[IC] Knights of The Dawn Covenant: The Longest Winter

[Zelosse]

Marcus wasn't about to let a trap take both of them, even as the floor cracked he tried to get the dwarf out but it all happened too fast. The floor gave way in an instant, falling rocks accompanied the fall but Marcus was the one mainly struck by the falling debree, using the last of his footing to toss Glodin a little further up so they wouldn't both tumble together. Both had sharp things, and neither wanted to accidentally feel how sharp. The walls were coated in a slime coating that made stopping the fall impossible, not that he didn't try, taking out a skinning knife and stabbing into the wall in an attempt to slow his fall but the blade could find no purchase going this fast on the slick walls.
With a thud and a groan he hit the ground hard, Glodin slammed into him soon after in a tangle. Thankfully neither were seriously harmed by the impact.
A few moments of dazed confusion accompanied the slow rise to his feet, holding his head with a hiss as a small cut bled into his eye. "Kest don't do that. They swarm, not cage.." He took a moment to look around, a dungeon obviously, but one that housed humanoids? These people had been alive at some point and not turned to food for the broodlings. Stranger and stranger behaviour. Not good. Marcus drew his pistol and fired 3 small pellets of light instead of the usual beam of searing fire. They hit the tunnel wall in a puff of black smoke but revealed a bit of what they had come through.
A soft groan caught his ears and he turned with pistol leading, eyes scanning the dark room but was totally blind in the dark. "Glodin, you're up. There's flint in my bag. Make us a torch please. You're the only one who can see down here." He reached into his pouch and produced the flint from memory, holding it out. Pistol still at the ready for the sound of more bugs.

--------------------------------

Bartuc didn't scream as they fell but instead managed to keep his balance throughout the slide, as they hit the bottom he took a leap to clear the debree and landed in a small roll to come up on his feet in fighting readiness, eyes scanning the room for threats. Everything about this room assaulted his senses. Dead women, dead templars, corpses of every race and even kest. Blood circles, cultist grimoires, horrible smells and sights. Bartuc swallowed his disgust and brought his crimson fire to life across his shoulders to act as a human torch further illuminating the cave room. "By the gods.." He mumbled, taking in the grotesque sight.
Bartuc spat on the ground and turned to the others, and Ruinil, to see if they were ok.

[Snarfulblast]

"SHITZE!" Karl slid down the tunnel neatly landing at the bottom in what appeared to be a necromancers lab. Standing up Karl walks over to Landell,"What's that?" Looking at the notebook Karl opens it finding notes about something he didn't understand, motioning Henry over he showed him the notebook,"You understand any of this?" Karl left the note book on the table and walked over to one of the bodies eye's scanning and searching it, then in a small fit of rage Karl brings his blade down on the chain dropping the corpse to the ground."Dam these Kest and their twisted minds! We should destroy this place and their research." Karl begins breaking everything in the room.

[Ace of flames01]

Mood: http://youtu.be/i5Kwf_nNmGI

One moment Ruinil was in a deadlock with a kest, then she found herself sliding down a hidden escape shaft, which was coated with a slimy residue that she could only assume to be kest mucus. In an effort to slow herself, Ruinil dug her sword into the walls of the escape shaft as she slid down. She managed to land on her feet, though she staggered a bit from loss of balance.

"Ugh... I am going to need a good soaking in the tub after this..." She thought to herself silently as she flicked off the gunk covering her hands. However, her attention was quickly shifted to her current location, as her nose caught the scent that seeped out of the rooms walls. The scent was indescribable. Ruinil nose scrunched up with disgust, she gagged a little, and her eyes watered.

She looked around the room and saw the corpses that heavily littered the room. Upon first sight, Ruinil almost screamed but caught herself by covering her mouth with her hands, her eyes went wild with terror. "Oh my gods....!" She whispered, her heart was racing and her breathing became heavy. Thankfully, she managed to calm herself.

However, it was then when Ruinil noticed the magic circle of blood and gore that was drawn on the ground in front of her. The painful throbbing sensation returned, stronger than ever. Memories of past exorcisms cast on her came to light. Her hair on her neck stood on end and the feeling terror returned. Rather than stepping away from the circle, though, she took a few steps forward and placed her hand on the edge of the circle. Her body was trembling.

Ruinil turned to Bartuc and looked him in the eyes, her eyes were filed with terror. "... I fear that something worse than death took place here..." She murmured. Her voice started to tremble, "...The dead do not rest here..."

Another memory shot through her mind. Another magic circle. It was similar in design yet it's intentions were not ominous. Leaving her slightly confused, yet it did not show.

[Doc Doctor]

Gonad surveyed the battle, nodding sagely to himself. He then took out a crack pipe and began smoking it. He didn't smoke often, if at all, but these were the days of high adventure. He wandered on over to a stack of kest corpses and began urinating. All this work irritated the bladder. Gonad started off on a hardy barbarian song, encouraging everyone to sing-a-long as he pissed.

"BWAH! Potent be Sky Yak, with udder of much moistness! Much milk does such give!
But silly it be to live off of milk, for not such a life does Gonad wish to live!

Better it be, to grow strong with blood! Much blood from enemy's veins!
GRUH! Then can there be many mighty infants, so many that it rains!

Good be blood for fertility! Good be blood for skin!
The only warriors that not like blood, have only lust for men!

HRAH! Do not doubt words of Gonad, for full of truth they be!
Last warrior that doubt truth of Gonad, no longer can he pee!

BWAAAAAHOOOOOO-HRAH!

BWAAAHOOOOOOO-HRAH!"

Now did the time arrive for the others to sing the repeat chorus.

[Cuccoruler]

Cythlla fell to the room below. She got up a little slowly. The scratch on her arm wasn't bleeding anymore than a papercut would so it wasn't really anything to worry about for now. Though it did ruin her dress which she wasn't exactly happy about. As Cythlla looked around the room she realized that this was a laboratory. Others saw this place as disgusting, but to Cythlla it was highly interesting. As Cythlla looked more closely she noticed a few books.

She knew that the others would end up destroying the place to prevent the experiments from being repeated. But she had to know what it was all about. These books had valuable knowledge in them. "We should take the books. They could have a clue on defeating this 'dead god' as they call him.Cythlla did have a thirst for knowledge, and she couldn't let an opportunity like this pass by. The only worries the others might have would be that she would try to recreate these experiments herself. This was where Cythlla could be a liability to the others.

_________________________________________________________________________________________

Henry meanwhile fell with the others. He looked a bit panicked though, more so than he should be. "We need to destroy all of this, if we let Cythlla see any of this she will try to remake whatever they were doing here." Henry said to the others looking around the room. The Last thing that Henry needed was to have Cythlla burned at the stake and be deemed a traitor. She was already seen with disdain within the Templars. He couldn't have her be deemed a traitor too.

[Zetsuko]

Marco had caught up with the main party shortly into their ambush, the twangs his crossbow made as he tried to assist in keeping the kest from the supports were barely audible over the sounds of combat, it was futile however as the kest broke the supports regardless and most of the party had fallen down the resulting hole, leaving Marco on his own at the top. He looked at the kest, freezing for a moment as they all turned toward him. He fired one of his crossbows once as he turned around to run, disappearing from sight in the process and heading back to the entrance. He spotted two figures just at the exit as he was running but the floor collapsed below them as well before he reached them. He wasn't able to stop himself and tripped into the hole as well, slamming into the far side before falling back in, he regained visibility as he tumbled down and landed in the dungeon with the other two.

He rose to his feet and dusted himself off, his crossbows had collapsed back down into gauntlets by now, and looked about the room. The sound of one of the figures from the entrance asking his fellow to make a torch got his attention and he interjected "Allow me friends" with that he held up a hand creating a ball of light and having it hover over his head to illuminate their cell. Now that he was visible he held out his arms to his sides and introduced himself, preempting any questions "My name is Marco" He then grimaced and felt at his side "and i think i broke a rib..."

[ShaggyDoo0]

Glodin had barely even begun to draw his pickaxe before he felt the ground beneath him give. The sturdy dwarf slammed his pick into the ground as he began to slide only to find his pick melt through the earth like butter. The rune worked as promised and sadly gave him no support as he slid into the depths. When he finaly reached the bottom he would have managed to land on his feet if Marcus was not in the way. Ot was the human's fault that he was stuck under a dwarf. The stocky dwarf quickly got up and looked around. "Aye lad, never toss a dwarf. No good ever comes from that. And don't worry, I'll get that torch lit in a jiffy." but before he even had time to grab the flint and torch there was a thud behind him announcing the new arrival.

Glodin turned to the intruder with pickaxe drawn expecting a fight, but was faced with another templar. Before the dwarf could ask the man introduced himself as Marco. "Alright laddie, just let me take the lead so you don't hurt yourself further. By the way, the name is Glodin Quarry of Uldgorin." Glodin turns back to Marcus and nods. "Marcus, light your torch now. And both of you just keep the lights behind me as best as you can. The light makes it hard for me to see into deeper darkness."

Glodin may not have heard the first groan, but he did hear the sound of a strong exhale coming from the same location after everything quieted down. He readied his pickaxe in his left hand and drew his hammer in his right before movinh tword the sound as quietly as he could. Sadly the dwarf wasn't one for stealth, his armor clanked and his footfalls were heavy, not to mention each step made a squishing sound in the mucus like layer of slime covering nearly everything.

[Zelosse]

Marcus spun on his heel the moment Marco hit the ground, pistol aimed directly at his forehead and an intensity in his eyes that shone in the dark. Even with the light, he did not falter. There were corpses in this room and a human put them in here. His pistol followed Marcos path to the ground before finding the holster on his hip with a soft sigh of sliding steel on oiled leather. His rapier came out with a similar swish and found the underside of Marcos helmet. "Stay still." He pushed the helmet upward to look on his face and confirm this was indeed Marco and not an imposter who had stolen his equipment.
Marcus studied his face for a moment before confirming it was indeed the real man, or at the very least a passable imitation. "Marco Du Montagne, knight-sergeant, if I am not mistaken." The rapier moved from his neck before being planted into the packed dirt of the floor. "You are injured. Sadly, I have nothing for that. Bear with the pain best you can until we can rejoin those with the capabilities to do so." Marcus knelt down to help pick the wounded man up, carefully trying to avoid causing pain to the upper body. He reached into his pockets and drew out a small glass vial with a silver stopper. "Not very effective but it'll dull the pain. Drink. Work to be done." He turned his attention to Glodin and picked up his sword. "There is a dieing man in this room. Find him, please. As for the others on the walls." His rapier was in-hand as if it hadn't left his grasp, slashing the throats of every presumably dead man and woman on the wall, their heads falling to the floor neatly severed. "Necromancers will not have them but we cannot risk a fire in a tunnel." As he lopped the head off one such corpse he noticed an irregularity in the anatomy. The man had been thin in life but his stomach was.. bloated. Prisoners were not often fed, and what little they had was not enough to allow for this kind of thing. He took a few steps back and leveled his pistol, suddenly very worried. "These bodies are carrying something in them! I'm sure of it!"

[boomlover]

Argus had been in the thick of it all. Kest blood of all over his body. Yet i had been a good time, and they where making process. Slowly but surely they where making there way through the kest. There calws and fangs barely becoming a problem. Argus was just about to crack A scouts skull open when he started to feel the ground below him crumbling away. And then before he could do anything about it He fell into the darkness." AAAAAH!" was all he could say as he fell into nothing but darkness. He went through a long tunnel twist and turns everywhere before seeing a light at the end of it. In a few seconds he was filled with fear for ending in the wrong part of the hive. Then with happiness when he saw a few of his companions including the captain. Then he was filled with dread as he realized that he was gonna crash into Cythlla. He tried to slow down but failed and decided to brace for impact. The hit was pretty hard. He crashed into her and then rolled into a table.

[OtomostheCrazy]

If the formation was not broken before, it definitely was now. It seems that the group had fallen into a sort of trap, and were separated into groups. Kaathe managed to land on his feet, though not without some pain from the strain of using his legs. It hadn't been long enough to fully recover from the run over to the hive. It didn't take him more than a moment to figure out that their group had been forcibly split. Although he cared less about the well-being of others, Kaathe immediately looked to see if Cythlla was okay. She was, but Henry wasn't with her. That was bad in several ways, especially when she pointed out that this was a laboratory with several books that probably held a substantial amount of time's worth of experimentation logs.

1. She could get ideas, and those ideas could possibly lead to the destruction/subjugation of all things under her rule.
2. Kaathe had to protect her in Henry's place, and getting close to her was somewhat uncomfortable, since he thinks that she may have cast some strange spell that forced his heart to speed up.

In any case, Kaathe was...relieved that she was fine, and looked around.

The place was filled with strangeness. He had cleared a Kest Hive before with others, but that hive definitely did not have things like this in it. Rotting corpses of normal races, and what looked to be the abominable results of experiments by whoever this lab belonged to, all scattered about. Kaathe stopped a moment. He had found something rather interesting. It was the body of someone he knew. It was no knight, nor was it a dwarf, a human, or a wood elf. It was the body of another Dark Elf.

This one he knew well. It was one of the individuals he had constantly challenged when he was a child. Kaathe could remember his goals and aspirations easily. 'To travel the lands, and become a legendary warrior that all people will tell stories about.' Something along those lines, anyway. Kaathe had heard rumors of him, back in his earlier days in the Dawn Covenant. Stuff like a single dark elf wandering around, defeating some of the most dangerous monsters that the knights had ever faced, alone...and winning. If Kaathe had been his younger self, he'd have grit his teeth to the point of shattering, and trained to the point where his body would be useless from overexertion. However, when the rumors had risen, and even now, Kaathe did not care about them.

Still, he was a Dark Elf. He grew up with his culture. He owed his former acquaintance a prayer, at least.

"Na Shi'an tiriathar sinfae."

Kaathe's tongue was dry, but his voice was true. It had been a long while since he had to speak a prayer for anyone, much less his own kind. It was a nostalgic experience, but lately there have been many things that began reminding him of his life before the Knights.

With a sigh, Kaathe turned away from the fallen dark elf, and tried to continue looking around, when yet another thing caught his eye. A large, uniquely-crafted curved Greatsword with a bladed guard was lying where everyone had fallen. It was that Forossa-person's weapon. The man must have dropped it when the floor gave way.

Kaathe lifted the sword up to inspect it. It wasn't as heavy as one would think, though it was still heavy. Still, it definitely was as sharp as it looked. Kaathe lifted the blade higher, and then rested it on his shoulder. He may as well bring along back to its owner.

Kaathe had to focus on the task at hand, which was figuring out what this place was meant for, who was responsible for everything in it, and why.

...Then Gonad, for whatever reason, started singing. Loudly. It was idiotic that the man thought that whatever he was doing was a good idea to the situation. They were in a closed space, with abominations strewn about. His singing could easily lead entire legions of Kest right to them, and maybe wake some of these hybrids up, if any of them were alive.

Kaathe was really beginning to think that Fate was trying to kill him today.

[Zetsuko]

"Aye, that is my full name" Marco said as he took the vial from Marcus, pulling out the stopper to take a swig "and my rank" The pain in his chest did dull, not that it was overmuch to begin with, to state he broke a rib might even be an exaggeration. He reached up and closed his fist around the ball of light over his head to extinguish it followed by touching his thumb and forefinger on either side of his eyes casting a nighteye spell to aid his vision in the dark, his eyes glowing faintly with the effect. From there a clicking could be heard and one of his crossbows unfolded and he followed just behind Marcus and Glodin with muffled footsteps, readying his second crossbow at Marcus's exclamation.

---

All Landeel could do was hope someone found his sword and return to the situation at hand. His attention was drawn to a clatter as Karl cut down a corpse that was hung by chains and began striking at everything in the room. He went over to try and quiet him down so his racket won't draw whoever or whatever put all this here "quiet man! the kest may not be all we have to worry about." provided he managed to get Karl quiet, He'd spot Ruinil examining the magic circle nearby and make his way over, looking over the circle before asking "Can you make sense of it?" Bluish energy collected in his left palm as he prepared to purge magic from the area if need be.

[Ace of flames01]

Ruinil glanced up Landeel for a brief moment and nodded before returning to circle. "Some of it... I will start with the obvious. It is a necromancy circle made with human sacrifices..." She started pointing at the corpses that were littered around the room. She ran her hand over part of the edge. "Judging by appearance.... This circle is old and been used... But it is still able to be activated... It was also made by man..." Ruinil looked over the symbols and went quiet for what felt like an eternity. "I cannot read much of the symbols used but some of the same words keep popping up....Kest... Darkness... Magica.... Power.... And Death God..." Ruinil concluded as she pointed to various symbols that appeared on the circle.

Ruinil stood up and turned to Landeel. "I have reason to believe that this was made by cultists to enhance the kest's abilities... Unfortunately, what kind of abilities these entitle... I do not know... Sorry... Magic circles are not my specialty, I am afraid... If Cythlla was here she could read the this..." She looked down with a defeated expression. At this point, there was not much Ruinil could do at this point. This was something that frustrated her and something that was easily seen in her expression, as she grit her teeth, revealing a pair of sharp fangs, her eyes narrowed, and clenched her fists.

[Snarfulblast]

"Fine I'll quite down but we need to destroy all of this. All of it you hear me." Karl walks over to the door which leads out of the room not opening it but standing near it so he could be ready for anything that came through the door."Whatever you are doing you better do it quickly before any Kest show up." Karl readies both his blades, standing ready to kill. He had many thoughts, first they needed to regroup with the others, second the needed to finish the nest, third they needed to find who or what helped them create these monstrosities.

[TheDarkTemplar]

The fall was more than unpleasant, it was aggravating. As she slid down the tunnel, Evelyn's shield got caught on a rock which stuck out from the shaft walls. Though only for a moment, it hurt like hell when her arm was jerked as a result. On top of that the exit hole she came out of was not the same as her group. While still in the same room as Gonad, Kaathe, Cythlla, and Argus, Evelyn fell into a pile of rotting Kest meat instead of on plain ground like her comrades. As she stood up and out of the mound of meat a face of disgust. "Even if I survive this, I'll never rid myself of this stench..", she thought as she first examined the room. After telling the others to search it for anything substantial it became clear that this place was already claimed by Sar'than's followers. Picking up one of the notebooks she read them aloud to those with her though quietly so as to not give away their location.

"Entry 1-We've entered the caves today. After some searching our men finally located its entrance. Almost immediately we encountered the creatures but our Lord was right as the salve masked us fom their wrath. After searching these tunnels for sometime I have come to two conclusions: this chamber will be perfect for my experiments, also that this is probably one of the oldest Kest hives to date. We should begin our work quickly.

Entry 2- My first batch of subjects arrived. As I was unsure of whuch race was most compatible I requested a variety of the races brought to the cages. To my surprise it appears as if humans seem to be the most compatible from what the trials show. I shall begin exclusively collecting humans. This is quite fortunate, to have such a large hive in the part of most populated by the only race capable of surviving the transformations.

Entry 3- I've nearly perfected my work, soon our Lord will have a new breed of servants eager to do his bidding! A few specimens have successfully survived longer than the expected decomposition period and so I've sent them to guard the queen. The failures I've placed on the tables to examine what went wrong. With luck I shall be able to remove whatever troublesome error in my work has caused their deaths.

Once Evelyn had finished reading the entries she began flipping through the pages, at the back was a series of formulas and notes on the actual process of combining humans and Kest. This book had to be destroyed, all of this was evil beyond forgiving and any trace of it had to be eradicated from the world. "Find the rest of these and destroy them. Once that's done we must go find the others. Once the queen and the surviving...creatures are dealth with we will seal this cave, collapse the tunnels"

[Cuccoruler]

Cythlla looked at Evelyn with a look of worry on her face. "We could find a way to counter these creatures, we don't have to destroy these books!" Cythlla pleaded not wanting to lose this knowledge. Her thirst for knowledge was frightening, of course this was what made her such a good researcher in the first place. "Please Evelyn, don't destroy these books. Atleast not until I find a way to counter them, then you can destroy them." Cythlla pleaded. It was rare for her to speak someone's name like this.

Cythlla already had one of the books clenched in her hand. She had skimmed through it already even, she had an idea of how this spell worked, but there must be some kind of a failsafe that can be set off to keep these creatures from going out of control. That was what she was searching for, though if she had time she would try to understand the ritual as a whole as well. She never used human sacrifices unless they were already dead.

___________________________________________________________________________________________________

Henry meanwhile looked at the others in a bit of worry as he felt like he was being ignored. Just like in his nightmare, he was starting to panic. "DON'T TRY TO UNDERSTAND IT!" Henry yelled at the others afraid that he wasn't being heard. "You need to destroy this, don't study it." Henry pleaded to them. Then before anyone could do something to stop him he walked towards the magic circle raised a claw and scratched into it disrupting the magic circle enough that it would be unusable. He mauled the floor again, this time make it so that it couldn't even be read. "I can't have her burned at a stake, not after what she's done for me." Henry said panting from the rage he just went into.

[Doc Doctor]

Gonad dropped one of the books on the ground and began pissing on it. All this walking irritated the bladder. He glared up at the ceiling and began telling the other knights the Legend of the Sky Yak.

Hrah... Many seasons ago, no life on world there was... Barren was sky, black and empty! But then, gruh, came potent Sky Yak! Fertile she was, and gave birth to many yaks! But too far was drop, so died many did... Piled high were infant yaks, bodies that reached heavens! Soon high enough were dead yaks that live yaks could land safely, bwuh. Became planet did bodies of dead yaks, and living yaks did go into seas and sky to become birds and fishies! Soon did yaks learn to walk on two legs! Became men they did! Such be truth from lips of Gonad. Know such and grow mighty!

[Zelosse]

Bartuc retrieved the fallen books one by one, careful not to have a stray spark catch them lest they ignite and ruin the contents forever. He was methodical in the search of the room, the grim sight of the experiments was appalling but had lost its shock value after so many dead enemies had been imprinted to his mind.
Bartuc leaned down and inspected one of the circles, but he had no real skill at any kind if magic beyond fire go boom and enemies feel doom. But there was a familiar aspect to these things.

"Ruinil, the circles have writings similar to the ones we used. Bonding. But it is warped, so maybe they are trying to create fusions or even equip them with plating? ." He handed over the books and waited for a development he could not provide to the situation.

[TheDarkTemplar]

Evelyn was wary of necromancy but she knew not to shun away an advantage when it presented itself. Cythlla was a researcher for the order but it was no secret she was a necromancer. That being said her work has always been to the advancement of the order and this would most likely be the same situation. Still, there was a faint feeling that allowing these books to leave this place intact was a mistake. Evelyn continued to contemplate the matter until she finally came to a decision. With a sigh Evelyn handed the notebook to Cythlla, "Do not let anyone but you look upon them. Once you've gained what you can from them they are to be burned, do not create copies". Evelyn looked around for the other books and saw that Bartuc was beginning to collect them. She waved him over so he could hand Cyhtlla the other books and that was when she noticed...Gonad. Pissing, singing, and telling old tales as if they were all seated around a fire. Evelyn tried to live by the teachings of the gods, but there were times when even she'd fall victim to her emotions. This was one of those times. Picking up a hunk of rotting Kest meat she hurled it at the mountain of a man with force towards his head, at the same time harshly whispering, "Will you shut it?! It is a miracle this room hasn't been swarmed with Kest by now!".

Evelyn rested her face in the palm of her hand which incidentally was the same hand she grabbed the Kest meat. She cringed upon having the foul juices touch her face and after wiping it away on her armor she sighed once more in frustration. "Alright, let's-", before she could finish her sentence, one of the supposedly dead hybrids came to life and sprung up and off the table.

---

Meanwhile in the other chamber, the ritual circle which Henry had frantically clawed at seemed to have still been active. Whoever placed it there failed to cut off the ethereal world with the physical world and so upon the breaking of the circle the spell it was designed for had malfunctioned upon being released from the seal which was the circle itself. In a flash, malevolent spirits desperate to inhabit the mortal world flew about the chamber. With empty bodies in large supply, the spirits possessed the corpses of Kest, human, elf, and dwarf alike. Their bodies writhing and contorting as they were reanimated by beings not meant for this world until they no longer resembled their original form. Before the group stood five creatures, standing on two legs which appeared broken and mangled, their bodies were soot black and resembled corpses long exposed to rot, they had no head only a maw of serrated bone fragments which led to a hole which functioned as the mouth on its chest. The first to attack was the tallest of the group which lunged forth towards Karl with intent to latch onto him and pull the elf into the maw of bone teeth which protruded from its torso.

---

As for Marcus, Glodin, and Marco, the trio would soon have problems of their own to deal with. One by one the bodies of the dead in the dungeons began to bloat and twitch until some popped open from the stomach to reveal Kest Workers. The insects crawled swiftly towards the three Templars, the ones that didn't appeared to have bonded with the corpses creating hybrids like those in the labs. The Kest Workers would be able to crawl through the cell bars eaily but the hybrids would have to break through. Unfortunately the looks of the cell it wouldn't be long before the bars gave in to the force, and there were a good number of hybrids clawing at the warriors.

[Ace of flames01]

Suddenly, the circle had activated and the corpses had reanimated themselves. Terror had struck Ruinil causing her to freeze up for a moment as it attacked and knocked Karl down. However, this did not last long before Ruinil sprung into action."Henry, you fool! You reactivated the circle!" She hissed as she set the hybrid ablaze in a crimson inferno, however she did not let the fire touch Karl as she yanked the corpse off of Karl. Ruinil stood in front of him to protect as the hybrid tried to take Ruinil down with it. She pushed it back, only to get a few minor burns. Yet she refused to move and held her ground until the hybrid had turned to ash before returning her attention back to Karl. "Are you well? Had the beast harmed you?" She asked as she pulled him to his feet.

Ruinil faced the horror that threatened the group. "What level of hell is this?!
Turning humans, dwarves, and elves into mindless demon spawns?! Whoever did this deserves a fate worse than death!" She roared with rage. Half demons.... Hybrids.... They were not meant to exist. She was not meant to exist.... She knew that... And yet... Here she was.

Ruinil did not wait for the hybrids to recover. She plunged her sword deep into the hybrid's maw and pinned the hybrid against the wall. The hybrid tried to bite Ruinil, but it was stopped by her blade. "Go back to hell!" She roared, setting the hybrid ablaze.

[Zetsuko]

Following Henry's outburst, Landeel folded one arm across his chest and brought the palm of his other hand to the front of his helmet in a sort of facepalm, he would've said something but when the circle had been disrupted it caused the rise of the corpses in the room, which began attacking them, naturally. Landeel sighed and waved his arm out calmly, purging magic to keep more spirits from passing through the circle, shortly after Ruinil had dealt with the first one. He followed by drawing his shortsword and kicking a table up, sending it crashing into one of the creatures, He wasted no time in finishing the thing off while it was stunned.

---

Marco stared at the oncoming kest for a moment before he began firing at the smaller kest, bolts coming from his crossbows easily dealing with the small workers. When he saw the larger ones breaking at their cage he murmured a "oh, bugger" as his bows folded and his claws blades extended from them. He eyes the place they were breaking at waiting for them to come through. One they did he rushed at them turning invisible just before he reached them, several of the hybrid were hit by seemingly nothing, their invisible attacker causing them to swing frantically catching eachother in the process. Between Marco's blades and the confusion of his attack a path was opened through the kest and Marco's voice could be heard in that direction "Marcus! Glodin! this way! let's go!"