Scribe of Thoth

Of Steel and Hope: An Academy-life

Something something war is bad-

Wow cool robot, I'm interested

Fire Emblem: The Slumbering Goddess

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The building Rudolf was parked atop shuddered with the force of Lienna's blizzard as the spell crashed into it, but the danger barely registered to him. A spear of ice peeked out from under the awning of the roof just before him, jostling the remnants of the man he'd just ki-

Another heave shook through his frame, but only a mewling whine came out this time; there was nothing left for Rudolf to throw up. It didn't help much - his abdomen ached dully and his throat burned all the same, and he still couldn't muster the strength to move no matter how much they yelled at him. Why were they yelling? If his legs could go anywhere, did those idiots really think he'd still have his nose lodged inches above a corpse? It was all his trembling arms could do just to keep him from diving face first into the blood still pooling underneath him. They got his participation in their stupid little battle out of him, and now they wanted more. This village could burn for all he cared, he just wanted to leave. The flapping of wings melded into the heartbeat in his ears, far off noises that had no relevance to the boy right now. All his thoughts had been drowned out by the overwhelming desire to curl up into a ball and wait for the skirmish to pass him by. Maybe they'd think he died too. Maybe he'd get lucky and disappear like he always does. If Noa's cursed blood could get him into this situation, it was the least that long-dead harlot could do to deliver him from the violence unscathed.

The boy dimly registered that the fog had retreated for now, bringing the carnage he currently wallowed in into greater clarity. Footsteps resounded across the rooftop, as muffled as the wings of the knight that surely intended to skewer him on his next dive. It felt like he'd dunked his head into a lake and could hear only the muted echoes of what was happening on shore. They could see him. Repeatedly drilled mental exercises went off in Rudolf's subconscious, sigils he'd traced again and again appeared in the forefront of his mind, yet he lacked the conviction to manifest them into spell. He didn't want to kill someone again, he just wanted to disappear. Saint Noa was likely cackling at him from on high right now, bereft of her protection as he was.

Deliverance came at last, though not from his Crest, nor magic, nor the tip of a pegasus rider's lance; instead Rudolf found himself hoisted from the roof and dropped unceremoniously back on the ground. Though the metallic tang of blood no longer filled his nose, a quick glance around left him certain the odor of death would return any moment, corpses littered across the village as they were. A hand yanked him to his feet before he could even get his bearings, accompanied by orders that denied him his chance to curl up in a corner somewhere and hide. Haggard eyes finally raised themselves to look at his captor, silently pleading with Kaira to just drop him and let him rest.

"I-I... I don't..." The words wouldn't come. He wanted them to discard him at their earliest convenience, to throw him into a bush to wait out the battle invisibly until they came back for him. None of his limbs obeyed him and whatever seed of magical talent had been embedded within him failed to sprout in the garden of primal terror that had overgrown his mind; he couldn't fight. He never could, they just couldn't see it. Everyone saw him now, though. A hand fumbled at his side for his sword, grasping at nothing a few times before Rudolf finally realized that his current lack of coordination was not at fault for him not finding the handle, but that the weapon still protruded from that poor mage's back. He couldn't go back. He wouldn't. "Don't- don't make me-" If Kaira had been the target of his mumbling before, she wasn't any longer - just a generalized plea to whoever or whatever was listening to extricate him from the fight.

Rudolf was granted no such reprieve. Worse, the unit seemed to be advancing for some reason. They'd blunder into another ambush and the mages they'd missed would bring up the rear and pick them off like fish in a barrel. The dark-haired boy trudged after them weakly at first, then bolted toward the main host with all the vigor of a terriied child. There was no choice but to acquiesce and regroup; he couldn't risk hiding so close to the enemy, one of the mages or pegasi might still know where he was.

---

@Hero

The Shattering of Aegis

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Ceolfric had plenty of concerns about Mister Liadon's honesty, but in this matter, he doubted it would pose an issue. Why waste all that time in the woods with someone only to lie afterward? If Cerric really wanted them gone, he could just say so - he was the one evaluating them, after all. The mention of a will similarly did little to hold the bandit's interest. If he had any heirs, he wouldn't know where to even find them, and anyone else who thought they had claim to his belongings would have to pry them off his corpse like everyone else. Likewise, there was no need to spread word of his death; if he'd died so unremarkably that no one besides the House took notice, that was his own fault. If his father's Heralds spent the rest of this generation looking over their shoulder fearfully for Ceolfric's return, so be it, it would at least punish them meagerly for any posthumous defiance.

Kyreth returned to the lobby shortly after, alive and apparently unharmed from his time upstairs. Ceolfric doubted Mystraleth simply required an errand boy to bring Aleka's book back to him, but the conversation had to have ended amicably if Kyreth was being entrusted with tasks. The bandit was tempted to ask about the Lord himself, but the lanky Tainted ran straight to his kinswoman to gossip about his experience in hushed whispers. There was nothing stopping him from barging right into their midst and demanding answers - it'd serve Lilann right for her earlier antics - but preparing for the trip took first priority. He'd need food for the road; despite there being plentiful game in the forest, he doubted the caravan would settle in one place long enough to hunt for it. At best they'd get to eat whatever mystery creature had been harassing travellers in the area, and Ceolfric certainly wasn't going to go hungry until whatever it was made an appearance. If he had a week or so of free time, he'd find a deer or a boar to preserve, but with only a day to prepare, it seemed he'd have to subsist on whatever rations the local vendors stocked.

"If any of you want to pool some coin into a cask of ale for the road, I'm headed for the markets," Ceolfric offered as he made for the door. He didn't expect his idea to garner much support from this crowd, but there was always the chance that the group might be more fun than they let on. Unfortunately, he'd have to content himself on simple pleasures for the time being, or at least until he had a place to store valuables while he was gallivanting across the countryside in pursuit of fame and glory. Surely some farmer around here could be coerced (under threat of imminent bodily harm or otherwise) into letting Ceolfric use a corner of their shed for loot.

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The Shattering of Aegis

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This woman was toying with him. She said nothing there - nothing of substance, anyway. Ceolfric didn't know what he expected, asking a common jester who, by her own admission, flits about on the fringes of tales of heroism and virtue. She made her living peddling sensationalized crap; the line between fact and fiction was a useless construct to be discarded in favor of theatrics to her. It would've been tolerable had Lilann been a poet caught up in the delusions of her own verse, but she fully recognized that everything crossing her lips was a ridiculous falsehood and yet still had the audacity to taunt him with them. Some fearmongering minstrel up in Dranir had surely concocted similar tales about him at some point, and under normal circumstances he'd certainly revel in the spreading of his own legend, but a lie was a lie no matter how entertaining. Such stories were meant to cow lesser men and frighten children out of straying too far into the woods, not convey information.

"So you have no idea," Ceolfric surmised mirthlessly, "Start with that next time." His fingers twitched at his side, eager to pry her mind open and confirm exactly what she did and didn't know about this storied apothecary underneath the veneer of exaggerated narrative, but a quick flick of his eyes back to Cerric dissuaded him. Not here. Not yet.

The elf's explanation further soured the idea; he'd apparently be stuck with all of them for nearly a fortnight, so it behooved him to refrain from any acts against the group until he was at least gainfully employed. No reason to ruin his relationship with the House over rumors of a woman he could go talk to personally at any point in time. Drawing the ire of other aetherborn over petty slights seemed a foolish course of action anyway; their capacity for retribution was a far greater threat than a normal man's.

Ceolfric leaned against a nearby couch as Aleka continued the briefing, attentive enough to not appear visually disinterested but otherwise unengaged. Babysit some merchant's daughter, kill a few unruly beasts, maybe dissuade a few of his former colleagues from trying to collect a toll from them. The company sounded like the most grueling challenge of the trip. Of course, this also served as an evaluation, so he'd have to find some way to be proactive on the journey. If the roads proved uneventful, they'd barely appear more impressive than common caravan guards.

---

@McMolly

Fire Emblem: The Slumbering Goddess

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The tension was palpable, the very air felt as though it were a string pulled taut with no intention of stopping. When it looked as though there would be no reply to his challenge, far-off wings answered. Any Galatea worth his salt would know they weren't from a pegasus, but the suspense didn't linger long regardless - the proverbial string snapped as soon as the wyvern burst through the fog, throwing the once-quiet scene into chaos. Auberon exploded into the beginnings of evasive action, but it proved unnecessary as the beast was promptly sent off-course by a flurry of attacks from his comrades.

Admittedly, that wasn't a development Auberon had expected or even considered. If they had the resources to field a wyvern, they certainly needed a larger support network than a single town. Should they bring such resources to bear against a mere class of young nobility, they could be overrun as soon as the heretics formed up properly.

His feet planted themselves again in preparation for another attack when his gaze was drawn by a voice that finally deigned to respond to his challenge - incorrectly, might he add. The entire farce collapsed with only a sentence. The cause of these heretics had sounded flimsy from the start, but to respond with such shameless greed suggested there was never any doctrinal dispute to begin with. He might've believed that the man was merely a mercenary hired by the apostates had the second bandit not been the spitting image of a dead man. The Church had been lured here deliberately for the same motive they'd been lured to Luin.

At first, Auberon briefly thought he was hallucinating. Unless the faithless all looked alike, that man had to be related to the bandit leader they'd felled, which suggested these were of the selfsame group. It took only a moment of deliberation for Auberon to realize he didn't care. All this connection meant to him now was that he had no reason to give quarter. Jorah's call went ignored - he evidently thought the blond was in trouble, but Auberon was of a decidedly different mind. Eyepatch had answered his challenge, which meant he would be afforded priority in the order of combat, as was custom, but a chance to make up for his mistakes in Luin was too good to pass up. He'd kill them both; surely there would be plenty more for the rest of the advance unit once the fighting drew reinforcements.

"You'll be able to ask the Goddess for a set in person in a moment," Auberon snarled, casting aside the honor of his proposed duel for raw aggression in the face of his opposition. Better to finish this quickly, lest he be tag-teamed by the honorless curs. He charged without hesitation, careful to keep both men in his field of view, and feinted a wide cut past the eyepatched bandit's chest. He pretended to overswing for only an instant before righting his axe and thrusting the spike at the top toward the man's blind side. From there, he rocked his weight backward and circled away, hoping to keep Eyepatch between himself and the Luin lookalike before they had a chance to react or take an advantageous formation.

---

---

He was going to throw up.

They all wrote him off like a worrisome craven, drowning out his very valid points with nonsense sermons and uninspired speechcraft that took a few too many lines from an Imperial Palace tutor. Funny how they didn't have any more ecclesiastical words of wisdom when the world around them erupted into flame. Rudolf flinched, partially from the brightness and partially from the shock, though when he opened his eyes again, he wished he hadn't. The ground was littered with a veritable sea of discarded arrows, charred from the magical onslaught and left to fall after Kaira's barrier no longer stood to support them. Yet even that sight was preferrable to looking skyward; the fog had briefly cleared, likely by virtue of the howling gale he'd heard conjured while his eyes were clenched shut, revealing the full might of their opposition.

It was - somehow - worse than Rudolf feared. He was promised a ramshackle band of upstart ideologues, not a well-rounded enemy force. If they tried to retreat from the mostly-stationary mages, they'd be outmaneuvered by the pegasi. They couldn't simply push through the enemy lines since they were at a disadvantageous elevation and the mages would cook them alive while they made for the rooftops, to say nothing of any ground-based reinforcements that hadn't revealed themselves yet. Beyond that, the tactical side of his brain refused to cooperate. It was drowned beneath an overwhelming flood of anxiety, a twisting in his stomach and instinctive panic in his mind that supplied no logical plan, no brilliant means of escape; not even animalistic fervor to lash out mindlessly at the threat. Only the petulant desires of a child - Rudolf simply wanted to be anywhere but here. He didn't care how. He didn't care if it was possible. He wanted out. The fog rolled back in preternaturally quick, all but confirming it wasn't natural weather, and Rudolf knew the choice he had to make. He'd run, leave the Crown Prince for dead and be stripped of all his future titles for bringing such monumental shame to House Bergliez in doing so. An elegant solution to all his problems, delivered to him on a silver platter; he got to live and shirk all of his responsibilities for the mere cost of his pride and a handful of human lives. How ironic that the bitter calculus of war in which he'd been taught would become such a boon in avoiding any relation to conflict for the rest of his life here. All the more proof that the circumstances of his birth had damned him from the start; a general needed the unwavering resolution of Saint Cichol, not the blood of duplicitious Noa.

Yet as Rudolf looked around for his avenue of escape, he couldn't follow through. Callan or Kyle or whatever his name was looked just about how the crimson-eyed boy felt. The same primal terror that gripped Rudolf likely found similar purchase inside the Faerghian's head, yet his wish would be denied by the same divine providence that would grant Rudolf's; the privilege of not having been born invisible to the world. From the comfort of safety, detached from the realities of a life and death situation, Rudolf would've bitterly laughed at the idea of his miserable Crest finally paying dividends on his suffering while those that had endlessly ignored him were punished. But in the moment, there wasn't any satisfaction. His heart ached for his classmates, even Veronica. His father once said a general sought victory because it was his duty; a duty to himself to strive for glory, a duty to his liege to provide spoils and service, and a duty to his men to see as many of them home at the end of the campaign as he could. Rudolf was no general, had no appetite for glory and no liege he cared to gratify, but that last duty weighed on him all the same.

Rudolf finally started thinking again when the swords cut through the mist. Five mages and two archers could make short work of pegasi, and the footsoldiers relied on the fog to retreat into. The heretic mages were the backbone of their formation. Since torching the town and forcing the rooftop mages to come down likely wasn't an option, his only other recourse was go up there. With the people that wanted to kill him. Alone.

"I'll- I'll be back," Rudolf breathlessly muttered, more to himself than anyone around him. He would be back.

Rather than dwell on what he planned to do, the boy slipped away into the fog. None of the charging swordsmen spared him a passing glance in the conflict, fleeting shadow that he was, though he hugged the wall of the nearest building for good measure as he advanced further past the enemy lines. Once in position, Rudolf hesitated a moment to ensure no pursuers would shamble out of the mist after him, then hefted himself atop a nearby barrel. From there, he warily stood, mindful of his balance, and grabbed onto the eave of the roof. Now came the hard part - actually getting himself up. Biting down on his lip for dear life to silence any grunts of exertion that might give him away, the dark-haired boy managed to pull himself up enough to see over the edge. His quarry stood overlooking the battle below as he had when Rudolf last saw him, utterly oblivious to the intruder in his midst. His hand extended of its own volition, magic numbing his fingertips for the briefest of moments before he limply withdrew his arm.

A more confident mage would've taken the shot. His enemy had been caught unaware and his escape was already in sight - simply drop off the roof and run. But whatever warrior might've been buried within him was drowned out by the cacophany of things that could go wrong. the heretic was a stronger mage, he could have a ward up for just such a contingency, the spell might fail, Rudolf might miss, the heretic could get lucky and duck at just the right moment. Rudolf's body felt less and less his own with each thought as he worked himself into a riskier and riskier situation by climbing fully up onto the roof. A hand wrapped around the hilt of his shortsword, more numb now than it had been when his fingers thrummed with dark magic just moments prior. It cleared the scabbard meticulously, noiselessly. The edges of his vision grew dim; everything faded into the fog except the unguarded back of the man in front of him. Rudolf braced his hand at the base of the pommel and thrusted with all his weight.

The comfortably uncomfortable dissociation spiraled back to lucidity in that moment. A yelp of agony. Something wet landed on him. The sword slipped from his shaking fingers as the body fell, still embedded in the mage's ribs. The half-digested remains of his breakfast forced itself up his throat and cleared his lips in one heave before Rudolf's legs gave out from under him and he collapsed to his knees. Terrified tears pooled at the corners of his eyes just as blood pooled underneath him, but the wetness of the tears just felt like more blood and he needed to move his head to look at his surroundings and not at the blood but it was all his trembling arms could do to keep him from dropping face first into the blood and he just wanted to go home where there wasn't any blood.

To an observer, it was a sorry sight; a boy, black robes newly stained scarlet, knelt in a pool of bodily fluids and hacking up another spurt of bile rather than rejoining the fight. He was easy prey, not that Rudolf even registered such, or anything outside his own head at the moment.

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The Shattering of Aegis

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Don't cause problems for the House (read: make sure all witnesses are effectively silenced) and remember to bring back a head. Seemed simple enough. One of his colleagues-to-be - yet another aetherborn, the tingle in the back of his skull supplied before Aleka confirmed it - helpfully demonstrated the procedure for turning in a contract almost on cue. If Ceolfric didn't know any better, he'd say it was planned, but not even Cerric seemed up to that level of pointless theatrics.

Aleka's offer earned a scrutinizing glare from the bandit. If he were to seek mentorship, he always assumed it would only be found at the end of a gnarled, discordant string of fate ripped from hated Azaiza's loom; some entity borne to this plane on the designs of a dusty grimoire who intended to barter knowledge for souls, not a local apothecary. His was the power of kings and concubines alike, true, but what could a common shopkeeper possibly have to show him? Cerric said it best, aetheric prowess was forged at the end of a blade. Ceolfric managed to rip his eyes away from Aleka long enough to raise a scarred brow at the bard. Hopefully these alleged stories inspired more awe than a description of her occupation, though he wasn't exactly holding his breath. Maybe the woman could provide a useful trick or two to make the tedious parts of his job more tolerable. The House doubtlessly frowned upon wanton slaughter in pursuit of a contract and he lacked the manpower this far south to simply hold an entire town hostage for the sake of finding one man anyway.

Things were simpler when the laws of men didn't apply to him.

The return of the servant who'd carried the books away reclaimed Ceolfric's attention, if only out of sheer curiosity. It wasn't surprising that his lordship hadn't deigned to greet them despite being in attendance, street rabble that they were, but for Freckles of all people to catch his eye was unexpected. Was it simply the novelty of being the odd man out? The only (alleged) mundane mortal among a pack of aether-blessed demigods? By Ceolfric's measure, that should've only made him less worthy of attention. Did Mystaleth spot some incongruency in his story? If he'd lie about the glowing dots on his face, surely he could lie about something else, but to be caught so easily by a complete stranger was as pathetic as it was unlikely. Then again, it wasn't a stretch to assume his senses were even sharper than Ceolfric's and he simply noted the disparity between five aetherborn entering and only four being recorded.

He looked again to Lilann to see if the fate that had befallen her brother - no, he supposed to couldn't be related, given their differing stories of origin - had unduly stolen her attention away from whatever tavern tales this serpent oil saleswoman must've inspired for Aleka to mention it. Instead, it seemed the teenager was vying for her attention now. Lady M? As in Mystraleth? Did he miss something? Was Vivian the lord's wife? He didn't see anything strange about her conduct, in any case. Tainted drew glances quite a bit, as far as Ceolfric was aware.

"More importantly," Ceolfric tacked on to Ermes' inquiry, "Do you know the story on this Agitha character? Preferrably without the ridiculous embellishments thrown on by whomever told you the tale." Maybe he'd be pleasantly surprised and learn this woman had cultivated a merchant empire through mass mind control of the local Red Fern producers or founded her alchemy business on potions brewed from the blood of dragons she'd slain in single combat.

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@McMolly

The Shattering of Aegis

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Kyreth's timid response elicited little more than an eye roll from the brigand. His powers must've been pitiful indeed if he was content to settle for the status of a stepped-on peasant when there was so much world left to conquer. Every word of Aleka's explanation of contract work hammered the point home - it was for cowards, the infirm, and those without aspirations. Thankfully, Aleka and Cerric both spoke his language for the remainder of their little double comedy act. Winning fame and infamy along the edge of a blade was exactly what he was here for, even if there was an inane test involved.

The only unfortunate caveat was that he'd likely be thrown in with these other fools for the sake of convenience on the part of his evaluators. Unless either of the two women pulled something out of their proverbial hats to impress him, the exercise would likely be an exercise of how much of their slack Ceolfric could pick up. The teenager certainly wasn't going to be useful for anything beyond maybe pickpocketing.

Cerric's earlier concern for Eila's connections didn't go unnoticed, though the girl's question evaporated whatever fleeting interest Ceolfric had in them, along with any chance of her being useful in their test. Clearly it couldn't be too interesting if she was scared of getting her hands a little dirty as a mercenary. She was a pretty face to act as bait at best.

"If the fair lady should find a contract objectionable to her delicate sensibilities, I'd be happy to take it off her hands," Ceolfric offered dryly. They knew what he was, and old habits die hard; there was no reason to beat around the bush. If someone wanted a debtor's legs broken, so be it. "Provided, of course, the House doesn't deem it too offensive to the institution's reputation to even consider honoring the contract." Ceolfric wasn't certain what their vetting criteria was for accepting requests, but if it got past Aleka and the client was confident enough to leave a paper trail right back to himself, Ceolfric wasn't the type to second guess the job.

Besides, coin flows all the faster when the client has to pay for discretion on top of the job itself. They'd be fools not to entertain at least some requests that toed the line of disrepute.

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Onryo Hunters - A ghost-battling magical girl/boy RP

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"You know, for a major disturbance, it sure is hard to find," An emerald-haired teenager groaned as he trudged through the forest. For all his tsukumogami's alarm, Naoto certainly hadn't seen any signs of onryo activity, and he'd been walking for at least the past twenty minutes.

"It wouldn't be if you'd listen to my directions and not wander off toward whatever catches your eye," The gnarled rag perched atop his shoulder responded, its tail end swaying like an agitated cat.

"But what if that light in the distance was an onryo?"

"It was clearly a street lamp, pay attention!"

How was he supposed to know he'd wandered too close to the road? Kabi had just given him a direction and told him to start walking, and Naoto didn't believe for a second that the shiro-uneri knew his way around town. Back in his day, this was probably all rice fields or something anyway. Case in point; if there was a street nearby, why hadn't he been told to walk here using that instead of trudging through the forest in the dark with only a phone flashlight and a nagging towel to guide him? He'd nearly tripped like three times now.

Fortunately, his woes seemed to be at an end (only to be replaced with entirely new woes of the supernatural variety) when the silhouette of a person shambled into Naoto's field of view.

"We're here," Kabi announced as he vigilantly perked up in search of the onmyo, "They're all heading for the source of the corruption. Follow the trail."

Naoto wasn't sure who 'they' were at first, but as he nudged his slipping glasses up and shined his phone light further along in the silhouette's path, countless others revealed themselves - ordinary people trudging mindlessly forward like zombies in search of a meal. Lucky him; everyone always said he'd be perfectly safe if zombies started eating brains. The enthralled masses didn't seem hostile to him, in any case. But beyond that, he felt something else, something that felt like Kabi but definitely wasn't, a tingle in whatever sixth sense linked him to the other side. Other hunters were already here, close enough to be felt but somewhere Naoto couldn't yet see.

He didn't bother waiting for Kabi's input, and instead took off running toward the subtle allure ringing in the back of his head. Naoto crashed through the threshold of limbo mid-bound, as if he'd simply dove into a wall of water before him. It washed over him much the same as a jump into any lake would, the cool dampness of Kabi's borrowed power replacing the familiarity of his own skin and clothes. The weight on his shoulder grew rapidly heavier and then subsided all at once as the tattered rag perched atop it expanded into a serpentine curtain and slithered off to take flight beside him.

The doe-eyed gaze he'd sported before sharpened into the scarlet glare of a predator as Naoto took in the scene again from a more spiritually-aware vantage point, not that he really would've needed to - the zombies were slumping over now, which meant whatever was feeding on them had to be very close.

"Wah! Creepy ghost girl eating the dead guy over there," Naoto yelped as he gesticulated wildly at a newfound figure hunched over one of the bodies. That was easy. The purple girl next to her didn't look like an onmyo either, so she clearly had to be the other hunter he'd felt. Looked like she already had it cornered. The pink one could go either way, though she looked more at home haunting a candy factory than a forest.

"That's a hunter," Kabi grumbled wearily, "And they're not dead yet, so stay on task."

Naoto deflated immediately. "Oh." Wind promptly stolen from his sails, the newly ashen-haired boy shuffled over to his fellow hunters with an apologetic grin and a casual wave. "Sorry about that. Um. Have you seen the ghostie yet?"

---

@LuckyBlackCat@Wayward@Strawberry

⥑ Ember to Ashes ⥏ Dark Fantasy/Mythology (Interest Check)

I could definitely be into this

Onryo Hunters - A ghost-battling magical girl/boy RP

@Myke If nothing on the list is catching your eye and you can’t think of another object to use, maybe think of a hunter power first and pick an object within that same sphere