exactly when’s the last time she saw them, anyway... Dawud: Rookie numbers. I avoided my mom was 18 months. I could have had two babies in that mean time. Daniele: It sucks...I miss my parents sometime.

Oh boy, ok, he’s now rambling about his parents. How does Dawud gracefully transition from that to telling him he loves him...Alright, he grabbed his hand. Let’s go.

Dawud: B-But you uh...You know who would always love you no uh...no matter what and even if you’re not a spellcaster anymore?

Now, no going back, if Daniele is quick, he might already figure out where this is going. Come on, he can say it.

Dawud: Ah I-I love you. Daniele: Oh Dav I... Dawud: What? Daniele: I love you too but I cannot date a human.

Shit. Fuck. Damnit. Motherfucker. Bitch. Cunt. Asshole. Swear word. Out of all the possible scenario imaginable, Dawud had not anticipated this one. What should he do now what should he do now what should he do now.

Snapping of course!

Dawud: You know what man, fuck you! I’ve always been a good friend to you and I’ve tried so hard to be one of the good one. And why do you care so much if I’m a human? The fact your family refuses to mingle with humans is why your parents think you’re worthless and don’t want you anymore. Oh and also by doing so your family has shot itself in the foot cause the reason you’re losing your power is because you’re a fucking inbred! Daniele: I’m not an inbred, what are you talking about?! Did someone hit you in the head??? Dawud: You told me yourself. There’s barely any wizards left in Italy, and if your family avoids human then logically at some point you’ll run out of non-relatives to have children with. Daniele: Ok, first of all, yes my great-grandparents were cousins but that was like, four generations ago. And don’t call me a wizard! Dawud: Well you know what, I don’t give a shit. I’m gonna find myself a nice human instead of a fucking wizard such as you. See, this is why nobody actually likes occult anyway.

And after saying that, Dawud left the scene. But the more he walked away, the more he realized what he just said. Oh my god what has he done? What the fuck has he done? Why did he say that? He didn’t even meant any of it, and of course going straight for insults and a hateful rant is not how you get someone to give you a chance! Why oh why did he do that? Why does he keep on making stupid decisions upon stupid decisions??

Guess that’s what he get for trying to be romantic at that damn art museum.

Prev - Next

[walker-journal]

Extreme Noodling (Dave+Adam)

Timing: Near Winter’s end, before Dave got bit

Summary: Dave and Adam wrassle some giant catfish (the google searches for this chatzy changed us as people I’m pretty sure. I know too much) 

Content Warning: lots of fish gore

The frost-flecked marsh water sloshed around Adam’s boots as he waded through the mire. Feathery moss hung in pale sheets from old maples and gnarled gum trees. Vertical clumps of reeds and cattails marked where the sparse islands of solid ground gave way to sluggish swamp water. This particularly frigid winter had touched the murk with thin sheets of ice, the fragile pristine white breaking under the slightest pressure for brackish mulch to pour through the cracks.

Adam was out in the frigid marshland today at the behest of David Herring, a sailor whom Nell has possibly summoned from hell as a birthday stunt. Adam was trying to take his return to Hunting gradually. His powers were slowly returning day by day, although resurgent strength and sharpening senses hadn’t brought any answers along with them.

Even more grueling training and keeping busy at work would have to suffice now, resolved  Adam as he held his rifle dry across his shoulders and waded towards where Herring was waiting.

Dave had braced himself against a nearby tree, his bag hooked over some higher up branches. Despite the frigid early spring weather, he stood in shorts and watershoes, already water and mud logged, but like this he could feel everyone and everything coming, no matter how big or small.

It was always a smart idea to have your back braced against something when you weren’t sure exactly where you stood with the person you’d called for back up. Dave wasn’t the type to calculate who owed who after surviving something together, and you never knew exactly what flavour of hunter you were getting until they had their knife against your throat. Most of the time, it had been alright, but considering the blood that stained Dave’s hands, he wasn’t surprised when things went the other direction fast. But the water in the marshes was even more still than the lakes, so he felt the ripples of Adam wading through the water long before he saw the young hunter approaching, so he was ready and waiting by the time Adam had slogged close by.

“Walker,” he greeted, raising a hand in greeting. “You gone up against a prodigium catfish before?”

Adam had to give mad props to the titanium viking balls this dude must have to go all beachwear in an ice swamp. However, as Adam might still want to have kids someday, these waders were staying on. Manly bayou bonding would have to wait.

“Read about them, never hunted them before,” the young Hunter admitted, the hot hills of California and the holy land having been more alghoul country then noodling holes.  

Dave nodded, watching Adam intently - mostly to be able to read his lips to make sense of what he could hear. At least the swamp was quiet, in the harsh way that winters often were. He didn’t have any kind of teeth guards on this time, his long canines exposed as he talked.

“This’ll be my fourth,” he replied, “but most of the others were juveniles. Feels about… fifteen feet, at a guess. Right now it’s about sixty feet that way.” He pointed deeper into the marsh land. “Fortunately, they ain’t agile creatures at that size, but they’ll crush you if they can. If you’ve read about them, I'm figuring you know about the barbs and arms.” He shifted, unstrapping a machete from the bag he’d hung from some tree branches. “If you think you can land the perfect shot, take it. Otherwise I’m thinking it’ll be better to get it in shallow water and incapacitate its arms for an easier kill.”

“Gothya, watch out for the barbs and baby Kermit arms, we gotta beach it in the the shallows unless there's an opening,” Adam reiterated, looking out at the hushed landscape of frost and brackish silt.

“But before we start I gotta ask,” the Hunter insisted as he knelt on the soggy crust the snowy embankment. He leaned the nonessential gear against the grey trunk of a willow.

“So...are you like sensing the fish right now? Do aquaman powers come with the whole wereseal thing?”

“Selkie. Something like that,” Dave replied, with just one eyebrow raised at Adam, unsure if he was missing out on some youthful slang or that Adam was not as informed as some of the other hunters around. Wereseal. The damn nerve. Not that there was anything wrong with being a werewolf, but Dave didn’t lose control like he’d gotten rabies once a month. It was all this damn tv, now everyone thought that just because you could change forms you’d have to be some cheap knock off were-

Dave hmmphed. Tiny pulses of water against his skin warned him of the large, slow being stirring in its tunnel, its mouth resting nearby the surface, waiting for prey to come nearby. “Any other questions? Ain’t exactly your college classroom.”

Ok, wait...so like, could Dave sense fish? If he could, was that a Dave-Selkie thing or a Dave-Dave thing? A tinge of frigid heat flickered in the back of Adam’s skull as something grew near, farther and larger than the palpable “otherness” that radiated from Dave. The Hunter tensed, but wasn’t going to pass up his last chance here.

“One more question….did uh….a hot Turkish motorcycle chick call you from a Hell Dimension for her sister’s birthday?”

The frosty mire stirred with an upwelling of bubbles that brought the brackish scent of rotting things with them. The dirty ice cracked upwards as an enormous bulk  briefly surfaced fifty feet away.

“Its like..ok if its yes, just been bothering me.”

Dave just… stared at Adam.  Had he heard that right? The words were distinct on the lips, but the sentence made no sense, not even when Dave happened to know there was a Turkish spellcaster who summoned things from hell dimensions. He wasn’t sure if he should be offended or complimented by the idea. “A hell dimension?” Dave repeated, just to make sure he’d heard right.

“The fuck are they teaching hunters these days? No, Walker, unless you consider Texas a hell dimension.” He cocked his head, considering. “Guess that wouldn’t be too far from the truth.”

The turbulence of water under the surface against his ankle had Dave looking around suspiciously, but the giant catfish was just reasserting itself in the water bed much, much to the starting of many smaller fish nearby, that darted away, including in their direction. Whether or not Texas was a hell dimension would have to be debated another day, preferably over a chilled beer.  “If we steer it a little to the left, the water there’s pretty shallow, and lots of land for you to use.” Not sure he was prepared for whatever other questions Adam might have, Dave began to wade deeper into the water, looking to get much closer before he caught the catfish’s attention.

“Not gonna lie,” Adam began with cheerful candor as he parkored his way between the more solid clumps of sodden shallows. “Texas sounds like a rough time for anybody who likes water.”

Dark hazel eyes glanced again towards the breach of a large slick mass against the ice, glimpsing what might’ve been a piscine whisker, before they focused back to Dave, crinkling with suppressed mirth around the edges.

“Waaaaaait,” came the dire moment of revelation. “If you have magic skin...in Texas, did you like accessorize it?”

“Dave, my dude...did you wear sealskin chaps?”

Adam was just in the start of pantomiming the Dave sauntering around Huston in this deviant form of cowpoke asswear when bulky shape burst from the icy murk.

“Hell yeah!”

Dave’s eyebrows raised right into his hairline as he looked over  at Adam, deeply unimpressed at his realisation. For a brief second, he almost knocked Adam into the water to quiet the kid, before remembering what they were here for. Maybe later.

“You’re lucky that thing works better dry,” Dave retorted, looking down pointedly at Adam’s rifle, but the tiny quirk at the corners of his lips belied his grumpy demeanor.

It was one thing feeling it stirring in the muck, and another for the large form  to crash through the crackly thin layer of ice. Dave grinned, his canine teeth bared as the form surged through the water, its wide mouth gaping for prey, not realising that it was no longer the predator. In the water, Dave was the more obvious target, so he started backing into the shallower waters, letting it think it was hunting him.

Considering how big the damn thing was, Dave hadn’t really expected it to be able to grab a nearby tree and use that to propell itself at Dave, barely diving out of the way before its jaw shut around him. When it’s body crashed through the water again, it sent waves of water and mud flying, but in missing it had given Dave an opening to drive the machete into its back, hoping to slice through the spine. The catfish flailed in protest, grabbing Dave with an arm like a tree trunk and dragging him under water.

----

“Aw shit,” Adam laughed as he tried to get a hold on the slick flailing creature that was driving Dave down into the murk, “it's trying to send you back to Texas!”

The icey bog water stung Adam’s bare arms with a cold burn that was soon replaced with an oiliness that seeped between his fingers. Adam gritted his teeth and lips shut to try to to get any of the frigid brackishness in his mouth as the catfish bucked and flailed beneath him.

Adam plunged his combat knife into the creature’s side, grime mixing with pale blue blood and the sudden reek of raw damp chicken. Trying to keep hold, Adam yanked out the blade and brought it down again and again, attempting to get the catfish to favor its wounded side and hopefully roll Dave out of the water.

----

It was fortunate that Dave was both hard of hearing and currently being wrestled by an enormous catfish underwater, because if he had heard Adam’s comment, there might have been a sea creature versus hunter alliance. The heavy set slime on his skin kept the catfish’s hands sliding off him, but as he was knocked deeper and deeper into the dirt, the chance of dying from being crushed by catfish was increasingly looming.

Dave bared his teeth and bit into the scaled underside of the catfish with little success, unable to open his mouth enough to get any kind of hold, but the overhead action above the water seemed to have more of an effect. Dave kicked himself out from underneath the catfish as the catfish trashed and tried to reach for the human above it, more interested in a prey that it could actually drown.

It curled its other arm around Dave as it reached for Adam, distracted by the dagger slashing deeper and deeper into its side. It wasn’t watching as Dave opened his own maw and bit down on its arm, bone snapping under his canines.

When Dave emerged from the water, it was with one of the arms firmly between his teeth, torn off the body and dripping blood into the water, he grimaced, dropping it onto the roots of a nearby tree that had started to sink into the water as the soil beneath it had given way to watery mud.

----

“Holy shit,” Adam effused in admiration of such unmitigated badassery, a grin brightening the Hunter’s grime-covered face as he climbed up the side of the flailing catfish. He hoisted himself up with each deep stab of the knife into the catfish’s spongy flesh as if it were a rock-climber’s spike. “That was fucking ace….hey what’s it taste like? Bet you got like Marsh-Mono now or something…”

Adam’s preliminary diagnosis on what disease Dave had doubtless contracted was cut short as the Hunter accidentally stabbed too deeply and pierced an organ. Greenish black fluid hemorrhaged from the wound and Adam let out a stream of gagging curses as the slimy knife slipped from his fingers into the acrid effluvium.

That momentary loss of purchase was all the catfish needed. Adam plunged into the marshwater as the fish spun into a deathroll and opened its toothless maw wide.

Adam’s world became warm and damply dark.

----

“Ah, fucking hell,” Dave groaned, wading deeper into the water. He couldn’t see where Adam had gone, but he couldn’t feel anything human sized with flailing limbs moving around in the water. If he’d been knocked out, it was a matter of moments before the human risked drowning. You couldn’t heal an absence of oxygen in your lungs. Thick blue blood pumped out of the catfish’s side, murking up the water, but it was still kicking, moving towards him with its still remaining arm. This was going to be tough just by himself, and without Adam moving around in the water, Dave had no fucking idea how to find him.

The catfish swiped, and Dave dodged out of the way with a slash at its side, seeing where Adam had been hacking deep into it, where it was also bleeding and oozing viscous pus into the water, stinking up a storm. Still no sign of the wayward hunter. Shit, shit. Hoping that with its movement he might get a better feel of where Adam was. “WALKER!” He barked, watching the catfish and staying well away from its brutish arms.

Which was when he realised there was something else moving inside the catfish and he realised exactly where Walker was.

“Jesus Christ.” He drove his hand into the deep gash in the catfish’s side, causing it to spasm in pain, hoping he could distract the catfish long enough for one of them to think of a plan to get Adam out of the monsters without… risking killing him while fighting the catfish.

Adam’s silver knife appeared from the catfish’s belly, a brief protrusion of metal followed by an upwelling of dark blue ichor. The enormous fish thrashed as Dave’s hand in its wound exacerbated this new pain burrowing out from the inside. The catfish bucked in spine-twisting arcs on the frosty mire as it instinctively tried to get free of whatever invisible thing was tearing at it.

The knife blade surfaced again when the panicked  flailing no had briefly subsided, the incision growing into a long fleshly tear that spewed gummy stomach lining. Long strips of blue-tinged mucosa and yellowish subcutaneous tissue spurted from the wound each time the blade retreated, staining the marsh ice in a splots of organic dyes.

Adam’s gore-caked right arm snaked through the widened opening, trying to find some kind of grip outside as the fish’s frenzied motions turned his world into a dark barrel-roll hell of sloshing fluids and pythonic stomach muscles. It was a dicey business as the fish’s jostling and this cramped space made accidentally stabbing himself a real possibility. The Hunter had nearly opened up a vein when he’d had to fold into the fetal position to retrieve the spare silver knife.

It was times like these where being trained to abandon thought and focus only on each incremental steps of survival came in handy. The horrid smell, the acrid taste of bloody filth in his mouth, the vertigo of the fish’s thrashing, the burn on stomach acid in his skin and eyes, and the rip-popping compression of the catfish’s spasming stomach messes would’ve made it easy to just panic.

Luckily, Adam had spent enough time being taking  doses of ever-higher concentrations demonic Terevi venom as a teenager that being digested  was no longer an excuse to slack off. It’s really those salt of the earth family values that build character y’know?

Adam stuck out one leg through the widened opening and placed it again one fleshy end of the wound for leverage as he pressed the knife’s blade upward, sawing his way through sinews and fat as frigid marsh water poured in through the opening.

Something suddenly gave and the world spun. Adam hit the squishy sod with a groggy oof but convulsing to hack up catfish blood.

The first time the catfish tried to roll, Dave punched it in the eye. The second, he sliced off one of its barbs and it knocked him into the water with its remained arm. Dave’s head smacked into a tree branch and he briefly saw stars. He got out from under it, and saw a shape tearing through the scaled belly. A leg. Walker. He almost wanted to surge forward and grab him, but the bleeding hole wasn’t enough to fit a whole man through, and yanking Adam out of place might trap him and make him suffocate. Dave couldn’t let the catfish roll  again, or Adam’s leg would snap like a matchstick. Dave hacked at its back with the machete again, blood spewing his body with every swing, now he knew where the hunter was cutting his way out from, keeping the catfish from grabbing at Adam or rolling again. With a final hack and a burst of bloody flesh, its intestines spilled out into the water in large ropes and bobbing in the water like grotesque pool floats. Adam along with it. The catfish spasmed, and twitched, its gills trembling, before at last it became still.

“Jesus fuck,” Dave said, rushing over to Adam’s side. He paused, waiting for the worst of the convulsions to pass before bending down, picking up Adam’s arm and swinging it over his shoulder. If the kid passed out, Dave was worried he’d faceplant into the swamp and breathe water. “Easy does it. Easy does it now,” He muttered, lowering Adam to sit on some firmer ground. “Keep your eyes shut, I’m gonna get this crap off your off your face so you can breathe,” Dave said, not being precious as he wiped the acidic gunk from Adam’s face, pulling a flask of water out of his belt and using it to rinse Adam’s face. He held his hand so that the water wouldn’t go into Adam’s nose nor mouth. Wasn’t looking to waterboard the guy afterall, just make sure that the acid didn’t cause permanent injury to his eyes or anything.

Pressing the half-filled flask into Adam’s hand so that he could drink or wash himself as need be, Dave stepped back, giving Adam space to catch his breath and assess his own wounds. He leant against a worn out tree, feigning a casual demeanor so Adam didn’t feel as intensely scrutinised as he was being. The thick sludge of blood and grime covering Adam from head to toe was mixed with stomach acid, and the little skin that Dave could see was turning pink where it wasn’t battered blue. “Always thought hunters had a flair for the dramatic, but you really take the cake,” he joked with the hint of a smile on his features, but the worry was there. Adam’s injuries would heal faster, but Dave wasn’t the one who’d just been eaten. He just remembered the feeling. “When you’re ready, you’re gonna need to get back in the water to wash the rest of it off.”

He didn’t ask, are you alright. He didn’t ask whether it hurt. He didn’t need to. He knew how trauma was what each hunter collected by the armful, this just another harrowing near death experience out of dozens that Adam had walked away from. This one might not even leave a scar, just a story to tell over a beer. Tomorrow, Dave would feel like he’d been hit by a truck, and in a week his muscles would still give him hell. In a week, Walker would likely be right as rain. But healing hurt, both the mental and physical sort, so he waited for Adam’s cue before coming in to help him get on his feet again. His own legs began to protest under both their weights, his ribs creaking. For right now, the adrenaline rushing in his weathered veins made this just about bearable, but they needed to make a move before the tides turned against them.

“I’ll tell you what, Walker. Once we’re both patched up, I’ll buy you dinner and a beer just to celebrate you not being dinner.”

[iliveonmylaptop]

Disappeared

(In which my I wish my DM took obvious plot hooks so I could play my secondary character oh well guess I’ll do it myself)

To say the heist went off smoothly would be a blatant lie, but it was actually successful in the very least so they couldn’t do too much complaining about it in the end. 

One tense, waterlogged night later, and Amir had his mech and his anti-scrying necklace, Navryn had a new charm to stave off her illness a little while longer, and the rest of them had some new bruises and a good amount of money.

Now the night later, Amir had bid them farewell and vanished to supposedly start avoiding Ravenwatch. Meanwhile, Gilther had nabbed a small amount of funds from the Bank of Miry and practically commandeered a nearby tavern to throw an impromptu party to the success of their mission. 

That’s Gilther for you, Alwin figured.

The others had joined in, though Nav had bowed out early to retreat to her room in the inn they were staying in. Alwin suspected that she was still feeling the effects from such a high-intensity adventure. She’d been coughing a lot more in the past few hours, waving off his concern when he asked with just a weak smile. So he had let it go. 

Alwin wasn’t really a party person in general, but tonight was going especially poorly for him. He still hadn’t had the chance to meditate yet and was nursing a nice new scar on his upper left arm; courtesy of a Child of Athos’s lucky dagger strike. So here he was. Outside the festivities, by himself. As usual. 

It was dark and cool out. The sun had set several hours ago and the taverns lights were still shining brightly, thanks to the party. Alwin sighed, resting against the stone blocks that made up the wall behind him. He was definitely feeling last nights exertions. His whole body ached with a low ambient pain and he had that exhausted swirl behind his eyes that marked him being all out of spells for the moment. 

He took one last glance at the tavern, smiled tiredly, and pushed off the wall. Maybe a walk would clear his head. 

Tent Town was quiet, even for this time of night. Alwin breathed in deeply, taking in the sour stench of misery wafting below the cooler tones of the salt air. Nethis was a city like any other. Still, something about it felt… off. It was so crowded with people, overflowing with poverty and general unrest. The city seemed to press in on him, almost suffocating in its size. It’d been a long time since he’d been this anxious about his surroundings. 

Maybe it was his upbringing talking. Trees aren’t nearly as noisy as people.

Alwin paused at the end of a row of tents, rolling his shoulders and wincing. Damn. Maybe walking wasn’t the best choice when he was still this tired. He instinctively went to tug on his bracers, getting a flicker of surprise and then irritation when he remembered they weren’t there.

He wasn’t used to roaming around without his armor on. But it had gotten soaked on the previous mission and it needed some drying out in his room before he could re-treat the leather and be able to wear it again. 

Alwin sighed again, claiming a seat on a nearby stump. He was being ridiculous, wasn’t he. Oh well. 

“Got anything to say?” he murmured, glancing up at the moon. It was a mere sliver in the sky at this stage, forcing his night vision to work for every foot of sight he got. “Am I still on track for you, Goddess? Are heists in your grand cosmic plan?”

The moon, predictably, did not reply. Alwin laughed, a soft huff in the still air. “Didn’t think so.”

“You’re out late.”

Alwin flinched with a full body motion, spinning in his seat with hands instinctively raised. What the fuck…?

Amir stepped out of the shadows, eyebrow raised. Alwin blinked and relaxed a hair, bringing a hand over his chest.

“Damn, you scared the living stars out of me,” he said. He shook his head, squinting back at the thief. “Kinda rude, actually. Weren’t you supposed to have scampered off with your prize?”

Amir chuckled. He tugged at a cord beneath his hood, giving a silver glimpse of the charm they’d stolen for him. 

“I have a passage on a ship leaving in an hour or so. My cargo is already on board, ready for some insurance. Ravenwatch won’t be finding me anytime soon with this, anyways.”

Alwin nodded, leaning back in his seat and rubbing his eyes. Something was buzzing in the back of his head, an old suspicion to not trust any thieves guilds. Amir seemed… alright, though. He hadn’t done anything super shady so far, and he was doing his best to get away from Ravenwatch, something Alwin could appreciate at the very least. 

“So, other than doing your best to put our party’s rogue to shame with your sneaking skills, what are you doing out here?”

Amir smirked, casually claiming a seat next to him. 

“I have to wait somewhere, don’t I?” He said while Alwin wondered if it would be overly rude to shift away. “Besides, I wanted to thank you.”

Alwin snorted, fiddling with his gloves. “Yeah you already did that. The gold is nice.”

“I meant you, specifically.”

Alwin paused, giving him a steady look as his instincts sang in warning. Amir’s face was still mostly hidden in the shadows of his hood, making his face hard to read at this angle. 

“Why?” He asked flatly. “You didn’t seem so thrilled about the rest of us tagging on. You only wanted Thora; for the heavy lifting. What makes me so special in your eyes all of a sudden?”

“That is a question, isn’t it,” Amir mused. “Who are you, Alwin? The wandering vagabond? A rogue cleric on a mission from his goddess, as you claim?” His voice dropped. “Or are the rumors true?”

Alwin flicked his eyes around them. It was quiet, with no one else in sight. This was… not great. He curled his fingers against the rough wood, missing his staff and wishing for maybe an extra five or six spell slots. 

“What rumors, exactly?” He finally said. Amir seemed to smile at his tight tone, a glimmer of white teeth peeking out from the shadows. 

“I may not be part of Ravenwatch anymore, but they do deal in information. Now imagine my surprise when some old contacts had a significant amount of information on you. You’re a long way from home, te’krula.”

Alwin stood up, heart hammering. He knew it this was foolish he knew people would know why didn’t his party take him seriously-

“This conversation is over,” he snapped. His hands were shaking from nervous energy, and he shoved it down. 

“No, I don’t think it is,” Amir said, soft. Alwin snarled as Amir’s hand shot out, grabbing his elbow. He whirled on him, already summoning a handful of arcane flames. 

“Don’t even think about it you piece of- ” Alwin gasped, stumbling momentarily as a sharp pain bloomed in his rib cage where Amir had buried a needle-like dagger in a lightning-quick movement. 

Amir tried to back up after his strike, but Alwin grabbed a handful of his cloak as leverage to punch him directly in the face with his flaming hand. The thief stumbled backwards with a curse, hand immediately going to the seared flesh across his cheekbone. Alwin yanked out the dagger after a moment, barely even wincing at the trickle of blood. He threw it aside with a contemptuous motion, the metal disappearing into the scraggly grass. 

“I’m not gonna give you a second shot, asshole,” Alwin spat. He reached for his magic, the beginnings of thorns growing out from the ground beneath his feet. His hands trembled, which he ignored.

And Amir- laughed. 

“I don’t need a second shot.” He wiped the blood from his nose with the back of his hand, grinning. “The first was enough.”

A wave of dizziness spun over Alwin and his eyes went wide in realization. The trembling in his hands stilled, along with the rest of the movement in his body.

“Fuck,” he rasped, swaying as his joints and muscles locked up. “What the fuck- did…”

“A paralytic poison,” Amir said, watching Alwin struggle uselessly against his own body with a distinct amount of satisfied interest. “ Don’t worry- it won’t kill you. It’s not strong enough to stop your heart.”

Breathing was hard, but it was all he could focus on as his body stopped answering to him. Alwin screamed internally as his jaw locked up with the rest of him, stopping the verbal component needed for his spell-casting. The vines shriveled away, disappearing with the last of his magical capabilities. 

He collapsed. 

I knew it, his frantic thoughts said, swirling around in his frozen head. I knew it I knew it I knew this would happen- 

Amir knelt next to him, cocking his head curiously. 

“I’m always surprised by how quickly that poison takes effect. Still,” he brushed a lock of hair out of Alwin’s face, calmly meeting his furious gaze. “Can’t be too careful when dealing with spellcasters. Especially not ones of… your caliber,” he chuckled. 

Fuck you, Alwin wanted to scream, but all that came out was a strangled growl. The instinctive terror of once again being helpless, flat on his back, burned into rage at Amir, at the world, at himself for once again letting his guard down when he had just started thinking that maybe he’d be ok, that just maybe he’d finally found some people he could stay with. But he couldn’t say it- just stare upwards at the man who was casually going to take it away. Amir seemed to get the message anyway. 

“You’re probably wondering what this is about,” the thief continued. He was currently rummaging through his bag, pulling out some loops of rope and something leather that Alwin couldn’t make out, frozen on the damp grass as he was. “To put it simply- you’re my insurance.” A firm hand pushed him on to his side, so Amir could start the process of binding his hands behind his back. “You’re worth a lot in certain circles. Alive, again, so don’t think that I went through all this trouble just to kill you.”

Alwin’s breath hissed through his teeth, unable to answer- not that he wanted to at this point. Amir only hummed from where he was, pulling the ropes tight with practiced ease. 

“Someone in Athos will be very happy to have the sole heir to Terranith at their disposal,” Amir said. He finished on Alwin’s wrists, moving up to his shoulders. Alwin shuddered as the rope looped around his chest, the act of breathing starting to escape him as the poison ran its course. Amir appeared to notice and paused as Alwin’s vision starting swimming into black.

He patted his captive’s shoulder, clicking his tongue sympathetically. “But that will be your problem- not mine.”

Alwin finally let go, world fading into darkness, and he knew no more.

--------

So the storyteller in me is screeching right now.

 Also- I write these for me. But if even one person enjoys reading these, I’ll continue posting them here on tumblr. (My Burn Scars comp seems to have gotten deleted? I guess I’ll have to repost the whole thing.)

Hey if you want more Alwin and the Inhumans stuff, how about leaving a like or a reblog? (Or an ask I talk way too much about everything and will yell at you for like an hour about it)

[recentanimenews]

I Refuse to Be Your Enemy!, Vol. 1

By Kanata Satsuki and Mitsuya Fuji. Released in Japan as “Watashi wa Teki ni Narimasen!” by PASH! Books. Released in North America digitally by J-Novel Club. Translated by Molly Lee.

Despite the fact that, if you look at forums and message boards, you’d think “otome game villainess” novels were the new vampire or Alice trend, we haven’t actually had too many legally licensed over here yet. My Next Life As a Villainess, aka Bakarina, it a very broad comedy, almost a parody, of the genre. Accomplishments of the Duke’s Daughter just has the manga so far, and seems more interested in the politics and worldbuilding than it does in anything else. This new series, though, may be the purest form of the genre I’ve heard of. It’s not subverting anything – in fact, the opposite, it’s almost painfully earnest throughout. Our heroine knows she’s going to be a villainess (actually, not even that – a mid-boss) and get killed by the hero, and does her damndest to avoid that in every possible way. All this while falling in love. Light novel fans might be a little disappointed. Romance fans should be quite happy – it’s right up their street.

Kiara has had a rough life. The daughter of a Baronet (the lowest rung of nobility), her mother died early, and her father sold her off to the family of a count. There she was fed odd potions, trained in poisons and knifework (for some odd reason) and shipped off to boarding school. What’s more, she’s been having these odd dreams where she lives in a different world as a schoolgirl playing an RPG… whose plot sounds a lot like the world she lives in! What’s more, she remembers from the dream that she (with a different, married name) is not only a spellcaster, but is brutally murdered by the heroes. So when a letter comes from the count telling her to come home and marry the guy whose last name she now recognizes, she very quickly runs away. Fortunately, she ends up hiding in the wagons of a group of young men who are sympathetic to her story… and one of them is more than he seems. Now she has to find a way to stop the fate she’s familiar with from the game from happening.

As you might guess, this is an isekai of sorts, but it’s handled in an interesting way. Kiara never loses her sense of “self” to whoever the Japanese girl whose memories she has, which the memories remaining “dreamlike”. As such, it feels a lot more realistic, even when she brings up RPG terms. On the down side, her character can be highly variable depending on the nature of the plot – she was bad at school, so has to have a few things explained to her (and the reader), but by the end of the book she’s putting her RPG memories to use as a real-time strategist, and seems to get far too good at spellcasting far too quickly. The better parts of the book are her interactions with Reggie, her love interest (yes, besides the presence of two other obvious candidates, there seems to only be one love interest here), and her “I must be mistaken no one could be interested in me” thought process is both frustrating and adorable.

The book ends on a cliffhanger, which is a bit annoying as it felt like if it had gone 10 pages more, we could have ended the series with the first volume. But there are five more. In the meantime, this is pretty solid, if a bit humorless. It’s serious romantic fantasy, with everyone acting the roles as straight as they can.

By: Sean Gaffney