So after this whole debacle is done I'd really like to finally get Freddy to be a master blacksmith. Unless of course we have more important things to do(we usually do).
Warhammer Fantasy: A Dynasty of Dynamic Alcoholism
- Thread starter torroar
- Start date
- Mature
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- Tags
- warhammer warhammer fantasy fantasy intrigue happens male protagonist ck2 quest belief stronk count of cannons drunken wisdom foes in the shadows graf of guns (guns) if you have a question check the front page first it begins... mountain vietnam ogres paranoia rising unseen enemies everywhere use the search function before asking waifu wars wake the bull
- Location
- Texas
That's just silly, he should further improve relations with the dwarves by partaking in the sacred and ancient art of rock horticulture.
- Location
- Africa
I remember during the earlier turns in the quest Freddy hired a dwarf master smith to teach him , in fact said dwarf became one of Alexandras teachers
Press the button. Migrating people migrate because they are sufficiently unhappy or desperate with their present circumstances enough to throw away everything they'd built up and leave the culture they were raised in.
Luckily, the migrants would simply migrate to another place willing to take them. Marienburg is always happy to slurp up skilled artisans they can stuff into the bottom ranks, and so would any relatively cosmopolitan city . Left without options, people hanging around get more unhappy, take up arms and compound instability.
It's like looking at steam escaping from a kettle and believing that its making the kettle hot. So you plug the nozzle until it explodes because the fire is still there.
Indeed he did but we never got the chance to finish it.Still just a measly blacksmith unlike Alexandrea.
- Trait: Blacksmith – You are knowledgeable in the ways of metal crafting. (+1 Martial, +1 Learning, Bonus to Weapons Research)
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The whole "throw away everything they'd built up" also selects against those who have already invested into the system, which means that those who end up leaving tend to be young.
And the effort that is normally involved in successfully emigrating means that those who lack the drive, resourcefulness, entrepreneurial spirit or connections can get left behind.
On the other hand, it can lead to the spread of ideas and a transfer of capital if the migrants manage to maintain contact with their home country or if they are able to return at a later date. Which can actually boost the development of the country of origin.
NCRTrooper
Wishing For A Nuclear Winter
- Location
- New York
- Pronouns
- He/Him
No, it's also officers, headmen, people who are in charge/authorities in certain areas, basically. As well as priesthoods, of course. The 5% was already there before the Estalian migrations began. It's a significant minority in the Empire, but the significant part is true nonetheless.
MasterDrakus
DEUS SOL
- Location
- Minas Gerais, Brazil
Did they find a hard time keeping the influence with those jobs after the knights went off to crusade and left the empire behind? Or did the Ostlanders not care?
Ekzentric Lohner
I miss Wildstar...
Yay, finished reading all the threadmarked story posts!
Or like the underlying point of the Worm one-shot fic Terrible(ly) Racist that spawned the now-memetic "I am a dragon. You are now Asian."
It's just one more example of writers not doing their homework on populations other than their own.
Didn't Ranald used to be a mortal man who became a god by tricking/convincing/romancing (depending on interpretation) Shallya into letting him drink from her chalice ((probably) not a euphamism)?
It's like when J K Rowling came up with where the world's other "major wizarding schools" were. Europe gets one school in Britain and two on the continent, but there's only one school like them for all of North America? I can almost buy the excuse that all the other countries have no major schools, or at least fewer than their populations would seem to require, due to a cultural preference for home schooling and apprenticeships, but Canada and the United States are populated mostly by people with a culture mostly inspired by European culture. Whatever magical learning traditions the original people of North America had were, most likely, pushed aside in favor of European-inspired traditions a century or two ago. Unless Ilvermorny is absolutely massive compared to the European schools, I'd expect it to have at least one peer institution by now.
Or like the underlying point of the Worm one-shot fic Terrible(ly) Racist that spawned the now-memetic "I am a dragon. You are now Asian."
It's just one more example of writers not doing their homework on populations other than their own.
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NCRTrooper
Wishing For A Nuclear Winter
- Location
- New York
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Doesn't Ranald have multiple origin stories, as is befitting of a trickster god? Also Ranald sucks anyway, so who cares if he technically reached godhood first or not?
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Ekzentric Lohner
I miss Wildstar...
Mathilde Weber: *glares from the future of an alternate timeline*
Today: Violence. Alternate perspectives. Anger. Fear. Madness. 15k.
Welcome!
Welcome!
Lovely Laurelorn 7
GM NOTE: 6 Hour Moratorium. Remain calm. Apologies for delay, but this time the muse really took ahold of me, which I suppose is a good thing in a certain light.
Lovely Laurelorn 7
For a brief moment, your mind wrestles with itself. But only briefly. Her too-wide eyes are both bloodshot and shot through with more luminescent things. Her lips are peeled back to bare subtly but noticeably pointed teeth that are stained lightly with blood. Her grip on the spear thrown to her is just shy of being too tight for proper control. If you were to speak against her, right now, in this moment, she might try and gut you with it. This is a sovereign of an entire race of people. It's not worth it. Before she even notices that you'd sucked in a breath to speak you instead turn your head towards Mena von Kessel.
"You'll ride with us, Von Kessel. We go to defend the Pinnacle. You think your wolves can handle it?"
Her response is to blink and then begin to laugh. It starts low and begins to grow in volume before she abruptly pulls her head back, in fact her entire body save for her feet wrenches backwards towards the ground itself, her knees bending at just past sixty degrees. Her arms splay wide out to the sides, ax still firmly held in her hand. A deep inhale comes next. Even beneath the armor you can see how her entire body seems to vibrate and shake from head to toe. Then she lets loose a loud howl towards the sky that just for a startling second sounds closer to that of an actual wolf, as in it actually turns inhuman, before straightening and grinning at you with very toothsome grin. She quite literally bounces on her feet and then turns sharply at the waist.
"GET ME SOME HORSES YOU SHITRAGS, ON THE DOUBLE! THE FUCKING STEEL BULL NEEDS A MOUNT!"
She is experienced at fighting, but her tact reminds you of a young irritated blacksmith who once lived in Jegow. On the other hand, she's right. This time, you do not appear to be getting rides upon the Steeds of Isha, and the Sisters of the Thorn are not offering this time around. And soon enough a number of blood-stained and wild-eyed looking horses are brought over to you, conspicuously absent of riders. The light barding has rents and tears, but the saddles, stirrups, and reins are unharmed. Mena herself has already mounted up again, flakes of soot coming off of her the whole while. She swishes her axe through the air but once. To your surprise, you see Sunweaver once more, this time on another horse from the wolves, but she looks remarkably recovered from her state last time you saw her. She favors you with a brief look and nod but the majority of her attention is understandably on the fighting going on nearby. Ariel has leapt atop the enormous white stag, though something tells you this only angers her further somehow. She then whips her spear above her head and points it in the direction of the Pinnacle.
"We go! Now!" The Queen in the Woods shouts.
With that royal if abrupt declaration, you are all off. The Steeds of Isha quickly take the lead ahead of the rest of the wolves and yourselves, but overall the entire formation moves quite quickly. The fey fighting nearby do not seem to react overly much either, in fact they seem far more focused upon fighting those Asrai just outside of Laurelocraobh than doing anything else. Without their central target in Naraiel, and Kyrian taken off the field, the fey seem focused purely on exercising their own endless malicious desires. There are no deals being made, no tricks or illusions, no songs or disguises, only their own drive to cause pain and spill blood driven to the highest extremes. It is impossible to say if it is from their long imprisonment in the Wildwood, something that has lurked within them even longer before said imprisonment, or they are simply being driven to new sadistic heights by the corruption of Nurgle and hatred of Drycha and Coeddil. Or possibly some combination of all three and more. But as it is, they do not seem to desire to try and throw themselves against the Blue Wolves of Nordland bringing up the rear more than a few cursory lobs of fire or gaseous orbs. None of which manage to actually hit your group as it travels by. The wolves of Nordland respond in a haphazard array of firing bows, throwing axes, and a few javelins.
Then you are past all of that. The distance between you and the Pinnacle is eaten up faster and faster, and soon enough you find yourself dismounting the horse provided to you to once more set your feet on ancient stone. The Asrai defenders still present cheer wildly at the sight of their Queen, but those same cheers become strangled and grow quiet at the sight of her. Ariel does not seem to either notice or care as she leaps with otherworldly grace from her mount to land barefooted amongst them. Silently, she sweeps them aside with nothing more than her presence to gaze up at Coeddil where he remains, still locked in the middle of recoiling in pain, expression literally clouded by frozen over pus and rotten sap being captured in the absolute explosion of ice that overtook the whole of his frame. The ancient treeman is not in a perfect rectangular block of ice, but there is no single stretch of his body that does not have less than a full foot length of glistening ice covering it. Before, you had thought of its shape as a sort of iron maiden of ice, and that impression hasn't changed. Certain portions of it are somewhat translucent, enough to see over half of Coeddil's outline, but the rest is utterly obscured by the darkest of glacial ice. The frost on the ground which spreads outwards at the base more than fifteen feet outwards in an uneven oval, a large twenty foot cone anchored at the treeman shooting out away from the Pinnacle.
The Queen in the Woods pauses a few feet before her bare feet touch ice, her expression which has been so tightly fierce stilling slightly as she gazes up at what your wife has wrought. Slowly, the rest of the Sisters of the Thorn who had come with her form up in a loose defensive formation but for all their effort they cannot help but look at Coeddil. All of them have a look of revulsion on their faces, with the barest hint of genuine fear. When Natasha appears in one of the archways, still leaning on it for support as she limps forward towards you, it is impossible to miss how many of the newly arrived Sisters of the Thorn swivel on their feet to keep her in front of them. But, quite frankly, you don't care. Instead you rush forward, gathering her up in your arms as she wraps her own around you, a searing hot kiss connecting you as you pick her up slightly and whirl her about before putting her down again. Frankly, you don't care that all of the elves are staring at you, and you ignore the wolf whistle from Mena. The two of you just, for this brief moment, exist alone in the universe. She is alive, unharmed despite you leaving her. You have returned, as you told her you would, and quickly to boot.
"Count Hohenzollern!"
A familiar voice breaks your reverie, and you turn without letting go of Natasha to see the few Greatswords you had been forced to leave behind.
"Volgar!" You shout happily, clapping a hand on the man's shoulder.
Though he is still bereft of the armor you had been forced to cut him out of, the man looks like he is as hale as he was at the beginning of the fighting. He still retains his greaves, as do Oskar Lohr and Ubel Manndrof, but their breastplates and gauntlets had been forced to be removed lest they die in them. They had been so terribly hurt by the fighting against Coeddil that none of them had been able to stand, or even sit really, but now they all approach with grim humor to rejoin the small number of their fellows which surround you even now.
"Glad to see you alive, my Count."
"The same to you," you nod at him. "I presume...,"
"The elf, yes sir," he jerks his chin in the direction of where the Highweaver stands.
The elf mage in question has inched close enough to murmur to the Queen in the Woods, though at this distance and with them facing away from you it is impossible to know just what they are talking about.
"I...also wanted to give you my thanks," he continues, ducking his head as he says so, "The elf confirmed that the infection would have bloated me unto death, I would have suffocated or been crushed inside my own armor if she hadn't been able to heal me."
"You would have done the same," you shrug. "Shame about the armor though."
Oh, the irony of saying such a thing to someone else.
"I'd rather the armor than me, if it's all the same to you, Count," he chuckles before stepping back and rejoining the rest of his fellows in a small circle of whispers.
Thus, leaving you and Natasha alone for a moment.
"How are you?" You say as gently as you can.
Even holding her lightly, it almost feels like she's suddenly lost a lot of weight. There is an upsetting frailty to her every movement now. One that causes a brief civil war between your mind and heart, and it is only the fact that the Pinnacle went essentially wholly unmolested while you were gone from her side that lets your mind be the victor. She has given up on holding her sword in anything approaching above her waist, and in fact is half using it as a cane more than anything else. And now that you are here, you can see that her golden blonde hair has gained a very noticeable white streak at the left temple that shoots all the way back until it ends with the rest of her hair just past her shoulders. The stripe of white is not straw-like or thin like that of an elderly person, but the change is impossible to deny. When you clasp her hands in yours between the two of you, you can see how the nails of her hands have become a uniform but disturbing metallic iron grey, a coloration that spiders outwards from the nails along her hands up to the wrist. Your noses are almost touching, and this close, your back stiffens when you see the faintest sheen of red that briefly flickers into and then out of existence in her otherwise ice blue eyes. She notices the moment you notice, and sighs, her chin dropping as she does so.
"I don't...know what happened to me," she whispers without looking at you. You despise how her voice trembles. "I...my hands, I don't...,"
"It doesn't matter," you kiss her on the forehead and hold her close. "We'll figure it out together."
"...right," she pulls in a fortifying breath before pushing off from you. "I was just...so angry," she sounds almost ashamed of it.
A clattering of hooves interrupts you, and both you and Natasha are witness to Mena von Kessel grinning salaciously down at the two of you. Seeing that she's caught your attention, she fires off a surprisingly good salute at you before bowing slightly in her saddle towards Natasha.
"Countess Hohenzollern, pleased to see you again," she waves with her axe before looking towards you. "We're off, Count. We aren't much for line fighting, but the moment the enemy tries it, we'll be tearing their legs out from under them."
Then she kicks her horse to cantering away without actually waiting for confirmation or acknowledgement from you.
"That girl needs more seasoning," Natasha shakes her head as she fully steps away from you.
"Agreed," you mutter before moving to catch her before she collapses against the nearest pillar. "Natasha!"
"Damn it," she growls through grit teeth as your arms fold around her.
"What-,"
"I was barely standing," she admits as you help her slowly slide down to her butt. "I'm fighting just to keep my eyes open, I'm so exhausted. Feels like Hagrid's taken a melon scoop to my insides at table side service."
Hissing, she lets her head lean back against the stone
"Are you-,"
"I'm not dying," she squints at you, "Not anymore at least. That elf," she looks over at the one in question, her white robes burnt and bloodied aplenty by now. "Highweaver Taira? She said that my organs were badly cut apart from erupting veins," she does not pause as your grip on her shoulders suddenly becomes a lot tighter, "My own blood was freezing and then bursting inside of me."
She says it with too much ease to the point that you can tell it is forced.
"But she healed me, so that's not a danger at this point," she huffs. "As it is, however," she limply attempts to raise her sword in a trembling arm before it clatters back to the ground despite her maintaining her grip. "Shit, I've become an invalid."
"No you are not," is your immediate angry snarl. "All you need to do is rest until you get your strength back."
"Well it's hardly like I can do much else," she rolls her eyes.
When you go to stand, she weakly places a hand against your chest.
"You'll come back?"
"Always," you reach down and pull her hand up to your mouth to kiss. "And I'll not leave you defenseless. Volgar! Oskar! Ubel!"
The three named Greatswords quickly make their way over to you, their weapons hefted high. They are not brilliant scholars, but they know well enough what you are asking of them without actually using words. Quickly, they take up a triangle position around her, weapons at the ready.
"Absolutely not, you'll need them at the battle line," is her gracious response.
"They've lost a significant portion of their armor, and you need the help," you fire right back before walking away.
"Frederick!"
"Get up and stop me then!"
"Damn it," she groans behind you before you hear her immediately begin cajoling one of the Greatswords to hand her a flask of something or other.
Ten minutes later finds you with the rest of the Asrai now forming up into wary battle lines. The arrival of Sunweaver, the High Spellweaver of Laurelorn - which is apparently different from a specific Highweaver - brings many casualties back from the brink. The presence of their Queen fortifies morale, though not as much as one might have hoped considering her demeanor. The presence of so many Sisters of the Thorn does no favor to the rest of the Asrai, given how wary they are of them. Over eighty of the strange not-quite-elves have formed a protective series of concentric lines around her, shoulder to shoulder now facing forward back towards Laurelocraobh. For some reason, you suspect that the number at full strength is about one hundred, but they have lost a small number. Ariel herself is standing at the forefront of them all, pretty much outright making herself a target.
But despite that, the fey have not advanced on the Pinnacle. With every minute that stretches on, the Asrai at the foot of the tree retreating further and further into safer territory, it seems more and more likely. But not just yet, it seems. It is coming though, that is undeniable. As it is, you have found yourself once more next to Eldyra, who is quietly cleaning her blade next to you. From this close, you can once more marvel at the craftsmanship of Death Thorn. It flat out rivals the best dwarf forging that you've ever seen, though you're not likely to voice such thoughts around any of the dawi. Living or dead, as for all you know the outrage might cause a dawi's spirit to spontaneously manifest to grumble at you. Despite her using it as vigorously as you did Brain Wounder, possibly more so, it seems untouched by battle as she nonetheless wipes it down one more time before placing the cloth somewhere in her belt.
"How are you holding up, Eldyra?"
The squire offers you a bemused smile, her conical and somewhat well ornamented helm turning with her as she goes.
"I could ask you the same, you know. I have seen few, human or elf or otherwise, simply get back to their feet and prepare to fight once more after sustaining the wounds that you did."
You've a simple answer to that question, but an effective one.
"I've legitimately had worse."
She just sort of stares at you for a moment before flicking Death Thorn back and forth briefly before returning it to its sheath. Like you, she has a shield, but unlike you, her shield holds a specific heraldry and is not simply some appropriated piece of gear. There is some sort of blue and white bird, lit from behind by the sun. Below is a stretch of green mountains and some elven rune that you can't read.
"Is that your house heraldry?"
"Mmm?" She peers at you before looking down at her shield. "Oh, no. This is the traditional heraldry of Tiranoc. When our armies march, it is under this. House Histmenluil," she pauses at your blank look and screws her face up in thought. "In Reikspiel it would roughly translate to something like...Golden Mountain's Thunder? Something like that."
"Histmenluil sounds easier to remember," you point out. "For a poor human that doesn't speak any of the elven dialects."
"Fair enough," she smirks at you but that soon falters as her face becomes downcast. "I...my father Eldyr was the Lord Histmenluil, and with his passing I have become the Lady Histmenluil."
And then she is silent for a few seconds while trying to blink back a growing wetness in her eyes.
"Technically, I have the right to bear our personal coat of arms," she manages to say, voice growing stronger as she continues. "But the Phoenix Court would not have the Lady Histmenluil," she spits out before sniffing once and nodding slowly. "But they would have the Squire of the Defender of Ulthuan. And when he knights me, I will bear the crest of my House proudly once more into the Court."
By the end of it, she's talking as much to herself as to you, fists clenching at her sides as she glares at the earth as if it were the assembled nobility of Ulthuan.
"I've no doubt you will," you tell her earnestly. "Hopefully even within my tiny little human lifetime," you add with a smile and a gentle elbow into her finely wrought armor.
It takes her a bit, but eventually she does respond.
"I should hope so," she says, a faint quirk on her lips. "Sir Tyrion's standards are high, but I don't think it will take an entire century more. Only some decades."
"Oh. Well," you click your tongue. "Maybe not in my lifetime at all."
Eldyra brows furrow as she looks at you more closely.
"What?"
"I know that humans are not as long lived as elves, or even dwarfs, but...how old are you?"
Oh, right, you never got around to telling her before. You were just too shocked that she was only 41 and barely considered past being a child by some of the elves.
"By the end of this year I'll be fifty-three."
The sudden and comprehensive shock that comes over Eldyra's face, jaw dropping slightly and eyes widening like saucers is one you'll never forget. She tries to sputter out something but fails as she switches to just look you up and down. It goes on long enough that you have enough time to gesture for and receive a flask of ostka from Luthor and drink the whole thing, the Greatsword's eyes otherwise being focused entirely on the enemy, before she processes it fully.
"But that's barely any older than me!" She sounds horrified. "But you act like...,"
"Haven't you dealt with humans before?" You can't help but ask.
"I...," she starts to say before cutting herself off and glaring at you without any heat. "For the vast most part? The only humans I have had experience with are those who have sworn themselves to Chaos or are mindless slave soldiers of the Druchii. My training has focused on threats to Ulthuan, to combat and tactics, to being the best knight-to-be I can be."
"Fair enough," you admit while rolling your shoulders. "I'm sure it would have come up sometime in the next few centuries, though."
The response to that is a contemplative silence and time enough to once more readjust the shield on your arm. It's the best defense you've got at this point, as at no point did you have time to go and get your proper armor back from wherever your horses were stored. If they're even still alive at this point. You wouldn't put it past these insane fey and dryads to slaughter everything not specifically plant or spirit. On the other hand, apparently Eldyra, or Tyrion, or some Handmaidens perhaps were able to go and secure the rest of Eldyra's own equipment for her usage. Still, you look more like one of the Asrai wardancers at this point than a human soldier. Your upper torso is a mess of only recently healed scars, everything from the waist upwards is bare to the elements without even scraps of a torn shirt to protect you. Below you've been reduced to something like lederhosen without the top part. To be frank your shoes are not doing much better, the fine leather rotting and buckles snapping off during the fighting. You can feel cool earth on parts of your soles, even. Not particularly great, but unlike your wife you can actually stand, as well as wield your blade without issue.
"So how long does that leave you?"
The question is so quiet that you almost miss it.
"Sorry?"
Eldyra doesn't look at you, her eyes locked on the fey as the last of the Asrai finally manage to retreat within the range of the Handmaidens of the Everqueen. Even now, you can see the incredibly bright lights that are fired from their magical bows, searing bolts of power that erupt upon impact no matter where or what they are hitting. The enormous treemen - that apparently got here from Avelorn somehow - raise their staves and then bring them down in unison in twinned thunderclaps. A gurgling of churning earth comes next. In seconds you can only watch as the ground seems to outright swallow the most over-eager of the fey and dryads, their bloodlust that drove them to chase after the retreating Asrai only leading them to their deaths. With that, the entire mass recoils far and away, while the Handmaidens refuse to go any further from the Everqueen's side and the treemen apparently sharing similar sentiments.
"How long does that leave you? You are right, most of my encounters with humanity are skewed. Many of those sworn to Chaos are immune to the touch of age even more so than my kind from the foul blessings of their Dark Gods," she elaborates calmly, still looking at the fey as they appear to be pulling further and further away from Laurelocraobh.
It's a question you've wrestled with before, and likely will again if you live.
"Could be today," you sigh. "Could be tomorrow."
"Obviously," Eldyra rolls her eyes, "But I am serious. I've never had cause to contemplate or study it. Most elves, should they truly live full and long lives, can live for a great many years. The creation of your Empire was a surprise to many in Ulthuan when we discovered it."
You cough.
"What do you mean it was a surprise?"
She rolls her hand through the air.
"You know, how quickly you built it all."
Now it is your turn to look shocked.
"Quick....what...quickly?" You look at her incredulously. "The Empire has, of this year, existed for over two thousand years! Two thousand three hundred and thirty three of them!"
"As I said, so very quickly," she says as if you've suddenly become a lackwit.
Princess Eldyra of Tiranoc, Squire of Tyrion the Defender of Ulthuan, has never looked more inhuman to you in that instant. The sheer lack of comprehension on her face, the absolute mystification at your shock, all of it is completely plain there. She has laughed, cried, and for a time you had forgotten that she simply was not like you. She is an elf. The whole history of the Empire, from the first Battle of Black Fire Pass to now is but a blink of the eye for the Asur of Ulthuan. So many generations of humanity have lived and died since the age when Sigmar walked amongst the tribes.
"Eldyra, what is the longest average lifespan for the Asur," you ask her with as much patience as you can muster. "Disregarding major exceptions," you add towards the end with a thought towards Malekith and perhaps the mysterious 'Alith Anar' that Sadrina touched only briefly upon on your travels to Laurelorn.
"Thousands of years," she answers simply. "Why?"
It is a hard, hard thing to not stagger aside from the simplicity of the statement.
"So by your people's perspective less than a single generation has passed, and so the Empire has grown into being."
"About," she shrugs.
"Right. Eldyra, I'm in the beginning of my fifth decade," you put your hands on your hips. "On average? Humans don't go past a century," you hear her gasp but keep going. "Most village elders and headsmen get past where I am, the healthiest and most well-kept nobility further than that, but even then."
"But-,"
"I've no idea what the Jade Magic and other...things...might or might not do," you shrug at that.
The way she looks at you is somewhat akin to someone discovering they are in danger of breaking a delicate piece of glass.
"That is...quite unsettling to hear," she tells you, eyes still too-wide.
"It is what it is," you sniff once.
"But what happens when you-,"
"Head's up," you interrupt her and point. "Time to get ready."
Ahead, the fey appear to have found either some form of order to themselves or have finally decided to stop trying to take down Laurelocraobh. There is really only one other target for them to go after. And even now as you watch, they are practically eating up the terrain between them and the Pinnacle. All the strange sorts of fey you've seen thus far and more are boiling over the ground, accompanied by a wave of angry screaming dryads. They are a mishmash of only vaguely humanoid creatures of birch, willow, or oak. Or all. Or none. It's hard to tell at this distance. But they are coming towards the Pinnacle in a rush that is beginning to pick up speed.
"Finally!" Ariel booms out, her spear raised high. "Come, wretches, and know that my mercy is extinguished! There will be no Wildwood for you! There will only be an end to you!"
Well, apparently a bit of recovery time without constantly exercising her powers has been enough for her to regain some small measure of strength. Either that or she's forcing herself to keep up a mask of it when she doesn't really have it. Personally, you're hoping it's the former, but if it's not at least she'll have the Sisters of the Thorn surrounding her. Then there is also the Pinnacle itself, and despite your worries there the elves do not seem to be overly upset about what your wife managed. Surely, if there was damage worth mentioning, the elves would have done so without hesitation.
As for the fey? They do not respond in words to Ariel's challenge, but they certainly do respond in a mishmash series of screams and hoots and screeches. Throats not meant for words ululate regardless in maddened fury at a volume louder than what most flesh could possibly manage. And they are definitely getting closer and closer now. In the further distance you can see the fluttering of the blue wolf banner as Mena readies her cavalry. She won't get here in time to intercept the enemy, but then you're reasonably sure she wishes to impact after they've already committed fully to ensure maximum damage. The dryads appear to have pushed even further to the front, incensed further and from here you can see them almost gliding forward through the earth at terrifying speed. Grass and soil are thrown up in the air, each forward movement of their legs shattering the ground like a ship through ice floes.
At the absolute forefront of them all are dryads that are even worse looking than the usual wood spirit in a martial aspect. They stand almost a fourth of the height of the average dryad taller, large spiky branches shooting off of them. More than a few of them have burning whorls of light spiraling around their bodies. Some have the upper portion of a skeleton hung above their heads like gruesome trophies wrapped through with roots that come from their backs. All of them don't have lungs that they need to scream with, so their unsettling cries simply do not end or even appear to stutter or fall in volume.
"Excuse me a moment," you murmur to Eldyra and then begin squeezing your way through the Asrai ranks, a motion of your fingers causing your Greatswords to remain in place rather than follow you.
They double-take at you, recoil from touching your human body, but there is a wariness there that you doubt they would have had for just about an Imperial before this day. In seconds you manage to reach the rather porcupine-esque perimeter of the Sisters of the Thorn. Many of them are quite focused on their duty, but you spy Ashnia of all people on the leftmost flank, and she half-turns her head towards you as you approach.
"Quick question, Sister," you speak up, clearing your throat just before.
"Speak, mayfly, we have but a few heartbeats left before we are under assault," she replies, voice incredibly clipped.
"Who are the big ones?" You gesture at the oncoming horde. "I assume one of them is Drycha?"
Ashina actually purses her lips at your question before squeezing her eyes shut. When they open again, they are once more those of a bird of prey, vertically slit and narrowed.
"Ah, the branchwraiths of the Wildwood. Eldest of those dryads bound there, spite and malice personified. Once it was they who were rulers of Athel Loren, before even the elves came, and they have resented us ever since," she sneers with suddenly pointed teeth bared. "I do not see Drycha yet amongst them, but she is a cunning creature despite her hatreds." Then she looks at you fully, blinking once so that her eyes return to that of an elf's. "But if she shows herself, you will know her by her hatred, for you have felt it's like already."
At that, she flicks her eyes fearfully at the entombed Coeddil.
"You will know."
Wonderful.
"Right, then. Good luck," you tell her but the Sister of the Thorn has stopped paying attention to you.
As quickly as you can, you push your way back to where Eldyra waits.
"What was that about?" The squire looks askance at you.
"I wanted to know which one was Drycha, but apparently none of those are her. She's smart enough to not throw herself at Ariel right off the bat, probably going to try and wear her down first."
"Mmm, likely."
Then the talking comes to an end. Various murmured conversations all around you die out entirely. Soon everything becomes just breathing, in and out, in and out. Fingers clench on swords and spears, feet set themselves, toes flexing. You cannot speak for anyone else, but your heart rate shoots upwards as it always does just before combat, thudding louder and louder. The closer they get, the louder the cacophony is. There is not the earthshaking pounding of an oncoming cavalry charge, but it is quite similar in its own way. Except, you realize after a second, the ground is shaking like a cavalry charge and then far more than it properly should. Far, far more. You can see it in the confusion of the elves around you, Eldyra included, that they feel it too. Ahead of you, you can see how even the oncoming fey are faltering from it, which is shocking on its own. The violence of the rumbling earth is so bad you are nearly knocked off of your feet, and it is only your Greatswords supporting you as well as each other that keeps the humans present from falling over outright.
From nearby where they had waited in somewhat safer positions, you hear Sunweaver and Highweaver Taira shriek in pain. That same moment you suddenly remember well enough a very recent and dangerously similar situation as in the past.
"Where I come from, it usually takes a few days hard ride to tell someone they've pissed you off if they're in another province!" You shout to make yourself heard at Eldyra, but you aren't sure if she heard your words.
Because at around that point, not so much melting out of so much as almost exploding out of one of the trees interwoven with the Dawnstone Pinnacle comes - screaming at absolutely deafening volume - a very angry looking dryad. This one, more than any of the others, you actually recognize. Her bark has splintered enough to show the odd wood-flesh beneath in certain potions of her arms and legs, with numerous gnarled branches sticking out of her back. She is not as large as the eldest of the Wildwood Branchwraiths, but she is undeniably a branchwraith nonetheless. The fierce green glow of her eyes are barely visible beneath the narrowed 'brows' of the jagged furrows that make up the facsimile of a face. But you know her. You've seen dryads that have looked like they came from all a manner of trees, from oak to willow to birch to ash and more. But you've only ever seen one that is tinged with red from top to bottom.
"DRRRRRRRRRYYYYYYYYYCHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
Such is the first word of Bloodglade, Eldest Branchwraith of Laurelorn, as she returns to her home. She tears the earth up as she strides to the forefront outside of the Pinnacle. And with her comes a number of lesser dryads that come pouring out of the trees at the same time. These ones, thankfully, appear to be completely unaligned to those of the Wildwood. Bloodglade herself stalks forward and throws her arms wide, and screams in a noise that cannot help but remind you of the same one that was heard throughout Laurelorn shortly after Coeddil was dealt with. It is ever so slightly less unhinged than that, however, albeit still filled with a powerful fury. It is, in fact, even louder for all that, as Bloodglade's scream seems to emanate not just from herself but from the trees all around you somehow.
"I don't understand a word she just said," you mutter.
Sunweaver speaks up then, this time thankfully not having collapsed outright like she did when Ariel had arrived so violently.
"She...ugh, the Weave cannot withstand such abuse, it will take many moons to heal it after this," she mutters, clutching at her stave. "Bloodglade asks why Drycha is despoiling her groves and glades, driving her children to madness."
"Are you all right?" Eldyra asks her, going to offer support before the Asrai woman shrugs her arm away.
"I will live," Sunweaver grunts stubbornly. "I was unprepared for the shock of Ariel forcing herself through the World-Roots so quickly and while so tainted by Cyanathair. It is no wonder she did not use them for so long. I will not falter like such again."
The tide of fey has been slowing at the full force of Bloodglade's fury and the growing arrivals of more and more of Laurelorn's own dryads, eventually coming to a halt. The new arrivals are coming not just from the few trees around the cleared area that is the Pinnacle, but from others as well. A significant number of them are emerging from Laurelocraobh. All of them are also converging. To your absolute surprise you see as they flow around Mena's soldiers. You would have thought that the dryads would react more than a little violently to the presence of so many humans. The Branchwraith of Laurelorn stalks a bit forwards, and is mirrored in doing so by one of the Wildwood Branchwraiths, one with a human rib cage acting as a left pauldron and a freshly dead elven corpse repeatedly impaled in her back branches. The creature raises one hand and draws forth a brief bloom of familiar energies that somehow seems darkened compared to what you've seen in the past that swirls around it. Then it opens what passes for it's mouth. The noise that comes out could only be described, you think, as a tree's branches collapsing to the ground in a windstorm.
(Demands of Fealty: 15+Eldest Growth(15)+Unprepared(10)-Homegrowth(10)=30/100)
"No...," Sunweaver whispers, horrified.
"What, what is it?" You ask, but you do not get an immediate answer.
You watch as the burst of energy slams directly into Bloodglade's chest. It bursts like a group of grasping vines that try to wrap themselves around the dryad from top to bottom. But you realize at about the same time as the Wildwood Branchwraith herself that it isn't taking. The growth ceases its expansion, and the tendrils that were trying to dig into her are failing to find any purchase. A terrible silence comes next, as the spirits of the Wildwood host appear to be plainly shocked, though it is hard to be absolutely certain given that only some of them have faces. And even then, those are not as readable as human ones.
"What was that?!"
"An attempt to exercise control," Sunweaver growls, looking more scared than you've ever seen her. "The eldest of the wood exercising their authority by sheer force of will and power."
Well shit. What looked like reinforcements for the Asrai might turn out to be the opposite if that's something that can be pulled off.
(Wrath of the Northern Glades: 88+The Audacity Of This Birch(10)+Enraged(5)=103/100)
Bloodglade does not even speak, does not scream. Instead, her arms shoot out at her sides before driving forward - lengthened claws first - directly into the older dryad's torso. Bloodglade is smaller, shorter, and more svelte. She is, despite what you've heard the Asrai call her, no doubt younger than these staggeringly ancient wood spirits. None of that stops her from plunging her claws through the front and out the back of the branchwraith's body and then with a stunning display of strength tears the dryad apart. In an instant, the older dryad comes apart in three or four pieces, wood shavings and brambles scattered to the sides as Bloodglade completes her execution. That amount of strength could have torn a fully armored knight apart with same terrifying ease. After which, Bloodglade turns to glare at the assembled fay once more, all the while more dryads and even some fey begin to appear and assemble in a loose ring. These fey are those you've seen before, but there is simply less of the palpable and ever-present malice that the creatures once imprisoned in the Wildwood possess. There is still certainly some, but it isn't angled at you at the moment.
Bloodglade howls with a heavy stamp of her wooden foot.
"This is my wood, not yours," Sunweaver translates.
Next to the two of you, Eldyra stirs.
"I...should we do something? Move to support...her?"
"Sometimes, Eldyra," you can't help but murmur, "You have to accept that you will not be the sole actor in events."
"What?"
Another earsplitting screech emanates forth from Bloodglade.
"Show yourself, Drycha," Sunweaver adds in quickly, "Followed by an insult or two."
"What kind?" You ask without thinking.
"Rotten-through broken branch left upon the ground unworthy of becoming fertilizer, soot-loving burnt sapling of a diseased tree," she clarifies.
"Is that...is that a good one, for them?"
Sunweaver looks at you with utmost seriousness.
"Every dryad is bound to one tree or another. A tree can be the home of many dryads, but a dryad is only ever has one. To insult it is to insult their home, their greatest treasure."
Oh.
Finally, the Branchwraith of Laurelorn gets an answer. It comes in a rush of displaced leaves scattering away on an unknown breeze, the rattling of bones in tree branches, the cracking of a tree struck by lightning finally collapsing. The moment the words hit you, it almost causes actual pain to your ears, the hatred in those hissed words almost clawing their way inside. They come from every direction without any discernible source, not even from within the amassed group of Wildwood fey. Even Bloodglade seems almost blown back by it, forced to cringe and almost crouch before the sheer force of those words, but she straightens almost immediately and snarls defiance. It sounds odd and wooden, but that is par for the course.
"Silence sapling," Sunweaver frowns as she translates, anger and worry flashing across her face. "Our cause is just, the flesh must die. Bloodglade expressed contempt, and further claims that Drycha is spitting on noble Adanhu's legacy, and is deliberately trying to break Durthu's Pact."
The crunching and cracking noise that comes next takes you a moment to recognize as laughter. Sunweaver's eyes widen a lot as she gasps, and she must visibly gather herself with a calming breath before she translates. Her grip on her staff has become white-knuckle tight.
"What...what we do here today," she swallows, "We do to honor Adanhu, who died needlessly so that Ariel would live. To end Durthu's Mistake. To avenge Coeddil." But then Sunweaver goes off script, almost staggering backwards. This time, she does not deny Eldyra helping her remain standing. "I just remembered. Bloodglade had left Laurelorn to confer with the elders of Loren. But if she has returned so, then she must have felt the effects of Coeddil's pain rippling throughout the Weave! It means all must have!"
"All who, exac-," is all you get out before the presence hits you like a sledgehammer to the skull.
It is hard to fully describe what happens next. You have felt otherworldly fury exerted upon the world itself before, from avatars of Goddesses and daemons alike. It is a unique pressure, one that crushes down on one's very mind and soul along with the body. But that which stabs an arm seamlessly from the largest tree intertwined with the Dawnstone Pinnacle is something both like and unlike those presences. There is a weight to it, one of staggering and immortal anger that runs as hot as the sun itself. As the gnarled treeman pulls itself free, it pulls an enormous blade with it. Unlike the filth-crusted thing that Coeddil had wielded, this one shines like brilliant glowing amber and carved with runes in it that cause your eyes to water just from looking at it. On that comparison alone, this new treeman would be far more pure and noble, but there is almost no such thing about it. Massive fissures split the wood, and half of its face has been shattered somehow, all of which are lit from within by an angry dull orange. A small cloud of buzzing creatures flit about its head, only fangs and claws visible within their individual blooms of light. Twisted branches covered in moss and tufts of growth almost give the appearance of spiked up hair. One hand that could, much like Coeddil's, squeeze you to death clenches open and closed while the other clutches the giant sword. Something akin to a girdle of leaves and vines wrap around what passes for the waist, and interwoven in that are more than a dozen skulls. Some are orc, others the horned craniums of beastmen, and still others are those of humans. More skulls are impaled and displayed on vertically sprouting branches along the shoulders. Some are far fresher than others.
The battlefield has gone silent.
"Durthu...,"
No one specific voice says it. Rather, it is dozens and dozens of suddenly dry elven throats that whisper the name in somewhat synchronized horror. As they identify the being whose anger seems to churn the very air as you look at it, you are reminded of a brief conversation from before. When Coeddil was considered to be a lesser threat compared to this very being due to his degraded mental faculties and eroding being from Nurglite corruption. Durthu does not speak, he merely surveys the battlefield. In the distance, you can see the stiffening of the two Averlorn treemen, and for a brief moment you swear you can see something of surprise in the ancient before you, but reading the body language of a walking tree is not the simplest of tasks. You can tell the moment his one-eyed gaze finds Coeddil, the corrupted treeman's arm and sword still outstretched towards the Pinnacle. The wood titan walks, ignoring everyone else entirely, and where he steps you watch as the elves do no less than scuttle out of his way. A sudden panic comes over you as a thought occurs, and even as you whirl about you see your Greatswords pulling Natasha further away into the shadows of the arches and pillars. The dryads of the Wildwood seem just as motionless as those of Laurelorn, every individual spirit and fey appears incapable of even moving under the mere gaze of one of the last true Ancients of Athel Loren.
Durthu stops before Coeddil, one foot crushing down on the thick layer of ice that remains on the ground. In the shocked silence, he reaches forward with his free hand and presses it against the outer layer of unmelting frost. The weakness, the fear, the sheer repulsion that the wintery coffin holds for all other fey and spirits you've seen? Completely missing in Durthu. It affects him not at all.
"Shit."
Then Durthu turns, unerringly, his gaze somehow right on Natasha who has struggled to her feet in a stubborn display of desperation. Possibly because she might need to be running in the next few seconds.
"Shit."
You are moving before you realize it, heart pounding in your chest the whole while. He takes a single step forward before you are able to get here, and to hell with it you've got Brain Wounder in your hands and held at the ready. Your mind feels like it is running faster than lightning. Considering the last time Coeddil barely paid attention to you and nearly killed you, you're probably only going to be able to get Natasha a few second's worth of delay. Possibly only just the one. In that time, each of your Greatswords might be able to provide one or two more, depending on how the space themselves out and the cleaving reach of Durthu's sword. Armor won't matter on a sword that size, especially if Durthu is even somewhat as strong as Coeddil was. Deflection would be insane prospect, more likely to tear your arms out of your shoulder sockets than do anything helpful.
The legs, then. It's the best you can manage, unless you try climbing him like you saw Mena attempting. The cloud of vicious spirits which hangs about him could tear you to shreds the minute you get too close to them, though. How long can you withstand being eaten alive by dozens of tiny mouths, how long will the Light of Summer keep you functioning as a distraction after that point? It probably cannot heal you if he outright bisects you down the middle, not even you would risk testing it that far. On the other hand, maybe it will keep one half alive long enough to keep him that much more distracted. After that, it's up to your Greatswords and Natasha herself to get to safety if that is at all possible. Can you rely on Eldyra to try and defend her? That would be knightly, wouldn't it? To defend your wife?
Durthu slows and comes to a stop in front of you, staring down at you and the rest of your Greatswords with an incomprehensible expression. What does he see when he looks down on you? Irritant humans to be eradicated, insects to brush aside, something to disregard entirely? Natasha is saying something, you think, from behind you. You can't hear it over the roar of the blood in your ears and the thundering drum of your heart trying to batter its way free of your chest. This is it. This is absolutely it. A stone portal awaits you.
Well. At least it wasn't within Ostland. You never wanted to die in battle while in Ostland, because that means you'd be dying and leaving behind a threat to your province.
"Durthu!"
Yhanna Sunweaver has been alive by the chronological reckoning of mortals for more than three thousand years, effects of the everlasting nature of the Weave upon her notwithstanding. She has watched with suspicion and paranoia as the dwarfs have fully receded back to their mountains, and has participated in dozens of fatal chastisements of human incursions when they attempted to grasp that which was not theirs. Hundreds, thousands of battle to endlessly repulse beastmen and greenskins and the slaves of Chaos as well, when she was a mere spellsinger. She has participated in battle against Cyanathair, and has witnessed the fury of Durthu when roused against humanity before. With all the natural ease that only wood spirits could utilize had he come through the Weave and passed through the World-Roots. Where the Queen, body and soul ravaged by Cyanathir's touch worse than she could have possibly imagined, had ripped and torn her way, Yhanna had not felt his passage almost at all until he had arrived. The weight of his anguish and anger was a palpable and crushing weight upon the Weave, upon her very soul. Even others of the Asrai could only perceive but a fraction that the spellsingers and spellweavers could. That she could. To witness Durthu was to see an eternity of pain writ large into the psyche, one that extended far beyond just his undeniably mighty body. Even the echoes of his pain and anger brought her eyes to watering and her flesh to crawling. A low keening note that only a handful of those present could only begin to hear skittered across her mind like an endless pane of cracking glass.
Durthu did not fully turn away from the foul creature of Winter clad in deceptive human flesh, but his terrible attention was no longer focused purely upon her or the idiotic human buffoon trying to stand in the Ancient's way. It would have been far easier if they had simply sacrificed the human woman to Durthu's inexhaustible fury, but of course the barbarian would not countenance such a thing. Worse, somehow the young Asur had joined him, and though she was not Asrai Yhanna would mourn her when she was struck down by Durthu's rage.
Few in all of existence could possibly turn the Ancient's attentions for long without being destroyed themselves. Yhanna would not count herself among such.
The Queen in the Woods, on the other hand, was one such being. Her ravaged state was visible even to those unblessed by magic, but to those who were it was even more grotesque. Whole portions of the Queen were missing, and were it not for her own formidable power and the blessings of Isha Herself upon Her Avatar she would have succumbed to the pain even after being healed by the Everqueen. Yet she called out to Durthu nonetheless, striding forward with a thin veneer of calm, spear held with head pointing towards the ground. Her wings beat only once as she moved, a cadre of the Sisters of the Thorn following behind her - those elite of that mysterious sisterhood known as the Handmaidens of the Thorn. Durthu watched her approach, the vicious spites that flitted about his head whispering grief and anger in equal measure, his eldritch voice emanating outwards in the grinding language of the forest itself. It was one that could only be understood and not spoken by those with throats of flesh without aid of magic or certain other mysteries.
"Ariel. You would stop me from exacting vengeance?"
Yhanna's entire body shook from the anger in that voice. Durthu had half turned back to his target before the Queen spoke again.
"Did you not feel it? The Elder is too deep within the grasp of the Fly Lord. A Proctor of Pestilence personally saw to his corruption!" Ariel called back. "There can be no cleansing for him."
Durthu growled, the earth and trees of Laurelorn shaking beneath his anger. The awful light of his soul grew brighter with it.
"Matters of the Elders are not for flesh to decide!" He roared, ire now ever so slowly grinding away from the humans and towards the Queen. "To cull or otherwise!"
One massive leg slammed down into the stone of the Pinnacle's finely paved promenade in a stomp that shattered ancient stone.
"Yes...yes! The wood needs no approval! The flesh holds no authority to punish it!" Drycha's eager hiss came from the rustling leaves around them.
At that, however, Durthu's one eye narrowed ever so slightly.
"Drycha..."
"You...you must aid us, great Oakheart! They have assaulted Coeddil, an Elder!" The sheer offended outrage in Drycha's voice caused more than a few branches of deadwood along the ground to snap apart into splinters.
"Durthu!" A somewhat tinnier voice spoke up as Craobhin entered the conversation, roots digging into the earth and rolling breezes carrying her indignant words. "You must not listen to her! She has ravaged my glades, my glens! She has entrapped my children, and even attempted to plant invading roots within me!"
By all rights, Craobhin was barely a true branchwraith compared to the ancient creatures formerly entrapped within the Wildwood, compared to a true Elder of the forest. But it was undeniable that Laurelorn was hers, for she was the one who had carried the Acorn of Ages that had given birth to Laurelocraobh, along with Guldul to plant new roots and grow anew. Known as Bloodglade and Craobhin both, she was right in her fury in Yhanna's opinion. More importantly, as a dryad, Durthu did not dismiss her out of hand as he would to almost any elf that dared ask of him anything. Indeed, the Elder was more experienced than any living being in matters of dispute between the groves and those who lived within them. The glower of Durthu turned, then, towards the assembled masses of the Wildwood.
"Is this true, Drycha?" He asked in what was closer to a bellow but was in fact but a whisper compared to the volumes the Elder could reach.
"Lies! Lies of a flesh-addled sapling!"
"It is you who is the liar! You who brought them here! Did you think I would not feel it as Guldul fell to daemons!?" Craobhin shrieked.
Ariel rose, then, wings beating twice as she lifted herself above the ground, exercising significant effort to manage even that much. She gestured with her appropriated spear.
"Look upon the rotten fruit of mercy, the escapees of the Wildwood! You can feel their corruption, that which Drycha has allowed within! She has made pact with Nurgle!"
It was an accusation that not even Durthu, so tragically marred by his own fury as he was, could ignore. Too many of the true Elders had died, where once there had been hundreds, by the end of the coming of Chaos there were but three. A grudge of grave magnitude, of which there could be but few. A few steps took him back to Coeddil, where he pressed a hand against the ice without even acknowledging the comparatively small amount of pain it cost him to do so. With a crunch, small but impossibly powerful tendrils covered in thorns sprouted from Durthu's fingers and dug into the ice, deeper, and deeper still before Durthu then quickly tore his arm backwards. In return came a tiny spurt of Nurglish sputum and rotten sap, followed by a thin continual dribble out of the holes. Even under all of that horrid ice, and the attentions of a being that was utterly foreign even to Sunweaver - however brief it had been - the virulence of Nurgle persisted. Even if Coeddil had fallen, the strength of the Plague God still bloomed within the husk, kept restrained by that which had entombed him. Without another word, Durthu stepped away, then through the scattered defenders of the Dawnstone Pinnacle and next to Craobhin. There he loomed.
"Drycha!" His bellow was anguished. "Tell me you did not do this, did not form compact with daemons!"
"It is a lie, Elder, a lie! Only flesh would bargain with Them!"
But Durthu would not be denied. With a sweep of his sword, the creatures of the Wildwood quailed before him, scattering in fear. There, finally, was Drycha revealed, hidden with low cunning and dangerous skill amongst the ranks of the dryads. Isolated like this, under the direction attentions of Durthu, she could not hide. Nor could she hide the corrupted dryads about her, the literally infernal rotting of the last of the Wildwood treemen, the plagued appearance of numerous fey within the center of the formation. She gazed up at the last living and uncorrupted Elder, entire body almost heaving with malice as she glared at the elves who had defied her so.
(The Last Elder Gazes Through The Weave: All Of The Secrets Of Root And Branch And Soil Are Known To Him)
The words of the Eldar were a whisper of crushing vines.
"So it is true. Coeddil poisoned. Guldul slain by daemons. Daemons you helped gain access to young Laurelorn."
Drycha trembled once, forced to take a step back before his mournful growl. Her head whipped left and right, a frantic desperation to her movements that Yhanna had never witnessed before.
"No, no! It is the flesh's fault! These accursed elves! They brought the attentions of Chaos upon themselves, it is they who have brought ruin to Laurelorn. To Loren! To Coeddil! Your fellow Elder!"
Slowly, Durthu shook his head.
"No. A terrible corruption was brought into the Weave, and you have done nothing to stop it. You have brought ruin to Coeddil, or failed to stop it. Either has wrought the same result."
With a terrifyingly surety, he stepped forward towards Drycha to which she recoiled.
"No, no! They are liars! They are ruination! If not for them-,"
"If not for you, Laurelorn would not be strewn in shattered trunks and torn roots."
(The Briarmaven of Madness: 73+Desperate Madness(10)+Okkam's Mindrazor(20)=103/100)
Yhanna could not even comprehend what she was seeing before it was over.
Drycha had reared back as Durthu grasped for her.
Cold slithering magic wrapped in malice mixed with Ulgu that swept about her arms.
Then with one fearful strike, it was done. Drycha struck with a claw that impacted along Durthu's face in a violent flash of magic and flying splinters.
Yhanna's mind, at first, flatly refused to believe that even Drycha would strike Durthu. Yet she could not help but wonder. Was it her ageless malice that had finally been driven too far? The knowledge of what Coeddil had been reduced to? The rejection of Durthu to her entreaties? The spilling of Cyanathair's taint upon Addaivoch?
She would never know.
For the moment Durthu staggered backwards, bellowing in abject confusion? The corrupted captives of the Wildwood had surged forward. The last iota of sanity that they had possessed disappeared in that one instant, swarming against not just Durthu but the dryads of Laurelorn and the elves alongside them. Drycha herself disappeared once more, form flickering from sight amidst the charging spirits.
Ariel shouts something in one of the elvish dialects, the one word you actually somewhat understand being 'Asrai' just as the tide smashes into the whole of the Pinnacle like a living ocean of wood and spirit-stuff. There is no rhyme or reason, no organization to any of it, just a wild feral rush of creatures large and small. You think you spy Ariel laughing madly as she leaps right into the enemy masses with her spear stabbing and whirling all about her. Many of them climb atop those engaging with the Eternal Guard shieldwall to try and leap behind, others keep extending the flanks further and further to try and get around the elves. Around the left flank entirely, some of them. Which means that they can step onto the Pinnacle without being stopped. Which means they are a direct threat to your wife and the Greatswords standing around her, their attempt to get further away from Durthu putting them directly into harms way. A fourth of the way through the thought you are sprinting forwards, Brain Wounder flashing in the otherworldly light of the Pinnacle and the magic that it both gathers to itself and then thrusts high into the air. The first to make it past are a group of diseased looking dryads, practically constantly vomiting some sort of black and green liquid covered in foul smelling algae out of their gaping mouths. Eldyra is right alongside you, knowing just as well as you do that with the rest of the Asrai engaged you won't be receiving much help at all here.
(Standing Ground: 22+Frederick Martial(19)+Eldyra Martial(20)=61/100)
(The Battle Elsewhere: 65/100)
(The Roar of Battle: 43/100)
Brain Wounder and Death Thorn cut them apart. Even a razor sharp woodsman's axe might struggle to cut its way through the magically hardened hide of a dryad, but before the runework of Alaric the Mad you can cut your way through in a single smooth motion. You have no idea as to the specific power and ability of the ones who crafted Eldyra's sword, but they are priests of a God of Forging and it is one of the finest and deadliest weapons you've ever seen. Just like Brain Wounder, her sword cleaves and stabs its way through a quartet of dryads in the time it takes you to kill two. Eldyra is simply incredible speed and grace, whereas you are in comparison holding an advantage in strength alone. None of the Dryads even get close to the cordon of Greatswords.
Then the second wave comes in just behind them, with fey with enormous stone hammers with them.
Then the third arrives with a pair of tree-kin currently leaking yellowish green fluids from an abundance of sickly looking mushrooms that have grown out of their faces.
Wooden claws more than a foot each in length slam down into your shield with such force you couldn't even begin to stop it, carving deeply into the finely forged elven metal. An upwards swipe of Brain Wounder lops the arm attached to those claws and cuts deeply into the dryad's chest. The angry wood spirit stumbles backwards but is beheaded by Eldyra before it can regain its footing. At the same time, you slam the edge of the shield into another dryad that attempted to leap on the Asur from behind, stomping your foot on top of its own to pin it just long enough to cut into the shoulder and out the pelvis between the legs. What the elf cannot dodge, you block, what you cannot respond in time to, she intercepts or narrowly deflects. But it is not a permanent state of things, as you are continually being forced back by sheer momentum and numbers. Step by step, you are being forced into what is essentially one of the hardest fighting retreats you've ever had. Behind you, the Greatswords ready themselves because despite your best efforts they'll be fighting soon enough.
The fighting is just as intense everywhere else. Durthu disappears under a dog piling of the last of the Wildwood's largest spirits. Treemen bearing the unmistakable mark of Nurgle, a pair of giants made of stone and water, and ogre-sized wolves made of light. The Eternal Guard grit their teeth and stab out with their spears, with the Sisters of the Thorn shredding every foe that dares try and test them. A few bursts of purifying green light are all that can be seen of Ariel, so ensconced as she is by the enemy. As for Drycha or Bloodglade, both of them disappeared early on in the fighting. Dryads of both forests are now engaged in deadly combat with one another, a literal case of nature battling itself in a way you've never seen before. Even where you are, you can hear the howling of Mena's cavalry as they crash into the rear of the Wildwood fey.
(Defensive Fighting: 48+19+20+Greatswords(5)=92/100)
(The Battle Elsewhere: 52+Durthu's Fury(25)=77/100)
(Anarchic Procession: 31/100)
Suddenly, the pressure eases, and it is not hard to see why. You had been forced back, back, and back again. Any further and you'd be pushed into the inner arches of the Pinnacle, and more importantly the enemy would quite literally be at your wife's throat. She's managed to stand again, but the sheer level of exhaustion she's suffering means she's practically defenseless. But because you have been forced back too close to her, all ten of the Greatswords step in to aid in the defense. By simple virtue of ten new swords that can cut and stab their way through the enemy, you manage to halt the crushing momentum. A growing layer of sap begins to coat your front as you cut your way through the dryads, but then there are stranger versions of vitae as well. One fey bleeds what sounds, looks, and feels like steam against your skin, thoroughly reddening it and leaving a lasting stinging pain. Another, some sort of bulbous creature seemingly made entirely out of pumpkins and thorny vines is punctured but once, causing it to release a high pressure blast of wind before deflating entirely. The sheer variety of creatures you've faced makes it easy to see why for many fey and daemons are the same mysterious and awful beings, nightmares told to children and imagined by worried travelers along the road. But this time, the momentum turns in your favor, buoyed as you are by the presence of some of the most elite warriors in Ostland. Step by sap-covered step, you push them back. The zweihander is quite reasonably famous for, if utilized skillfully by a man of sufficient strength, its ability to cleave a fully armored knight in twain in a single blow. Compared to even the mystical and magically enhanced hides of the dryads, there is little comparative contest. Some of them manage to ward off blows, a solid strike of a zweihander somehow leaving not a single mark upon the wood, but the benefit of fighting in a unit is that another zweihander - or Brain Wounder or Death Thorn - intervenes and deals a successful blow instead.
An earthshaking bellow, followed by an awful grinding noise of shattering stone and wood, announces Durthu simply throwing off the five colossi that had piled on top of him. It is a display of strength that can be not just seen out of the corner of the eye but felt just about everywhere. Beings that large are simply not supposed to be thrown into the air like that! It seems like some sort of violation of the laws of reality, but the strength of the Elder Treeman is simply beyond such petty considerations, apparently. He even manage to cut one of the corrupted treemen in half as it falls to the earth in a single upward swing of his massive blade. The rest crash around him, and he begins laying about with his blade before they can even begin to recover. They fight back as best as they can, but it is quite obvious that their own attacks on Durthu are largely ineffectual. At least compared to that strange explosion of shadowy magic which heavily damaged his face. Ariel appears, once more mounted this time, stabbing out around her into the enemy, followed by the Sisters of the Thorn. Blasts of light come from their staves, which also work well as spears for any who get too close to them. Despite the surprise and sheer ferocity of the Wildwood, the Asrai are winning. With grim expressions and consummate skill, they tirelessly kill again and again. Those that fall are pulled back by their fellows, where Sunweaver and the Highweaver can tend to them. A living and moving throne of plant life has appeared, raising Sunweaver above the ground, while the Highweaver still walks on bare feet. In the distance, Mena von Kessel continues to cycle her charges, slamming her cavalry into the rear and then pulling them right back out to a safe distance before turning around and doing it all over again. In truth, she is getting closer and closer to you and the elves every time, as there are quite literally less and less of the Wildwood escapees every time. The dryads of Laurelorn are fully incensed, now, having returned from their conference or at least are now awakened with the presence of Bloodglade, and with them surrounding the enemy in a snarling ring of living wood there is little chance for them to escape. This is no longer, you think, a mission for revenge on Ariel and the Asrai. It might have started as that, but circumstances have turned against them. It might have been a fight for survival, but then they were surrounded and are being torn apart from behind. Now? Now they are fighting to fight, to kill as much as they can before the inevitable happens. They are without fear, and ignore injuries as best they can unless they are actually slain.
Well, fine then. One way or another, the spiteful monsters that escaped the Wildwood are dying today. The only thing left to do is kill as many of them as possible to crush their last stand as best you can.
"Come on and die!" You roar, ducking out of the way of another tree-kin's overhead smash, this time cracking the lower third of the shield to pieces as you do so. "I'll use you as fuel for a fucking distillery's fires!"
"Asuryan!" Eldyra invokes with a savage slash of her sword to cut the arms off of a dryad.
"For Ostland, and the Steel Bull!" Cries Volgar, his zweihander arcing overhead and glinting in the sunlight.
(Extended Execution: 74+19+20+5=118/100)
(The Battle Elsewhere: 24+Durthu's Fury(25)=49/100)
(Spiteful Shadows: 7/100)
Though you have really only just met one another, Eldyra manages to synchronize with you with incredible speed. Not just you, but the Greatswords as well. A seemingly endless wave of enemies spill around the sides of the faltering elven shield wall, all of them coming right at you. Or, perhaps, a fearful thought comes to you, at Natasha. An object of fear and hate to them all. All three elements together are the unstoppable force and immovable object in a single small group. You wish you could peel off some of the Greatswords to go back an help move Natasha elsewhere, perhaps further into the Pinnacle, but you are only able to achieve the carnage you are right now because each of them is in the fight. Without them, pressure alone was forcing you backwards, even with Eldyra here. It is a minor numbers game. Worse, however, is the fact that despite expectations the elves are faltering. They are retreating in good order, one rank back covering the other, but they are being pushed back nonetheless into the greater Pinnacle rather than just on its perimeter. Within a moment there won't be a living elf not standing on the stone flooring of the Pinnacle rather than the churned up earth just outside of it. Durthu doesn't seem to care about any of it, instead just kicking out with his legs, whipping long extended vines that slice through bodies as if it were steel, and wielding his giant weapon to terribly effective extent. But only in his immediate area, without any coordination with the elves themselves. Mena has, by now, been forced to back off somewhat, because for all her battle lust the young woman is not an idiot enough to get within striking range of the treeman lest he turn his fury upon them as well. You can see only little otherwise, your defense is achieved largely by focusing so stringently upon the enemy and cutting them apart. Your personal tally of dryads killed grows higher with every second, and the same for various other fey. The same goes for the others. Instead of slowing the enemy, this only seems to bolster them further!
When a hulking branchwraith appears, it is with shadowy extrusions of its claws, things that appear close to whatever it was that Drycha did that allowed her to strike Durthu so strongly. With a single slash of her claws, your shield practically disintegrates, but you are able to dodge backwards before the tips can actually reach through an tear apart your flesh. As she tries to attack with the other hand, Eldyra is there and has impaled the dryad through the side, sword piercing through and out the other side. Her armored shoulder checks it off balance enough for you to reverse your grip on Brain Wounder one-handed and drag the edge up through the thigh and diagonally upwards before twisting it outward. The light in the branchwraith's eyes disappears as it is killed, and you rear back and punch with your left hand directly into the wooden face of another dryad that had prepared to strike Eldyra while her flank was exposed. Wood crunches at the same time as your knuckles, but it is the dryad that recoils for just long enough for it to be hacked apart by the Greatswords. The stinging in your hand is quickly forgotten as you get back to the fighting, but then you hear something that forces you into a sudden halt, the slack immediately picked up by the others.
"Frederi-mmph!"
The battle fury, the knowledge of impending victory, all of it slips away as horror fills your veins. Your head snaps around, but it feels like you are moving in slow motion all at the same time.
Natasha's arm is outstretched towards you, but the other is pinned at her side, held there in place by a chipped and pitted wooden arm. Her mouth is covered by the palm of a hand with elongated wooden claws, all of her being crushed within the embrace of the being which has her in its clutches. Halfway covered in shadows that are even now bleeding away, Drycha appears, her already inhuman face twisted in abject fury, maw wide and slavering with bubbling sap-spit that sizzles as it hits the ground. Her other hand is large enough to wrap around the lower half of Natasha's face while resting against the side of her throat. The absolute exhaustion she has been left in after channeling with the Pinnacle has left her in such a state that she cannot even visibly struggle against the branchwraith's grip. Burning yellowish green light burns in Drycha's face, the hollows of her eyes where the lights gleam from looking somehow like scorched black bark.
"Natasha!"
The single movement forward you make lasts stops right after it begins as Drycha squeezes her even tighter, drawing out a muffled pain. Your grip grows so tight on Brain Wounder that something in your hand pops. Your world tunnels onto the sight before you, the rest of the world simply blurring out of existence. There are no drums. Only a deep seated chasm of screaming in your mind.
"Let her go!"
But Drycha does not respond. Not to you, at least.
The voice could not be mistaken. From within her shifting throne of vines, Yhanna Sunweaver turned about from her latest patient, the gashes on his arm already sealing up. There, to Yhanna's horror, stood Drycha with the thing known as Natasha von Hohenzollern in its hands. How had she gotten within the Pinnacle's perimeter!? Yet even as she thought the question, she realized the answer. The Asrai had long propagated and carefully maintained growth of plant life within the Pinnacle, nurturing nature itself to grow in aesthetic symbiosis. That, and the sheer volume of slain dryads carpeting the ground could have easily disguised Drycha's movements in one of the moments where the shield walls had been temporarily overwhelmed. Drycha's scream caught the attention of all, but the majority of them simply could not respond or even acknowledge it. The only reason Yhanna could was because she was not directly on the front lines. Ariel, too, could as she rode atop her mount, glaring angrily at the branchwraith who had helped set this all in motion. But the only one that Drycha seemed to have eyes for was the Elder, who paused in his battle fury to turn. The fey around him had fled, leaving him an island of peace amidst insane violence, retreating from him in any direction that he could. As for the humans and the Asur, Yhanna found herself profoundly disturbed at the expression on Frederick von Hohenzollern's face.
It was an anguished thing of twisted fear and anger messily meshed together, his body having hunched forward more like a beast's than even a barbaric human.
"Look at yourself, look at what you are doing!" Drycha howled in mad grief. "You...you would let this flesh," she jostled the human in her arms, causing an outraged growl to spill from Frederick's lips. "Live?! She is the monstrous abomination who brought winter unending to Coeddil, and you simply walked away from her!"
Durthu only looked at Drycha, which seemed to infuriate the already maddened dryad further.
Even from where she stood, Yhanna could see the terrible wound left upon his face as golden amber bled down to the earth.
How unhinged had Drycha become that she could forget or ignore that it was she that had struck him so?
"You are killing us, when the flesh are slaughtering our brothers and sisters of the wood!" Drycha shrieked, causing her captive to flinch in pain from the volume.
In her distracted state, the humans took a single step forward, but were forced to halt when Drycha's head turned to them and she screamed at them. Bones clicked and creaked as her crushing grip on the human woman's head tightened. Frederick roared in impotent anger, but Drycha only had eyes for Durthu. The rest of the Wildwood fey continued to fight the last fight of their lives, selling themselves dearly upon the elves.
"But you can change this! Stop them!," Drycha trilled in something that was likely meant to be coy but was instead a sibilant yowl. "Coeddil the Cunning, he knew! Surely you can see his truth! You are the last Elder, now! Their king is mad, their Queen is weakened! We can still-,"
Durthu held up his hand, and at that, Drycha became silent.
"You have brought ruin, daughter of the boughs. You have allied with daemons. You were Coeddil's greatest handmaiden," Durthu gestured towards his fellow Elder. "Look at him now." His voice was filled with such painful mourning that great numbers of the elves found themselves crying without quite knowing why. Then he looked back on Drycha, and he groaned with a grave unhappiness. "When there is too much rot within the growth, what is infected must be culled. All of The Forest know this cruel truth. There is no blame to be found in the Asrai, only in myself."
Drycha's entire body seemed to tremble.
"Great one...please..."
But Durthu's voice was firm in its anger.
"Your actions have become a danger to The Forest. You have become a danger to The Forest."
The branchwraith stilled.
"No," she said simply. "You...you are wrong. Coeddil was right, you...you are blind to-to their treachery." The words stuttered their way out of her maw, her body beginning to twitch. "You won't even...you won't even avenge him!"
Frederick was growling something, but Yhanna for some reason could not understand him.
"But I will," Drycha ranted with a fractured serenity. "I will honor him!"
It does not matter how hard you push yourself, your heart thumping, legs and arms pumping, but she is simply too far, and those fucking fingers just too close. Even Eldyra, for all her damned vaunted elven speed and dexterity cannot make it there in time to stop it. For all your strength, you cannot cross that distance in the time it takes for the deed to be done.
All it took was a single smooth swipe of claws. The razor sharp fingertips almost dancing their across the throat.
Natasha's eyes are wide, and locked on yours. But she cannot speak. Her mouth opens, but she cannot make a sound.
Crimson pours forth, painting her in her own blood.
The dryad throws her to the ground so roughly you hear the snap of bone as instinct flickers, one hand thrown outwards while the other clamps down futilely, instantly dyeing the arm up to the elbow red. Feet slam against the earth as the distance between you disappears, your senses deadened to everything else. Nothing else matters, right now, here in this instant. You've scooped her up into your arms, and your chest is splashed with too much blood!
Against your chest, the amulet bounces uselessly, the emerald light locked within it bright but utterly useless to you in this most vital of times. A terrible thought grabs hold of you, to throw it, to smash it, to punish it for daring to even exist! What is the point of it if it cannot do this one simple thing!
The sounds of fighting continuing all around you is muffled by the sheer volume of your heart pounding in your ears, what feels like your very life draining away leaving you colder than the depths of a Kislevite blizzard.
Natasha's face is paler than you've ever seen it, all of her going limp. Frantically, you try to put pressure on the wound, trying with hands thick with callouses and covered in scars to preserve life for once rather than take it. But it isn't working, it isn't going to work. Her mouth opens again, and you see her trying to mouth something, anything, but you just can't understand it. Your mind feels like it has been dumped into the waste channels of the Smokelands, clogged into sludge-like slowness. Her wrist was broken when she was thrown forwards, but even still with it purpling she tries to cup the side of your face. But she is too weak to do even that much, and you find yourself clutching at that hand and holding it to your face for her. Blubbering, you try to say anything, but nothing worthwhile comes. Barely verbalized but stringent, you scream for help again and again. Even your vision of her is growing hot and cloudy, the tears making it hard to see. Then, finally, she can simply struggle no more. You are screaming, screaming, screaming again as she falls against you, eyes still wide open but going glassy as she looks towards the canopy.
When something approaches, you nearly slam your shoulder into them, raising...raising...
When did you drop Brain Wounder?
"Move," is all that Sunweaver says to you as she kneels, staff in one hand with the other covered in healing light. Loops of vines connect her back to the shifting mass of plants which rests just behind her.
You snarl ferally, but when she pushes against you with her dainty little hand, somehow she manages to move you. Weaker than a newborn babe, you collapse backwards as she examines Natasha.
(Regrowth: 50+Throne of Vines(10)+Dawnstone Pinnacle(20)=80/100)
It feels like your heart only just now remembers how to beat properly again as Natasha rapidly blinks, gasping in a wet breath as her throat seals itself. Coughing, she turns to her side and almost vomits out a thick splash of blood that had collected there from the bleeding. Her broken wrist straightens with a series of unnatural pops, the bruises disappearing.
But most importantly, she is alive.
"Natasha," you sob out, crashing to your knees by her side and reaching out again.
"Frederick," she chokes out, reaching right back, your hands coming pressing together at the palms.
You don't say anymore and instead simply indulge in the sight of her beautiful living face. As you do so, the world slowly comes back into focus around you. A loud boom announces Durthu being knocked off of his feet and grappled with by the last two corrupted treemen of the Wildwood on the ground, his sword actually pulled out of his grip and thrown to the side. The elven lines have buckled in numerous places as the dryads are driven into their last fatal frenzy, led principally by the branchwraiths with their various powerful magics that are no doubt enhanced by the Pinnacle. The Sisters of the Thorn have been mauled, as the greatest concentration of the Wildwood's leadership has contested Ariel herself, and there are more than a few Sisters of the Thorn that are lying still against the ground where they have fallen. The Queen in the Woods fights, and fights mightily, even as ravaged and exhausted as she is. But you find it hard to care about any of that. Any of it at all. Instead your gaze shifts left and right over the battlefield, tracking from the direction that Ariel is slowly but surely making her way in, to her likely target.
Drycha has escaped the perimeter of Laurelorn spirits leaving a trail of dead behind her, and is fleeing towards the treeline.
A loud screech announces the arrival of Bloodglade, and then you can scarcely see much more as the two branchwraiths engage in a confused tangle of violence against one another. Within seconds you can tell that the younger branchwraith cannot win, she is simply not as strong or tough or as insane as Drycha is, for all of Bloodglade's outrage.
"Taira!" Sunweaver's shout distracts you before the High Spellweaver of Laurelorn stands, letting Natasha slump slightly in your arms. "See to her."
"But-," the Highweaver's expression is one of pure discontent filtered with disgust, and you feel a searing rage fill you.
A mixture of elven passes out of Sunweaver's mouth and Higheaver Taira's mouth snaps closed, but aside from another ugly look she approaches with only a single shudder as she kneels next to Natasha and begins summoning forth her own magics once more. A cleared throat from behind makes you turn to see Ubel carefully holding Brain Wounder in one hand. The rest of the Greatswords look a large fraction of incensed as you are.
"Natasha, I'm so sorry," you whisper as you hold her close. "I should have been faster, I'm so sorry."
It doesn't matter that you can't cross that many feet that quickly, that no human could without the aid of magic. What matters is that you couldn't save her from that, and it was by luck that the elves deigned to save her.
"Frederick," she says, voice a quiet rasp that forces you to lean in even closer.
"I'm so sorry, damn it, I-,"
"Frederick!" Her hands tighten infinitesimally against your own.
"Yes?"
She struggles to glare at you, and the heat that should be in her eyes is less than a candle's worth.
"Kill that wooden bitch."
Then she is gone, head falling to the side, and for a moment you feel like you have died with her until you feel her still breathing. Slowly, with as much gentleness as you can manage, you let her down onto the ground. She was barely able to be conscious before, and her very soul, let alone her mind and body, will likely take some time to heal from everything she has gone through thus far. It is all too much, too much for her body no matter what she might have wished. A deep inhale fills your chest with the cool air of the forest, heated by dying breaths and war cries but chilled by the ice summoned within it all the same. Slowly, you find yourself standing upright, chest now covered in your own wife's blood along with the sap and life fluids of wood spirits and fey alike. Without a word you open your hand and have Brain Wounder placed into it, your hand clenching tightly around the hilt. Exhaling the held breath you turn until you are facing the rest of your Greatswords, and Eldyra as well who is both relieved and frustrated, at least going by her expression. Sunweaver watches you warily, leaning slightly on her staff. Around you, the battlefield as shifted once more. Ariel has taken to the air, at least briefly, in short but powerful hops she is pushing herself into the air and advancing on Drycha quickly, but has left her handmaidens behind and is continually getting bogged down in the fighting. Durthu is still dealing with the rest last of the larger fey, now finding corrupted tree-kin and other large but not fully giant beasts at his legs, his sword still just out of reach. Bloodglade is losing, a yowl escaping her as one of her wooden arms is cut off and thrown to the side, yet she still fights on. The elven lines have buckled, badly, and Ariel is no longer leading them properly, though some of her Sisters of the Thorn are trying to rally the Asrai. Not that they need to, truly, but it will help lower Asrai casualties in the long run.
At the end of the day, the Battle of the Dawnstone Pinnacle, of Laurelorn, can only end in one way. It is now just a measure of how complete or incomplete it might be at its full conclusion.
"Count Hohenzollern?"
Your breathing is remarkably slow and measured, all things considered. But you have been pushed, in this moment, just beyond the frantic heaving of before. The anger in you has reached a level of such scorching heat that it doesn't even burn anymore, leaving you in something distantly approaching numb but not quite, a level that is imperceptible not because of its weakness but because you no sense you have is equipped of properly registering it anymore.
"Count?
Blinking once, you look at your Greatswords.
"What are your orders?"
You cannot countenance leaving her unprotected. The elven lines are buckled, but not fully broken.
"Natasha goes to the ice, it's the furthest point from the fighting and the fey revile it."
You ignore the pained expression on the Asrai's face. She will follow her superior's orders or else.
"You will stay with her, and protect her on all sides."
All of them open their mouths, and with a look they shut them again.
"Go. Now."
You deeply inhale and exhale once more, eyes unblinking at the vista of combat before you.
Trait Regained: Engine of Rage - There are higher peaks of fury meant to be beyond mortal ken...but you can see them from here. (+3 Martial, -1 Diplomacy, -1 Intrigue)
"Okay."
Choose (1):
6 Hour Moratorium.
[] Durthu - Impossibly ancient, unfathomably powerful. Has decided upon Drycha as a threat. If he were fully free to act, he would crush her easily. But first one would have to get to him, and then aid him.
[] Ariel - Wild, unrestrained, focused on killing the last ringleader of the Wildwood escapees. Bogged down by chaff, but powerful nonetheless. Her sheer mobility makes it difficult to aid her, but would prove valuable in chasing down your target.
[] Bloodglade - The younger dryad is losing, but she fights on to try and defeat the one that invaded her forests. The immediate path, the most dangerous path. But, if Bloodglade falls, then Drycha escapes.
Lovely Laurelorn 7
"You'll ride with us, Von Kessel. We go to defend the Pinnacle. You think your wolves can handle it?"
Her response is to blink and then begin to laugh. It starts low and begins to grow in volume before she abruptly pulls her head back, in fact her entire body save for her feet wrenches backwards towards the ground itself, her knees bending at just past sixty degrees. Her arms splay wide out to the sides, ax still firmly held in her hand. A deep inhale comes next. Even beneath the armor you can see how her entire body seems to vibrate and shake from head to toe. Then she lets loose a loud howl towards the sky that just for a startling second sounds closer to that of an actual wolf, as in it actually turns inhuman, before straightening and grinning at you with very toothsome grin. She quite literally bounces on her feet and then turns sharply at the waist.
"GET ME SOME HORSES YOU SHITRAGS, ON THE DOUBLE! THE FUCKING STEEL BULL NEEDS A MOUNT!"
She is experienced at fighting, but her tact reminds you of a young irritated blacksmith who once lived in Jegow. On the other hand, she's right. This time, you do not appear to be getting rides upon the Steeds of Isha, and the Sisters of the Thorn are not offering this time around. And soon enough a number of blood-stained and wild-eyed looking horses are brought over to you, conspicuously absent of riders. The light barding has rents and tears, but the saddles, stirrups, and reins are unharmed. Mena herself has already mounted up again, flakes of soot coming off of her the whole while. She swishes her axe through the air but once. To your surprise, you see Sunweaver once more, this time on another horse from the wolves, but she looks remarkably recovered from her state last time you saw her. She favors you with a brief look and nod but the majority of her attention is understandably on the fighting going on nearby. Ariel has leapt atop the enormous white stag, though something tells you this only angers her further somehow. She then whips her spear above her head and points it in the direction of the Pinnacle.
"We go! Now!" The Queen in the Woods shouts.
With that royal if abrupt declaration, you are all off. The Steeds of Isha quickly take the lead ahead of the rest of the wolves and yourselves, but overall the entire formation moves quite quickly. The fey fighting nearby do not seem to react overly much either, in fact they seem far more focused upon fighting those Asrai just outside of Laurelocraobh than doing anything else. Without their central target in Naraiel, and Kyrian taken off the field, the fey seem focused purely on exercising their own endless malicious desires. There are no deals being made, no tricks or illusions, no songs or disguises, only their own drive to cause pain and spill blood driven to the highest extremes. It is impossible to say if it is from their long imprisonment in the Wildwood, something that has lurked within them even longer before said imprisonment, or they are simply being driven to new sadistic heights by the corruption of Nurgle and hatred of Drycha and Coeddil. Or possibly some combination of all three and more. But as it is, they do not seem to desire to try and throw themselves against the Blue Wolves of Nordland bringing up the rear more than a few cursory lobs of fire or gaseous orbs. None of which manage to actually hit your group as it travels by. The wolves of Nordland respond in a haphazard array of firing bows, throwing axes, and a few javelins.
Then you are past all of that. The distance between you and the Pinnacle is eaten up faster and faster, and soon enough you find yourself dismounting the horse provided to you to once more set your feet on ancient stone. The Asrai defenders still present cheer wildly at the sight of their Queen, but those same cheers become strangled and grow quiet at the sight of her. Ariel does not seem to either notice or care as she leaps with otherworldly grace from her mount to land barefooted amongst them. Silently, she sweeps them aside with nothing more than her presence to gaze up at Coeddil where he remains, still locked in the middle of recoiling in pain, expression literally clouded by frozen over pus and rotten sap being captured in the absolute explosion of ice that overtook the whole of his frame. The ancient treeman is not in a perfect rectangular block of ice, but there is no single stretch of his body that does not have less than a full foot length of glistening ice covering it. Before, you had thought of its shape as a sort of iron maiden of ice, and that impression hasn't changed. Certain portions of it are somewhat translucent, enough to see over half of Coeddil's outline, but the rest is utterly obscured by the darkest of glacial ice. The frost on the ground which spreads outwards at the base more than fifteen feet outwards in an uneven oval, a large twenty foot cone anchored at the treeman shooting out away from the Pinnacle.
The Queen in the Woods pauses a few feet before her bare feet touch ice, her expression which has been so tightly fierce stilling slightly as she gazes up at what your wife has wrought. Slowly, the rest of the Sisters of the Thorn who had come with her form up in a loose defensive formation but for all their effort they cannot help but look at Coeddil. All of them have a look of revulsion on their faces, with the barest hint of genuine fear. When Natasha appears in one of the archways, still leaning on it for support as she limps forward towards you, it is impossible to miss how many of the newly arrived Sisters of the Thorn swivel on their feet to keep her in front of them. But, quite frankly, you don't care. Instead you rush forward, gathering her up in your arms as she wraps her own around you, a searing hot kiss connecting you as you pick her up slightly and whirl her about before putting her down again. Frankly, you don't care that all of the elves are staring at you, and you ignore the wolf whistle from Mena. The two of you just, for this brief moment, exist alone in the universe. She is alive, unharmed despite you leaving her. You have returned, as you told her you would, and quickly to boot.
"Count Hohenzollern!"
A familiar voice breaks your reverie, and you turn without letting go of Natasha to see the few Greatswords you had been forced to leave behind.
"Volgar!" You shout happily, clapping a hand on the man's shoulder.
Though he is still bereft of the armor you had been forced to cut him out of, the man looks like he is as hale as he was at the beginning of the fighting. He still retains his greaves, as do Oskar Lohr and Ubel Manndrof, but their breastplates and gauntlets had been forced to be removed lest they die in them. They had been so terribly hurt by the fighting against Coeddil that none of them had been able to stand, or even sit really, but now they all approach with grim humor to rejoin the small number of their fellows which surround you even now.
"Glad to see you alive, my Count."
"The same to you," you nod at him. "I presume...,"
"The elf, yes sir," he jerks his chin in the direction of where the Highweaver stands.
The elf mage in question has inched close enough to murmur to the Queen in the Woods, though at this distance and with them facing away from you it is impossible to know just what they are talking about.
"I...also wanted to give you my thanks," he continues, ducking his head as he says so, "The elf confirmed that the infection would have bloated me unto death, I would have suffocated or been crushed inside my own armor if she hadn't been able to heal me."
"You would have done the same," you shrug. "Shame about the armor though."
Oh, the irony of saying such a thing to someone else.
"I'd rather the armor than me, if it's all the same to you, Count," he chuckles before stepping back and rejoining the rest of his fellows in a small circle of whispers.
Thus, leaving you and Natasha alone for a moment.
"How are you?" You say as gently as you can.
Even holding her lightly, it almost feels like she's suddenly lost a lot of weight. There is an upsetting frailty to her every movement now. One that causes a brief civil war between your mind and heart, and it is only the fact that the Pinnacle went essentially wholly unmolested while you were gone from her side that lets your mind be the victor. She has given up on holding her sword in anything approaching above her waist, and in fact is half using it as a cane more than anything else. And now that you are here, you can see that her golden blonde hair has gained a very noticeable white streak at the left temple that shoots all the way back until it ends with the rest of her hair just past her shoulders. The stripe of white is not straw-like or thin like that of an elderly person, but the change is impossible to deny. When you clasp her hands in yours between the two of you, you can see how the nails of her hands have become a uniform but disturbing metallic iron grey, a coloration that spiders outwards from the nails along her hands up to the wrist. Your noses are almost touching, and this close, your back stiffens when you see the faintest sheen of red that briefly flickers into and then out of existence in her otherwise ice blue eyes. She notices the moment you notice, and sighs, her chin dropping as she does so.
"I don't...know what happened to me," she whispers without looking at you. You despise how her voice trembles. "I...my hands, I don't...,"
"It doesn't matter," you kiss her on the forehead and hold her close. "We'll figure it out together."
"...right," she pulls in a fortifying breath before pushing off from you. "I was just...so angry," she sounds almost ashamed of it.
A clattering of hooves interrupts you, and both you and Natasha are witness to Mena von Kessel grinning salaciously down at the two of you. Seeing that she's caught your attention, she fires off a surprisingly good salute at you before bowing slightly in her saddle towards Natasha.
"Countess Hohenzollern, pleased to see you again," she waves with her axe before looking towards you. "We're off, Count. We aren't much for line fighting, but the moment the enemy tries it, we'll be tearing their legs out from under them."
Then she kicks her horse to cantering away without actually waiting for confirmation or acknowledgement from you.
"That girl needs more seasoning," Natasha shakes her head as she fully steps away from you.
"Agreed," you mutter before moving to catch her before she collapses against the nearest pillar. "Natasha!"
"Damn it," she growls through grit teeth as your arms fold around her.
"What-,"
"I was barely standing," she admits as you help her slowly slide down to her butt. "I'm fighting just to keep my eyes open, I'm so exhausted. Feels like Hagrid's taken a melon scoop to my insides at table side service."
Hissing, she lets her head lean back against the stone
"Are you-,"
"I'm not dying," she squints at you, "Not anymore at least. That elf," she looks over at the one in question, her white robes burnt and bloodied aplenty by now. "Highweaver Taira? She said that my organs were badly cut apart from erupting veins," she does not pause as your grip on her shoulders suddenly becomes a lot tighter, "My own blood was freezing and then bursting inside of me."
She says it with too much ease to the point that you can tell it is forced.
"But she healed me, so that's not a danger at this point," she huffs. "As it is, however," she limply attempts to raise her sword in a trembling arm before it clatters back to the ground despite her maintaining her grip. "Shit, I've become an invalid."
"No you are not," is your immediate angry snarl. "All you need to do is rest until you get your strength back."
"Well it's hardly like I can do much else," she rolls her eyes.
When you go to stand, she weakly places a hand against your chest.
"You'll come back?"
"Always," you reach down and pull her hand up to your mouth to kiss. "And I'll not leave you defenseless. Volgar! Oskar! Ubel!"
The three named Greatswords quickly make their way over to you, their weapons hefted high. They are not brilliant scholars, but they know well enough what you are asking of them without actually using words. Quickly, they take up a triangle position around her, weapons at the ready.
"Absolutely not, you'll need them at the battle line," is her gracious response.
"They've lost a significant portion of their armor, and you need the help," you fire right back before walking away.
"Frederick!"
"Get up and stop me then!"
"Damn it," she groans behind you before you hear her immediately begin cajoling one of the Greatswords to hand her a flask of something or other.
===============================
Ten minutes later finds you with the rest of the Asrai now forming up into wary battle lines. The arrival of Sunweaver, the High Spellweaver of Laurelorn - which is apparently different from a specific Highweaver - brings many casualties back from the brink. The presence of their Queen fortifies morale, though not as much as one might have hoped considering her demeanor. The presence of so many Sisters of the Thorn does no favor to the rest of the Asrai, given how wary they are of them. Over eighty of the strange not-quite-elves have formed a protective series of concentric lines around her, shoulder to shoulder now facing forward back towards Laurelocraobh. For some reason, you suspect that the number at full strength is about one hundred, but they have lost a small number. Ariel herself is standing at the forefront of them all, pretty much outright making herself a target.
But despite that, the fey have not advanced on the Pinnacle. With every minute that stretches on, the Asrai at the foot of the tree retreating further and further into safer territory, it seems more and more likely. But not just yet, it seems. It is coming though, that is undeniable. As it is, you have found yourself once more next to Eldyra, who is quietly cleaning her blade next to you. From this close, you can once more marvel at the craftsmanship of Death Thorn. It flat out rivals the best dwarf forging that you've ever seen, though you're not likely to voice such thoughts around any of the dawi. Living or dead, as for all you know the outrage might cause a dawi's spirit to spontaneously manifest to grumble at you. Despite her using it as vigorously as you did Brain Wounder, possibly more so, it seems untouched by battle as she nonetheless wipes it down one more time before placing the cloth somewhere in her belt.
"How are you holding up, Eldyra?"
The squire offers you a bemused smile, her conical and somewhat well ornamented helm turning with her as she goes.
"I could ask you the same, you know. I have seen few, human or elf or otherwise, simply get back to their feet and prepare to fight once more after sustaining the wounds that you did."
You've a simple answer to that question, but an effective one.
"I've legitimately had worse."
She just sort of stares at you for a moment before flicking Death Thorn back and forth briefly before returning it to its sheath. Like you, she has a shield, but unlike you, her shield holds a specific heraldry and is not simply some appropriated piece of gear. There is some sort of blue and white bird, lit from behind by the sun. Below is a stretch of green mountains and some elven rune that you can't read.
"Is that your house heraldry?"
"Mmm?" She peers at you before looking down at her shield. "Oh, no. This is the traditional heraldry of Tiranoc. When our armies march, it is under this. House Histmenluil," she pauses at your blank look and screws her face up in thought. "In Reikspiel it would roughly translate to something like...Golden Mountain's Thunder? Something like that."
"Histmenluil sounds easier to remember," you point out. "For a poor human that doesn't speak any of the elven dialects."
"Fair enough," she smirks at you but that soon falters as her face becomes downcast. "I...my father Eldyr was the Lord Histmenluil, and with his passing I have become the Lady Histmenluil."
And then she is silent for a few seconds while trying to blink back a growing wetness in her eyes.
"Technically, I have the right to bear our personal coat of arms," she manages to say, voice growing stronger as she continues. "But the Phoenix Court would not have the Lady Histmenluil," she spits out before sniffing once and nodding slowly. "But they would have the Squire of the Defender of Ulthuan. And when he knights me, I will bear the crest of my House proudly once more into the Court."
By the end of it, she's talking as much to herself as to you, fists clenching at her sides as she glares at the earth as if it were the assembled nobility of Ulthuan.
"I've no doubt you will," you tell her earnestly. "Hopefully even within my tiny little human lifetime," you add with a smile and a gentle elbow into her finely wrought armor.
It takes her a bit, but eventually she does respond.
"I should hope so," she says, a faint quirk on her lips. "Sir Tyrion's standards are high, but I don't think it will take an entire century more. Only some decades."
"Oh. Well," you click your tongue. "Maybe not in my lifetime at all."
Eldyra brows furrow as she looks at you more closely.
"What?"
"I know that humans are not as long lived as elves, or even dwarfs, but...how old are you?"
Oh, right, you never got around to telling her before. You were just too shocked that she was only 41 and barely considered past being a child by some of the elves.
"By the end of this year I'll be fifty-three."
The sudden and comprehensive shock that comes over Eldyra's face, jaw dropping slightly and eyes widening like saucers is one you'll never forget. She tries to sputter out something but fails as she switches to just look you up and down. It goes on long enough that you have enough time to gesture for and receive a flask of ostka from Luthor and drink the whole thing, the Greatsword's eyes otherwise being focused entirely on the enemy, before she processes it fully.
"But that's barely any older than me!" She sounds horrified. "But you act like...,"
"Haven't you dealt with humans before?" You can't help but ask.
"I...," she starts to say before cutting herself off and glaring at you without any heat. "For the vast most part? The only humans I have had experience with are those who have sworn themselves to Chaos or are mindless slave soldiers of the Druchii. My training has focused on threats to Ulthuan, to combat and tactics, to being the best knight-to-be I can be."
"Fair enough," you admit while rolling your shoulders. "I'm sure it would have come up sometime in the next few centuries, though."
The response to that is a contemplative silence and time enough to once more readjust the shield on your arm. It's the best defense you've got at this point, as at no point did you have time to go and get your proper armor back from wherever your horses were stored. If they're even still alive at this point. You wouldn't put it past these insane fey and dryads to slaughter everything not specifically plant or spirit. On the other hand, apparently Eldyra, or Tyrion, or some Handmaidens perhaps were able to go and secure the rest of Eldyra's own equipment for her usage. Still, you look more like one of the Asrai wardancers at this point than a human soldier. Your upper torso is a mess of only recently healed scars, everything from the waist upwards is bare to the elements without even scraps of a torn shirt to protect you. Below you've been reduced to something like lederhosen without the top part. To be frank your shoes are not doing much better, the fine leather rotting and buckles snapping off during the fighting. You can feel cool earth on parts of your soles, even. Not particularly great, but unlike your wife you can actually stand, as well as wield your blade without issue.
"So how long does that leave you?"
The question is so quiet that you almost miss it.
"Sorry?"
Eldyra doesn't look at you, her eyes locked on the fey as the last of the Asrai finally manage to retreat within the range of the Handmaidens of the Everqueen. Even now, you can see the incredibly bright lights that are fired from their magical bows, searing bolts of power that erupt upon impact no matter where or what they are hitting. The enormous treemen - that apparently got here from Avelorn somehow - raise their staves and then bring them down in unison in twinned thunderclaps. A gurgling of churning earth comes next. In seconds you can only watch as the ground seems to outright swallow the most over-eager of the fey and dryads, their bloodlust that drove them to chase after the retreating Asrai only leading them to their deaths. With that, the entire mass recoils far and away, while the Handmaidens refuse to go any further from the Everqueen's side and the treemen apparently sharing similar sentiments.
"How long does that leave you? You are right, most of my encounters with humanity are skewed. Many of those sworn to Chaos are immune to the touch of age even more so than my kind from the foul blessings of their Dark Gods," she elaborates calmly, still looking at the fey as they appear to be pulling further and further away from Laurelocraobh.
It's a question you've wrestled with before, and likely will again if you live.
"Could be today," you sigh. "Could be tomorrow."
"Obviously," Eldyra rolls her eyes, "But I am serious. I've never had cause to contemplate or study it. Most elves, should they truly live full and long lives, can live for a great many years. The creation of your Empire was a surprise to many in Ulthuan when we discovered it."
You cough.
"What do you mean it was a surprise?"
She rolls her hand through the air.
"You know, how quickly you built it all."
Now it is your turn to look shocked.
"Quick....what...quickly?" You look at her incredulously. "The Empire has, of this year, existed for over two thousand years! Two thousand three hundred and thirty three of them!"
"As I said, so very quickly," she says as if you've suddenly become a lackwit.
Princess Eldyra of Tiranoc, Squire of Tyrion the Defender of Ulthuan, has never looked more inhuman to you in that instant. The sheer lack of comprehension on her face, the absolute mystification at your shock, all of it is completely plain there. She has laughed, cried, and for a time you had forgotten that she simply was not like you. She is an elf. The whole history of the Empire, from the first Battle of Black Fire Pass to now is but a blink of the eye for the Asur of Ulthuan. So many generations of humanity have lived and died since the age when Sigmar walked amongst the tribes.
"Eldyra, what is the longest average lifespan for the Asur," you ask her with as much patience as you can muster. "Disregarding major exceptions," you add towards the end with a thought towards Malekith and perhaps the mysterious 'Alith Anar' that Sadrina touched only briefly upon on your travels to Laurelorn.
"Thousands of years," she answers simply. "Why?"
It is a hard, hard thing to not stagger aside from the simplicity of the statement.
"So by your people's perspective less than a single generation has passed, and so the Empire has grown into being."
"About," she shrugs.
"Right. Eldyra, I'm in the beginning of my fifth decade," you put your hands on your hips. "On average? Humans don't go past a century," you hear her gasp but keep going. "Most village elders and headsmen get past where I am, the healthiest and most well-kept nobility further than that, but even then."
"But-,"
"I've no idea what the Jade Magic and other...things...might or might not do," you shrug at that.
The way she looks at you is somewhat akin to someone discovering they are in danger of breaking a delicate piece of glass.
"That is...quite unsettling to hear," she tells you, eyes still too-wide.
"It is what it is," you sniff once.
"But what happens when you-,"
"Head's up," you interrupt her and point. "Time to get ready."
Ahead, the fey appear to have found either some form of order to themselves or have finally decided to stop trying to take down Laurelocraobh. There is really only one other target for them to go after. And even now as you watch, they are practically eating up the terrain between them and the Pinnacle. All the strange sorts of fey you've seen thus far and more are boiling over the ground, accompanied by a wave of angry screaming dryads. They are a mishmash of only vaguely humanoid creatures of birch, willow, or oak. Or all. Or none. It's hard to tell at this distance. But they are coming towards the Pinnacle in a rush that is beginning to pick up speed.
"Finally!" Ariel booms out, her spear raised high. "Come, wretches, and know that my mercy is extinguished! There will be no Wildwood for you! There will only be an end to you!"
Well, apparently a bit of recovery time without constantly exercising her powers has been enough for her to regain some small measure of strength. Either that or she's forcing herself to keep up a mask of it when she doesn't really have it. Personally, you're hoping it's the former, but if it's not at least she'll have the Sisters of the Thorn surrounding her. Then there is also the Pinnacle itself, and despite your worries there the elves do not seem to be overly upset about what your wife managed. Surely, if there was damage worth mentioning, the elves would have done so without hesitation.
As for the fey? They do not respond in words to Ariel's challenge, but they certainly do respond in a mishmash series of screams and hoots and screeches. Throats not meant for words ululate regardless in maddened fury at a volume louder than what most flesh could possibly manage. And they are definitely getting closer and closer now. In the further distance you can see the fluttering of the blue wolf banner as Mena readies her cavalry. She won't get here in time to intercept the enemy, but then you're reasonably sure she wishes to impact after they've already committed fully to ensure maximum damage. The dryads appear to have pushed even further to the front, incensed further and from here you can see them almost gliding forward through the earth at terrifying speed. Grass and soil are thrown up in the air, each forward movement of their legs shattering the ground like a ship through ice floes.
At the absolute forefront of them all are dryads that are even worse looking than the usual wood spirit in a martial aspect. They stand almost a fourth of the height of the average dryad taller, large spiky branches shooting off of them. More than a few of them have burning whorls of light spiraling around their bodies. Some have the upper portion of a skeleton hung above their heads like gruesome trophies wrapped through with roots that come from their backs. All of them don't have lungs that they need to scream with, so their unsettling cries simply do not end or even appear to stutter or fall in volume.
"Excuse me a moment," you murmur to Eldyra and then begin squeezing your way through the Asrai ranks, a motion of your fingers causing your Greatswords to remain in place rather than follow you.
They double-take at you, recoil from touching your human body, but there is a wariness there that you doubt they would have had for just about an Imperial before this day. In seconds you manage to reach the rather porcupine-esque perimeter of the Sisters of the Thorn. Many of them are quite focused on their duty, but you spy Ashnia of all people on the leftmost flank, and she half-turns her head towards you as you approach.
"Quick question, Sister," you speak up, clearing your throat just before.
"Speak, mayfly, we have but a few heartbeats left before we are under assault," she replies, voice incredibly clipped.
"Who are the big ones?" You gesture at the oncoming horde. "I assume one of them is Drycha?"
Ashina actually purses her lips at your question before squeezing her eyes shut. When they open again, they are once more those of a bird of prey, vertically slit and narrowed.
"Ah, the branchwraiths of the Wildwood. Eldest of those dryads bound there, spite and malice personified. Once it was they who were rulers of Athel Loren, before even the elves came, and they have resented us ever since," she sneers with suddenly pointed teeth bared. "I do not see Drycha yet amongst them, but she is a cunning creature despite her hatreds." Then she looks at you fully, blinking once so that her eyes return to that of an elf's. "But if she shows herself, you will know her by her hatred, for you have felt it's like already."
At that, she flicks her eyes fearfully at the entombed Coeddil.
"You will know."
Wonderful.
"Right, then. Good luck," you tell her but the Sister of the Thorn has stopped paying attention to you.
As quickly as you can, you push your way back to where Eldyra waits.
"What was that about?" The squire looks askance at you.
"I wanted to know which one was Drycha, but apparently none of those are her. She's smart enough to not throw herself at Ariel right off the bat, probably going to try and wear her down first."
"Mmm, likely."
Then the talking comes to an end. Various murmured conversations all around you die out entirely. Soon everything becomes just breathing, in and out, in and out. Fingers clench on swords and spears, feet set themselves, toes flexing. You cannot speak for anyone else, but your heart rate shoots upwards as it always does just before combat, thudding louder and louder. The closer they get, the louder the cacophony is. There is not the earthshaking pounding of an oncoming cavalry charge, but it is quite similar in its own way. Except, you realize after a second, the ground is shaking like a cavalry charge and then far more than it properly should. Far, far more. You can see it in the confusion of the elves around you, Eldyra included, that they feel it too. Ahead of you, you can see how even the oncoming fey are faltering from it, which is shocking on its own. The violence of the rumbling earth is so bad you are nearly knocked off of your feet, and it is only your Greatswords supporting you as well as each other that keeps the humans present from falling over outright.
From nearby where they had waited in somewhat safer positions, you hear Sunweaver and Highweaver Taira shriek in pain. That same moment you suddenly remember well enough a very recent and dangerously similar situation as in the past.
"Where I come from, it usually takes a few days hard ride to tell someone they've pissed you off if they're in another province!" You shout to make yourself heard at Eldyra, but you aren't sure if she heard your words.
Because at around that point, not so much melting out of so much as almost exploding out of one of the trees interwoven with the Dawnstone Pinnacle comes - screaming at absolutely deafening volume - a very angry looking dryad. This one, more than any of the others, you actually recognize. Her bark has splintered enough to show the odd wood-flesh beneath in certain potions of her arms and legs, with numerous gnarled branches sticking out of her back. She is not as large as the eldest of the Wildwood Branchwraiths, but she is undeniably a branchwraith nonetheless. The fierce green glow of her eyes are barely visible beneath the narrowed 'brows' of the jagged furrows that make up the facsimile of a face. But you know her. You've seen dryads that have looked like they came from all a manner of trees, from oak to willow to birch to ash and more. But you've only ever seen one that is tinged with red from top to bottom.
"DRRRRRRRRRYYYYYYYYYCHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
Such is the first word of Bloodglade, Eldest Branchwraith of Laurelorn, as she returns to her home. She tears the earth up as she strides to the forefront outside of the Pinnacle. And with her comes a number of lesser dryads that come pouring out of the trees at the same time. These ones, thankfully, appear to be completely unaligned to those of the Wildwood. Bloodglade herself stalks forward and throws her arms wide, and screams in a noise that cannot help but remind you of the same one that was heard throughout Laurelorn shortly after Coeddil was dealt with. It is ever so slightly less unhinged than that, however, albeit still filled with a powerful fury. It is, in fact, even louder for all that, as Bloodglade's scream seems to emanate not just from herself but from the trees all around you somehow.
"I don't understand a word she just said," you mutter.
Sunweaver speaks up then, this time thankfully not having collapsed outright like she did when Ariel had arrived so violently.
"She...ugh, the Weave cannot withstand such abuse, it will take many moons to heal it after this," she mutters, clutching at her stave. "Bloodglade asks why Drycha is despoiling her groves and glades, driving her children to madness."
"Are you all right?" Eldyra asks her, going to offer support before the Asrai woman shrugs her arm away.
"I will live," Sunweaver grunts stubbornly. "I was unprepared for the shock of Ariel forcing herself through the World-Roots so quickly and while so tainted by Cyanathair. It is no wonder she did not use them for so long. I will not falter like such again."
The tide of fey has been slowing at the full force of Bloodglade's fury and the growing arrivals of more and more of Laurelorn's own dryads, eventually coming to a halt. The new arrivals are coming not just from the few trees around the cleared area that is the Pinnacle, but from others as well. A significant number of them are emerging from Laurelocraobh. All of them are also converging. To your absolute surprise you see as they flow around Mena's soldiers. You would have thought that the dryads would react more than a little violently to the presence of so many humans. The Branchwraith of Laurelorn stalks a bit forwards, and is mirrored in doing so by one of the Wildwood Branchwraiths, one with a human rib cage acting as a left pauldron and a freshly dead elven corpse repeatedly impaled in her back branches. The creature raises one hand and draws forth a brief bloom of familiar energies that somehow seems darkened compared to what you've seen in the past that swirls around it. Then it opens what passes for it's mouth. The noise that comes out could only be described, you think, as a tree's branches collapsing to the ground in a windstorm.
(Demands of Fealty: 15+Eldest Growth(15)+Unprepared(10)-Homegrowth(10)=30/100)
"No...," Sunweaver whispers, horrified.
"What, what is it?" You ask, but you do not get an immediate answer.
You watch as the burst of energy slams directly into Bloodglade's chest. It bursts like a group of grasping vines that try to wrap themselves around the dryad from top to bottom. But you realize at about the same time as the Wildwood Branchwraith herself that it isn't taking. The growth ceases its expansion, and the tendrils that were trying to dig into her are failing to find any purchase. A terrible silence comes next, as the spirits of the Wildwood host appear to be plainly shocked, though it is hard to be absolutely certain given that only some of them have faces. And even then, those are not as readable as human ones.
"What was that?!"
"An attempt to exercise control," Sunweaver growls, looking more scared than you've ever seen her. "The eldest of the wood exercising their authority by sheer force of will and power."
Well shit. What looked like reinforcements for the Asrai might turn out to be the opposite if that's something that can be pulled off.
(Wrath of the Northern Glades: 88+The Audacity Of This Birch(10)+Enraged(5)=103/100)
Bloodglade does not even speak, does not scream. Instead, her arms shoot out at her sides before driving forward - lengthened claws first - directly into the older dryad's torso. Bloodglade is smaller, shorter, and more svelte. She is, despite what you've heard the Asrai call her, no doubt younger than these staggeringly ancient wood spirits. None of that stops her from plunging her claws through the front and out the back of the branchwraith's body and then with a stunning display of strength tears the dryad apart. In an instant, the older dryad comes apart in three or four pieces, wood shavings and brambles scattered to the sides as Bloodglade completes her execution. That amount of strength could have torn a fully armored knight apart with same terrifying ease. After which, Bloodglade turns to glare at the assembled fay once more, all the while more dryads and even some fey begin to appear and assemble in a loose ring. These fey are those you've seen before, but there is simply less of the palpable and ever-present malice that the creatures once imprisoned in the Wildwood possess. There is still certainly some, but it isn't angled at you at the moment.
Bloodglade howls with a heavy stamp of her wooden foot.
"This is my wood, not yours," Sunweaver translates.
Next to the two of you, Eldyra stirs.
"I...should we do something? Move to support...her?"
"Sometimes, Eldyra," you can't help but murmur, "You have to accept that you will not be the sole actor in events."
"What?"
Another earsplitting screech emanates forth from Bloodglade.
"Show yourself, Drycha," Sunweaver adds in quickly, "Followed by an insult or two."
"What kind?" You ask without thinking.
"Rotten-through broken branch left upon the ground unworthy of becoming fertilizer, soot-loving burnt sapling of a diseased tree," she clarifies.
"Is that...is that a good one, for them?"
Sunweaver looks at you with utmost seriousness.
"Every dryad is bound to one tree or another. A tree can be the home of many dryads, but a dryad is only ever has one. To insult it is to insult their home, their greatest treasure."
Oh.
Finally, the Branchwraith of Laurelorn gets an answer. It comes in a rush of displaced leaves scattering away on an unknown breeze, the rattling of bones in tree branches, the cracking of a tree struck by lightning finally collapsing. The moment the words hit you, it almost causes actual pain to your ears, the hatred in those hissed words almost clawing their way inside. They come from every direction without any discernible source, not even from within the amassed group of Wildwood fey. Even Bloodglade seems almost blown back by it, forced to cringe and almost crouch before the sheer force of those words, but she straightens almost immediately and snarls defiance. It sounds odd and wooden, but that is par for the course.
"Silence sapling," Sunweaver frowns as she translates, anger and worry flashing across her face. "Our cause is just, the flesh must die. Bloodglade expressed contempt, and further claims that Drycha is spitting on noble Adanhu's legacy, and is deliberately trying to break Durthu's Pact."
The crunching and cracking noise that comes next takes you a moment to recognize as laughter. Sunweaver's eyes widen a lot as she gasps, and she must visibly gather herself with a calming breath before she translates. Her grip on her staff has become white-knuckle tight.
"What...what we do here today," she swallows, "We do to honor Adanhu, who died needlessly so that Ariel would live. To end Durthu's Mistake. To avenge Coeddil." But then Sunweaver goes off script, almost staggering backwards. This time, she does not deny Eldyra helping her remain standing. "I just remembered. Bloodglade had left Laurelorn to confer with the elders of Loren. But if she has returned so, then she must have felt the effects of Coeddil's pain rippling throughout the Weave! It means all must have!"
"All who, exac-," is all you get out before the presence hits you like a sledgehammer to the skull.
It is hard to fully describe what happens next. You have felt otherworldly fury exerted upon the world itself before, from avatars of Goddesses and daemons alike. It is a unique pressure, one that crushes down on one's very mind and soul along with the body. But that which stabs an arm seamlessly from the largest tree intertwined with the Dawnstone Pinnacle is something both like and unlike those presences. There is a weight to it, one of staggering and immortal anger that runs as hot as the sun itself. As the gnarled treeman pulls itself free, it pulls an enormous blade with it. Unlike the filth-crusted thing that Coeddil had wielded, this one shines like brilliant glowing amber and carved with runes in it that cause your eyes to water just from looking at it. On that comparison alone, this new treeman would be far more pure and noble, but there is almost no such thing about it. Massive fissures split the wood, and half of its face has been shattered somehow, all of which are lit from within by an angry dull orange. A small cloud of buzzing creatures flit about its head, only fangs and claws visible within their individual blooms of light. Twisted branches covered in moss and tufts of growth almost give the appearance of spiked up hair. One hand that could, much like Coeddil's, squeeze you to death clenches open and closed while the other clutches the giant sword. Something akin to a girdle of leaves and vines wrap around what passes for the waist, and interwoven in that are more than a dozen skulls. Some are orc, others the horned craniums of beastmen, and still others are those of humans. More skulls are impaled and displayed on vertically sprouting branches along the shoulders. Some are far fresher than others.
The battlefield has gone silent.
"Durthu...,"
No one specific voice says it. Rather, it is dozens and dozens of suddenly dry elven throats that whisper the name in somewhat synchronized horror. As they identify the being whose anger seems to churn the very air as you look at it, you are reminded of a brief conversation from before. When Coeddil was considered to be a lesser threat compared to this very being due to his degraded mental faculties and eroding being from Nurglite corruption. Durthu does not speak, he merely surveys the battlefield. In the distance, you can see the stiffening of the two Averlorn treemen, and for a brief moment you swear you can see something of surprise in the ancient before you, but reading the body language of a walking tree is not the simplest of tasks. You can tell the moment his one-eyed gaze finds Coeddil, the corrupted treeman's arm and sword still outstretched towards the Pinnacle. The wood titan walks, ignoring everyone else entirely, and where he steps you watch as the elves do no less than scuttle out of his way. A sudden panic comes over you as a thought occurs, and even as you whirl about you see your Greatswords pulling Natasha further away into the shadows of the arches and pillars. The dryads of the Wildwood seem just as motionless as those of Laurelorn, every individual spirit and fey appears incapable of even moving under the mere gaze of one of the last true Ancients of Athel Loren.
Durthu stops before Coeddil, one foot crushing down on the thick layer of ice that remains on the ground. In the shocked silence, he reaches forward with his free hand and presses it against the outer layer of unmelting frost. The weakness, the fear, the sheer repulsion that the wintery coffin holds for all other fey and spirits you've seen? Completely missing in Durthu. It affects him not at all.
"Shit."
Then Durthu turns, unerringly, his gaze somehow right on Natasha who has struggled to her feet in a stubborn display of desperation. Possibly because she might need to be running in the next few seconds.
"Shit."
You are moving before you realize it, heart pounding in your chest the whole while. He takes a single step forward before you are able to get here, and to hell with it you've got Brain Wounder in your hands and held at the ready. Your mind feels like it is running faster than lightning. Considering the last time Coeddil barely paid attention to you and nearly killed you, you're probably only going to be able to get Natasha a few second's worth of delay. Possibly only just the one. In that time, each of your Greatswords might be able to provide one or two more, depending on how the space themselves out and the cleaving reach of Durthu's sword. Armor won't matter on a sword that size, especially if Durthu is even somewhat as strong as Coeddil was. Deflection would be insane prospect, more likely to tear your arms out of your shoulder sockets than do anything helpful.
The legs, then. It's the best you can manage, unless you try climbing him like you saw Mena attempting. The cloud of vicious spirits which hangs about him could tear you to shreds the minute you get too close to them, though. How long can you withstand being eaten alive by dozens of tiny mouths, how long will the Light of Summer keep you functioning as a distraction after that point? It probably cannot heal you if he outright bisects you down the middle, not even you would risk testing it that far. On the other hand, maybe it will keep one half alive long enough to keep him that much more distracted. After that, it's up to your Greatswords and Natasha herself to get to safety if that is at all possible. Can you rely on Eldyra to try and defend her? That would be knightly, wouldn't it? To defend your wife?
Durthu slows and comes to a stop in front of you, staring down at you and the rest of your Greatswords with an incomprehensible expression. What does he see when he looks down on you? Irritant humans to be eradicated, insects to brush aside, something to disregard entirely? Natasha is saying something, you think, from behind you. You can't hear it over the roar of the blood in your ears and the thundering drum of your heart trying to batter its way free of your chest. This is it. This is absolutely it. A stone portal awaits you.
Well. At least it wasn't within Ostland. You never wanted to die in battle while in Ostland, because that means you'd be dying and leaving behind a threat to your province.
"Durthu!"
===================================================
Yhanna Sunweaver has been alive by the chronological reckoning of mortals for more than three thousand years, effects of the everlasting nature of the Weave upon her notwithstanding. She has watched with suspicion and paranoia as the dwarfs have fully receded back to their mountains, and has participated in dozens of fatal chastisements of human incursions when they attempted to grasp that which was not theirs. Hundreds, thousands of battle to endlessly repulse beastmen and greenskins and the slaves of Chaos as well, when she was a mere spellsinger. She has participated in battle against Cyanathair, and has witnessed the fury of Durthu when roused against humanity before. With all the natural ease that only wood spirits could utilize had he come through the Weave and passed through the World-Roots. Where the Queen, body and soul ravaged by Cyanathir's touch worse than she could have possibly imagined, had ripped and torn her way, Yhanna had not felt his passage almost at all until he had arrived. The weight of his anguish and anger was a palpable and crushing weight upon the Weave, upon her very soul. Even others of the Asrai could only perceive but a fraction that the spellsingers and spellweavers could. That she could. To witness Durthu was to see an eternity of pain writ large into the psyche, one that extended far beyond just his undeniably mighty body. Even the echoes of his pain and anger brought her eyes to watering and her flesh to crawling. A low keening note that only a handful of those present could only begin to hear skittered across her mind like an endless pane of cracking glass.
Durthu did not fully turn away from the foul creature of Winter clad in deceptive human flesh, but his terrible attention was no longer focused purely upon her or the idiotic human buffoon trying to stand in the Ancient's way. It would have been far easier if they had simply sacrificed the human woman to Durthu's inexhaustible fury, but of course the barbarian would not countenance such a thing. Worse, somehow the young Asur had joined him, and though she was not Asrai Yhanna would mourn her when she was struck down by Durthu's rage.
Few in all of existence could possibly turn the Ancient's attentions for long without being destroyed themselves. Yhanna would not count herself among such.
The Queen in the Woods, on the other hand, was one such being. Her ravaged state was visible even to those unblessed by magic, but to those who were it was even more grotesque. Whole portions of the Queen were missing, and were it not for her own formidable power and the blessings of Isha Herself upon Her Avatar she would have succumbed to the pain even after being healed by the Everqueen. Yet she called out to Durthu nonetheless, striding forward with a thin veneer of calm, spear held with head pointing towards the ground. Her wings beat only once as she moved, a cadre of the Sisters of the Thorn following behind her - those elite of that mysterious sisterhood known as the Handmaidens of the Thorn. Durthu watched her approach, the vicious spites that flitted about his head whispering grief and anger in equal measure, his eldritch voice emanating outwards in the grinding language of the forest itself. It was one that could only be understood and not spoken by those with throats of flesh without aid of magic or certain other mysteries.
"Ariel. You would stop me from exacting vengeance?"
Yhanna's entire body shook from the anger in that voice. Durthu had half turned back to his target before the Queen spoke again.
"Did you not feel it? The Elder is too deep within the grasp of the Fly Lord. A Proctor of Pestilence personally saw to his corruption!" Ariel called back. "There can be no cleansing for him."
Durthu growled, the earth and trees of Laurelorn shaking beneath his anger. The awful light of his soul grew brighter with it.
"Matters of the Elders are not for flesh to decide!" He roared, ire now ever so slowly grinding away from the humans and towards the Queen. "To cull or otherwise!"
One massive leg slammed down into the stone of the Pinnacle's finely paved promenade in a stomp that shattered ancient stone.
"Yes...yes! The wood needs no approval! The flesh holds no authority to punish it!" Drycha's eager hiss came from the rustling leaves around them.
At that, however, Durthu's one eye narrowed ever so slightly.
"Drycha..."
"You...you must aid us, great Oakheart! They have assaulted Coeddil, an Elder!" The sheer offended outrage in Drycha's voice caused more than a few branches of deadwood along the ground to snap apart into splinters.
"Durthu!" A somewhat tinnier voice spoke up as Craobhin entered the conversation, roots digging into the earth and rolling breezes carrying her indignant words. "You must not listen to her! She has ravaged my glades, my glens! She has entrapped my children, and even attempted to plant invading roots within me!"
By all rights, Craobhin was barely a true branchwraith compared to the ancient creatures formerly entrapped within the Wildwood, compared to a true Elder of the forest. But it was undeniable that Laurelorn was hers, for she was the one who had carried the Acorn of Ages that had given birth to Laurelocraobh, along with Guldul to plant new roots and grow anew. Known as Bloodglade and Craobhin both, she was right in her fury in Yhanna's opinion. More importantly, as a dryad, Durthu did not dismiss her out of hand as he would to almost any elf that dared ask of him anything. Indeed, the Elder was more experienced than any living being in matters of dispute between the groves and those who lived within them. The glower of Durthu turned, then, towards the assembled masses of the Wildwood.
"Is this true, Drycha?" He asked in what was closer to a bellow but was in fact but a whisper compared to the volumes the Elder could reach.
"Lies! Lies of a flesh-addled sapling!"
"It is you who is the liar! You who brought them here! Did you think I would not feel it as Guldul fell to daemons!?" Craobhin shrieked.
Ariel rose, then, wings beating twice as she lifted herself above the ground, exercising significant effort to manage even that much. She gestured with her appropriated spear.
"Look upon the rotten fruit of mercy, the escapees of the Wildwood! You can feel their corruption, that which Drycha has allowed within! She has made pact with Nurgle!"
It was an accusation that not even Durthu, so tragically marred by his own fury as he was, could ignore. Too many of the true Elders had died, where once there had been hundreds, by the end of the coming of Chaos there were but three. A grudge of grave magnitude, of which there could be but few. A few steps took him back to Coeddil, where he pressed a hand against the ice without even acknowledging the comparatively small amount of pain it cost him to do so. With a crunch, small but impossibly powerful tendrils covered in thorns sprouted from Durthu's fingers and dug into the ice, deeper, and deeper still before Durthu then quickly tore his arm backwards. In return came a tiny spurt of Nurglish sputum and rotten sap, followed by a thin continual dribble out of the holes. Even under all of that horrid ice, and the attentions of a being that was utterly foreign even to Sunweaver - however brief it had been - the virulence of Nurgle persisted. Even if Coeddil had fallen, the strength of the Plague God still bloomed within the husk, kept restrained by that which had entombed him. Without another word, Durthu stepped away, then through the scattered defenders of the Dawnstone Pinnacle and next to Craobhin. There he loomed.
"Drycha!" His bellow was anguished. "Tell me you did not do this, did not form compact with daemons!"
"It is a lie, Elder, a lie! Only flesh would bargain with Them!"
But Durthu would not be denied. With a sweep of his sword, the creatures of the Wildwood quailed before him, scattering in fear. There, finally, was Drycha revealed, hidden with low cunning and dangerous skill amongst the ranks of the dryads. Isolated like this, under the direction attentions of Durthu, she could not hide. Nor could she hide the corrupted dryads about her, the literally infernal rotting of the last of the Wildwood treemen, the plagued appearance of numerous fey within the center of the formation. She gazed up at the last living and uncorrupted Elder, entire body almost heaving with malice as she glared at the elves who had defied her so.
(The Last Elder Gazes Through The Weave: All Of The Secrets Of Root And Branch And Soil Are Known To Him)
The words of the Eldar were a whisper of crushing vines.
"So it is true. Coeddil poisoned. Guldul slain by daemons. Daemons you helped gain access to young Laurelorn."
Drycha trembled once, forced to take a step back before his mournful growl. Her head whipped left and right, a frantic desperation to her movements that Yhanna had never witnessed before.
"No, no! It is the flesh's fault! These accursed elves! They brought the attentions of Chaos upon themselves, it is they who have brought ruin to Laurelorn. To Loren! To Coeddil! Your fellow Elder!"
Slowly, Durthu shook his head.
"No. A terrible corruption was brought into the Weave, and you have done nothing to stop it. You have brought ruin to Coeddil, or failed to stop it. Either has wrought the same result."
With a terrifyingly surety, he stepped forward towards Drycha to which she recoiled.
"No, no! They are liars! They are ruination! If not for them-,"
"If not for you, Laurelorn would not be strewn in shattered trunks and torn roots."
(The Briarmaven of Madness: 73+Desperate Madness(10)+Okkam's Mindrazor(20)=103/100)
Yhanna could not even comprehend what she was seeing before it was over.
Drycha had reared back as Durthu grasped for her.
Cold slithering magic wrapped in malice mixed with Ulgu that swept about her arms.
Then with one fearful strike, it was done. Drycha struck with a claw that impacted along Durthu's face in a violent flash of magic and flying splinters.
Yhanna's mind, at first, flatly refused to believe that even Drycha would strike Durthu. Yet she could not help but wonder. Was it her ageless malice that had finally been driven too far? The knowledge of what Coeddil had been reduced to? The rejection of Durthu to her entreaties? The spilling of Cyanathair's taint upon Addaivoch?
She would never know.
For the moment Durthu staggered backwards, bellowing in abject confusion? The corrupted captives of the Wildwood had surged forward. The last iota of sanity that they had possessed disappeared in that one instant, swarming against not just Durthu but the dryads of Laurelorn and the elves alongside them. Drycha herself disappeared once more, form flickering from sight amidst the charging spirits.
==========================================
You don't understand a single Gods-damned word that was spoken, if there were any spoken at all, between the Queen of the Asrai and Durthu. All you know is that she had spoken to him, they had conferred in that awful thing that passes for a language before Durthu had stepped over to Coeddil. The booming of your heart had not slowed, and you had without exception ordered your Greatswords to fall back and surround her and keep moving. You kept your sword up at all times. Eldyra had joined you, face stricken but determined. When you first saw the spurting of brackish liquid trickling through the holes punctured into the ice, you had felt a bewildering mixture of horror and fear. How could any liquid still be flowing within that ice? The sight of him bleeding summoned forth utter bleakness in your thoughts. But then Durthu and Ariel had kept talking, and then another voice had come from the trees so compounded in unrestrained anger that you could not help but imagine that was Drycha herself. Bloodglade spoke up next, and all the damned while, you hadn't understood a single word spoken. It was infuriating, but so long as Durthu seemed occupied, then you were fine with not understanding every single thing around you. At this point, your thoughts had narrowed, as had your objectives. It was high time to leave Laurelorn, this was clearly an internal matter between the Asrai and Asur far in excess of what you had agreed to. You watched with bloodshot and unblinking eyes, then, as Durthu and the dryads spoke. Yet even then, you were still somewhat unprepared for the mad rush that followed after that explosion of shadow that sent Durthu stumbling backwards.
Ariel shouts something in one of the elvish dialects, the one word you actually somewhat understand being 'Asrai' just as the tide smashes into the whole of the Pinnacle like a living ocean of wood and spirit-stuff. There is no rhyme or reason, no organization to any of it, just a wild feral rush of creatures large and small. You think you spy Ariel laughing madly as she leaps right into the enemy masses with her spear stabbing and whirling all about her. Many of them climb atop those engaging with the Eternal Guard shieldwall to try and leap behind, others keep extending the flanks further and further to try and get around the elves. Around the left flank entirely, some of them. Which means that they can step onto the Pinnacle without being stopped. Which means they are a direct threat to your wife and the Greatswords standing around her, their attempt to get further away from Durthu putting them directly into harms way. A fourth of the way through the thought you are sprinting forwards, Brain Wounder flashing in the otherworldly light of the Pinnacle and the magic that it both gathers to itself and then thrusts high into the air. The first to make it past are a group of diseased looking dryads, practically constantly vomiting some sort of black and green liquid covered in foul smelling algae out of their gaping mouths. Eldyra is right alongside you, knowing just as well as you do that with the rest of the Asrai engaged you won't be receiving much help at all here.
(Standing Ground: 22+Frederick Martial(19)+Eldyra Martial(20)=61/100)
(The Battle Elsewhere: 65/100)
(The Roar of Battle: 43/100)
Brain Wounder and Death Thorn cut them apart. Even a razor sharp woodsman's axe might struggle to cut its way through the magically hardened hide of a dryad, but before the runework of Alaric the Mad you can cut your way through in a single smooth motion. You have no idea as to the specific power and ability of the ones who crafted Eldyra's sword, but they are priests of a God of Forging and it is one of the finest and deadliest weapons you've ever seen. Just like Brain Wounder, her sword cleaves and stabs its way through a quartet of dryads in the time it takes you to kill two. Eldyra is simply incredible speed and grace, whereas you are in comparison holding an advantage in strength alone. None of the Dryads even get close to the cordon of Greatswords.
Then the second wave comes in just behind them, with fey with enormous stone hammers with them.
Then the third arrives with a pair of tree-kin currently leaking yellowish green fluids from an abundance of sickly looking mushrooms that have grown out of their faces.
Wooden claws more than a foot each in length slam down into your shield with such force you couldn't even begin to stop it, carving deeply into the finely forged elven metal. An upwards swipe of Brain Wounder lops the arm attached to those claws and cuts deeply into the dryad's chest. The angry wood spirit stumbles backwards but is beheaded by Eldyra before it can regain its footing. At the same time, you slam the edge of the shield into another dryad that attempted to leap on the Asur from behind, stomping your foot on top of its own to pin it just long enough to cut into the shoulder and out the pelvis between the legs. What the elf cannot dodge, you block, what you cannot respond in time to, she intercepts or narrowly deflects. But it is not a permanent state of things, as you are continually being forced back by sheer momentum and numbers. Step by step, you are being forced into what is essentially one of the hardest fighting retreats you've ever had. Behind you, the Greatswords ready themselves because despite your best efforts they'll be fighting soon enough.
The fighting is just as intense everywhere else. Durthu disappears under a dog piling of the last of the Wildwood's largest spirits. Treemen bearing the unmistakable mark of Nurgle, a pair of giants made of stone and water, and ogre-sized wolves made of light. The Eternal Guard grit their teeth and stab out with their spears, with the Sisters of the Thorn shredding every foe that dares try and test them. A few bursts of purifying green light are all that can be seen of Ariel, so ensconced as she is by the enemy. As for Drycha or Bloodglade, both of them disappeared early on in the fighting. Dryads of both forests are now engaged in deadly combat with one another, a literal case of nature battling itself in a way you've never seen before. Even where you are, you can hear the howling of Mena's cavalry as they crash into the rear of the Wildwood fey.
(Defensive Fighting: 48+19+20+Greatswords(5)=92/100)
(The Battle Elsewhere: 52+Durthu's Fury(25)=77/100)
(Anarchic Procession: 31/100)
Suddenly, the pressure eases, and it is not hard to see why. You had been forced back, back, and back again. Any further and you'd be pushed into the inner arches of the Pinnacle, and more importantly the enemy would quite literally be at your wife's throat. She's managed to stand again, but the sheer level of exhaustion she's suffering means she's practically defenseless. But because you have been forced back too close to her, all ten of the Greatswords step in to aid in the defense. By simple virtue of ten new swords that can cut and stab their way through the enemy, you manage to halt the crushing momentum. A growing layer of sap begins to coat your front as you cut your way through the dryads, but then there are stranger versions of vitae as well. One fey bleeds what sounds, looks, and feels like steam against your skin, thoroughly reddening it and leaving a lasting stinging pain. Another, some sort of bulbous creature seemingly made entirely out of pumpkins and thorny vines is punctured but once, causing it to release a high pressure blast of wind before deflating entirely. The sheer variety of creatures you've faced makes it easy to see why for many fey and daemons are the same mysterious and awful beings, nightmares told to children and imagined by worried travelers along the road. But this time, the momentum turns in your favor, buoyed as you are by the presence of some of the most elite warriors in Ostland. Step by sap-covered step, you push them back. The zweihander is quite reasonably famous for, if utilized skillfully by a man of sufficient strength, its ability to cleave a fully armored knight in twain in a single blow. Compared to even the mystical and magically enhanced hides of the dryads, there is little comparative contest. Some of them manage to ward off blows, a solid strike of a zweihander somehow leaving not a single mark upon the wood, but the benefit of fighting in a unit is that another zweihander - or Brain Wounder or Death Thorn - intervenes and deals a successful blow instead.
An earthshaking bellow, followed by an awful grinding noise of shattering stone and wood, announces Durthu simply throwing off the five colossi that had piled on top of him. It is a display of strength that can be not just seen out of the corner of the eye but felt just about everywhere. Beings that large are simply not supposed to be thrown into the air like that! It seems like some sort of violation of the laws of reality, but the strength of the Elder Treeman is simply beyond such petty considerations, apparently. He even manage to cut one of the corrupted treemen in half as it falls to the earth in a single upward swing of his massive blade. The rest crash around him, and he begins laying about with his blade before they can even begin to recover. They fight back as best as they can, but it is quite obvious that their own attacks on Durthu are largely ineffectual. At least compared to that strange explosion of shadowy magic which heavily damaged his face. Ariel appears, once more mounted this time, stabbing out around her into the enemy, followed by the Sisters of the Thorn. Blasts of light come from their staves, which also work well as spears for any who get too close to them. Despite the surprise and sheer ferocity of the Wildwood, the Asrai are winning. With grim expressions and consummate skill, they tirelessly kill again and again. Those that fall are pulled back by their fellows, where Sunweaver and the Highweaver can tend to them. A living and moving throne of plant life has appeared, raising Sunweaver above the ground, while the Highweaver still walks on bare feet. In the distance, Mena von Kessel continues to cycle her charges, slamming her cavalry into the rear and then pulling them right back out to a safe distance before turning around and doing it all over again. In truth, she is getting closer and closer to you and the elves every time, as there are quite literally less and less of the Wildwood escapees every time. The dryads of Laurelorn are fully incensed, now, having returned from their conference or at least are now awakened with the presence of Bloodglade, and with them surrounding the enemy in a snarling ring of living wood there is little chance for them to escape. This is no longer, you think, a mission for revenge on Ariel and the Asrai. It might have started as that, but circumstances have turned against them. It might have been a fight for survival, but then they were surrounded and are being torn apart from behind. Now? Now they are fighting to fight, to kill as much as they can before the inevitable happens. They are without fear, and ignore injuries as best they can unless they are actually slain.
Well, fine then. One way or another, the spiteful monsters that escaped the Wildwood are dying today. The only thing left to do is kill as many of them as possible to crush their last stand as best you can.
"Come on and die!" You roar, ducking out of the way of another tree-kin's overhead smash, this time cracking the lower third of the shield to pieces as you do so. "I'll use you as fuel for a fucking distillery's fires!"
"Asuryan!" Eldyra invokes with a savage slash of her sword to cut the arms off of a dryad.
"For Ostland, and the Steel Bull!" Cries Volgar, his zweihander arcing overhead and glinting in the sunlight.
(Extended Execution: 74+19+20+5=118/100)
(The Battle Elsewhere: 24+Durthu's Fury(25)=49/100)
(Spiteful Shadows: 7/100)
Though you have really only just met one another, Eldyra manages to synchronize with you with incredible speed. Not just you, but the Greatswords as well. A seemingly endless wave of enemies spill around the sides of the faltering elven shield wall, all of them coming right at you. Or, perhaps, a fearful thought comes to you, at Natasha. An object of fear and hate to them all. All three elements together are the unstoppable force and immovable object in a single small group. You wish you could peel off some of the Greatswords to go back an help move Natasha elsewhere, perhaps further into the Pinnacle, but you are only able to achieve the carnage you are right now because each of them is in the fight. Without them, pressure alone was forcing you backwards, even with Eldyra here. It is a minor numbers game. Worse, however, is the fact that despite expectations the elves are faltering. They are retreating in good order, one rank back covering the other, but they are being pushed back nonetheless into the greater Pinnacle rather than just on its perimeter. Within a moment there won't be a living elf not standing on the stone flooring of the Pinnacle rather than the churned up earth just outside of it. Durthu doesn't seem to care about any of it, instead just kicking out with his legs, whipping long extended vines that slice through bodies as if it were steel, and wielding his giant weapon to terribly effective extent. But only in his immediate area, without any coordination with the elves themselves. Mena has, by now, been forced to back off somewhat, because for all her battle lust the young woman is not an idiot enough to get within striking range of the treeman lest he turn his fury upon them as well. You can see only little otherwise, your defense is achieved largely by focusing so stringently upon the enemy and cutting them apart. Your personal tally of dryads killed grows higher with every second, and the same for various other fey. The same goes for the others. Instead of slowing the enemy, this only seems to bolster them further!
When a hulking branchwraith appears, it is with shadowy extrusions of its claws, things that appear close to whatever it was that Drycha did that allowed her to strike Durthu so strongly. With a single slash of her claws, your shield practically disintegrates, but you are able to dodge backwards before the tips can actually reach through an tear apart your flesh. As she tries to attack with the other hand, Eldyra is there and has impaled the dryad through the side, sword piercing through and out the other side. Her armored shoulder checks it off balance enough for you to reverse your grip on Brain Wounder one-handed and drag the edge up through the thigh and diagonally upwards before twisting it outward. The light in the branchwraith's eyes disappears as it is killed, and you rear back and punch with your left hand directly into the wooden face of another dryad that had prepared to strike Eldyra while her flank was exposed. Wood crunches at the same time as your knuckles, but it is the dryad that recoils for just long enough for it to be hacked apart by the Greatswords. The stinging in your hand is quickly forgotten as you get back to the fighting, but then you hear something that forces you into a sudden halt, the slack immediately picked up by the others.
"Frederi-mmph!"
The battle fury, the knowledge of impending victory, all of it slips away as horror fills your veins. Your head snaps around, but it feels like you are moving in slow motion all at the same time.
Natasha's arm is outstretched towards you, but the other is pinned at her side, held there in place by a chipped and pitted wooden arm. Her mouth is covered by the palm of a hand with elongated wooden claws, all of her being crushed within the embrace of the being which has her in its clutches. Halfway covered in shadows that are even now bleeding away, Drycha appears, her already inhuman face twisted in abject fury, maw wide and slavering with bubbling sap-spit that sizzles as it hits the ground. Her other hand is large enough to wrap around the lower half of Natasha's face while resting against the side of her throat. The absolute exhaustion she has been left in after channeling with the Pinnacle has left her in such a state that she cannot even visibly struggle against the branchwraith's grip. Burning yellowish green light burns in Drycha's face, the hollows of her eyes where the lights gleam from looking somehow like scorched black bark.
"Natasha!"
The single movement forward you make lasts stops right after it begins as Drycha squeezes her even tighter, drawing out a muffled pain. Your grip grows so tight on Brain Wounder that something in your hand pops. Your world tunnels onto the sight before you, the rest of the world simply blurring out of existence. There are no drums. Only a deep seated chasm of screaming in your mind.
"Let her go!"
But Drycha does not respond. Not to you, at least.
========================================================================================
"DURTHU!"
The voice could not be mistaken. From within her shifting throne of vines, Yhanna Sunweaver turned about from her latest patient, the gashes on his arm already sealing up. There, to Yhanna's horror, stood Drycha with the thing known as Natasha von Hohenzollern in its hands. How had she gotten within the Pinnacle's perimeter!? Yet even as she thought the question, she realized the answer. The Asrai had long propagated and carefully maintained growth of plant life within the Pinnacle, nurturing nature itself to grow in aesthetic symbiosis. That, and the sheer volume of slain dryads carpeting the ground could have easily disguised Drycha's movements in one of the moments where the shield walls had been temporarily overwhelmed. Drycha's scream caught the attention of all, but the majority of them simply could not respond or even acknowledge it. The only reason Yhanna could was because she was not directly on the front lines. Ariel, too, could as she rode atop her mount, glaring angrily at the branchwraith who had helped set this all in motion. But the only one that Drycha seemed to have eyes for was the Elder, who paused in his battle fury to turn. The fey around him had fled, leaving him an island of peace amidst insane violence, retreating from him in any direction that he could. As for the humans and the Asur, Yhanna found herself profoundly disturbed at the expression on Frederick von Hohenzollern's face.
It was an anguished thing of twisted fear and anger messily meshed together, his body having hunched forward more like a beast's than even a barbaric human.
"Look at yourself, look at what you are doing!" Drycha howled in mad grief. "You...you would let this flesh," she jostled the human in her arms, causing an outraged growl to spill from Frederick's lips. "Live?! She is the monstrous abomination who brought winter unending to Coeddil, and you simply walked away from her!"
Durthu only looked at Drycha, which seemed to infuriate the already maddened dryad further.
Even from where she stood, Yhanna could see the terrible wound left upon his face as golden amber bled down to the earth.
How unhinged had Drycha become that she could forget or ignore that it was she that had struck him so?
"You are killing us, when the flesh are slaughtering our brothers and sisters of the wood!" Drycha shrieked, causing her captive to flinch in pain from the volume.
In her distracted state, the humans took a single step forward, but were forced to halt when Drycha's head turned to them and she screamed at them. Bones clicked and creaked as her crushing grip on the human woman's head tightened. Frederick roared in impotent anger, but Drycha only had eyes for Durthu. The rest of the Wildwood fey continued to fight the last fight of their lives, selling themselves dearly upon the elves.
"But you can change this! Stop them!," Drycha trilled in something that was likely meant to be coy but was instead a sibilant yowl. "Coeddil the Cunning, he knew! Surely you can see his truth! You are the last Elder, now! Their king is mad, their Queen is weakened! We can still-,"
Durthu held up his hand, and at that, Drycha became silent.
"You have brought ruin, daughter of the boughs. You have allied with daemons. You were Coeddil's greatest handmaiden," Durthu gestured towards his fellow Elder. "Look at him now." His voice was filled with such painful mourning that great numbers of the elves found themselves crying without quite knowing why. Then he looked back on Drycha, and he groaned with a grave unhappiness. "When there is too much rot within the growth, what is infected must be culled. All of The Forest know this cruel truth. There is no blame to be found in the Asrai, only in myself."
Drycha's entire body seemed to tremble.
"Great one...please..."
But Durthu's voice was firm in its anger.
"Your actions have become a danger to The Forest. You have become a danger to The Forest."
The branchwraith stilled.
"No," she said simply. "You...you are wrong. Coeddil was right, you...you are blind to-to their treachery." The words stuttered their way out of her maw, her body beginning to twitch. "You won't even...you won't even avenge him!"
Frederick was growling something, but Yhanna for some reason could not understand him.
"But I will," Drycha ranted with a fractured serenity. "I will honor him!"
=========================================
There is a scream coming from somewhere. Only distantly do you realize that it is you.
It does not matter how hard you push yourself, your heart thumping, legs and arms pumping, but she is simply too far, and those fucking fingers just too close. Even Eldyra, for all her damned vaunted elven speed and dexterity cannot make it there in time to stop it. For all your strength, you cannot cross that distance in the time it takes for the deed to be done.
All it took was a single smooth swipe of claws. The razor sharp fingertips almost dancing their across the throat.
Natasha's eyes are wide, and locked on yours. But she cannot speak. Her mouth opens, but she cannot make a sound.
Crimson pours forth, painting her in her own blood.
The dryad throws her to the ground so roughly you hear the snap of bone as instinct flickers, one hand thrown outwards while the other clamps down futilely, instantly dyeing the arm up to the elbow red. Feet slam against the earth as the distance between you disappears, your senses deadened to everything else. Nothing else matters, right now, here in this instant. You've scooped her up into your arms, and your chest is splashed with too much blood!
Against your chest, the amulet bounces uselessly, the emerald light locked within it bright but utterly useless to you in this most vital of times. A terrible thought grabs hold of you, to throw it, to smash it, to punish it for daring to even exist! What is the point of it if it cannot do this one simple thing!
The sounds of fighting continuing all around you is muffled by the sheer volume of your heart pounding in your ears, what feels like your very life draining away leaving you colder than the depths of a Kislevite blizzard.
Natasha's face is paler than you've ever seen it, all of her going limp. Frantically, you try to put pressure on the wound, trying with hands thick with callouses and covered in scars to preserve life for once rather than take it. But it isn't working, it isn't going to work. Her mouth opens again, and you see her trying to mouth something, anything, but you just can't understand it. Your mind feels like it has been dumped into the waste channels of the Smokelands, clogged into sludge-like slowness. Her wrist was broken when she was thrown forwards, but even still with it purpling she tries to cup the side of your face. But she is too weak to do even that much, and you find yourself clutching at that hand and holding it to your face for her. Blubbering, you try to say anything, but nothing worthwhile comes. Barely verbalized but stringent, you scream for help again and again. Even your vision of her is growing hot and cloudy, the tears making it hard to see. Then, finally, she can simply struggle no more. You are screaming, screaming, screaming again as she falls against you, eyes still wide open but going glassy as she looks towards the canopy.
When something approaches, you nearly slam your shoulder into them, raising...raising...
When did you drop Brain Wounder?
"Move," is all that Sunweaver says to you as she kneels, staff in one hand with the other covered in healing light. Loops of vines connect her back to the shifting mass of plants which rests just behind her.
You snarl ferally, but when she pushes against you with her dainty little hand, somehow she manages to move you. Weaker than a newborn babe, you collapse backwards as she examines Natasha.
(Regrowth: 50+Throne of Vines(10)+Dawnstone Pinnacle(20)=80/100)
It feels like your heart only just now remembers how to beat properly again as Natasha rapidly blinks, gasping in a wet breath as her throat seals itself. Coughing, she turns to her side and almost vomits out a thick splash of blood that had collected there from the bleeding. Her broken wrist straightens with a series of unnatural pops, the bruises disappearing.
But most importantly, she is alive.
"Natasha," you sob out, crashing to your knees by her side and reaching out again.
"Frederick," she chokes out, reaching right back, your hands coming pressing together at the palms.
You don't say anymore and instead simply indulge in the sight of her beautiful living face. As you do so, the world slowly comes back into focus around you. A loud boom announces Durthu being knocked off of his feet and grappled with by the last two corrupted treemen of the Wildwood on the ground, his sword actually pulled out of his grip and thrown to the side. The elven lines have buckled in numerous places as the dryads are driven into their last fatal frenzy, led principally by the branchwraiths with their various powerful magics that are no doubt enhanced by the Pinnacle. The Sisters of the Thorn have been mauled, as the greatest concentration of the Wildwood's leadership has contested Ariel herself, and there are more than a few Sisters of the Thorn that are lying still against the ground where they have fallen. The Queen in the Woods fights, and fights mightily, even as ravaged and exhausted as she is. But you find it hard to care about any of that. Any of it at all. Instead your gaze shifts left and right over the battlefield, tracking from the direction that Ariel is slowly but surely making her way in, to her likely target.
Drycha has escaped the perimeter of Laurelorn spirits leaving a trail of dead behind her, and is fleeing towards the treeline.
A loud screech announces the arrival of Bloodglade, and then you can scarcely see much more as the two branchwraiths engage in a confused tangle of violence against one another. Within seconds you can tell that the younger branchwraith cannot win, she is simply not as strong or tough or as insane as Drycha is, for all of Bloodglade's outrage.
"Taira!" Sunweaver's shout distracts you before the High Spellweaver of Laurelorn stands, letting Natasha slump slightly in your arms. "See to her."
"But-," the Highweaver's expression is one of pure discontent filtered with disgust, and you feel a searing rage fill you.
A mixture of elven passes out of Sunweaver's mouth and Higheaver Taira's mouth snaps closed, but aside from another ugly look she approaches with only a single shudder as she kneels next to Natasha and begins summoning forth her own magics once more. A cleared throat from behind makes you turn to see Ubel carefully holding Brain Wounder in one hand. The rest of the Greatswords look a large fraction of incensed as you are.
"Natasha, I'm so sorry," you whisper as you hold her close. "I should have been faster, I'm so sorry."
It doesn't matter that you can't cross that many feet that quickly, that no human could without the aid of magic. What matters is that you couldn't save her from that, and it was by luck that the elves deigned to save her.
"Frederick," she says, voice a quiet rasp that forces you to lean in even closer.
"I'm so sorry, damn it, I-,"
"Frederick!" Her hands tighten infinitesimally against your own.
"Yes?"
She struggles to glare at you, and the heat that should be in her eyes is less than a candle's worth.
"Kill that wooden bitch."
Then she is gone, head falling to the side, and for a moment you feel like you have died with her until you feel her still breathing. Slowly, with as much gentleness as you can manage, you let her down onto the ground. She was barely able to be conscious before, and her very soul, let alone her mind and body, will likely take some time to heal from everything she has gone through thus far. It is all too much, too much for her body no matter what she might have wished. A deep inhale fills your chest with the cool air of the forest, heated by dying breaths and war cries but chilled by the ice summoned within it all the same. Slowly, you find yourself standing upright, chest now covered in your own wife's blood along with the sap and life fluids of wood spirits and fey alike. Without a word you open your hand and have Brain Wounder placed into it, your hand clenching tightly around the hilt. Exhaling the held breath you turn until you are facing the rest of your Greatswords, and Eldyra as well who is both relieved and frustrated, at least going by her expression. Sunweaver watches you warily, leaning slightly on her staff. Around you, the battlefield as shifted once more. Ariel has taken to the air, at least briefly, in short but powerful hops she is pushing herself into the air and advancing on Drycha quickly, but has left her handmaidens behind and is continually getting bogged down in the fighting. Durthu is still dealing with the rest last of the larger fey, now finding corrupted tree-kin and other large but not fully giant beasts at his legs, his sword still just out of reach. Bloodglade is losing, a yowl escaping her as one of her wooden arms is cut off and thrown to the side, yet she still fights on. The elven lines have buckled, badly, and Ariel is no longer leading them properly, though some of her Sisters of the Thorn are trying to rally the Asrai. Not that they need to, truly, but it will help lower Asrai casualties in the long run.
At the end of the day, the Battle of the Dawnstone Pinnacle, of Laurelorn, can only end in one way. It is now just a measure of how complete or incomplete it might be at its full conclusion.
"Count Hohenzollern?"
Your breathing is remarkably slow and measured, all things considered. But you have been pushed, in this moment, just beyond the frantic heaving of before. The anger in you has reached a level of such scorching heat that it doesn't even burn anymore, leaving you in something distantly approaching numb but not quite, a level that is imperceptible not because of its weakness but because you no sense you have is equipped of properly registering it anymore.
"Count?
Blinking once, you look at your Greatswords.
"What are your orders?"
You cannot countenance leaving her unprotected. The elven lines are buckled, but not fully broken.
"Natasha goes to the ice, it's the furthest point from the fighting and the fey revile it."
You ignore the pained expression on the Asrai's face. She will follow her superior's orders or else.
"You will stay with her, and protect her on all sides."
All of them open their mouths, and with a look they shut them again.
"Go. Now."
You deeply inhale and exhale once more, eyes unblinking at the vista of combat before you.
Trait Regained: Engine of Rage - There are higher peaks of fury meant to be beyond mortal ken...but you can see them from here. (+3 Martial, -1 Diplomacy, -1 Intrigue)
"Okay."
Choose (1):
6 Hour Moratorium.
[] Durthu - Impossibly ancient, unfathomably powerful. Has decided upon Drycha as a threat. If he were fully free to act, he would crush her easily. But first one would have to get to him, and then aid him.
[] Ariel - Wild, unrestrained, focused on killing the last ringleader of the Wildwood escapees. Bogged down by chaff, but powerful nonetheless. Her sheer mobility makes it difficult to aid her, but would prove valuable in chasing down your target.
[] Bloodglade - The younger dryad is losing, but she fights on to try and defeat the one that invaded her forests. The immediate path, the most dangerous path. But, if Bloodglade falls, then Drycha escapes.
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taovkool
Forever Gone
- Location
- The Library, Department of General Works
Motherfucker.
That's it. The wooden bitch dies.
For Natasha.
What are we choosing here again? A POV change? An ally assistance?
...Drama Dice...curse you for giving me Heart Attacks!!!
My guess is that we choose whom to help and who will help us in Turn to kill Drycha.
Oh man, that is a worrying note to start reading the update on.
taovkool
Forever Gone
- Location
- The Library, Department of General Works
Ah, in that case, my vote goes to the Bloodglade.
It says here that it was faster than the other routes. Screw reinforcements, the faster Fred gets his hands on that bitch's neck, the better.
Ganurath
Literal Enthusiast
- Location
- A Valid Location
- Pronouns
- He/Him
You're too kind. Durthu killing her would be the most painful for her, emotionally.
The latter. I'll edit the options to make it more obvious. All 3 are currently engaged. All 3 would (or are) try (or tying) and take down Drycha if they could (or are already currently trying).
taovkool
Forever Gone
- Location
- The Library, Department of General Works
It also has the added benefit of helping out Bloodglade who is now currently overwhelmed by the enemy. Durthu and Ariel seemed like they could take care of themselves. Bloodglade dying, on the other hand, would be absolutely bad for the battle.