[hr][hr][center][img]https://i.imgur.com/V7rv2Qs.png[/img][/center][hr][hr][center][color=808080][i][b]Present:[/b] Esmii [@BlackRoseSiren], Oksana [@Ti], Yuliya [@Suicharte], Marz [@Th3King0fChaos], Yvain [@jasbraq], Roslyn [@Fallenreaper], Khaliun [@YummyYummy], Sven, and Penny[/i][/color][/center][hr][hr][center][h1][color=F4A460]The Aftermath  ||  [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGmmjZe5BMc&list=PLpV28ONBH95SsjGpQEVhLeLhBFn7MZ95a&index=2][color=F4A460]♫[/color][/url][/color][/h1][/center]
	[color=C0C0C0]It was, simply put, a brawl. Even as the Hegelans fought their way out of confinement, the world above shook with magic and fury. It all came to a head with a crazed hegumen losing control of an atomic blast when he found himself once again cut off from his ability to use magic. It was only a momentary lapse, but it was enough to unleash further devastation across the surrounding countryside. 

	Kirimansk was not spared either. If those strong in the Gift were able to resist the incredible force of the explosion, those not were - as usual - helpless amid the collateral of their magical betters’ clash. Some hundred fifteen souls perished in one fell instant, but the heroes stood triumphant, the tyrannical enemies vanquished at their feet. At least a dozen of the monks - false and true - lay dead around them and about a third of the monastery of St. Artyom lay in ruins. Some people embraced each other or the newly-recovered Marz. Some celebrated.

	Sven flopped onto his back, laughing, crying - his emotions in turmoil. Esmii fell to the ground beside him and embraced him. The enormous lad thrust one arm in the air and stretched out his middle finger. [color=385403]“And [i]fuck[/i] you one more time.”[/color] He shook his head, lying there, adrenaline still coursing through him. [color=F7976A]“Yeah, fuck you!”[/color] agreed Penny. Esmii stuck her middle finger up in the yanii way. Yuliya chimed in with a few words in Vossoriyan and Oksana joined her. It was cathartic. It was a desperate sort of relief, and Sven recognized it as such. He was alive: alive and well - and so was Esmii, but how many others had died because they had picked a fight with some very bad people? Would it have been better to step aside? Marz and a few dozen other hegelans were now outside, blinking, stretching, glancing uneasily up at the sky. The monks that had survived were being rounded up by the mountain-dwellers. Some turned tail and ran. Some accepted their fate.

	Penny sat on the ground as well, ‘cross-legged’. She leaned back and took a few deep breaths. People were already healing each other and she would assist as needed. It was a binder’s sacred duty, after all. First, however, she just… breathed, feeling her lungs fill, the life that yet carried on in her chest. Yet, it was unsatisfying. Looking over at Sven and Esmii, she was - as she had often been during this week and a half - keenly aware of Ashon’s absence and the danger he was likely in hunting that vile beast in Kerremand. More than that, though, it was the smell: there was dust and fire in the air. For all that she lived, other people’s stories had ended, in sudden flashes of fear and pain that they had been helpless against. The past year had taught her to not give a damn about those who initiated violence - she had sent a dozen or more to hell by her own hand and would continue to do so as was her divine prerogative - but the innocents had done nothing. To callously employ magics that killed indiscriminately… She started to gather herself.

	Then, a shadow fell across her and the perrenchwoman looked up, shielding her eyes from the late afternoon glare. It was Marz, and while he stood closest to her, he addressed them all. [color=933A16]“Aye, take yer moment,”[/color] he allowed, [color=933A16]“I reckon’ ye’ve earned it. We all ‘ave, but it’s only fer a moment.”[/color] A few of the other hegelans nodded somberly, and one - a great, grizzled giant of an older man - spoke up. [color=yellow]“They’ve been keepin’ us in there, working underground.”[/color] He sniffed and glanced about at the scenes of devastation nearby, muttering under his breath momentarily. [color=yellow]“Workin’ on chaos marble weapons.”[/color]

[hr][hr][center][h1][color=F4A460]The Enemy Moves  ||[/color]  [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrjwSsTailQ][color=F4A460]♫[/color][/url][/h1][/center][hr][hr]
	Marz turned the weapon in his hands over a couple of times as the other hegelans and then his fellow students looked its way. [color=933A16]“An’ there’s a lot more where they came from,”[/color] he confirmed. 

	Khaliun floated quietly nearby, her two mercenary companions no more than a couple of yards distant. The light of the setting sun burned vast and golden-orange behind her. Yvain crossed his arms. [color=00e600]“And, correct me if I’m wrong, but we still haven’t found the boxes that we came here for.”[/color] 

	[color=pink]“I think is safe we can say they are ones with anti-magic device, no?”[/color]

	Penny, brow furrowed, clambered to her feet and nodded. [color=f7976a]“If we can use magic again, we can use that to track them, right?”[/color] She nodded further, recalling. She glanced about, realizing that she was the only one who had been part of last year’s clandestine operation on Isla d’Amato. [color=F7976A]“Last year,”[/color] she admitted, [color=F7976A]“I was called by the late Paradigm -”[/color] She quickly made the sign of the Pentad. [color=F7976A]“To undertake a... task. There, we encountered… items similar to these. When active, they would give off a very particular sonic and magnetic signature.”[/color] It was burned into her memory and there was no forgetting the feel of it: how she had nearly died, how those horrid [i]snake[/i] people that the others so loved had kept her locked up and isolated, how they had turned those infernal devices on, how they had done it again and again. [color=F7976A]“I can recognize it. I can track it. If I’m within sensing range, I can lead you there.”[/color]

	 [color=385403]“But the shchool wants us to retrieve theshe thingsh?”[/color] Sven retorted. He shook his head, unafraid to question authority. [color=385403]“I shay they’re a weapon of terror. We should deshtroy them.”[/color]

	Yuliya pursed her lips and nodded. [color=pink]“You know what? I agree with him.”[/color] She glanced about. [color=pink]“How many people still alive if these things are not here?”[/color]

	Penny, once again, found herself disagreeing with her friend. [color=f7976a]“Guys,”[/color] she interjected amid the burgeoning consensus, [color=f7976a]“We’re forgetting something.”[/color]

	[color=00e600]“And that is…?”[/color] Yvain pushed off from the wall he’d been leaning against.

	[color=ebe7a3]“We don’t know who made them,”[/color] Roslyn interjected. [color=f7976a]“Or where they came from,”[/color] Penny agreed. [color=f7976a]“And if they’re still out there, they’ll just make more.”[/color]
	
	Marz nodded uneasily, stroking his scruffy beard. [color=933A16]“Aye, and we should be ready.”[/color] He scowled.

	[color=dcf3ff]"Yes, and magic keeps going in and out now!"[/color] Oksana chimed in, sharing the others' concern. With so many speaking and so quickly, it had been difficult for her to keep up, but she'd caught that much. Penny nodded. [color=ebe7a3]“I mean, it's an improvement,”[/color] Roslyn offered, [color=ebe7a3]“but also another mystery we should probably get to the bottom of.”[/color]	

	[color=933A16]“Ehhh, eheh."[/color] Marz scratched at the back of his head, a bit sheepish, but proud, nonetheless. [color=933a16]"That was... actually the lo’ of us."[/color] He gestured towards his fellow mountain-dwellers. [color=933A16]“[i]This[/i] wondrous thing -”[/color] He gestured towards an arm-sized mechanism held by a rather heavyset fellow, who smiled at the compliment and blushed. [color=933A16]“Not you, yeh tub o' lard!"[/color] he barked, and a few of them laughed. [color=933A16]“The device. It's an anti-anti-magic device, I guess yeh could call it."[/color] He shook his head and another hegelan interjected. [color=orange]"Needs a better name."[/color] Marz waved him away dismissively. [color=933A16]“I know, I know, alright!?"[/color] He turned back to the others. [color=933A16]“Anyhow, Thah's what's been givin' yeh yer magic back in fits n' starts."[/color] He posted hsi hands on his hips matter-of-factly. [color=933A16]“And if we could manage somethin' like that in secret, in a Gods-damned prison, then I give us a damn good shot o' reverse-engineering one o’ them things an’ finding an even prettier way teh counter it.”[/color]

	Yvain crossed his arms again. [color=00e600]“Impressive,"[/color] he admitted, nodding along, [color=00e600]"But isn’t it all a bit of a moot point when this town is [i]crawling[/i] with Volti and their hired thugs?”[/color] He looked to Yuliya for support. [color=00e600]“Have we not forgotten that she and I were accosted and nearly [i]murdered[/i] by them?”[/color]

	Not quite facing the perrenchman, Sven rolled his eyes. [color=385403][i]Hard to forget when you’ve reminded us at least three times already,[/i][/color] he thought, but he said nothing. 
	
	[color=pink]"Is true,"[/color] she confirmed. [color=pink]"They need death."[/color]

	Esmii passed a concerned look around. [color=purple]“We can’t just forget about the chaos marbles,”[/color] she reminded them, and the hegelans nodded in chorus. [color=purple]“I’ve seen what they can do and it’s... terrifying.”[/color]

	[color=gray]“We need get them,”[/color] an elder hegelan rasped in half-way passable Avincian. [color=gray]“We need break them.”[/color]

	[color=00e600]“And who here can handle a chaos marble?”[/color] Yvain asked, glancing at Khaliun’s hammer. [color=00e600]“I know of two.”[/color] Penny and Yuliya glanced at each other. [color=f7976a]“I think Yuliya and I can,”[/color] the former advised. [color=f7976a]“Maybe we should split,"[/color] she continued. [color=f7976a]"At least two who can handle the marbles with our hegelan friends to lead them. The rest with me to find the crates.”[/color]

	[color=ebe7a3]“To destroy them?”[/color] Roslyn asked pointedly, still aware that they were not necessarily all on the same page.

	Then, Khaliun spoke her first words since the encounter. [color=78CBE8]“They’re moving,”[/color] she said simply, raising her mighty weapon with the help of kinetic magic. [color=pink]“Who?”[/color] Yuliya prodded, shaking her head. [color=pink]“Always I tell this girl, say full sentence! She never listen.”[/color]

	The tethered tilted her head to the side. [color=78CBE8]“The Volti.”[/color] She blinked. [color=78CBE8]“Dozens of them.”[/color][/color]
[hr][hr][center][h1][color=F4A460]Action Opportunities  ||[/color]  [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxYkYgXrksM][color=F4A460]♫[/color][/url][/h1][/center][hr][hr]
	[color=C0C0C0][i]Welcome to the penultimate chapter of Cold Comfort! Our group of students has not only managed to finally reunite with the recently-escaped Marz, they have also become aware of the anti-magic device managed to survive the battle with the crazed abbot and the false monks of the Order of St. Artyom. However, the town of Kirimansk has once again paid a heavy price. As the ten youths weigh whether or not that was worth it, a new opportunity and a potentially deeper crisis present themselves, intertwined: The hegelans reveal that they were kidnapped from their homes specifically for the purpose of crafting a weapons using the terrifying power of chaos marbles. There is, in fact, an entire arsenal of the things hidden within the sacred caves. The anti-anti-magic device (better name pending) that they have developed will allow people within about a three hundred yard bubble to use magic normally, even within an anti-magic zone. Doing so, they may finally be able to find the crates that they were sent here for. What they do when that comes to pass remains up in the air and very much undecided. First, they need to get there, and [i]fast[/i]. Before any further discussion can take place, Khaliun reveals that she has sensed multiple forms moving in a coordinated manner. She believes these to be agents of the infamous terrorist group known as the Dieci Volti Nascosti, one of whose members assaulted and nearly murdered Yuliya and Yvain a few days earlier. The clock is ticking and now things become a desperate race against time and a well-ensconced enemy with considerable resources as well as nebulous motivations and potentially hidden power. Before any action may be taken, the group must decide:

[indent][b]OOC:[/b] Where each of them stand on what to do with the boxes and chaos marbles.
[b]IC:[/b] Where each of them stand on the boxes and chaos marbles.
[b]IC:[/b] How they'll be splitting themselves as a group, if at all, and how they'll approach the Dieci Volti agents at work throughout the city.[/indent]
Best of luck and happy posting! Most of this will be handled in our discord server, aside from your main forum posts. I expect that a good deal will be played out live this coming Saturday.[/i][/color]