In fishing, the primary components were the tackle, the bobber, the line, and the rod; however, the most important part of the ensemble was the bait.
Especially live bait...
"Delicious..." Scarlett says, as the Makara's guttural summons were cut short by blood-soaked gurgles. From where she stood to it, a harpoon was connected by a length of chain that pulsed rhythmically, if beating with her heart. The spearhead was crossed between the eyes of the Makara, as it impaled it from the underside of its jaw and through the root of its mouth. Hooked, the harpoon would suddenly reel in, and the beast would crash into Scarlett, as if she were a rock upon the shore.
Sharpened fangs of steel sliced through keratin scales and into the sanguine muscle below, as the reinforced muscles of her jaws held tight; similarly strengthened muscles in her neck and shoulder worked to tear out the lion's share of her prey's throat. Rich with blood, the slack chain would fatten, and slither back into the housing that held the harpoon with the weapon, literally, at hand.
"Milli, return," Scarlett summoned, as the jewel glowed and recalled the snake. "Time to field-test my theory..."
Scarlett dropped the dying beast at her feet, and pressed her left palm to her shoulder. "Synergy!" Scarlett pushed on her shoulder; surging iron and magic into the muscle - the arm dissolving into blood and metal, as the construct named "Eosinophil" retracted her arm entirely into a hollow opening that rattled and hissed back at the approaching hoard. "Alchemy and Galdr! Science and Faith! Fuse together, and become the Key that unlocks the Pyro Gate! Uncage the Burning Serpent! The Iron-forge Hydra!"
All good Magicka arrived with the heraldic cry of a magical chant. That was just common knowledge.
Suddenly, however, Scarlett dropped to her knees - blood leaked out of her mouth and nose, as a massive serpent erupted out of Scarlett's shoulder with a torrent of bloody chains that morphed into false serpents and created the summon of a hydra, clad in red-hot iron, with five heads.
However, the flow of Scarlett's blood wouldn't staunch, as her body rejected the undisciplined, recklessly rushed ritual. It was difficult to synchronize and stabilize two lives in one body, as Scarlett was hosting Milli through herself, and the giant serpent required more resources that she could give. Two of the heads suddenly exploded and resumed their unaltered state as blood vessels; the thick, corpulent tethers writhing on the ground like blood-gorged worms flailing outside of Scarlett's body.
Milli acknowledged the threat of hemorrhagic shock and exsanguination on Scarlett's life, and brought her massive head down to lick at her face - worriedly coaxing her to pull back, and not push herself to the brink of death.
"You worry too much..." Scarlett seethed, before she released the spell, and the hydra vanished in a bloody display that mired the swamp with her iron-laden blood.
An objective threat that polluted the water, and created a temporary barrier around her. It would serve as a ward, until Hector and Shavis appeared... stumbling upon a scene of a war that never was, as Scarlett sat before her kill; eating it and feeding Milli, normal-sized, hunks of meat in alternation. Her right arm nothing but a weave of blood vessels that seems to be commanding the ward, as they pulsed with her heart.
"A helping hand wouldn't go amiss."
The Irish Tree
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