#bone dragon was fun!!!!! it actually took a while to kill its final form. i kill 90% of enemies in one hit and 100% in two until now | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

atethewriting · 5 years ago

Text

The Tail Of A Golden Deer: The Sixth

This is a collaborative project with the account @jongins-laceglove. We apologize for the delay and hope you enjoy the sixth part of this series!

A Deer watched as the two men ran off, staring at the group before him with a wide smile on his face.

“I’m gunna go find Jisungie!!!!! I’ll be back!!” He yelled enthusiastically, running back into the dark and scary wood.

A carefree, young lad spun and skipped around without a single thought in mind. Except for, well, Jisung. Little did he know someone was watching him from the trees. Eyes that roared with green hues, and a uniform in which was for little girls. The thing stared and pondered with its’ little green eyes, growing curious.

Another watched the deer carefully, just as unaware. A man with spitting red hands and tan skin, followed Chenle by foot. All while Peppermint remained carefree.

That is, until he saw something so dreadfully horrible that made him stop right in his tracks.

A boy with dark hair hang lifelessly from a rope that was carefully tied into a noose. The boy’s body was bruised and cut and mangled, while his head dangled by his spine. Slowly, the fairy fell out of the rope’s hold and landed silently on the cold ground.

Chenle felt himself tick and buzz as he began to laugh, allowing the toxicity of freedom and in-sanity crawl under his skin. Crack, snap, bloody murder. The Canary’s hair and once-beautiful antlers went ink black, dripping with blood and dead skin. His once-gone fingers into sprouted bones, all the while his mouth tethered shut and spread into a sewed-on smile that reached to his ears. With eyes as red as hers, the Canary turned around and laughed at Haechan. This laugh wasn’t carefree and joyous at all. This laugh...this laugh spoke murder.

“Hiya, Freak!” He giggled, getting a bit too close for Haechan’s liking. The smell of death reeked throughout the forest, nothing the two hadn’t smelled before.

Haechan let out a hearty sigh and fought off the feeling to kill Chenle, realizing that he was definitely needed. “Hey.” He spoke blankly.

“Haha! Acting tough, are we? How cute, how cute indeed. Yep! Yep! Such carefreeness for one who just killed my best friend. How cute, how cute indeed. Yep! Yep! We found your double. There is always the possibility of replacing you, but my Mama said we need you and your triples later on. Yep! Yep! The Canary always wins! Indeed, Indeed!” The boy’s voice worked like clockwork, ticking and buzzing and slowly losing control. A small whisper in his ear told him what to say, so he gladly listened.

Haechan remained silent.

“My Mama said not to trust men who know men in lab coats! Yep! Yep! How cute, how cute indeed! Rude! Rude!” Chenle sang as he paced around the Mage, laughing and giggling.

That seemed to trigger Haechan in a way that made him stumble back and fall on the ground, a small gasp leaving his lips. “W-Who told you about that!?” His eyes went wide, a part of him trying not to cry.

“My Mama!” The canary replied cheerfully, humming.

“G-get away from me, freak!” The mage yelled, getting back onto his feet and running off.

Chenle only giggled, turning around and returning to his normal self.

“Well, I found Jisungie...I guess...”

---------------------------------------------

Winwin sat nearby the mangled body of a wind, mumbling about how he can’t leave Kun with a child and no one to protect him. He had no clue if Aldrich had returned yet but he knew that he couldn’t leave Kun with a fucking CHILD. It was a bad idea to let Kun keep her in the first place but it was even worse for this to suddenly happen.

It then hit him.

“FUCKKKKKKKKK Even if i do make it back Baekhyun is literally going to slaughter me if he found out this happened!” Winwin yelled quite loudly, scaring off some birds.

A loud whistle sounded throughout, spooking Winwin. Curious, he sprung up and followed the sound.

Oh, it lead back to the cabin. OH, everyone’s here.

“I have news...” The deer whispered, staying awfully close to his double. “J-Jisungie...Jisungie is dead...”

Minseok blinked at him, trying to process his words before sighing heavily, moving sit down on the deck.

Hybrid Jisung smiled at the news, turned away from the group as he sat next to Yixing’s body.

That night was one big blur, everyone getting ready for bed as Minseok stared off into the forest, pacing nervously as he tried to decide on what to do with Yixing.

He walked by his body countless times, not even having the stomach to look at his lifeless form.

The moment he died kept replaying over and over in his head, the feeling he got as his friend’s life force slipped from his body like it was nothing wasn’t anything short of pure, unfiltered dread.

He finally gave up, letting out a loud frustrated noise as he opted for just putting a bed sheet on him and walked into the house.

He would have missed it when Chanyeol woke with a start, blindly searching for his notebook if it weren’t for his excessive cursing.

“Fuck if I don’t find it now I’m not going to be able to write it down, shit where is it I’m gonna fucking scream that god damned notebook is-“ Chanyeol flinched when his notebook smacked him in the face after Minseok threw it right at his face with an expectant look in his eye.

Chanyeol quickly sat down at the coffee table, quickly trying to scribble down all the events of his vision before it completely slipped from his mind.

“Fuck!” He growled, throwing his notebook across the room when he completely forgot some important information before he could write it down.

Minseok gingerly picked it up, flipping through the tattered book before stopping at the page he wanted, only to be more confused than ever.

“Orange. Blue. Black. Death. Jongin. Ch” He furrowed his brows and repeated it over and over, looking between the book and Chanyeol with a questioning look on his face.

“I don’t know, Minseok.. I really don’t know. I can’t help beyond that, I’m sorry. It’s gone.” He sighed, slumping over on the couch in defeat and running his hands over his face.

“And Jongin? Why does that name sound so familiar...” Minseok pondered as he walked over to Chanyeol, handing him his book back.

Chanyeol shook his head, taking the book absentmindedly with furrowed brows. “I.. It’s on the top of my tongue, but I just can’t quite put my finger on it. For some reason my first thought is that he has something to do with Renjun.. but that can’t be right, no that’s impossible. Right? It’s gotta be.”

Minseok stood there, his mind racing as he tried to figure out what to think of this situation when he and Chanyeol were suddenly startled out of their thoughts by the sound of the glass door slamming shut- making them both jump in surprise.

They exchanged a suspicious glance before they both scurried outside, seeing an orange-headed boy with a fluffy striped tale slinking quietly into the dark forest and immediately following after.

~~~~

He stared down at the dead body of his doppelgänger, happy with his work as he tied the cloth pouch that held Jongin’s eyes to his belt.

He was about to fly off- before he heard the argumentative shouts of.. three? People in the distance, and decided to have some more fun that night.

He quietly walked through the forest, slowly getting closer and closer before he broke through the tree line, and startled the three men.

“W-wait, you look.. Chanyeol I think you were right about Jongin being related to Renjun... I think they used to be friends.”

Kai snarled, his boney dragon wings twitching and his white eyes seemingly glowing under the moonlight. “You knew Jongin?” He threatened.

The tallest one nodded once, his ears flopping slightly with the movement. “Yeah actually. He was- wait, knew?” He backed up.

Kai smirked, staring right into him “Yes, knew. Why I killed him, after all!”

They gasped, but the one with the orange hair stood out to him in particular, so of course he did the most logical thing.

Kill him.

He lunged forward, ripping into the soft skin of his stomach with his left hand and tearing out organs as the boy let out pained screams. Black flames from his hand burned him from the inside out.

Kai turned to the other two that were trembling in fear, too shocked to say anything as he twisted his hand once more- making the boy scream even louder and enjoying the way that they flinched.

He finally had enough, reaching into his rib cage and burning right through his lungs to rip out his heart.

He kicked the body aside, moving towards the other two.

“Now. What do you know of Renjun? Where is he. If you play nice I might let you live~ barely, of course- But you’ll survive.” He teased.

The short one shuddered, his eyes still glued to the corpse of his friend and not even registering the words his taller friend sassed back at the man.

“I’d like you to say that again with just as much confidence after you know just how many seers I’ve killed, boy.”

The boy glared as he moved to punch Kai- but let out a guttural scream when he grabbed his arm, breaking his bones with the sheer force of his grip and tossing him to the ground as though he weighed nothing.

Kai smiled at the two before he slowly lifted both of his arms. One backed up as the other merely sat on the ground in horror, pathetically scooting against the dirt in an attempt to escape. “No.. no, please! I’m begging you, don’t!”

Kai just chuckled deeply, and steadily grew flames in the palms of his hands- the left being black, and the right being blue.

“Well, this was fun while it lasted.”

He shot his flames at both of them, their cries of pain the only thing he could hear over the sound of burning flesh.

He frowned at the blue flame, being reminded once again of the days when his bastard of a father took him to that small blue room.

When their screams finally stopped, he relented- and made sure he was satisfied with their charred beyond recognition corpses before finally flying back to wherever he came from.

~~~~~~~~~

What’s it like to lose your best friend?

Only few know that feeling.

Only few know the hopelessness.

A deer, a mouse, a bard, and many.

In-Sanity is a lot of fun.

When you’re doing it with another.

The Deerest of Deers stood silently and blankly, rapidly changing from his other form back to the original. It couldn’t decide. Didn’t want to decide. In-sanity is funny. It likes to bounce around wildly in your mind while you try to stay alive. Quite humorous, if you ask us. It likes to glitch and sting and buzz. A monster of all sorts, we must say.

He ticked and buzzed and flinched when the others around him in the cabin living room spoke. Everything was incomprehensible, blended in with each other. Reverbs and autotunes lifted their voices until everything was just hums and squeaks.

The boy let out a small, freakish sound. Down he went, to the ground. Not unconscious, just overstimulated. The voices mocked him. Told him it was all his fault.

The voices only laughed and the buzzes and static noise got louder. Every other sense blocked out as he fought his mind.

Don’t slip into In-Sanity.

Mint, snapping, twisting, deer.

The boy let out another freakish sound, covering his ears and trying to drown out the hearty thoughts that stabbed him countless times over.

It was testing him. Probing his mind with questions. He wasn’t ready, wasn’t worthy.

“Stop go away!” He yelled, yet nothing came out.

“I can’t!” He said once more, no one heard him.

A slip out of mind. To where no one heard his cries. His mind. His mind. His mind.

As soon as it started, it was over.

Skin, pale and scared, seemed to glow. The red and white hues to his features returned, no longer gold. He wasn’t worthy anymore.

To everyone else, he had merely changed colors like a chameleon. No one saw his pain. No one saw him collapse.

“Don’t trust men who have green couches! Don’t forgive men in lab coats! Don’t believe men in orange! A tiger is dead! Yep! Yep! A griffin has no heart! Yep! Yep! Dobermen Dead! Indeed! Indeed!” He blurted out, unable to control what he just said. Covering his mouth, he shook. “W-what...I-I didn’t mean to say that! Why did I say that?!!”

Jisung watched Chenle from a corner of the room, his own eyes swimming with worry. He’d been trying to muster up the courage to walk over and help him- seeing as nearly everyone else couldn’t see his distress through the haze of their own.

He mentally slapped himself when Sicheng and Yuta stepped into his line of vision, unfamiliar serious looks in their eyes.

He opened his mouth to ask what was going on, but before he could get the words out they both reached down and grabbed an arm, pulling him up. A confused noise escaped his mouth as they dragged him up the stairs into his and Chenle’s room.

Sicheng pushed him down on the bed, Yuta sitting down next to him as he pulled a chair away from the desk in front of the window it sat in front of.

He was speechless, eyes flicking between the two with a suspicious look.

“What do you two want.”

Sicheng snorted out a laugh, crossing his legs in the chair.

“We wanted to know if you need to talk? Not just about all the deaths.. but things in general.”

Jisung looked surprised, and he was indeed as to why they’d want to talk to him of all people. Why not Chenle? He certainly needed it more than him.

“I.. I suppose so. It honestly hasn’t caught up to me yet.. and I don’t think the worst has come.”

Yuta nodded, moving to wrap his arm around Jisung’s shoulder. “I see.. well, you know we’re here for you when it does hit. If you need us we’ll be there- no matter what. Don’t be scared to come get us.”

“I second that!”

Jisung chuckled, reaching to grab the desaturated orange blanket with cream splotches and black stripes that was draped over the headboard.

He wrapped it around himself, a comfortable silence settling in between the three. He didn’t have to speak for them to understand his situation or noisy mess for thoughts. They just knew. almost as if they’d been through something similar.

~~~~

Jisung shot up from his sleep in a cold sweat, looking out the window to see a bright crescent moon.

He swallowed, but the lump in his throat protested, causing him all the more pain.

He blinked, suddenly realizing the wetness of his cheeks.

All too fast, his mind flashed with the memories of his boyfriend from his dream and he only cried harder.

He got up quietly, padding through the hallway and down the steps to the bathroom. He picked up a small animal that was glowing dimly, and grabbed some sugar cubes for it on his way to the bathroom.

He set the small fluffy yellow creature onto the side of the counter, right in front of the mirror and giving it the snacks. He smiled softly as it’s glow became brighter with happiness, nearly buzzing in delight as it hummed sweetly.

With shaky hands, he took out Chenle’s pocket knife and sniffled, staring into the mirror at his own blurry and disoriented reflection.

He raised the knife to his hair- slicing off chunks until it was an inch long on top. With shaky hands, he shuffled through the drawers in the shelf behind him, pulling out an electric razor and deciding to shave the bottom a bit.

He stared into the mirror with a dull look, holding back the urge to scream and cry and punch something until his fists were bloody.

He clenched his jaw, suddenly turning to go back upstairs.

He walked right past his room, turning into an empty . His tears started falling even heavier, dripping onto the ground as he searched through the drawers for Chenle’s lighter.

He finally found it, pulling it out of the drawer and dropped to the ground. He hugged it close to his chest, sobbing freely.

After a while he calmed down a bit, and he decided to get up and go act upon whatever impulses his mind feeds him.

As he was standing up to leave the room, he jumped- the silhouette of his roommate startling him.

“C-Chenle? What are...what are you doing out of bed...?”

“What the heck do you think I’m doing?! I’m trying to find that stupid book...Yep! Yep! Indeed!” Chenle grinned and approached the other, his figure darkened and bloody. In between the knots and strings of his mouth, a set of sharp teeth rest, waiting to strike. The boy’s red eyes glowed so brightly that it was almost blinding to look at.

“Would you like to commit a crime as horrible as murder with me? For sure! For Sure! We shall ruin life and death! The king has befallen! Yep! Yep! In a pile of roses, once more! Yep! Yep! May we pray for his poor soul!” The Canary giggled, twitching and ticking as he hummed around the room.

“My Mama,” He continued, looking back at Jisung, “My Mama said to have you help me, as you are as heartbroken as I am!”

Jisung gulped, shoving the lighter into his pocket and averting his gaze to the floor. “I don’t know who your ‘Mama’ is, but she’s wrong. I’m not heartbroken. I don’t know why I would be. It’s not like.. like he’s really gone or anything. He’s just, he’s just missing, that’s all. Yeah, he’s missing!”

He bounced over to the doorway, looking behind him to Chenle, waiting for him to follow.

“I- I’ll find him! Yeah, You’ll burn the book, and i’ll g- go look for him. And I’ll find him! He’s okay, I just know it.”

Chenle stopped the taller one, tightly gripping his wrist and looking down.

“Jisungie...You can’t go in the woods anymore...there’s an evil man there. H-He...He killed your...your me. He’ll kill you, too, if you go out there. The man with...dragon wings...He doesn’t show any mercy. Just...Just grab the book. We’ll burn it together, okay?”

He let out a shaky and weak sigh, the tension in his body slowly disappearing.

“I.. I will burn the book with you. But after that, I can’t promise anything. I appreciate it.. but I have to go into the forest. I can’t explain it, it’s like there’s something calling me. And I need to know what it is.”

“Then, I’m going with you.” The Deer let go of the mouse’s wrist, leaving the room and coming back with a lit lantern. “But let’s do it before it gets too late. We can burn the book when we get back, or we’ll get it now and do it in the woods. How does that sound?”

Jisung only nodded.

And, off they went.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

With winds of ice and horror, two boys stood at the edge of a dark forest, wielding only a pocket knife, a lighter, an old book, and a lantern. In Xymore times, right now it would be 2 First, or, 2AM.

The Wood, alive with creatures only the night knows, crawled up their backs and made them shiver. Howls and shrieks and cries they had never heard before. Sounds only heard in dreams. The wisps of eerie whispers tickled them.

Only a small flame brought them to the center of it all. Everything fell into a sort of enchanting spell at this hour, whistling a tune while purple lights dangled from the trees as if they were hung for a birthday party.

“Mendorus Candelactum...” Chenle mumbled, “The Goddess Of Memories...She’s watching...We mustn’t make a sound, Jisung...”

“How do you know th-”

“Shh...”

The Deer stood tall on his heels and sniffed the air, pointing North, deeper into the forest.

“That way...” He breathed, quietly heading the direction he pointing to.

The reeking smell of death filled their noses and blanketed their tastebuds with rotten, human flesh. Chenle, quite used to it, kept moving closer towards the smell. Jisung, however, gagged and unwillingly followed the canary.

What they saw was hideous.

Guts scattered the forest floor. Blood, clotted and gooey, stuck to the bottoms of their shoes as they directed the light towards the source. Three dead bodies rest mangled and stagnant, hollow of any magic. Just a shell of the people they used to be. The youngest let out a choked sob once he saw someone familiar, yet the oldest directed his attention towards the rope that hung from a tree, and the man who lay beneath it.

A graveyard of magic and unfulfilled hope. It disgusted them, yet, intrigued them, as well. A lighter and a book, four dead bodies, possible doom...It intrigued them. Made them so undeniably curious. What lie at the end? Only the dead knew that answer.

The small “tick, tick, tick” of a lighter being lit was the only sound made in this moment. Soon after, the crackling of a book being burned to ashes, and the choked laughs of two In-Sane children. ‘Such a pretty sight,’ they pondered, allowing for the in-sane-ness to drown them in such a pretty and curious light. ‘Such a pretty sight to see the ones we hate mangled on the forest floor.’

Jisung giggled, the misplaced happy sound cutting through the air over the crackling of the burning book. His hand subconsciously reached towards the dancing fire, before the sound of a twig snapping from behind startled him.

He whipped around towards the sound, flinching and swiftly pulling out his dead boyfriend’s knife from his back pocket.

His eyes widened at what he saw, the corpses of their deceased friends- and his boyfriend- rising from the ground, their empty eyes dull-ly twinkling from the light of the small fire.

“Burn.. Burn.... Burn........” They groaned, clawing and stumbling after the pair before Jisung had to slash at Minseok’s hand when his body got too close. “I.. I think that’s how they died...” Jisung mumbled to himself, clicking his tongue as he grabbed a heavy rock to bash Chanyeol’s skull in with it while stabbing Minseok in his rotting temple, successfully killing them one last time.

He panted, staring down at the bodies in a moment of uneasy silence before a shrill scream of surprise ripped out from his throat, being shoved to the ground with a harsh pushed from behind.

He struggled, slashing at the crazed, re-animated body of his boyfriend that reached for him while he sobbed. “No! No, please- Chenle! It-It’s me! Don-don’t you recognize me?! It’s- it’s go-ing to be ok-okay! Just please, Don’t hurt me!!!”

Our very deer-like Chenle twitched and ticked towards his double, pulling him up by the back of the shirt and giving a dead stare. Looking him in the eyes, the Canary’s pupil dilated until the eye was as small as a pin. Looking death in the eye, giving his doom the final laugh before reaching up the lighter in which the book was burned from. Slowly, the small whispers of the forest silenced, being filled by the short breaths of someone who’s faced death many times over.

“You can’t hear me...You have nothing left...But, I promise you...I will take care of him. You shall hurt no-one...an-y-mo-re. May Death never forgive you, and may you light up in flames and fuel our heat.”

The Silence, like a bubble, popped. Soft, crackling noises from the fire that burned a familiar body.

“He’s watching us. Such...a foolish boy...Jisungie...Someone’s watching us. He’ll make it 21...We must hurry home.”

A whip of dark light flew by them. The small laugh of a confused man, creeping up behind them.

“I recognize those certain words, yes yes,” The voice spoke, making himself apparent.

Kun.

“Mark told me once, I thought it was your father who would say it. Of course, it’s you. He could tell the future! Ah, green, green!” Wrapping his arms around Chenle and squeezing tight, a bright smile lit up the forest. “Your father wouldn’t be proud of you, but I am.”

“Kun!!” The Deer smiled, returning to his normal self and helping up Jisung, “Jisung! This is...oh, are you okay? You look awfully pale.”

Said boy shivered in dread, wrapping his arms around himself on the ground he sat disoriented upon. He stared Into the distance- the feeling of something being wrong consuming him before the question registered, and he stood up stiffly, offering a curt nod to no one in particular.

“Yeah, I’m.. fine. I’m just not used to an... anybody el-se b-ut m..my Chenle car-ing about m-e.”

He wiped blood off of the blade of his knife with the fabric of his tattered gray shirt, cutting a long slit into it accidentally as a result.

He scrunched up his nose in anger, impulsively flipping the knife downwards in his hand before shoving the knife into the hole.

Right as it registered in his head what he’d done, it was too late.

He gasped, the pain slowly spreading through his body before he pulled the knife back out of the side of his side in a panic- spasming in pain and flinging the knife through the air blindly.

Kun blindly caught the knife, recognizing its’ pattern and dropping it to the ground, letting a small gasp grab his throat and strangle him. A choked cry brought him all the way left as he stumbled over to Jisung and absent-mindedly started to treat his wounds. A strange tingling feeling brought him to a halt, feeling as if there was a ghost touching his shoulder. He shivered, continuing what he was doing until the wound was bandaged and secure.

Yet, something felt off. Not in the way that’s like “oh I’m not home”, but in a “I know this place” kind of way. He knew this forest.

It was the forest he went missing in over 20 years ago.

“What the...”

---------------------

By now it was getting to be sunrise and the three In-Sane members of the group made their way up the steps, too tired to notice that a green book and some pointy object rest where Yixing was supposed to be, but now gone.

Tired, but aware, Kun saw the small sign that was hung right next to the door, absolutely speechless.

“Renjun...Renjun...Huang Renjun...?” He spoke to himself, entering into the cabin after the two boys.

With Chenle and Jisung already in their rooms, probably sleeping, Kun took his time peeking around the cabin until he had someone to talk to. Reminiscing the old cabin and memories he had in the past.

The fiery heat of a Phoenix made his way down the stairwell, still sleepy and in his soft pajamas. It was quite early, after all. Sunlight breeched through the large windows Kun was facing, causing him to groan and shield his eyes from the powerful light. His tucked-away Fairy wings were quite visible, now, as his black shirt wasn’t at all heavy. This caught Renjun’s attention. He gasped so loud that it made Kun swiftly turn around.

The two shook as they tried to keep themselves together. Many, Many years it had been since they last made eye contact. So many lost years in which the Phoenix called the Fairy’s name deep in the woods with no response. They both looked so mature now, it was almost too good to be true.

“Kun?”

“Renjun?”

Renjun trembled, his eyes stinging with the pain that came along with the remembrance of lost memories.

Pictures of his childhood flashed before his eyes in a vivid haze of laughter and fun. He had been friends with the fairy at a young age.. up until he disappeared without a trace one day, leaving the boy to wonder if it was all a dream.

But he stood before him now, in all his glory.

He blinked his thoughts away, stepping closer to the other man.

“Is... is it really you? I- I assumed you were dead. You look so different now...”

“I would say the same for you, Renjun. Yes, it really is me...I uh...thought I’d never see this place ever again, honestly.” Kun didn’t seem to smile, even in this moment of joy. Yet, the phoenix could tell Kun was insanely proud of him. “Oh, right. My Renjun wanted me to tell you that he is okay. He’s at home resting....Mmmm...Do you have any soda...? It’s been years since I’ve had a coke.”

Renjun’s caramel brown hair glowed ember in a moment of excitement as he jumped to the kitchen happily.

“That’s right, you used to really like pop didn’t you?” He thought out loud, swiping a can of coke from the top shelf of the fridge.

��I like to drink one out in the place we used to play around as kids... I never really thought about it before, but I really miss those days.” He pondered reminiscently.

“Mmm...” Kun looked down at the floor, holding the can of coke tightly in his hands. Soft tears slowly fell down his face while he attempted to push them away and act like nothing was happening. “S-Sorry...Sorry I’m sorry...”

The distant arguing of two of the now awake members came crashing down the stairs. Winwin...and Yuta...Surprise, surprise. Winwin came tumbling over to Kun, tackle hugging him.

“Saonac, soam-raoc acaas!!“ He slapped Kun right on the cheek, giving a small pout and sitting on his lap.

“Shoth of!“ The stupid, tear-faced idiot returned.

“Dhraeen~” Winwin stuck his tongue out, wiping Kun’s tears away.

“I’ve missed you, too.”

The loud crash of a startled man came tumbling down the stairs, quickly collecting himself and looking at the group with wide eyes.

“I know the coordinates!”

#fairyland!au #nct #writing #fanfic #fanfiction #worldbuilding #fairyland #horror #collab #crossover #exo #kpop

6 notes · View notes

nelllraiser · 5 years ago

Text

your ass is grass | deirdre & nell

TIMING: after deirdre’s fateful call with regan’s dad. (yes, this is old) PARTIES: @deathduty and @nelllraiser. SUMMARY: regan is grass. nell still hates mimes. deirdre isn’t a rotten egg. penises.

HellaHairFlip Today at 12:40 AM: do u have anything to add walmart dentist Today at 12:41 AM: add that i love u :/

A lot of things were going wrong for Deirdre, she was happy at least at sneaking into a nearby recreation center was not one. “Move your feet, Penelope. We’ve got something very important to steal.” The door clinked open and the banshee pushed it open, waiting for the human to follow her in. She adjusted the mask on her face, an unnecessary precaution, probably, but she might have taken any excuse to wear a mime mask. They were truly terrifying. “We can’t commit theft if that’s how slow you’re going to move. Don’t witches have more self-respect than this?” The cold night air drifted in behind her, a perfect day for a little criminal activity. Penelope wasn’t her first choice in companions, but she’d need the witch for the spell once they were done here. So it was convenient, more than anything.

Of all the things to steal, Nell was rather...surprised that it was only fake grass that was needed as an ingredient for breaking a fae promise. “I’m moving fine!” she hissed back, feeling rather dramatic in her all black outfit along with the ski mask over her eyes. “And did you have to wear a mime mask of all things? Cursed creatures. Snobby know-it-alls. They probably think you’re emulating them.” Nevertheless, she thought it’d be rather fun to commit a little bit of theft, even if it was only grass. Besides, if she got brought home by cops— it wouldn’t be the first time. “So why do we need grass anyway?” she asked as they closed in on their target.

“Why aren’t you wearing the mime mask I bought you?” Deirdre hissed, though her anger deflated a moment later. If someone saw them, it’d be the mime and the bargain bin bank robber, and she’d kill to see that headline somewhere. “We can’t be a team like this.” She knew Penelope couldn’t see the smirk on her face, but she hoped the child could feel it. “This was the only mask left in the store,” she groaned, leading the witch through the halls until they reached one of the fields. Glorious, beautiful turf shone back at her through the small window in the double doors. Deirdre pushed on the handle and unsurprisingly found it clunk back at her with the telltale signs of being, equally unsurprisingly, locked. “I told you on the way here: we need the grass for the spell. It takes two parts, fae components and then something representative of the spell. My darling Regan is the grass, or the not-grass, but her father thinks of her like grass.” She looked up at the mechanism that held the door in place and turned back to the witch, gesturing up at it. “Can you do anything about that? I don’t suppose you know any convenient door opening spells, do you?”

“Because mimes are the literal scourge of the Earth!” Nell’s voice was full with the passion of a thousand suns on that matter. “I’d rather die than impersonate a mime.” Damn. She would have liked to be a team, though. Nell hadn’t thought of that. “Maybe if you’d gotten anything else but the mimes- we could have been the super cool theft tag team. I feel like we could have even just made homemade masks. A fun bonding activity, don’t you think?” She was only half-joking. It’d probably be amusing to see what sort of mask Deirdre might fashion. “Yeah, yeah, but why is Regan grass? None of your analogies make sense.” Nevertheless, she gave a bit of a smug smile as Deirdre requested her services. With a simple few words, and the passing of her hand over the mechanism, the door was ready to go. “Now who’s lacking self-respect?” The retort didn’t make any sense, sure. But it made her feel a little better.

“You really...hate mimes.” Deirdre blinked, simply listening to the child. She hadn’t expected it to be such a hot-button issue, but she also hadn’t expected to be stealing grass in the middle of the night with someone who was, effectively, a child. “I don’t do crafts, I make people do crafts for me and then I throw them out,” she scoffed, crossing her arms over her chest as though it were the most obvious of fact---that she would never degrade herself doing anything lowly. “Regan isn’t the grass, her dad wants her to be grass: easily maintained, something to look at. He only cares enough to keep his lawn looking the way he wants it, no matter what that means. Regan isn’t grass, she’s better than---oh, forget it. Why am I even explaining this to you?” But her explanation served as filler between Penelope’s spell and the door clicking open. “There’s something I’ve always wanted to say, Penelope,” Deirdre smiled, pushing open the door and pausing at the threshold between the field and the hall. Then she turned, her smile twisting with mischief, “last one in is a rotten egg.” And being right at the door, Deirdre took the first step on to the fake grass and was, unceremoniously, not the rotten egg. “You humans have some delightful phrases, although I hope this doesn’t mean I just turned you into an egg.” She paused, “the last one in is not a rotten egg.” She turned back, pulling a knife from her back and gesturing around. “Do you want to do anything else or shall I get started on the grass.”

“They’re my biggest and most mortal enemy on this Earth,” Nell finished succinctly before thinking to continue on with. “Though often I doubt if they’re actually mortal. Especially that weird one that walks on all fours.” Nevertheless, her disdain for the mimes dissipated as she traded it for amusement. “Crafts can be fun.” Nell wasn’t entirely sure if she’d entirely caught the whole ‘grass’ analogy, but she was fairly certain she at least understood it well enough to be able to replicate the spell Deirdre was teaching her...if she ever needed to. Surely being able to do away with fae promises was something that would come in handy one day. “No fair! I wasn’t warned! You’re supposed to count down from three or something.” She was, quite understandably, quite miffed at having found herself the rotten egg, though she was quickly placated by Deirdre’s rectification of the situation. “Oh- that’s much better. Thank you. I could feel my yolk forming as we spoke.” Nell scanned the surrounding area, as if someone was waiting to jump out and yell, ‘Gotcha!’. Though could they actually be arrested for taking fake grass? “No, no, please proceed with your grazing. I’ll be here.” She squinted at the knife. “You know you could probably just pull the fake grass up...right?”

“Oh! You’ve seen that thing too?” Deirdre knew they were getting off-topic, but what was a chat about mimes while they stole fake grass? “I was with someone who cut its head off and the cursed thing just grew right back! Such a shame, really. I would have loved to pick through the bones that thing must leave…” she paused, gazing off, lost in the fantast in her head. “If any,” Deirdre murmured finally, shaking her head and moving along. “I think you’d look like Humpty Dumpty if you were an egg. You know, with the eyes and the mouth and the small little legs dangling over your brick wall.” Deirdre bent down, stabbing her knife into the grass and digging out a clean square for them to take. “This is more fun,” she glanced up, working through her patch of grass, “you’re not terrible for a human, Penelope. Certainly more fun than some---”

“Hey!” A voice boomed through the walls, and the jangling of keys followed. “Is anybody in there?” The double doors on the other side clanked open, and an old man dressed in security blues hobbled in. “You whippersnappers better not be painting any more penises here!”

In a moment, Nell put two and two together, her brow furrowing together a bit. “Wait, are you talking about Shiloh? She was telling me she cut it’s head off!” She’d been a bit jealous that she hadn’t been there to witness that, or have the honor of cutting it off— even if it wasn’t it’s real head. “But true...it’d probably be some pretty weird bones.” Her nose wrinkled, immediately rejecting Deirdre’s egg classification of her. “Ew, no. I couldn’t be. I don’t fall off of walls. I’m gonna be like a...dragon egg. You can be a chicken egg,” she joked with a little shrug. But she nodded sagely at the other woman’s claim, knowing firsthand that it truly was more fun to cut things with a knife. “Aww, Deirdre. Careful now. I’ll start thinking you like me or-” But her head snapped towards the voice that had yelled out, and she took in the sight of the night guard. “Do you have enough grass yet??” she asked in a hurried tone, not really wanting to be taken home in the back of a cop car or something. “Damn- we should have drawn some penises, though,” she finished under her breath.

“You know Shiloh too?” Deirdre, astonished again, blinked. It really was a small town. “Is Humpty Dumpty not a beloved story, Penelope?” She teased, making quick work of the turf below and slinging it over her shoulder once a sizable enough square has been cut. “I do like you, human. I say this now because you’ve suggested phallic defacement and of that, I am always a fan.” The guard finally snapped his flashlight to life and cast its orange-tinted light over to the two trespassers.

“Oi! You two there better not be drawin’ any penises or else I’m--” he paused, squitining. Then he took a cautious step forward. “Are you….are you two stealin’ grass?”

Deirdre snapped up, down with her thievery but not so done with her mischief. She turned to Penelope and gave a wide smirk, then turned back. “It was her!” And with no remorse, she pointed at the younger girl and dashed from the field with her fake-grass. She spared one singular glance backwards, seeing the security guard waving his light around and giving a very slow chase. He was too shocked to speak into his transerver to report the crime, but not shocked enough to trip over as he attempted to give chase. He hollered behind them, “a mime and a ski-enthusiast are stealing grass! A mime and a ski-enthusiast! My wife said it could never happen! I knew I was right to worry!”

‘Bitch!” Nell called after Deirdre, though it was colored with some amusement. “You’ll never catch us alive!” She yelled dramatically before hauling ass after Deirdre, rather quick on her feet. But then the other woman’s words about phallic drawings as well as the security guard’s were running through her head. And truly...she couldn’t resist. In a moment she was waving a hand over the grass, and a giant, stark white penis was glowing up from the greenery. Who cared if she used a little magic while her identity was hidden? As the man’s voice continued to yell after them, her joyful laugh flitted through the air, all too pleased with her art as her and Deirdre made their grand escape.

#chatzy #your ass is grass #ch:deirdre #wickedswriting

10 notes · View notes

aweebwrites · 6 years ago

Text

Fins and Hooves

Warning: animal death, mentions of blood (nothing too gross)

________________

Zane watched, perched on his favorite resting point in the lake as Cole ran along the shore. Cole himself had made the resting point using his affinity for earth. It was a shallow bowl shaped rising in the water, close enough to the surface that he could sit or lay down comfortably and still be visible above water while being just deep enough to keep his tail and gills submerged. There were two similar ones to his left for Nya and Skylor whenever they decide to come over to his side of the lake but his was hand carved with beautiful patterns and colourful stones embedded along it by his thoughtful mate.

Said mate who looked majestic running along the shore line, sending water splashing when the the waves came in too close. His hair had grown out over the winter and he had Nya pull it in a ponytail. He wasn't just running for fun however. He insisted that he hunt today. He found land animals unique in taste and while he loved fish, he like a change in diet from time to time. So after mentioning that to the kelpie during their morning swim (the sudden change in the dynamics of the lake confused breeding fish and a few who were supposed to be heading further north to lay their eggs had done so here instead. They decided it was a good thing and frequently checked to see how the hatchlings are doing), he took it upon himself to hunt for his mate.

“What has Cole so busy?” Nya says, sliding up onto the rest next to him.

“He's hunting.” Zane informed her, resting his chin in his webbed hand. “I've never actually seen him do it so I thought I'd observe.” He says and Nya hummed.

“I'm surprised he finds any prey with those thundering hooves of his.” She snorts.

“I thought the same thing at first.” Zane says quietly, watching him turn at the start of the fjord filtering fresh sea water into their new home, eyes on the small woodland bracketing a third of their home, arrow drawn tightly in his bow. “But he's being loud on purpose. It spooks prey out of hiding and their panic would make them uncoordinated and easy to take down. He's managed to do this for a few but he rejected them it seems.” He says, a little confused on the last part.

“Cole goes all out for you, no matter what he does. Of course he'll be picky hunting for you.” Nya says with a grin, nudging him with her tail and he smiled a little, blushing at that. “Oh. Looks like he's chosen.” She says and Zane watcher in awe as Cole went stock still, eyes focused on his target.

He breathed out slowly and let his arrow fly, a wounded yelp sounding after. He then grinned, swinging the bow over his shoulder and trotted off into the woodland. He reappeared soon after with a deer over his hide, blood running from its throat.

“Strong man.” Nya says, wagging her brows and Zane laughed, splashing her with the icy water.

They both slipped off the rest and swam towards the shore coming up to the place where both warm and frigid waters mixed.

“Big one. I know Skylor would love a taste.” Nya commented as Cole slid the corpse off of him.

“Which reminds me. She and the others should be here any moment now. I should get extra for them. You know how Lloyd is with deer.” Cole says, kneeling to steal a kiss from his mate.

“I'll help. If I recall, Master Wu has a taste for fish as well.” Zane says with a smile, cupping Cole's cheek.

“What's with the secret huddle?” They all looked up as Jay circled overhead before landing. “Oh deer! Get it?” He says with a grin, and Nya splashing him as Zane chuckled.

“Jokes aside, Lloyd is actually just starting to change his scales. He'll be here for a while before he has to leave for the Spirit Coves. Dragon growth spurt and all.” Kai says, hovering next to them.

Just then, a loud thud sounded and they saw a green dragon crain its head up and roar. It would have been intimidating if his roar hadn't cracked half way in. They were left laughing instead.

“You guys are jerks.” Lloyd huffed, crossing his front paws, before in a puff of green, he was his less scaly form.

In this form, he looked almost human if his slitted green eyes, pointed ears, peaking fangs, folded wings and scaled tail wasn't enough of a give away. Considering that he was part dragon, part Oni (demon) and human all in one, he leaned more towards his dragon heritage unlike his demonic father. Speaking of.

“Did Master Garmadon get your message Master Wu?” Zane asked the white dragon as he shifted into a similar state as his nephew.

“Yes. He should be back shortly after Lloyd returns from the Spirit Coves. The venom of the Great Devourer's bite may not be able to injure him but the effects have to be dealt with gently.” Wu says and Lloyd hung his head.

“Cheer up squirt. Your dad will be fine. He's tough, remember?” Cole says, ruffling his hair, earning a hiss and a swipe of claws in the direction of where his hand was. “Tell you what, how about we hunt you something to eat. The deer have wandered pretty close by…” He says, swinging Lloyd up on his hide and he beamed, near drooling at the mention of his favourite meal.

“Hey! How comes he gets to ride on your back!” Jay protested, zapping Jim for good measure.

“Ow! That's why you cluck!” Cole yelled and Zane laughed.

_____________________

“Hey Skylor! Where have you been?” Kai asked once she walked up to where everyone was eating on the shore outside.

“Molting. I hate it but at least it all goes one time.” She shrugged then walked over to Nya, leaning down and kissing her.

“I kept it safe like you asked.” Nya says, gesturing to her seal skin she wrapped around her neck.

“Great. Hold onto it for a while longer, would you?” She asked, sitting next to her and Nya nodded with a smile, returning to her meal, offering her some.

Zane on the other hand wasn't sure of what to do. The only ones he's eaten in front of was Nya, Skylor and Cole after a lot of reassuring. He feared his mouth may be unsettling for some.

“Aren't you hungry Zane?” Master Wu asked but before he could use that as an excuse, his stomach growled.

Loudly.

“Ha! Zane's stomach is more intimidating than you!” Jay grinned at Lloyd who glared at the harpy before plucking a feather, making him yelp.

“Serves you right.” Kai smirked at his mate as he whined into his feathers.

“Zane?” Cole's soft, worried voice called and he looked up at his mate before looking away.

“I… The way I eat is-”

“That's what this is all about?” He looked up at Cole, confused. “Snowflake, no-one minds or even cares how you eat.” Cole says, holding onto his webbed hand.

“Oh. Cold water mers have a very flexible jaw for the very big prey that live there.” Master Wu explained to a confused Lloyd.

“Ok. But what does that have to do with not wanting to eat? I'm pretty sure I can open my mouth wider than yours.” Lloyd pointed out before shifting and opened his mouth wide and took a big bite out of the deer he hunted all by himself.

“You might not have noticed but I don't chew. I eat my meals whole.” Skylor pointed out before demonstrating by swallowing down a large fish.

“I think Jay and I are the only ones who have small mouths but that doesn't stop Jay from getting food even on his tail feathers.” Kai says pointedly, to the messy eater who looked at him sheepishly, scales in his hair.

"The fangs are still new so my way of eating is a little different too." Cole says, nudging him gently and he smiled a little.

“There’s no such thing as normal. Everyone is unique in habits and more. Here, we are all family and we accept each other, flaws and all.” Master Wu says and Zane looked around at his strange pod before smiling.

“Plus, it'll be a shame for that deer to go to waste…” Lloyd says, licking his maw.

“It would be, wouldn't it?” Zane says, looking down at the untouched deer Cole had hunted and even skinned, just for him.

His stomach rumbled once more and he looked to Cole who nodded. He then sighed, letting go of insecurity. They watched in awe as he opened his mouth, revealing blue muscles in his cheeks and a very blue mouth filled with sharp teeth and a long dark blue tongue before he struck into the upper thigh of his prey, teeth cutting through the flesh easily and breaking bone. The group all cheered for him and Cole grinned, proud of his mate.

The rest of their meal was uneventful but the happy aura never left. Zane's pod was a strange one indeed but he wouldn't trade them for anything.

_____________

(Idk what to call this Au so I just put the first thing that came to mind. Also, Lloyd! He looks like his kid self now but after his trip to the Spirit Coves, he'll look like current Lloyd but with more demonic features. That's another story. Also, Lloyd doesn't know Misako. She was a human and died before he hatched several years ago from natural causes (I made her lay an egg that took years to hatch >:3 I also gave Garmadon the chance to raise his son). Finally, Garmadad isn't fully evil. He killed the last of the Devourers for the protection of Ninjago but got bitten in the process (the bite is treatable in this au because no angst! {Or very little at least}). He's in the first realm getting treated by other Oni (they're not evil like in the series but they aren't particularly good either. They look after their own and the Omega is fond of both him and Lloyd. He's super tsundere when confronted about Lloyd but he would high-key die for him. Same for Firstborne). Anyway, enough talking for now. I haven't slept yet... Weeb out!

32 notes · View notes

shipmistress9 · 6 years ago

Text

The Last Dragon - 1

Welcome to my latest (and probably utterly ridiculous) AU idea. Let's cover the basics first. This is a Hiccstrid story, so expect fun and fluff, heartbreak and angst. Next, I don't know yet whether this is going to stay T-rated or might get upgraded later on. So just a fair warning that it might get upgraded. And one other thing here: I'm testing out a different way of writing a story. It's much compacter than what I usually write, little more than what I usually write as an outline. You've been warned.

So, on to the main point: The story! This is a 'The Last Unicorn' AU, featuring Hiccup as the last dragon. But to give this all-clear right away: There won't be any bestiality in this story! (If you know the original story then you can guess what happens anyway.)

So... yeah... I hope someone will like it... ^^"

. o O o .

Chapter 1 — where a dragon goes on a journey.

When the hunters left the forest, they didn’t notice the shadow incredulously watching them from behind the trees, drawn in by their voices.

He was the last, the hunters had said. The last Night Fury to roam this world. The last dragon at all. But that couldn't be… could it?

No… there had to be others! Surely they were just hiding from the humans that had become so numerous over the centuries, just like he was hiding too.

Hiccup cocked his black scaly head as his eyes followed the hunters out of his forest, internally laughing at their stupidity. Silly humans, what did they know about dragons? To them, his kind only existed in legends and fairy tales anymore, told around a campfire or to keep children from roaming the woods. Just because they hadn't seen any dragons in the better part of a century? Hah! That was ridiculous.

And yet, the thought refused to fade into oblivion. For days and weeks, Hiccup roamed his forest, just like he had done for all his life, chewing on what the hunters had said.

No more dragons? Was that possible?

After two more moons had passed, Hiccup made a decision. He would leave his forest, for the first time ever, and look for the other dragons. Maybe they had retreated into a far-away hidden land, away from the humans. Maybe they were living in hiding, afraid and cornered. Or maybe they were even captured, waiting for the one that could free them.

In the darkness of night, the Night Fury flew from one village to the other, disguising his appearance as that of a black dog to look for his brothers and sisters or to maybe overhear where they might be. It occurred to him that the humans wouldn't even know if dragons lived among them. If they were hiding their appearance like he was, letting the humans see something they expected to see, then it was no wonder those hunters had thought there were no dragons anymore. Untiring, he wandered on and on, searching the eyes of every animal he saw for that certain spark of intelligence. But there was nothing. Only real dogs, barely tamer than the feral wolves of his forest, cart ponies, and oxen. Once, he met a cat, certainly the most intelligent of all animals he'd seen on his journey so far. But all she could tell him was that he was supposed to ask the Sorcerer. Hiccup laughed at her, then wished her good luck with catching mice and left.

But after another week of fruitless searching, he returned to the cat. Asking her where he could find the Sorcerer could have been embarrassing, but of course, the cat had already forgotten that she'd talked to him before.

“The Sorcerer? The Sorcerer, the Sorcerer, out in the swamps he lives. But beware, beware, you might find more than you are looking for,” she purred in a light sing-song, then continued to lick her paws.

Hiccup was amused by the cat's concern, but he took her advice. It took him three days, searching the vast swampland to the east until he found the odd building, half built onto a tree and covered with moss. To its side, a campfire was burning and a funny-looking old man leant over a book on a table.

“Now, now, big boy,” the funny old man said when Hiccup approached him. “What is a pretty beast like you doing out here in this no man's land?” He patted Hiccup’s head, clearly seeing nothing but the dog disguise.

Hiccup was disappointed. Was this the Sorcerer he’d been looking for? The one who was supposed to be able to help him? This doddery old man wasn’t even able to see him. Apparently, the cat had been stupid after all.

“Father? I’m back. I got the two rabbits you asked for, and even a deer in addition.”

Hiccup and the old man turned their heads into the direction of the voice. There was another human, a girl, carrying a dead deer over her back, a bow slung over her shoulder, and a quiver from which two rabbits hung was attached to her waist.

“Oh, that’ll last us a few days. Or… ah… maybe not. But look, Astrid, we have company. Would you mind getting him a bone and maybe some leftover meat from last night?”

The girl cocked her head and blinked, her long blond braid falling over her shoulder, but didn’t react otherwise and did as her father had told her. Hiccup’s mood fell even further. These humans were just as stupid as all the others he’d met, and certainly not able to help him. Grumbling, he tore into the roasted meat the girl had brought him. He gladly took the food, but would leave right after. The other dragons had to be somewhere!

“This tastes good, doesn’t it?” the girl murmured as she watched him eat. She reached out to pat his head as well, even scratched him behind his ear flaps. That actually felt good, and with a low rumbling deep inside his body, Hiccup leaned into her touch. She chuckled, and let her hand move on, over his neck, around the ridges on his back, and--

“These are really beautiful!” she said, awe filling her voice as her hand glided along his wing.

Wait, what?

Hiccup practically jumped away from her, staring in a bit of a shock, but the girl only chuckled.

“Did you think I couldn’t see what you are?” she asked, mirth gleaming in her eyes. They were blue, he noticed now, like the sky.

[You can see me?] He hadn’t meant for his thoughts to project into her mind, but she nodded in response anyway.

“Yeah, I’m not easily tricked by any magic,” she said, sounding as if there was more behind those words than just a simple statement. “Unlike my father over there. His magic is woven so deeply into his being that he hardly ever can tell reality and magic apart. What does he think you are?”

Bemused, Hiccup projected the picture of a large dog into her mind, making her chuckle again.

“I see. No wonder he instantly wanted to feed you. He adores dogs.”

[Aren’t you afraid of me?] he asked, a little hesitantly. He might not be the biggest of dragons, but he was still big enough to eat her in one meal if he had to. And from what he remembered of his long life in his forest, humans didn’t tend to react well when they saw his true form.

“Should I?” she asked, laughing at her own words and shook her head. “No, I’m not afraid of you. You haven’t eaten us when you had the chance, so I guess you won’t do it now either after we fed you.”

Making a strange snorting sound, Hiccup had to agree with her logic.

“Anyway... I assume there’s a reason you came out here? If you need Father’s magic or advice for whatever reason, then I suggest you wait until he finished his calibrations. He won’t listen to or look at anything else until he’s done. How about you tell me what brought you here instead? I’m curious, you know?” She settled against his side, expectantly looking up.

Hiccup was reluctant at first, not exactly used to talk to anyone. But he had to admit that he was a little fascinated by this courageous girl. Astrid. So, in lack of anything else to do and with renewed hope that these humans might be able to help him after all, he spent the better part of an hour answering her questions. It felt strange to do so but also oddly soothing, sharing his concerns.

Once he was done explaining that he was looking for the other dragons and hoped the Sorcerer could help him, Astrid nodded.

“Yes, I think you did right in coming here. We haven’t seen any dragons in ages either, but somehow, I feel like Father might know something after all.”

Making the old man understand was amusing. It took Astrid quite a while to convince her father that the occasional image of the night-black dragon was actually the truth and not just his wishful thinking. But once the Sorcerer had understood, there was no further delay.

“Oh, for all the lost chicken tows!” he muttered, awe filling his eyes as he finally accepted the truth. “I can hardly believe it. I hadn’t thought to ever see a living dragon again in my life. I thought he had them all.”

At that, Hiccup perked up. [Who has them all?] he asked eagerly, projecting his question for all around him to hear. [Do you know where the other dragons are? Tell me, old man, I need to know!]

So the Sorcerer told him. He told him of Grimmel the Grisly, a dark magician, how he’d, long ago, made it his goal in life to capture and own all dragons. “I and the others of our order tried to stop him, of course,” the Sorcerer said. “But by the time we were ready to face him, he already had quite a number of them captured. You see, he draws power from them. They are all in a cave beneath his castle, bound by a magical crystal that feeds on their strength. Lucky for us, he is content with enjoying his collection and has no desire to conquer the world with his powers.”

[So they really are captured? And nobody ever tried to free them?] There was a spark of anger in Hiccup, confusing him. He wasn’t used to such strong emotions.

“Of course we tried!” the Sorcerer defended himself. “But Grimmel had grown too strong, and we were unable to stand against him. He killed us, one after the other, and by now, I am the last of my order. Just like you are the last of the dragons.”

That silenced Hiccup. [Forgive me. I am sorry you had to pay such a high price for a fight that shouldn’t have been yours.]

The Sorcerer accepted his words, but the girl, Astrid, didn’t seem to be appeased.

“So that’s it?” she exclaimed. “We’re just going to leave it like that, with the dragons captured and that man holding nigh-on-infinite power? What if he learns that there is a dragon missing from his collection? Or what if he decides that he wants to be the only living Magician?”

Her concerns were valid, of course, but then Hiccup hadn’t intended to just let the matter drop anyway. In short order, they decided that they had to try and free the dragons. They didn’t have much of a plan yet, but the Sorcerer was confident that, with the help of a dragon himself, a Night Fury no less, they at least had a chance. Because Night Furies, as every child knew from the old stories, were the strongest and deadliest of all dragons, their princes and kings. He still would probably only be able to hold against Grimmel for a little while. But maybe, ‘a little while’ would be all they needed.

. o O o .

So, that was that. I’m really curious about what you might think about this. So... yeah... Feedback is highly welcome! :D

#Hiccstrid #fanfiction #httyd #'The Last Unicorn' AU #The Last Dragon #Romance #Romance/Angst/Hurt/Comfort/Fluff #Angst #Hurt/Comfort #Fluff #Hiccup Haddock #Astrid Hofferson #Hiccup and Astrid #Hiccup is a dragon #NO bestiality!

30 notes · View notes

iturbide · 6 years ago

Note

I loved that last snippet you posted! Though that does raise some questions, namely abt Grima. Him sometimes posessing/controling Robin is already cool, but what changed that he can do that? I'm super curious overall how he fits into the story, could you tell us a bit about him here? Like, you talked before how he was worshipped as Plegia's protector, and I'm curious abt how his character developed in this world

I’m so glad you enjoyed it I’ve been mulling that particular scene over for a while and trying to figure out how to write it, so I’m glad it turned out well!

but oh my friend i am always delighted to talk about grima c;

One thing to note from the outset is that we’ve actually seen Grima before. Twice. And even when Grima’s influence isn’t at the fore, there have been moments when Robin’s reactions weren’t necessarily his own. Grima is a constant presence here, subtle, just out of sight – and it all traces back to events in the last few millennia.

So this requires some delving into ancient history. A lot of things remain the same from a general timeline standpoint (though I don’t follow the Accordion because I take some issue with its progression of events; this ended up being a pretty solid breakdown of how I see the chain of events), but a few things are notably different, and they become very, very important.

To start with: Forneus didn’t just get divine dragon blood for his experiment. He managed, somehow, to lay hands on a viable Divine Dragon egg – an incredible, terrible feat given the fact that the degeneration had taken its toll on fertility rates and the Divine Dragon tribe had been decimated by the war. He wasn’t just performing alchemic experiments on blood, he had the real thing and used alchemy to modify and manipulate it, which resulted in Grima having the strength and many of the same general abilities as the rest of the Divine Dragon tribe, but with some oddities mixed in (a few things he can’t do that they can, a few more he can that they can’t) because of how that magic influenced his development. In the end, Forneus superstitions and his increasing mental instability made him try to kill his creation when it finally emerged, only to fail and lose the tiny dragon to the darkness of the labyrinth, which kept him safe from Duma’s destruction of Thabes and gave him room to grow until Alm and Celica accidentally broke the seal that let him out into the world.

Because Naga had retreated to the eastern half of the Archanean continent following Mila and Duma’s exile (due in large part to the fact that she couldn’t maintain life in the desert without Mila’s assistance), the creation ended up settling on the western side. His presence caused disturbances in the normal weather patterns, bringing more rain to the dry landscape, and soon enough the struggling desert populations began to flock to the dragon and establish a greater presence. These first humans called him Grima – and once he realized that it was their name for him, he began to respond quite readily.

Besides making life easier from an agricultural standpoint, Grima also offered humans shelter and protection from outside threats, both natural and manmade. He earned his title of “the fell dragon” through his fierce retaliation against those who caused harm to his people and his lands – but in general, he was a very calm, reasonable dragon who let people do their own things and just liked to watch, frequently doing flyovers of his territory just to see what they were up to.

Unfortunately, Grima never stopped growing. He just kept getting bigger and bigger as the centuries passed, until finally Naga couldn’t possibly miss him. Despite the fact that he showed no signs of degeneration and was by no means a threat to her people or his own, she judged that the risk he posed should he succumb to madness was too great – so she made her bond with her Chosen human and went to war with the fell dragon.

Now, Divine Dragons with that much power tend to have some strange abilities. Naga, for example, can hear the prayers of those who reach out to her (according to Nah’s support conversations with Morgan). Grima, being a full-blooded (if somewhat strange) Divine Dragon, had his own set of talents, though he understood them rather poorly – namely the ability to read the thoughts and hearts of those he could lay eyes on. And one look told him all he needed to know about Naga’s Chosen: he was, indeed, a powerful man – but he was also cruel and self-righteous, and Grima knew that if he won the battle then Grima’s people would be in great danger. And with Naga’s backing, the fell dragon’s chances of victory seemed slim at best.

So Grima turned to the people closest to him and granted them a small boon: not a full blood bond, the way Naga had with her Chosen, but a small fragment of power to help see them through the troubled times he feared would come. That gift was intended to help protect the people in his stead – and from there, Grima charged them with gathering as many as they could and heading west, away from the battlefield to come.

Grima had no army, when Naga and the first Exalt came. Grima fought alone, and fell alone, in a desperate attempt to save his people.

And that should have been the end of it. But what Grima didn’t know, thanks to his poor understanding of his own powers, was that the blood boon he granted those people would endure, passed down from one generation to the next over a thousand years. He didn’t know that a cult would form within the faith dedicated to his name, devoted to restoring the fell dragon’s blood to its full might. And he never, ever expected that there would come a day when a babe bearing his Mark was born into the world.

Grima felt it, when Robin entered the world. His body was dead and turned to nothing but bone and dust, but after a thousand years his soul suddenly had a physical connection to something, grounding him somewhere rather than simply existing formlessly and watching the passage of time. Grima has been there as Robin grew up, has seen the world close-up for the first time in centuries…and has realized, too, the dangers in it for not just the people he left behind, but for this child who bears his blood.

That connection is a strong one, and the fact that Grima’s soul is bound so closely to Robin means that things can bleed over between them sometimes. Grima has a visceral reaction to Falchion, for example, because he remembers the blade that took his life, while Robin interprets the sudden surge of emotion as fear at where things are headed. More often, Grima uses that bond to interact with Robin (though he interprets it as just mentally debating with himself, and Grima’s happy to let him think that), or to channel power to Robin when he needs it, giving him a surge of strength or magic to get out of a tight spot (basically I headcanon that Ignis is actually Grima lending Robin power in battle). But when things are dire, and something Robin loves is at stake, when he loses himself to panic or fear or rage – that’s where Grima will step in to ensure that Robin does not lose that which he holds most dear.

Grima’s careful about this, of course, never actually pushing Robin aside and possessing him completely. They exist in parallel – as though Grima has taken Robin’s hands and begun to lead him through the steps of an unfamiliar task, affording them incredible power with Grima’s focus to make the best use of it. That is a lot of energy to channel through a human, though, and it takes a serious toll on Robin’s body – he’s not kidding about the burning analogy, that much energy puts his every system into overdrive to increase his speed, his reflexes, his strength, his magic – meaning that even at his very best, Robin can only sustain Grima’s full might for about five minutes, ten if he really pushes it (and then his recovery period is significant).

(Fun note: the first time that happened, it was completely by accident. When they stumbled across that burned battlefield, Robin’s horror perfectly mirrored Grima’s own, and the resulting resonance pulled them into parallel with Grima getting his first actual taste of interacting with the world through a human body. It was Henry that jarred them both out of it, and pulled Robin back to the fore while Grima ceded control.)

Ultimately, Grima has no interest whatsoever in returning to the world. He’s content with the way things are, and being able to watch things the way he used to (actually it’s better, since he can get closer than he could in his flyovers); combined with the fact that Robin is intent on keeping Plegia safe for his own reasons, Grima is more than happy to lend him power when he needs it – and is actually quite pleased by Robin’s very peaceable nature, and the way he resorts to violence only as a last resort rather than fighting first and asking questions later (since Grima himself attacked only after the first enemy blow had landed).

And as a final, random note: Robin can read people the same way Grima could, though not with the same clarity (he can’t actually read minds, but he gets very strong impressions when he interacts with someone for the first time). Grima himself still has that ability, though, and when he’s at the fore he can get the full measure of someone from a look and then leverage it to its full advantage.

#fire emblem: awakening #fanfiction #headcanon #grima #robin #assassin's creed: awakening #answered #anonymous #can you tell i've thought about this a lot #i've thought so much about this #and honestly i love grima's moments of influence #both taking greater control and just lending support when needed #grima's happy to offer up power when robin reaches for it #it just took robin a while to learn how to make that contact

18 notes · View notes

castellankurze · 6 years ago

Photo

Maybe I just expected too much.

(spoilers below)

In 2012, ‘Fear to Tread’ by James Swallow was the last Black Library book for which I put down actual money. I’d been slowly growing less and less interested in 40k, a change that I felt was driven largely by the Horus Heresy series. FTT was a good enough book that I decided to make it my final purchase, but I was still a fan of the 40k setting, if not the tales BL was choosing to tell there, and I kept an eye out for books that might rekindle my interest.

One that was recommended to me several times over in the following years was ‘The Death of Antagonis’ a novel in the Space Marines series following the exploits of the Black Dragons, members of the 26th ‘Cursed Founding’ of space marines. Partially this was due to what was reputed to be a badass character from the Sisters of Battle, partially down to the character of the dragons themselves. But by the time I’d heard of it, it was off the shelves of my local bookstores and I’d either have to get the ebook version (which is useless to me, since I can’t use one on the job) or pay extra shipping, and since the book was already pricier than the 7.99 I was used to paying for the old BL paperpbacks, I wasn’t curious enough to pay even more to see if this was the book that would break my funk.

So it was that years passed and, as if by happenstance or a turn of fate, I happened to spy ‘The Death of Antagonis’ on the shelves of the Strand bookstore in New York City while on my honeymoon. I grabbed it.

‘The Death of Antagonis’ (henceforth DOA) is a novel taking a peek into the lives of the decidedly nonstandard space marines of the Black Dragons chapter, a group of Wolverines who, as part of their genetic enhancement when becoming space marines, sport bone growths from their skeleton which they coat in adamantium to use as deadly close-combat weapons, a practice which garners them suspicious eyes from many branches of the fanatically pure Imperium of Man.

DOA starts off strong, and I mean really strong, as the Black Dragons engage in a desperate holding action against an undead horde on the ill-fated planet Antagonis. Even as they do so, Inqusitor Werner Lettinger of the Ordo Malleus investigates them for possible Chaos corruption, while the mysterious Canoness-Errant Sethano joins them for unspoken purposes of her own.

For the first half of the book, the Black Dragons themselves are basically everything I could want from a story about space marines, alternating between genuine purehearted too-good-for-this-world sincerity in their declarations of faith and the protection of mankind, to deadpan snarky-ass motherfuckers who see right through Inquisitor Werner’s pretext for his investigations.

Canoness Setheno is a badass, and it’s easy to see why she was one of the selling points of the book. Her name is taken from Greek mythology as one of Medusa’s sisters, and true to form of 40k poking its tongue into its cheek so hard it goes right through the flesh to waggle it at you, her title is the Gorgon. While her character can be summed up as ‘do what needs to be done’ her particular brand of flair makes DOA far more memorable than it would have been without her.

Inquisitor Lettinger is something interesting. Many 40k books like to make a character like the Inquisitor the dedicated bonehead, the asshole who shows up to ruin everything. Werner is however, at least for the first half of the book, a bit more nuanced than that. He’s genuinely fascinated by the Black Dragons, and while he showed up fully intending to prove their corruption, his actual exposure to the chapter has him question whether they’re really unsalvageable. It’s a nice but of depth to an old plot.

Even the Chaos marines in the book are a fun twisting of the old narrative. Rather than veterans of the Horus Heresy, they’re the devious results of a renegade pastor who once took part in the creation of the Excorcists marine chapter and the demon-summoning rituals therein, armoring the so-called Blades of Epiphany in gold (get it? the traitors wear shiny gold and the loyalists are mutants who wear black).

The plot itself rapidly moves past the doomed-world scenario into a deeper look at the Black Dragons themselves - almost as if David Annandale was told he had to write a book about a world dying and so shoved that out of the way ASAP so he could do more interesting stuff. Namely, thrust of the plot of DOA is that the Black Dragons are about to have themselves a little family squabble.

The Dragons worship their deformities as a curse from the Emperor, paradoxically shaping them for their purpose as weapons and defenders of humanity. They even hold up the most prized examples as members of special kill-teams known as Dragon Claws. The problem is...what happens to those members of the chapter who then don’t exhibit those same deformities? Are they left by the wayside? Maybe somewhere along the way, they might get a bit resentful.

I’ll spare the blow-by-blow, but the first half of the book really sets up a fascinating narrative where everyone in the Imperial caste of characters is really, genuinely trying to do the right thing. You could probably even write an actual thesis statement on the theme of toxic masculinity and how it applies to the Black Dragons, and how their instinctive fascination with their own body ideals inadvertently radicalizes young men who cannot live up to the chapter’s unspoken standard.

Unfortunately, then the second half of the book happens.

I don’t know what went wrong, exactly. Maybe David Annandale got editorialized. Maybe a deadline was looming and the book just had to be finished, damn the consequences. Or maybe, like I said above, maybe I just got my expectations up too high. Maybe I was too hype from reading my first 40k novel in so long and finding out a lot of it was playing to my prejudices to keep my feet on the ground.

Whatever the case, the second half of DOA feels like a massive step down as the Chaos plot takes ascendance and what really felt like something unique - a genuine difference of politics and desires to best serve mankind - instead falls down into a far more standard issue ‘Chaos corruption blargalarg’ plotline. The climax feels like it cribbed ideas from other 40k works like the World Engine and the Eisenhorn series, but it feels too rushed and unfocused to really do anything truly unique with them. The Black Dragons are exhorted to embrace their role as the Emperor’s killing blades and it just feels too hasty, too cheap, a simple solution to a complex problem, with Chaos used as the kludge to explain the wedge driven into their ranks.

In the end, I still think this is the book that made me fall in love with the Black Dragons, because there’s too much Grade-A dialogue, especially in the first half of the book, for me to write it off completely, but ultimately I think it serves as a reminder, many years later, of why I parted ways from the Black Library take on the 40k universe. It’s a 7 of 10 that really feels like it could have been a 10 of 10 if it had dropped the very by-the-numbers Chaos plot entirely and focused on the very natural tension in Black Dragons’ own ranks.

#40k #The Death of Antagonis #Black Dragons #kurze rants

15 notes · View notes

softiexing · 7 years ago

Text

❧ emotion rollercoaster

words: 980 words genre, warnings: fluff, angst, vampire!au

❝So, what you’re trying to say is that… You, a God-knows-how-old vampire… is afraid, from heights?❞ You asked, with the ghost of a smile appearing on your face.

BaekHyun always made fun of your scared self. He liked to prank you, most of the times having in mind your feelings. But having him in front of you, with that big cute pout of his was far too entertaining –and the long queue to get on the rollercoaster didn’t seem to get any smaller soon. You decided not to waste the precious opportunity to get your little and sweet revenge. Who would have thought that someone with the strength necessary to lift easily a car would be afraid of a simple rollercoaster?

❝You don’t understand ____...❞ He whined again, ❝they are big and scary metal monsters, I’m old, ____, it escapes to my mind how they could work without actually killing you.❞ His pout got a little bigger as the queue reduced its length, people getting on the ride. You didn’t know why, having this irrational fear to heights he was the one to suggest the idea of going to a theme park for a couple of days –even going as far as to buy a room in one of the hotels nearby the park.

It didn’t take too long for you to finally arrive to the ride, his anxiety starting to rise and –even if at the start was funny it was starting to worry you. He was fidgeting in his spot, moving from side to side as he waited for your turn to enter the long carriage with the shape of a bright red dragon. ❝You know… you don’t really have to get in if you don’t want you,❞ you spoke softly, trying not to scare the shit out of him, since he was more preoccupied with the idea of getting into the ride than paying attention to his surroundings. BaekHyun was pretty stubborn when he wanted to be, and even if you actually told him it wasn’t necessary to get in the ride, you found yourself screaming in joy next to him –who screeched in terror at the top of his lungs.

❝You know, you could try and be a singer, you can hit those high notes!❞ You exclaimed as you let him sit down in a bench under one of the big trees that decorated the park –he felt a little dizzy after exiting the ride. He just dry-laughed at you not being able to form words coherent words yet. ❝Where should we go next? There are a lot of rides and different expositions in the park to visit…❞ Looking for the map in your purse, you didn’t take notice of how he got up. It wasn’t until he physically took away the map from your hands you didn’t look up to meet his beautiful blood red eyes. A rare occurrence, since it only happened was when he was on his five senses and fully aware of his surroundings, like when hunting or being hunted. You stood there, frozen in your spot and ready for him to murder you in the bloodiest way he could find. That, however, never happened.

❝How about we go first to eat something and, then, go see all those expositions? We can take a ride on the carrousel then.❞ His soft voice spoke and, for you, it told you to run away from him –velvetish and seductive, like inviting you to a sweet death. You were terrified to your bones, but still found yourself unable to move, to run away. It was like he possessed your body and actions. Was this what they called hunting? He never explained well how he did it, even if you actually asked a few times for him to explain how it was –he always told you it was far too complicated for you to fully understand, that it was something human vocabulary could not explain.

❝Okay…❞ Your mouth moved against your will and, when you were able to regain consciousness of your actions, both of you were already half way down to the small snacks bar. His eyes back to their gorgeous dark chocolate-like colour. ❝What…? What happened?❞ You asked, clearing your throat a couple times, somewhat a little sore from the experience.

❝That is, my love, called mental manipulation. It’s a… technique, you might call it, that we vampires use as one of multiple methods of hunting. While looking at our victim at the eyes we can manipulate them into doing what we want. Once we have fulfilled our wantings we can either break the bond or just kill them.❞ He calmly explained, as he wasn’t talking about literally killing people. ❝Of course, whatever happens while the prey is being hunted depends on the vampire’s strength, the victim’s mental health and the morals of the hunter. There are terrible monsters out there. ❞

❝Why did you do it?❞ You knew he didn’t trust himself around you, even if he was opening his heart and feelings at you. You trusted him, or at least you wanted to trust him –but he was a vampire, and he had to consume human blood to keep living as human-like as possible.

❝You wanted me to explain how I hunted back then, right? So I just did it…❞ He simply stated as he took a turn and walked straight into one of those cotton-candy selling machines. His hands, holding yours, were freezing and soft, like a well cut piece of ice. ❝Do you want some cotton candy? ❞

Byun BaekHyun was a mysterious vampire. He courted you, he loved you, but he also scared you. Why were you still talking and, somewhat, living with someone who could easily kill you? Well, not even you knew that. Maybe he had you under his spell all this time and you didn’t even know that.

67 notes · View notes

zippdementia · 4 years ago

Text

Part 87 Alignment May Vary: The Sea of Moving Ice

One of the biggest rules of being a good DM is letting your players take direction and control over the story. It is hard to do, sometimes, especially in D&D, where the DM is often put in the position of knowing everything the PCs are going to encounter (per a dungeon map) and in charge of directing a story that they are told by a module. It is something I have gotten better at as I’ve developed as a DM and yet this game presents a unique challenge in that it has gone on for so long and has incorporated so many story elements and plot lines that, as we draw close to a conclusion, there is an element of linearity that is being assumed (we aren’t starting any new huge unresolveable plotlines).

During this next section, which took us about six sessions to play through, and will be broken into two blog posts, I had to remind myself of that a lot and ultimately was able to let go and let the PCs steer the plot into areas I didn’t foresee at all.

Speaking of steering, this section opens with the Players traveling through a teleport in Vraath Keep to Waterdeep, and from there boarding a vessel, an Icebreaker, to take them north into the uncharted Sea of Moving Ice. This is an adventure lifted straight from Tyranny of Dragons, though changed drastically to fit our story needs. I fell in love with the idea of a dungeon embedded in an iceberg and really wanted to bring that into the campaign.

Brief note on the party’s time in Waterdeep: just to set the stage for the current political climate, while in Waterdeep the party learns that while the Alliance (a political banding together of Waterdeep, Baldur’s Gate, and five lesser cities, whose seat of power is in Waterdeep) has allowed Karina to link her teleport to their city, they are not very supportive of her war effort and feel that getting involved in a war on foreign soil in the Elsir Vale is not very worth their time or attention. They feel powerful enough to repel any invasion that happens to cross the water and seek to attack the Sword Coast; they worry that Karina’s power and influence make her a figure that people would follow and there are some that mutter that the best thing to happen would be for her and the undead to die fighting each other.

Into the White

So why are the PCs heading into the Frozen North? What are they looking for? The set up I use for this adventure is that Karina gets a vision in a dream, a message from a dragon she once gave The Rod of Storms to, in exchange for “treasure when she needed it.” The dream tells her to go to the Sea of Moving Ice and find a particular iceberg named Oyaviggaton, which is native for “Winter’s Crown.” However, Karina cannot leave Vraath Keep right now. This vision comes 80 years or so after she initially traded for it. She did not suspect she would be in the middle of running a war when it came. Karina sends the players, in her stead, telling them that her visions showed her an iceberg, and beneath the iceberg, a library. And beneath the library, something for her, waiting... encased in a massive wall of ice.

Cliff Notes: A long while ago, during the Haggemoth adventure, Karina traded the Rod of Storms away to a Bronze Dragon. It was a cool moment and at the time it let me get rid of a troublesome item and focus on the character growth that was happening with Karina. But the dragon made a promise: one day, when the time was right, it would repay her with a gift. Now that time has come! The Rod of Storms ended up coming back into the game, as well, in the hands of one of the Red Hand generals, and from there it was taken by Nysyries, and when she was killed by Harpies it.... geez, I actually don’t recall after that. I remember at some point Aldric got it and it got powered up by an elemental elder on the plane of air, and then Imoaza killed Aldric to get the Rod and then it was used to build Black Razor Alpha... I mean, this item has woven itself in and out of our story. I thank Robert Kendzie for designing it, as part of Haggemoth!

There is a mechanic in the Sea of Moving Ice adventure that determines, using simple dice rolls, how often a random encounter occurs and after how many encounters the PCs find the iceberg they are looking for. I take this table for our use, but with a twist: I come up with a bunch of new encounters and, depending on what they roll, decide to use those to build up the next part of the story. Imoaza’s player ends up getting the first encounter and it’s one I had hoped to use... three Buer Hags (from Vollo’s Guide).

Buer hags are ice Hags, and I play this encounter up, where they attack the Icebreaker while wheeling and laughing about in a storm they created. They try to lock the Icebreaker onto the side of a huge glacier and partially succeed before the party drives them off with powerful magic. But a few things come out of this encounter. First, they realize that Ruz is a changeling and they tell her something strange: “You’ve come looking for the other one, haven’t you? But you can’t have her. You can’t have our child!”

Also, during the fight, one of the Hags descends on a crewsman manning the crow’s nest and brutally devours him alive. The gory display combined with a blast of a spell from the Hags to amplify its effects overloads Milosh’s circuits and he becomes convinced that he is on a mission in his old life, chasing something infinitely important and yet completely undefinable across the fertile plains of his homeworld, Eberon. He charges out into the icy waste and disappears. After combat, Imoaza and Ruz wait for him for a while while helping to fix up the ship. But when he doesn’t return after an hour, they decide they need to go find him. What follows is definitely a side quest and was nothing I expected to happen this adventure, but it is a piece I love. All three of them become lost out in the snowy expanse of the glacier, trying to come up with ways to find their way and find each other. Like Milosh uses a scrying spell to try to find if anyone is around him. And Imoaza has a cool idea. A while back I mentioned she got a glimpse of the Weave, the magic that surrounds everything. So now she asks if she can try to find the Weave again and use it to trace Milosh’s passage. It’s such a fun idea, we run with it, and Imoaza rolls for Arcana, scoring a critical success! With this, the dice are telling the story for us: Imoaza not only taps into the Weave Sight but finds that she can see more than ever before! Around this time, Milosh casts his scrying spell, and to Imoaza it is like a siren going off in her Weave Sight. She tells Ruz and they head off towards Milosh’s location.

The crater Milosh found himself in was cut in half by a humongous Chasm. Milosh thought briefly of taking shelter there from the coming storm but almost immediately discarded the thought. Something about the chasm was uninviting. Or no, that wasn’t quite right. Uninviting means uncomfortable, the opposite of desirous. And a hole in the ground certainly fit that description. But the chasm went beyond this. Looking at it Milosh could almost see the chasm walls pulsing, like they were breathing, like he was staring down the gullet of a gigantic black beast. Milosh didn’t react without purpose to most things, yet staring into that void he shuddered involuntarily and took a step back.

The Crater does indeed hold a monster and it attacks just as Ruz and Imoaza find and reach Milosh. A mighty Remorhaz bursts free of the chasm and chases down the players, fully intending to swallow one of them to slowly digest as it returns to hibernation. Rather than fight it, Ruz casts fly on everyone and they boost out of there, Milosh firing a delayed fireball out of his gun-arm into the furnace like maw of the Remorhaz as they do... as the Remorhaz is immune to fire, it does nothing, except convince them they are making the right choice. This sets us up to run a crazy chase scene, the Remorhaz charging through the snow beneath them as they fly away, trying to not let the building storm knock them back into the awakened creature’s grasp.

They eventually lose it and make their way back to the ship, but one more thing happens before they set sail.

it looked like an abandoned battle site than a camp, Ruz could now see. She silently thanked Karina for the gift of the magical robes that seemed to keep her warm as she bent in the snow and ran a fur-gloved hand through the wreckage of bone and wood that she had found nestled into the shadow of the rock. She frowned as her hand bumped against something else, something made of leather. A bag... and inside, a journal? She picked it up. The pages had not gotten wet, thankfully, and so she teased open the frozen spine and began to read.

As they finally sail away from this glacier, the party spots an old campsite next to what looks like a fortress wall and decides to investigate. They find the remains of some kind of explorer’s party and Ruz finds a journal he does not share with the others. It belonged to a Changeling, someone who was being rescued from the Buer Hags who had stolen her. However, before the party could escape, they were found here in their final campsite and wiped out (or so Ruz can assume, for the journal ends with the words, “I can feel it in the air. My mothers are close.”)

While Ruz reads, Imoaza and Milosh examine the fortress wall. Imoaza finds strange runes all over it and before she can warn him, Milosh scales the wall and sees beyond it where a hole disappears into the earth. Imoaza’s Weave Sight shows her the runes lighting up and something awakening beyond the wall, just as Milosh hears the sobbing of babies coming from the hole and a scrabbling sound.

Terried, the three dart back to the ship and sail away.

Ready Player Two?

The players are ambushed. It starts with Kobolds, dropping boulders on their ship as it sails down a narrow avenue formed by two glaciers that will, over the course of decades, eventually touch each other. Imoaza flies up to the glacier lip to do battle and while up there, she is attacked by something far worse, a hideous long limbed humanoid which makes a cry like a wailing child as it leaps at her. Imoaza is taken.

This scenario was set up based on their action last time, which released something, or many somethings, that have been hunting them since. But it was also a necessity from a meta game perspective, as we have a session where Imoaza’s player won’t be joining us. So this removes her from the action while keeping suspension high.

I had intended this to be a quick scene, where the PCs realize they are outnumbered and have to abandon their ship to sail away on rowboats, as the boulders from the Kobolds are sinking their boat. Ruz actually does something incredibly clever: he uses a chromatic orb of cold to freeze the holes in the ship and asks if the ship can stay afloat long enough to get them out of there. I say yes... but then I also effectively cut this out as a possibility as three of the long limbed demon-like horrors drop down on the deck and start killing crew.

The result is the scene I intended: there are some nice moments of tension as Ruz and Milosh try to fight back while also freeing their rowboats (some cool uses of Telekineses to do this) and trying to save as many of the crew as possible from the horrid beasts. At the same time, it puts the players on rails more than I like to do. My general thoughts when DMing are not to overplan and not to try to force players into a specific scenario unless the story absolutely calls for it. Those times are RARE, and even then should be made as natural and organic as possible and STILL a DM should be ready for everything to change on them in an instant. Truly good games come from those unexpected changes, those twists and turns that the DM cannot anticipate and must follow to their conclusion. In this case, having the float still be a factor would not have been a detriment to the story and would have made the players feel empowered, which has always been my goal. But I miss it in the moment, and so they escape the ship and Milosh blows it up with a delayed fireball (kinda becoming his Megabuster Signature move).

Still, despite me missing this opportunity, other things arise because of it. The PCs pick up a few survivors out of the water, including the one-eyed, hook handed Captain, and set out into a lonely night broken by a sea of stars above them. And in this moment, Ruz and Milosh share a very cool, player directed, bonding moment. Ruz casts a psychic spell so they can speak without “speaking,” and maybe because of the quiet blackness, the rocking of the boat, their exhaustion, or the incredible otherworldly view of the stars, they transcend the physical plane and end up together in another space. Hear, Milosh sees Ruz’s true Changeling form and Ruz reveals what she is. She also reveals what she read in the journal and that she believes there is another Changeling out here on the ice, somewhere. The two speak of Imoaza and refuse to believe she is gone. They speak of their purpose and realize that both of them have lost a piece of their purpose. Milosh’s entire existence was devoted to the Surveyor, or in this case the next closest thing (Carrick, possessed of a piece of the Surveyor’s soul). With him gone, he now doggedly pursues the prophecy, trying to stop it from coming to fruition. But he does so without direction and without a thought to what might come after. Ruz, on the other hand, lost her entire history, displaced from a world she knew to a near eternity spent in Chaos. Now she has returned to find her city destroyed, her homeland under siege, and she has no one left to fight for except herself. Ruz says that no matter what, she will not be a sacrifice to this new Faerun she doesn’t know. She has sacrificed enough. She wants to find a family and live again. They both agree that their goals mean seeing this war through to its end, winning it, and then having the freedom to move on. Overwhelmed by Ruz’s candor, Milosh reveals his truth to her, as well: that he was taken from another world, aeons ago... so long ago he is not even sure that world exists anymore. He was placed in this cybernetic body by the Surveyor and told to pursue the prophecy. He does not know what future he would even want for himself, now.

Their discussion is interrupted by the captain, who tells them they are coming up on the iceberg they sought.

In Tyranny of Dragons, Oyaviggaton is the primary dungeon, an iceberg home to a white dragon who is dominating the Eskimo-esque villagers who reside on its floating lair. I’ve changed this scenario a little, making the Dragon a trio of witches and adding in some story-related pieces to the dungeon, as well as changing some of its challenges to match my level 16 and 17 (Milosh) characters. But the primary outline I’ve kept the same, and that ends up leading to some unexpected ire on the part of my players. See, in the original, the natives on the island are suspicious of the outsiders and stage a fight between them and their champion warrior, Orcaheart. They say it is to be a one-on-one fight with NO MAGIC... and then they cheat during the fight (the shaman, Bonecarver, heals Orcaheart). And if caught cheating, they turn this around on the players and attack them for daring to accuse their shaman. It’s a very hostile moment and it is definitely meant to conjure up the “hostile natives in a strange land” trope that is part of many pulp fiction works of yore. And despite it being anachronistic and unintentionally racist, it does touch on a style of storytelling that is so embedded in Western culture that I can’t help but be enamored with the moment. It’s problematically familiar.

That said, it also has a major design trap for the unwary DM. And tonite, I was that DM.

See, if the natives are under the thrall of an evil force, then the whole point is that the PCs should want to help them. Having the natives cheat and lie during what is supposed to be an honorable fight doesn’t enamor them to the PCs. In fact, it is liable to make players loathe them. This could potentially be circumvented by some really big clues as to what is going on behind the scenes or, even better, by making one of the natives a very obvious ally, who can then also explain what’s going on. The text even suggests this be Bonecarver... but that is hurt by the fact that they also make Bonecarver the one who cheats!

Had I thought about this ahead of time, I would have taken out the cheating entirely. It doesn’t add anything except more conflict, and this is already literally a head on brawl. You don’t need the extra bit. But I don’t think about it and the end result is a laughable amount of rage being directed at these already victimized natives. Milosh is the one to go up against the mighty Orcaheart and he almost wins... but the cheating means he gets knocked unconscious and when Ruz spots and points out the cheating by using magic of his own to strengthen his voice, the natives turn on him as an evil mage and knock him out, too.

Oh man, the players are pissed! They wake up inside the iceberg dungeon and, spotting three frog-like humanoids going through their belongings, immediately unleash hell upon one of them, smashing him to jelly against a wall. The others reveal they were sent by Bonecarver to help them proceed deeper into the iceberg and fight the witches. Then they hand them potions (a third is currently smashed against the wall) and flee for their lives.

The players make a pact to (a) stop the witches, and (b) burn the village to the ground.

Below the Berg

Now inside the Iceberg (and on a new session), it’s time to bring the party back together. Milosh and Ruze begin searching the dungeon and in the process come across a couple of trophy rooms: rooms where giant monsters and even an entire treasure galleon have been frozen by the power of the Bhuer Sisters. They also encounter more Kobolds, these ones carrying Imoaza, who has been frozen in a block of ice!

The players make quick work of the Kobolds (two turns) and go to work on freeing Imoaza with fire spells. When the block of ice is damaged enough, she comes back to her senses and breaks free with Blackrazor suddenly in her hand and a wild look in her eyes. Her two companions back away and try to talk sense into her. But Imoaza is seeing other people... Aldric is in front of her, accusing her of his murder and taunting her for getting trapped in a cold place... like the place he died. Imoaza reacts as she does to most opposition: disdainfully. And in her disdain, she finds her way back to the present. But Aldric’s voice will forever be taunting her, now. This is an indefinite madness, a leftover of her harrowing experience being ambushed by the Wendigo, the hideous creature with the cry like a child that captured her and brought her unconscious to the witches, who froze her for their keepsake. Aldric’s player (now playing Milosh) actually role plays this voice out when appropriate, basically bringing the voice of Aldric back into the game, even if Imoaza is the only one who can hear it.

The three, now reunited, set about exploring more of the iceberg. They find many interesting things here, which will be detailed in the next post: Still Frozen.

#dnd 5e #D&D #Dungeons & Dragons #Tyranny of Dragons #Forgotten Realms

1 note · View note

thevesseler · 7 years ago

Text

Superbia, Part 3

Beginning of Story

Previous Chapter

Next Chapter [TBC]

This one’s kind of a long one, sorry.

[The perpetual frown stuck on your face deepens; not only are you finding yourself with rabbit on your plate once AGAIN, but you think the fairies might not be able to recognize you without the goofy grin you always wore around... her. God. Every time you think about how you coped with it, you shudder knowing it hit the rest of them hard at least tenfold. You mutter under your breath.]

MILENAH: Stupid lack of GPS signal, Stupid Terys for leading, stupid me for following, and thinking I could do any of this again! But most importantly, stupid Grienburgh being in danger in the first place!

[After being overcome with Shoulder Infatuation, Lauren declared that your party would be spared immediate punishment, and instead treated to a nice “dinner”–if you can even call it that–until they figure out what to do with you. Since then, they've taken you back to their commune.]

[Time did nothing to Lauren since you last saw her. She's clearly trying to fill the shoes of the departed eldest the best she can, but you can tell even after the death there's a middle child inferiority complex brewing within. Iris, on the other hand, gives you the evil eye from across the table. This should come as no surprise to you; she was always far more perceptive than she was given credit for, and it's always been clear which of your late friend's younger sisters she was closer to. No fault to Lauren, but she was often a little... in her own world.]

[Terys has already lost interest in trying to seduce her, but she hasn't taken the hint.]

LAUREN: You know, I've never seen a mustache up close before! Does it ever get caught in anything?

TERYS: …

LAUREN: The strong silent type, are you? I don't mind, though I can only hope you'll tell me why its color doesn't match that of the hair on your head. With locks like that, you could be Iris' twin!

[Iris doesn't avert her gaze from you. Even then, she still has something to say.]

IRIS: No thanks, I'd kill myself if I looked like that.

LAUREN: Hah! Ahahah! She knows not what she speaks!

TERYS: I don't need your validation, I know how I look.

[Lauren tosses a bone at Iris' head with impeccable accuracy.]

LAUREN: We have guests, sister, please show them some hospitality!

[Iris mumbles something, only loud enough for Sarjane, sitting adjacent to her, to hear.]

SARJANE: Wait, hold up– Who's Macki?

[The tension in the air becomes twice as thick as Lauren tenses up, her knife nearly going through the wood of the table. It's a unique knife, possibly customized and seemingly too big for eating.]

LAUREN: Iris... why would you bring up Ma–

IRIS: She was our sister.

[Your three friends lean forward in their seats. You force yourself to zone out, expecting everything to fall apart.]

IRIS: Much like us, she had no interest in letting any human who wandered into our woods go on their merry way. Except one. Her reasoning... was that she had fallen in love with her. She passed the teachings of her craft onto her, too...

[She finally tears her gaze from you, looking down at her lap.]

IRIS: There's a wing-hoarding dragon who guards the caves, and sleeps on a pile of wings he's ripped off of other fairies over the years. Macki wanted to make sure she and the human could defend each other while hunting in the forest. Then one day, as the human was supposed to accompany her for their next hunt, she decided to sleep in, letting Macki go off on her own. So what do you think happened next?

[Nobody dares ask.]

IRIS: By the time the she found her in the middle of the woods, Macki had already bled out. We could've killed that human, but instead, Lauren let her go.

LAUREN: What would you have done? I think it's what Macki would've wanted.

IRIS: ...Maybe. How could you know for sure? You're not Macki.

[Lauren twists the knife further into the wood.]

WYNTRAM: If you don't mind me asking, who was the human?

[Son of a bitch!]

IRIS: Her name was... uhh, M...Mi–Michelle.

[She shoots Lauren a look.]

LAUREN: That's right, it was Michelle.

IRIS: It was definitely Michelle.

[You don't know why the fairies are trying to protect your identity, but they're doing a terrible job of it. Perhaps they just don't want to start any drama. Seeing your chance, you decide to be bold.]

MILENAH: Now that that's behind us, what do we have to do to get you to trust humans again?

[Iris' lips tighten, forming a flat line. You know it's already too late for her to go back on “Michelle.”]

LAUREN: Well, there really isn't anything you can do. If it weren't for your handsome devil of a friend here, we would've punished you on the spot!

TERYS: You're welcome.

LAUREN: However, I have an interesting proposition. Other than Macki, there isn't a pair of hands in our commune that can best my good little sister at archery. If one of you could take on Iris and win, we'll grant you mercy, as well as our utmost respect.

[Your friends all turn to you.]

LAUREN: Of course, if you lose, we'll have to open up the portal to our own realm. It's a lovely place to visit, but it's not so fun to live there, especially if you aren't a fairy. Our queen could always use some more court entertainers, though.

[Your heart sinks. You spot Terys from across the table, his arms instinctively wrapped around his abdomen, knowing what this would mean for him if you lost. So it's come to this.]

LAUREN: Of course, you could always forfeit right now–

MILENAH: No!

[Iris grins smugly at you.]

IRIS: Oh?

MILENAH: I'll take you on, I haven't missed a shot in years. Soon enough, you'll understand the utility of a human!

[Wyntram and Sarjane, who had been holding their breaths the entire time, let out a sigh of relief.]

IRIS: Tomorrow morning, as soon as the sun rises. I'll send someone to wake you up.

LAUREN: In the meantime, feel free to spend the night in our spare cabins! We have two, which should be enough to accommodate four humans. Have a good rest, for it might be your last.

[Time is of the essence, and these assholes are holding your party up by making you stay overnight. The walk to the cabins is eerily quiet. Two male fairies, both holding bukkehorns, stand outside the entrances.]

IRIS: They're here to make sure you don't escape in the middle of the night.

MILENAH: Wouldn't dream of it.

SARJANE: Well, I guess this is good-night for now. And don't worry, we'll be there to cheer you on. You're gonna be great!

MILENAH: I know, but don't jinx it.

[Sarjane grabs Wyntram's hand and starts pulling him toward the left cabin.]

SARJANE: This one is guarded by a cuter guy.

WYNTRAM: That's... subjective.

[He turns to Terys, who hasn't spoken a word since “You're welcome.”]

WYNTRAM: See you tomorrow, man.

TERYS: ...It healed so long ago... why does it still hurt...

[For a brief second, Wyntram looks considerably worried.]

SARJANE: There he goes with that vague cryptic BS again. Come on, doc, I wanna see if they have indoor plumbing!

[Night falls, and much to Sarjane's disappointment, the cabins do not in fact have indoor plumbing.]

SARJANE: What do you think fairy shit looks like?

[Wyntram doesn't look up from his phone. The cabin has no charger, and the battery should run out in a few hours, but that doesn't stop him from looking at the black screen in locked mode.]

WYNTRAM: Who knows? Maybe flowers. Like those hydrangeas.

SARJANE: Noooo! I put those all over my face!

WYNTRAM: Heh.

SARJANE: You were a bioengineer, didn't you ever work on fairies?

WYNTRAM: Honestly? No. My town generally thought they were a myth, and anyone who claimed to see them was usually laughed off the mountain.

SARJANE: How many people can be laughed off the mountain before a scientist says “Hey, maybe what they're saying isn't totally made up”?

WYNTRAM: Since I started working, seven and counting.

SARJANE: Geez. That is, like, five too many.

[Wyntram's message chime rings out in the hollow cabin.]

SARJANE: Looks like you get some service here after all. Is it Dael?

WYNTRAM: No, it's my cousin.

“Hey DorkFuck 5000, have you watched The Stepford Wives yet?”

WYNTRAM: She likes to send me old movie recommendations that she thinks I'll overanalyze.

[He unlocks the screen to respond.]

“Which version? I liked the remake better, but you can't tell me Joanna's marriage to Walter wasn't compulsory heterosexuality. It's like they told her she had to choose a guy to marry, she threw a dart at a board, it landed on a picture of a deflated scrotum that looks like Matthew Broderick and she said 'Him, I guess...'”

SARJANE: That's not over-analysis, that's just fact.

WYNTRAM: Look at your own phone.

[The following silence between them lasts three minutes before either decides to say something.]

WYNTRAM: Man, this sucks. Why do I always get stuck with you?

SARJANE: Whoa, wait a minute!

WYNTRAM: No– Shit! Hold on, that's not what I meant. It just seems like every time we camp or stay at inns, the two of us always end up rooming together. Like I get it, we're really good friends, but sometimes, I feel like there's other people I need to talk to once in a while.

SARJANE: Hey, you're not still thinking about what he said outside the cabin, are you...?

WYNTRAM: …

[She crosses her arms.]

SARJANE: Oh? Ohohohoho???? Could it be the good doctor actually has genuine friendly concern for people other than Hard Glass Mazdaki?

WYNTRAM: Yeah, of course! I'm human! But please don't call yourself that.

SARJANE: The point is, you say this sucks. I think I know how to make it un-suck.

[You wish you knew how to make him respond to you. Anything, even an insult, would do. If it weren't for the guards outside, Terys would probably leave the cabin to “meditate,” or whatever he claims to do to let off steam when he's alone.]

MILENAH: Big day tomorrow.

TERYS: …

MILENAH: You know, I took another one of your manuscript pages again. Doesn't that piss you off?

TERYS: ..

MILENAH: Well, in the event that it doesn't, let me show you what I've been working on for you.

TERYS: .

[You slip the manuscript page onto his side of the cabin. He scans it from where he sits.]

MILENAH: It's supposed to be a resurrection spell. Our biggest concern was that since we don't have a healer, what are we gonna do if one of us drops dead? This melody is the answer, the spell is a one-use-per-fight sort of thing, though, so use it wisely. I call it... “Bring to Life.”

[He crumples the paper into a ball and throws it at you.]

MILENAH: Please don't tell me it's already been done!

TERYS: ….........

[You slam your head against the cabin wall.]

MILENAH: I'm not going to lose, you know!

TERYS: You better not.

MILENAH: I'm no fool! I know what losing means for you, and I'm not gonna let you go through that again.

TERYS: You better not.

MILENAH: Don't you have any faith in me?

TERYS: What difference does it make, how much I have in you? Of course I do, but if you lose to that fairy, what will it even count for in the end?

[You'd normally try to give him some speech about moral support and The Power of Friendship that you only half-believe yourself, but you're interrupted by a knock on the door. You walk over to answer it.]

MILENAH: Hm?

GUARD FAIRY: You have visitors.

[Behind him is Sarjane standing by her own cabin's guard, and Wyntram off to the side.]

SARJANE: Hey Millie, guess what? I'm stealing you!

MILENAH: Why?

SARJANE: It doesn't matter, don't worry about it.

[You walk out the door to follow her and the guard, when you notice Wyntram stay put.]

MILENAH: Shouldn't he be following us?

SARJANE: It's fine! The cabin can only fit two people!

MILENAH: Huh? But then that means–

SARJANE: It's fiiine!

[As Sarjane approaches the door to open it, the subjectively cuter guard returns to his post. She shuts the door behind you.]

SARJANE: Sorry I used you like that. I just had to get those two alone.

[You feign offense.]

MILENAH: I'm hurt. You don't like spending time with me?

SARJANE: Never said that. How are you holding up? Knowing your record, I think that violet-mopped malcontent will be in for a rude awakening tomorrow.

MILENAH: Which one, Iris or Terys? Depending on who you're referring to, what you said has two entirely different meanings.

SARJANE: Pssh.

[She causally walks over and flops onto her bed.]

SARJANE: Still, this lady seems pretty sure of herself, and according to the Orange One, their sister was even better. Do you think she can do that thing where you pin the onion ring to the tree?

MILENAH: No idea. Macki didn't teach me that one.

[Your blood freezes as you realize what you've just said.]

SARJANE: A-ha!

MILENAH: Yoooouuu! You tricked me!

SARJANE: I did nothing, “Michelle.” You just have a loose tongue.

MILENAH: Die.

SARJANE: Oh, it's not like I'll tell anyone.

[You take a seat on Wyntram's bed, which you guess is yours now.]

MILENAH: Everyone in this commune knows what I did, but none of them will admit it's me. All of this could have been avoided if we just went left like I wanted.

SARJANE: True, but think how much less I'd know about you if we did.

MILENAH: I don't have a loose tongue. But I am a hypocrite. I hold on to all of my friends' biggest secrets and guard them with my life, but then I don't trust them enough to share my own. Can you blame me? The incident with Macki wasn't my proudest moment. It's funny... the day it happened, I swore it wasn't my fault. I never sleep in, it's not my nature. That morning, I felt... wrong. Completely disoriented. Why was I so tired the night before?

SARJANE: More importantly, the fairies had to hunt in pairs before you came along, right? So why did she go off to hunt alone instead of asking someone else to go with her?

[You never considered that.]

MILENAH: I don't know her reasons. I wish I could ask her.

SARJANE: Iris said Macki was in love with you. I'd kill to hear your side of that story.

MILENAH: I actually never knew for sure. She spent a lot of time with me, taught me everything I know, and told me how pretty I was, but does that really mean love?

SARJANE: You can't rule it out, I mean, you can't blame her for thinking yo–

MILENAH: ?

SARJANE: Ha! I just remembered something!

[She's visibly sweating. You don't think she knows how much louder she's speaking than she was a moment ago.]

SARJANE: Dinner!

MILENAH: What...

SARJANE: You didn't have any!

MILENAH: Well, I didn't want to eat rabbit. I'll be fine, I can still shoot on an empty stomach.

SARJANE: You say that now until you pass out and impale yourself on your own arrows.

MILENAH: You've got an active imagination. Now, what were you trying to say before?

[She ducks underneath the covers.]

SARJANE: Good night!

#The Vesseler #Story

0 notes