Illarion.org

((open RP))


Sian grunted as he dug deeper into the ground, his head was regularly ducking down below ground level and back up above it slightly, while he hunched in the muddy pit and a shovel occasionally peeked out top, hurling another heap of dirt straight out. Two gauntlet-clad hands thumped as they hit the turf on the hole's edge and he climbed out of the hole.

'I will never be like Darlok,' echoed words of Aristeaus in his head like a memory he couldn't push back far enough into the dark recesses of his memory.

Moments later, he began dumping countless bones and rusty weapons and armor pieces from the vanquished undead into the pit, causing some ruckus and loud noises to echo through the southern forest, not far away from the Monastery. He emitted a deep sigh as he tossed a last femur into the pit and onto the pile of skeletal remains and sat at the pit's edge, taking his pipe and striking his flint over the last bit of Sibanac that Moskher Hezche had given him in the tavern earlier that day.

'Because Darlok lost,' the man had told him, a familiar heart-warming smile about his lips.

Inclining his head wearily, his sadness-stricken pale blue eyes gazed up into the cloudy, colorless sky and he blew out a thin stream of smoke that seemed to melt into the clouds overhead if seen through his eyes.

He looked back down at the pile of destroyed skeletons in the grave he had dug for them, puffing out some more smoke from his pipe before he gently grabbed the pipe from his mouth and spoke calmly down to them.

"May you rest in peace, and in the name of Tanora, may your stones be light and few when you face your final passage."

He somberly stared at the pile and puffed out another thick cloud of smoke before he rose in fatigue to standing over the grave, bending down with the screech of his rusty armor, and grabbing the shovel again. With another grunt he began to shovel the dirt he had unearthed into the pit, piling it up over the remains. Occasionally, the head of the pipe protruding from the corner of his lips lit up, illuminating his face and thus giving his icy blue irises an eery glow. Smoke poured from his nostrils shortly after, and minutes later the grave was just but a mound of fresh soil somewhere in the woods.

He wiped some sweat off his forehead with the steel on the back of his hand, leaving another scratch in the roadmap of scars that was his face, and drove the shovel into the ground, leaving it there as if to mark the nameless grave, then walked from there to a spot under a pine tree's branches, just before first raindrops began to drizzle from the sky. Sitting down next to a highly over-sized steel halberd, he leaned back against the treetrunk and struck his flint over the pipe again, lighting it anew.

Sian's eyes closed slowly and his face was illuminated again, this time by a lightning bolt across the horizon far off in the distance, and the whole scenery was orchestrated by a thunderclap and more of the element rumbling and rolling from far away. The sound of some twigs snapping in the brush somewhere behind him erupted, but the twenty-odd-something year-old human youth seemed oblivious of it, puffing out some more smoke. Until...

It was clear that more skeletons had neared their victim: Sian sitting prone, hunched a bit by the tree-trunk, and he stood up with a sigh and weary attribute to his motion, finally opening his eyes and looking up at the undead nearing him slowly, carefully; as if retaining their wariness from former life. Icy blue eyes scanned over the three deformed figures as bones clicked and crackled, rusty armor and weapons screeched and cawed like ravens. Otherwise it was silent, aside from the rain picking up in strength and volume, coating the woods in a numbing peace and natural serenity.

A raindrop hit square into the head of the youth's pipe, and extinguished its burning, upon which he took the pipe from his mouth and tossed it to a spot on the ground nearby his bag, his other hand instinctively grabbing the metal shaft of the heavy halberd. Only meters seperated the undead and him, and he heaved the halberd around, defying his own lack of strength to lift it properly—the mere motion of equipping it seemed to throw the wiry frame of the armored youth off balance—then kicking the shaft of the weapon to deliver more momentum, finally swinging it up and jousting it into the air, causing it to land on his shoulderplate with a loud "clank" of metal hitting metal, and gripping the weapon firmly in his right hand. His left twitched by his side in anticipation, and he squinted his left eye shut to aim.

The skeletons seemed to pause that moment as if insecure upon how to act next, and Sian's short black hair began to drape down and stick against his forehead in the growing downpour of rain. He slowly closed his eyes, and nothing happened.

When one of the undead made its move, an ungodly howl cried out into the air with a supernatural delay while the air itself was divided by the head of the massive halberd swinging through its midst. A wide diagonal circle glared up in the gloomy forest, the reflection on the axehead of the halberd beaming in the remnants of daylight and twilight together. And it was all concluded by white dust and metal shrapnel raining down before Sian, a cloud of turf was hurled into the air, and the halberd had driven itself deep into the grounds. Pieces of what was left of the skeletons rained down sadly, hitting the ground apart from eachother. None of the three undead stood anymore, and Sian emitted another wistful sigh and let his hand hang, eyes again both closed; while he remained somewhat hunching over the weapon's shaft—it had thrown him out of balance as always when he used it, and he was on one knee within the mud, feeling the raindrops pearl off his chin like tears, while he listened to the storm going on around him.

"Just one; just one last fight; just," Sian muttered to himself, feeling weaker than ever.

"Great, truly great!"

The voice of a female can be heard near the monastery and a shadow shoos fast through the trees.

A young woman appears on the path that leads towards Trolls Bane. Her trouser and her white, slightly torn up linen shirt are drenched from the rain. Wet strands of her short, light brown hair are sticking at her face and she doesn't wear a cloak or a bag, but a sword belt.

She just wants to turn on the path to run towards Trolls Bane, as a skeleton shows up from near the prison and follows her.

"What the...ack!", Bailey unsheathes her sword and turns to the skeleton, though she knows that she doesn't wear any armour.
She parries the first hit from the skeleton and tries in a desperated hit to chop it's head off, but fails.
"Dammit!" she yells and fights with skeleton, seemingly inferior.

Sian's head jolted up, but his eyes remained closed. Had he heard a yell? The moment he heard the familiar sound of the clash of steel, his eyelids fluttered open, and with a gasp of agony his back arched violently in attempt to pull the halberd from the ground. However, it took a second try and tug; he grit his teeth, and doubled the weapons momentum of swinging by slamming an armored kneecap into the shaft, causing it to swing in another high vertical arch and land on his shoulder. He scoffed under the pain of the sheer weight of the halberd pressuring his spine and his torso immediately arched, causing his shoulders to hunch and the rusty plate parts to screech again under the impact of the weapon. He almost slipped and tumbled to the ground in a patch of soil turned to mud as he squinted his eyes to spot where the ongoing melee was taking place.

Finally the woman and the skeleton were focused on, two blurry figures in a rainy haze. He breathed heavily as he observed. Flashes of reflections cast off of blades through the gloomy grey twilight. Suddenly, he charged off towards the entangled duo, covering the distance in seconds merely, and lept through a bush, then shattering a cobblestone of the road with an armored boot in the wake of his landing behind the skeleton—effectively encircling it in between himself and the young woman.

"Run to town m'lady!" shouted Sian, and his left hand sprung out to grip the metal handle of the halberd like the right gauntlet had already been doing. His left eye winced shut as he took his aim at the skeleton's ribcage and his wiry muscles tensed, as if apprehending the motion that was to follow shortly...

Bailey takes a step backwards, just to get some space for readying herself.

"I don't run from a fight!"
She parries another hit from the skeleton as it's bones fall apart, splitted by the mans axe.

Bailey lowers her sword and takes a deep breath. The shirt she wears got another tear at her left upper arm, and the linen slowly drenches there with blood and rain.
She closes her eyes for a moment as she recognizes the pain, but finally directs her attention to the man in front of her. "Thank you..."

Sian was down on one knee again, the halberd plunged into the forest ground, and his back and shoulderplates heaved up and down with deep, raspy, heavy breathing. The weight of the weapon was obviously too much to handle for his rather feminine build, swinging the weapon from his shoulder and into the skeleton had thrown him off completely yet another time. His head hung low, eyes widened as if in shock, staring blankly at the ground. The old black orcish gauntlets still gripped the halberd tightly, and their metal still creaked achily under a truly tense grip around them; just as if he had to force himself to let go now.

Slowly, and with fatigue spreading through his appearance, his back arched again as he drew the halberd from the ground, straining every muscle in his entire body, and clearly audible, gritting his teeth so hard that is sounded like they were just about to crack inside his mouth. The weapon truly seemed to betray him in the sense of its very weight. It was visibly clear that its mass was overwhelming for Sian.

Still on a knee, he lunged upwards and flung the halberd back, adding a kick into the metal shaft to swing it up onto his shoulder again. Once more he hunched under the weight of the weapon, his rusty old black half-plate creaking and screeching unnervingly all the while with every even slightest movement, but this time he staggered a bit under the weapon, only barely managing to stay standing. His shoulderplates still cried with rust while they heaved and indicated that he was still out of breath, when he finally rose his head to look the woman in the eyes. His gaze scanned briefly over the injury on her arm and then up until their gazes met. Then he shook his head, and a wholehearted smile formed upon his scarred face—surprisingly—as seconds ago he had only had a mixture of determination and panic written on it.

"Nothing to thank for m'lady, I consider it a duty as a Novice to aid a fellow human in distress," he spoke a bit raspily, thereupon clearing his throat. But in his eyes, betraying that smile of his, was still a sadness that lacked the words for description.

The cut at her arm doesn't seem so deep that a simple bandage wouldn't do it.

Bailey examines the man in front of her closely with her brown eyes that reminds on a deer. Her breath slowly calms down and her lips are forming to an honest smile. Some raindrops run over her face, but it doesn't seem to disturb her.

"You are the first novice I meet who wears armour and a weapon", she nods towards the axe. "Quite a massive weapon too. I guess I couldn't even swing it.", she smiles gently at him.

A hint of surprise sneaks into his face but quickly dodges for an even wider, now toothy smile.

"I can hardly swing it myself, truth be told 'tis more of a memoire of old times," he replied, readjusting the weapon on his shoulder, shifting its weight so he could stand further upright in front of her, stifling a gasp of pain caused from a sting in his spine that ached under the weapon's weight.

"And it might be your first time to meet a Novice of Tanora who's without a lizard-like tail and scales," he continued, his lips curling even further into a feline smile. "As for the armor, 'tis simply means of protection on my quest of spreading peace under," he paused for a moment, his face dimming a bit in the break, then smiling again, "adverse conditions."

The rain did not seem to disturb him either, although he ran his gauntlet-clad left hand through his raven-black hair, causing it to stand up like a messy patch of spikes on top of his head.

"If you give me a moment to grab my bag, I'll gladly accompany you back to the town m'lady."

"You can call me Bailey. And yes, I would be glad if you accompany me back", she smiles.

She rips of the sleeve from the already teared shirt and binds the cloth around the wound of her upper arm with one hand and her teeth.

"I'm ready, if you are."


((and if you want we can continue ingame ;) ))