[center][h3]Ancestral Farmstead[/h3]
[b]Level 5 Tora[/b] - (34/50) EXP and [b]Level 4 Poppi[/b] - (32/40) EXP 
[b]Tora Stress:[/b] 95/100 and [b]Poppi Stress[/b]: 35/100
[b]Location:[/b] the Land of Adventure
[b]Word Count:[/b] 969[/center]

In defiance of the hypnotizing whirl of the emerald heavens, the battle against the Brachydios continued. Finally stirred from his paralysis, Courier 6 acknowledged a newly-reactivated augmentation and prepared himself for a daring maneuver. While Geralt, the Cadet, and Euden kept the monster busy, he used his bird and both his strikers to boost himself sky-high, then kicked himself into overdrive. A blur of gunsmoke and muzzle flash, he pounded the surprised Brachydios with slug after slug. His bullets pierced scale, flesh, and the muscle beneath, and the monster howled. A moment later the Courier touched the ground, disoriented and unstable, but his foe was in no place to respond and Bastion picked up where he left off. 

Flying into a blind rage, the Brachydios charged at his metal assailant and bulled into Bastion head-on. Unable to avoid the collision Bastion vanished on the spot, but his brutal fusillade made its mark on the beast. The others seized the chance to capitalize on the monster's outburst, starting with the Cadet, who slung his clutch claw at its hide to latch on and zoom in for a wild ride. Suddenly aware of its unwanted burden, the Brachydios started to struggle, trying to force the Ace Cadet off. Meanwhile, Euden rushed in, leaped up, and came down with a fiery plunging attack into the monster's tail. His blade bit through it, but it didn't leave behind a great cleft, and its blaze bore no visible effect. The Brachydios swung its tail, but while Euden dodged backward, Geralt pushed forward. Picking his moment after its momentum stopped, the Switcher swung full-power and finished where Euden left off, slicing the appendage off in a spray of blood. Another bellow heralded the achievement, and the monster bucked wildly, stomping this way and that as it scattered explosive slime. A globule stuck to Euden, who -having seen both Bowser's punishment and the Cadet's struggle- dove to the ground and hurriedly rubbed it off in the gray dirt. 

On the other side of the battlefield, the Thing from the Stars reveled in the haunting halflight of its new environs. Looming like impending doom, it prepared to strike Bowser Jr again, only for a little, patchwork thing to stand in its way. Tendrils of darkness snaked into the ground, hidden for a moment, before rising beneath the Thing en masse. Its manifold, insalubrious arms lashed and clawed at the twisted flesh, and when their beating proved ineffective, they ensnared the thing in a crushing embrace. The Thing, however, wasn't the only problem on the field; the farmhands, spurred on by the state of the Thing, had regrouped and were pushing forward. Kamek summoned Dry Bones to find them off, while Linkle devoted her full attention to them. New husks made themselves known, including a couple [url=https://gamepedia.cursecdn.com/darkestdungeon_gamepedia/thumb/4/48/Foreman.png/755px-Foreman.png?version=e294498ecf89d042a0a8850df8166645]foremen[/url] Stirring the Rabble to hit harder and striking from afar with vicious whips. [url=https://gamepedia.cursecdn.com/darkestdungeon_gamepedia/thumb/8/8a/Scarecrow_Claw.png/600px-Scarecrow_Claw.png?version=0e42cc947897dadfb2ba59991ccad0b1]Scarecrows[/url] also floated among their ranks, their hollow keening instilling a virulent Horror into those who heard it. Tora and Poppi, having rejoined the fight, winced at their terrifying faces but forged onward, fighting with all they had to keep the husks away.

[center][i]Everyone takes 10 Stress damage from the Scarecrows.[/i][/center]

Even with its enemies divided, the Thing was stalled long enough for a true avenger to appear, one empowered by red-hot, righteous fury after seeing his beloved son laid low. Despite his wounds Bowser thundered onto the scene and assaulted the Thing from the Stars with reckless abandon. His claws, both energy and real, gouged into its protected meat, and his blows smashed it in. The Centurion followed him into the fray, striking low as a whirlwind of punches and slices in a mad bid to bleed it out while Bowser went high. The Thing struck back, surging with sidereal lightning in the color of madness, but its frenzied assailants would not relent. 

[center][i]Grounded heroes take 15 Stress damage from Return to the Stars. Airborne heroes take 25[/i][/center]

The battle reached a fever pitch. Bowser and Agoston attacked wildly, their for the only thing in existence, every cell in their bodies screaming for its absolute destruction. Linkle, Kamek, Tora, Poppi, Hat Kid, and the others staged a desperate offensive against the husks, madly beating back husk after husk, and all the while the stress mounted.  Finally, something broke. Something essential. The sound, a single note of clarity in the chaos, rang across the battlefield, and the Thing's mephitic flesh sagged.

Limp, useless meat turned gray and stony as it sloughed off, falling to the ground. Along with it went the crystals, becoming clear and soft as the color left them. A great mass of the color welled up, bunching into one mass of madness that hummed and shook in the air before shooting skyward all at once. The lunatic ray cut through the void of green, the night sky surging back to replace the trappings of another dimension. Finally the color departed in a brilliant flash, but as it rose, a singular portion of the color fell back to earth, like a climber slipping from a precipice, and bled into the hilltop's soil.

The husks remained, as did the color, but the beast was gone, as was much of the farmhands' vigor. Slain for now, but it would live again in another time, another place. Nestled in the middle of the grotesque [url=https://gamepedia.cursecdn.com/darkestdungeon_gamepedia/thumb/8/88/Thing_Dead.png/575px-Thing_Dead.png?version=fcd88afc8f02440bc61105770a206822]mass[/url] it left behind was its spirit, the chilling visage of the Thing from the Stars.

Tora went limp, falling flat on his back. His nerves were brutalized, and his head swam with the color. Dazed, reeling, and about to break, he could fight no more. Poppi knelt be his side, holding him close.