An Unwelcoming Welcome(OPEN)

[Sahir Masbrati]

Upon a small canyon within the borders of Nerezza a haunting wind cut past the high ledges and down through the deep gash like a bird of prey. Slicing past the barren corridor of stone there was no trees, nor brush to halt its course, whilst the shadows that left creeping images on the long steep walls could do naught to slow its advance. It was a path that the wind frequented, seemingly enjoying itself as it whistled throughout the caverns carved from rivers of long ago.

Yet if Sahir Masbrati could talk to the wind as it swept past her with a chill, she might have learned that the path through the canyon had been abandoned long ago to all but slavers and dangerous beasts that lurked within it's walls, and had she not listened to the conniving trader that lured strangers into the slavers' grasp, she might have never encountered it at all. Such though, was her luck this day. She clutched her shoulder bag tightly to her side as she treaded slowly towards her destination, and the peril that laid ahead.

A few pebbles bounced down from a round opening, and Sahir turned sharply towards it for fear of what might be there. "Hello? Hello?" Her swallowed her worries as she called out to the darkness.

"And hello to you dearie." Came a voice above her as black as the sky. A human silhouette leaned over from the opening. "Lost are you?"

Sahir backed away to the opposite wall. Her eyes scanned to either side of the canyon, and saw glimpses of similar shadows from where she'd come. The slavers had been watching, and waiting to trap her within. With them making themselves known now only meant they were certain she could not escape.

"I...don't suppose you intend to use magic to try and get me?" She asked, her only chance at defeating them hanging on a yes from the ruffians.

"Hmm, now what need have we for magic? We find steel is so much more, personal. Much better for welcoming a stranger to our land." The figure above chuckled as a glint of metal appeared in his hands.

Sahir's eyes widened in fear, and with no option to fight and no time to get her explosives she took off in a dash for the path ahead, all the while crying for help as loud as she could.

[Yeligar Maelstrom]

A flash of white ran past Sahir as a man in white clothes, and a white cape came to defend her. Yeligar was sent her for an odd job by a rich man that lived on the edge of Crepusculum. Yeligar was searching when he heard the screams of a woman. Being the chilvours gentleman that he was, he bolted into action and ran towards the scream where he saw a blade wielding person chasing a woman.

"Do you have no honor?" He asked the attacker. Yeligar then looked behind him, and told the woman,the back to the attacker. With a shield at his side, and his lance at the ready.

[Ingway Desmodius]

"Of course not, you moron! They're slavers!" I call down from the canyon walls, where I sit perched, like a hawk, watching it's prey, as my gaze scans across the bodies that inhabit the canyon. My footwork remaining fleet as ever, I flow, without hesitation, down the canyon side, leap and land behind the bunch of slavers with a graceful, almost barely audible footfall.

"My apologies, young lady, but rumour has it that these slavers know of a certain place in this canyon that is home to a certain..."something", and I intended to find out where it is, and, sadly, required you to lure them out," I say, nonchalantly balancing the tip of my dagger on my finger.

"Well, looks like we've got a party here boys!" Shouts the Boss of the slavers as he lets out a sinister chuckle. "Tell you what, you boys take care of our unwanted guests, and I'll see what I can do with girlie over here..." He jeers with a devilish grin as his gaze falls on the tanned girl. With a frenzied shout, the slavers let out rowdy cheers and almost primitive grunts as they brandish their weapons skyways before charging evenly towards towards myself and the eye-patched warrior in white.

With a quick motion of my hand from under my cloak, two green glyphs flash before Sahir, delivering a short sword and a small buckler before her. "It's the best I can do for now, but just hang tight and I'll get you out of this, alright!" I call to her, hoping she can halt the man's advances for even a short bit.

[Sahir Masbrati]

Sahir leapt back with a startle as the new players entered the battle. Her eyes narrowed cautiously at the slender one above, giving a mistrustful gaze as the equipment fell from his glyphs. Her hand moved instinctively to the pendant, wondering if her appearance or reputation as the God Slayer would do anything. In the end she muttered with disdain as she grabbed the short sword and shield, deciding there were too many people for her to risk revealing herself.

"I don't even know how to use a sword!" She cried out.

"All the better for me then!" The slaver's leader shouted as he leapt from the sheer rock face in front of Sahir. "Don't worry sweetheart, I don't want to go messing up that pretty face. It'll fetch me a better price and you a better home if you just cooperate." His hand moved delicately over the edge of his scimitar. He advanced on her in an attempt to corner her.

With a desperate swipe of the short sword Sahir aimed for his outstretched weapon. The slaver leader, a man far more capable than her in combat dodged her stroke, toying with her as she tried again and again to injure him. With a retaliatory strike he slammed the blunt side of his blade down at her with a primal roar. Though she managed to bring the buckler up just in time the sheer power of his strike sent her off her feet and back against the wall.

"Bastard." She cursed him as she wiped the blood from her cheek.

[Yeligar Maelstrom]

"Ma'am!" He said to Sahir, he then looked over at the leader, and pointed his lance at him, "Ice trails!" He said, then a bunch of streams flew from his lance, and aimed to strike all over at the leader.

[Ingway Desmodius]

"Dammit!" I remark sharply, as I briskly dodge the sweeping strikes from my aggressors. With a movement as quick as lightning, my blade, Fabled Fortune, is draw from it's sheath and flashes across the legs of 2 of my opponents as I dodge past them, only to meet against the blades of more slavers as they come at me in waves. Knowing full well that I have to get to the girl to protect her, I quickly create a glyph on the ground and jump just as it actives, the glyph absorbing a large potion of air and causing a vacuum that, when filled, propels me towards the lead slaver while the shockwave hammers against the foes the surrounded me.

As I glide through the air and maneuver away from my assailants, I notice the white warrior failed to do the same, and instead concentrated his effort on the Boss Slaver, as opposed to the men charging him. Not having impeded the slavers, they bull-rushed him and tackled him, most dropping their weapons and using their fists to try and bludgeon and pummel the eye-patched knight.

Glancing back towards my target, I see the icy trails careen towards the slaver, as he moves to corner the young girl, and seek to catch to man flatfooted should he manage to dodge the chilling strike. With a quick flip, I now brandish a massive zweihander, as my decent fuels the blades crushing power for when I aim to strike the man upon landing.

[Sahir Masbrati]

"What? More?" Sahir gasped as she witnessed the path of magical ice spray from Yeligar's lance towards the stout slaver.

The man grimaced at the moving spell and with a hefty grunt he rose his foot before stomping it down hard. The ground seemed to buckle under the power as a wave of stone collided with the ice. Smirking to himself he turned his attention upwards as Ingway descended upon him. Raising his blade with a powerful slash the air rang with a sharp ping as steel met steel. "Useless!" He shouted as he threw his weight to the left and parried the massive weapon away from him.

"You can do it Besier! Pound them into dust!" The fellow slavers cheered from above while some slowly made their way down the sheer rock face to join in the fray.

"Sorry sweetheart but it looks like you'll have to wait your turn. You just go and behave yourself, and maybe my boys won't be too rough on you. Got it?" The last words dripped with an ugliness second only to how cocksure he seemed of himself. He turned his back to her as he brandished his weapon towards the two would be rescuers.

Sahir's hand tightened against the blade's handle as she looked at the man's back with anger bottled up inside. Tempted as she was to lunge at him, she was only too sure he would be ready for that. With the cries of the slavers getting closer she decided she was better off helping out in another way. Taking off away from the ruckus Sahir opened her pack and tried to dig past her gear and into the false bottom of her bag.

[Ingway Desmodius]

As the hulking man easily parries my blade, I quickly dematerialize before the massive sword hammers into the ground, and quickly recover and hop away from him. "So, what's a Roccian like you doing all the way out in Nerezza?" I quip, hoping to distract this Besier fellow while I ready some equipment beneath my cloak. "Not many Geomancers outside of its place of birth?"

Besier looks at me, his eyes glancing up and down while he sizes me up, a task I'm all to familiar with. "None of your damn business blondey. That s*** was old hat, and soon, you and your little pirate friend over there will be the same," he scoffs, as he runs his finger along the length of his blade. "Now stop talking and start dyin'!" He shouts as he stomps on the floor once again, causing the earth below me to rise, throwing me slightly off balance before he charges and swings his blade downward, attempting to split me in twain.

As I fall forward though, I sling, in succession, three bolas, and manage to catch him after he dodges the first with the second around his feet, and third around his waist. As I quickly roll back up, I summon a glyph against the mans weapon and dematerialize it, leaving him weaponless as he too quickly rises, freed from my constraints, and substantially more pissed-off.

"You think little magic tricks will stop me? Wrong! I'm gonna enjoy feeling my boot against you're skull as you're beggin' for mercy, just before I squeeze the last breath of life outta ya," Besier boasts maliciously, cracking his knuckles, as he and I start circling one another, waiting for the other to strike.

[Sahir Masbrati]

As Sahir burrowed desperately through her bag, a pair of the slavers caught her off guard as they slipped down one of the higher cavern entrances. Each bared a long curved dagger that they jerked out menacingly towards her. As she looked up, Sahir let out a surprised yelp. While her mind thought only of running away, the months of her work as the God Slayer had given her instincts better reactions. Running up to the same wall they came from Sahir took a two step jump up the wall and flipped over the men.

"What? Damn it, come back here." The one who didn't have his mouth wide open in surprise jabbed the other as they tried to chase her down.

"Come on, come already." She begged her bag as the false bottom continued to elude her. Finally reaching past some dried provisions her hand grasped the clasp tucked beneath the fabric and she shouted victoriously as she pulled a wrapped bottle out into the open.

"Stay back! Stay back both of you!" She brandished the bottle before the grisly looking pair. "I'll blow you both sky high if you come one step closer."

The two looked to each other, the simpler looking of the two showing worry as he backed off. "You don't think she really has something?"

"I, ah...don't know. Maybe we'd better let the boss deal with it. Not like she's going anywhere." The more battle hardened waved his blade with a threatening gesture at her, staying a good few feet away.

[Yeligar Maelstrom]

Yeligar watched as the other man there tried to fight the leader, so he decided to take care of the other slavers that were there, and so he switched the snow blade with the wind blade, as the wind started to pick up around him.
"Wind wires!" He said as he watched three slavers got around him, and held up their swords and started to run at him. He swung his lance at them, and only he notice the wind had wrap around their wrists, ankles and swords. He then gave a quick, strong tug, and it made them fall face first towards the earth, making them pass out. Yeligar then tug on the lance once more, and sent their blades one towards the leader, and the other 2 towards the two slavers attacking Sahir.

[Sahir Masbrati]

As the blades went flying towards the two slavers Sahir saw her chance to act. Pointing out towards them she cried, "Look out!" which caused the two to look for a split second and see the attack coming. Though both dodged in the nick of time thanks to her exclamation it gave her the opportunity to ram the greener of the two with her shoulder and dash through the opening it made.

"Why you little..." The other one turned his attention back to her. Yet he got no more than two steps when Sahir took out a small capsule she'd palmed when she had taken the vial and threw it in front of the man. The capsule burst in a plume of smoke, leaving the slavers caught in its choking gas while she ran back to the fray.

Here goes nothing. She thought as she winded back her arm and threw the vial towards the oncoming gang as hard as she could. The vial sailed past Yeligar, Ingway and Besier and into one of the higher cavern openings. With a tinkle of glass the liquid trapped within detonated instantly, sending a pile of rocks tumbling down in front of the slavers and blocking off the canyon's pathway with a good twenty foot tall wall of rubble.

[Ingway Desmodius]

As the single blade comes flying towards the back of Besier, he simply stomps his foot, creating a stalagmite, to which the blade manages to stick into, as opposed to his back, and promptly draws the blade from the stone protrusion, now waving it menacingly in my direction. I couldn't help but grimace a bit and think a very sarcastic "thank you" to my eye-patched assistant.

Continuing to pace around each other, we swipe and strike cautiously at one another, my speed and reflexes protecting me from the man's brutish strikes, and his perception and geomancy making him a veritable wall against my quick swings. As we continue this back-and-forth duel, my keen eye catches sight of the bottle glinting in the dank sunlight as it flies overhead, myself thinking nothing of it till my ears are assailed by the rock-shattering blast that ensues upon it's landing.

Bearing witness to the crumbling debris as it piles high against the canyon walls, I smirk at my opponent calling out to him, "Well I suppose you not got the option to run away now," in a mocking fashion, only causing him to become more riled up, and charge at me. Growing tired of the constant back and forth, I opt to just reveal my abilities and end it, as opposed to trying to keep them a secret, and dragging the conflict out any longer then necessary.

Throwing my cloak towards Besier, he quickly swats it aside, but not fast enough to catch the glyph I placed below him, causing a chunk of earth to vanish underneath his feet, leaving his footfalls unsure and him knocked prone in short order. Following with a flurry of hand motions, the vibrant green hue of my floating sigils encircle the man, firing all manner of keen blades to assail him as if he were a pin cushion. Making sure to pierce his hands and shins only, I direct the rest of the blades to areas just shy of the man's body, more so as a message to the rest of his cohorts than anything.

Dispelling the sigils and dematerializing my weapons, I leave the man grounded, as he winces at his wounded limbs, whilst I turn to the slavers closer to Sahir. "Now, what say you two leave this young lady alone and answer a few questions for me, hmmm?" I question playfully, cracking my fingers as I meander closer to the men, placing myself between them and Sahir.

[Sahir Masbrati]

The slavers look to Ingway with eyes widened in fear. They had not ever seen their boss handled to easily, and the strange magic that he wielded left that fearful of what else he might bring out from the glyphs. Throwing their hands up in the air look ready to back off.

Boom! A thundering echo from one of the cave openings fills the canyon. At first it seems like only an echo of the explosion Sahir used moments ago, yet moments later another is heard. Boom... boom... boom. The powerful sound grows closer with each repeat. The men look to each other with fear in their eyes, the greener of the two looking like he had just messed himself.

"Th-th-that not what I th-th-think it is, is it?" He stammers.

"Oh crap." The other one looks to Sahir and snaps at her. "I hope you're happy you little brat, 'cause if you thought we were going to go rough on you then you've really done a number on us all with that little potion of yours!"

"What are you talking about?" Sahir looks from him to the cave openings, unable to pin down which the sound is coming from.

"What the heck do you think makes these tunnels? You just woke up a Bulette, and these things only know how to do two things, dig tunnles and eat. Gampy, we're getting out of here NOW!" He shouted to his ally and bolted away done the canyon towards the only way out.

Boomboomboomboomboom CRASH! From a ground level opening a four legged beast broke out as piles of debris bounced off its rock hard shell.



The creature stood a massive 15 feet tall, it's body only just managing to fit within the breadth of the canyon's open area. It's head reared upwards, sniffing the air before it looked down upon the group of people that laid in front of it. As it scraped it's claw once against the dirt it roared before charging down the warriors.