@jasonwolf

Drake's eyes flashed before his eyes he became captured in ice, when he came to he found Jaklo scolding him with a furious demeanor. While it was true that Drake had fantasized about such adventures this was his first time, and being still of youth and inexperience had helped cause a carefree attitude that was now shattered by Jaklo. He was right after all, this wasn't a fairy tail or some game, if they fail people die, this was his chance to mature and hold up his family's legacy. While at first his eyes were scared and distraught by his loud and intimidating leader, the eyes of a child in trouble, this soon changed to a more determined fire in his eyes after Jaklo had finished. There was a pause of silence for Drake as he stood upright off the ground finally, picking his Weapon back up. Now set straight, its as if a small boy had suddenly been replaced with a stern soldier, no tears were shed, no arguing was sent to his commander, no spite, submission, or laziness came from him, and his care free demeanor had vanished entirely. With axe in hand he looked to Jaklo, "Hunter." I replied with the same emotion-free, stern and disciplined response he could muster in his voice, as if he was a veteran soldier.

"Apologies, all." he said to the group, having embarrassed himself with lack of disclipline, more over he bowed his head towards Cassadra "sorry for the cauldron." were his last words before he turned to the melted path ahead. His posture and position were more straight then it was previous, and his eyes, though still hidden by his helmet, were fueled by determination, He didn't go far ahead from the group as they were a team after all, so after a few feet of walking ahead he stopped and waited in silence with eyes looking no where but forward in silence.

"It's a pot. Lovely. Perhaps we make a stew for whatever it is that we're hunting?" Baron said as Cassandra finished her display of power. Though his words chided, his voice betrayed his jovial tone -no offence meant in the comment. "Pit of Creation, eh? Always respect for a named implement. Can't wait to see exactly what you create with your pit, mon trésor." He said, voice dripping with flattery. This witch was one of the few Baron didn't already have a negative attitude towards, and he was just itching for an excuse to move her to the other list. Something about witches tended to rub him the wrong way -well, maybe that's just everyone.

Of course, her chiding Drake only served to higher elevate his thoughts of her -maybe this team wasn't entirely bad. He, out of better judgement, refrained from laughing directly at Drake after the comment, though the temptation was there. His entrance into the cauldron broke Baron's willpower. Like a slab of balsa wood it splintered, and Baron let out a harsh wheezing chuckle. His tentacles moved around, tips pointing directly at Drake as they circled around. They (along with Baron) considered bodily pulling the man-child from the pot. He was rather glad to see that Jaklo took the initiative for him.

"We are on job right now. So stop fucking around before I send you back to the office in a wheelchair. You can mess around on your own time, not when there are lives on the line. So are you gonna act like a hunter or a child?" Came the harsh shout as the hunter brandished his weaponry. Baron smiled with a new respect for him. "Saying what we all were thinking." Baron stated simply, his tentacles waving in the storm.

A set of the tentacles flared bright orange, as the mist around them faded away. The now metallic tentacles swirled in a lazy pattern near Drake, anticipating an outburst or violent payback for Jaklo's maneuver. When Drake apolagised civilly, Barons eyes widened in surprise. "How... uncharacteristically mature of you. Maybe you're not a lost cause yet." He commented in passing, before looking to Jaklo. "Now, let's take some of that pent up aggression and direct it towards our quarry, hm?" He said, pulling out his dueling blade with a casual flourish. He stood straighter, allowing a tentacle of his to take hold of the cane as he pointed his sword in the direction it had appeared that Jaklo was most attentive earlier.

"Allons-y, mes camarades." He said rather non-committaly, turning back to Cassandra. "Assuming, of course, that you can move your 'Hole of Making Things', that is." He said, remembering the rather elaborate process she had had to go through just to conjure the thing, let alone get to the (hopefully) impressive part.

Cassandra’s look of amusement swiftly turned into one of shock and horror. ”Is he serious? The Pit has been in my family for four centuries. He just sat in my family’s most sacred possession . . . I hate him.” Cassandra let her mind wander as Jaklo scolded the young imbecile. Cassandra resisted the urge to fume, turning back to Baron.

She sighed, allowing herself to calm down, she replied to him, “Don’t worry, love, The Pit goes where I go.” She snapped her fingers and the cauldron began to hover just above the ground and inch towards Cassandra, melting the snow beneath it. She marched forward with her comrades, cauldron in tow. A voice began to call to her, a familiar presence had descended upon them, known only to her, or so she believed.

“My dear,” spoke the ethereal voice, “keep your wits about you. I have foreseen the dangers you are to face; you mustn’t lose yourself to the foolishness of others.”

”Thank you, Mary.” Cassandra thanked the spirit in her mind. If she ever loved anyone, it was Mary. She had looked out for Cassandra since she was eight years old, taught her the ways. Cassandra wasn’t the trusting type, but she trusted her ancestors without question, especially Mary. She knew the hardships of being alone as a young girl, perhaps that’s why she was the one who came to mentor Cassandra.

Her anger faded, her mind was clear, and Mary departed, leaving Cassandra and her team to fend for themselves.

Brushing the last few specks of ice-crystals off the metal knob, Coal twisted the handle, unaffected by the cold metal, as he swung the door open, flinching as it hit the wall with an unintentional bang.
Cerberus’ first instinct was to leap off Coal, and scurry up the rickety stairs, the creaks and moans of worn-wood echoing throughout the home. Taking slow and careful steps as if the place might fall down on their heads, Coal’s dark eyes wandered into and between the gloom, the light that filtered through the door was pinkening quickly and night would soon be upon them, which would without doubt cause the temperature to drop drastically. They would need to work fast if they wanted to come out of this with all their fingers.

”Luz Bruxa”, Coal murmured through tight lips, a flare of golden light filling his open palm. The yellow light pooled onto the floor, casting long, dark tendrils of shadows across the knotwood-ridden walls, that coupled with the utter stillness and silence giving the place a strong foreboding mood.
But Coal was now headstrong, determined to prove himself as a capable witch, and proudly strode into the room. “I’m heading into the kitchen, everyone else, help along and look for clues with me” Coal ordered the group, ”Imagine that, Coal thought to himself, ”I just gave my first order!”. A sense of pride swelled in him as he dug his non-glowing hand into his bookbag, drawing out what looked like a small little brown bag, tied together with string.
Undoing the knot, he sprinkled out what seemed to be glitter all over the floor that vanished as soon as it hit the floor. “Rainbow Dust, detects the presence or making of magic. Better safe than sorry,” he replied to one in particular, before stuffing the bag of Rainbow Dust back in his bag and heading off into the kitchen. The Rainbow Dust he left behind remained undisturbed, whatever being was behind this spell was long gone, at least now they’d know when the caster would come back.

Entering the kitchen, Coal was hit instantly with a pang of uneasiness, there was no life in this room. No mice or cockroaches scurrying away, no cobwebs with half a spider’s meal, the place was by no means tidy, just sterile. A carpet was haphazardly spread onto the floor, the cupboards were shut but cans of frostbitten beans and broken packs of instant noodles littered the floor, a fridge door was left open, with stacks upon stacks of ice melting inside the malfunctioning fridge. The whole place smelt of ice. Dry, stings the lungs, and utterly unpleasant. The only thing in half decent condition was a table laid out in the middle of the room, with no chairs around it. The table itself was old, made of rotting wood and a shorter leg held up by a phone book, but on it were bits of paper, decorated with ink and small, neat handwriting.
Wishing he had taken the second floor with Cerberus instead, Coal raised his arms again, his fingers dancing in complicated strokes, spreading his arms in a grandiose manner, he bellowed ”Baaz”.
Cuboards banged open, cans flew out, chunks of ice ricocheted across the room, and the stacks of paper fluttered about like cooped up birds, struggling to arrange themselves neatly. By now, everyone in a one mile radius heard him. “Sorry!” Coal’s voice quipped from inside the echo chamber disguised as a kitchen. What was supposed to be a simple spell to show everything in the room was taken too literally. Every object not nailed down was now neatly organized in a grid like pattern on the floor.
Sometimes, having a lot of power can be a nuisance. “Wild magic is witch magic,” said Coal, a frequent line he used to excuse immense screw ups such as this.
”No need to dwell on mistakes,” he assured himself, ”There’s a mystery we need to solve!”.
Taking deep breaths, Coal approached and looked over the neat mess. Nothing he hadn’t seen before.
Soup cans, cans of peas, cans of corn, cans, cans, cans. One might think the owner was preparing for an apocalypse (well he or she wasn’t far off). More dry food, newspaper clippings, and..

“Oh, what’s this?”

The stomping was now very audible to even a normal person’s ear. Jaklo sheathed Legacy holding his shotgun with both hands. The blizzard was letting up, the eye of the storm was getting close to them. The group was pretty much in empty countryside. There were a couple farm houses and woods a few hundred yards away. Standing over it all there was a being of pure ice. It rivaled the size of the nearest trees clearly putting it at about twenty five to thirty feet tall. There was a dark mass in its center probably the catalyst of its creation. The best guess Jaklo had was this was a golem, a giant very angry ice golem. Jaklo’s eyes dilated and he grinned with monstrous glee.

“Lock and load. Hunt’s on.” Jaklo laughed sprinting to the right of the creature.

He kept moving unloading into the right shin of the golem. The dragon’s breath let out a roar just like its namesake as it sprayed a bright orange flame. The golem’s leg had huge chunks blown out of it, but within seconds the spaces filled with snow and then turned into ice. It began swinging at Jaklo, but it was pathetically slow. At the same time Jaklo knew one good hit would likely break his visage, and a second was death.

Lenya concealed her horror behind the practised calm of a ritual practitioner. It didn’t do to show shock or fear in the midst of a ritual which might take hours to complete. Coal blundered into the house without as much as a hesitation. She held her breath for a moment and was vaguely disappointed when no explosion, spell or demon tore from the building to shred the young witch.

She ran a number of ‘kids these days’ style comments through her mind. There were few schools or institutions of any kind when it came to magical learning. It seemed depressingly common for youths to be reckless and full of their own power, convinced that their magic made them invulnerable. There might easily have been something as mundane as a hand grenade or other explosive trap on the other side of that door. Mundane enough to get one or more of them killed. Perhaps it would be best to view Coal as a sort of forlorn hope, like in Napoleonic times.

Reluctantly she followed the others into the house. Briefly she touched Azai’s shoulder.

“Let’s hear it,” she concurred with Max, keeping her eyes on the house.

“If our reckless friend there hasn’t already ruined whatever you had in mind,” she added dryly, pulling her coat tight around her slim body.

“If there are any watchers or alarms, they are certainly triggered.”

Max cringed instinctively as they looked into the house. He wasn't sure what he expected, exactly. A yeti to arrive and punch his head off his shoulders. A net to fall from the ceiling. A Claymore mine. A magical fireball. None of these things occurred, however.

Curiosity began to override his caution, though. Here was something new, a gap in his knowledge. Without waiting to hear Azai's plan, he poked his head inside the house, breath fogging in the air. The entire place was in disarray, furniture knocked aside. Maybe there had been some sort of fight here? It didn't seem impossible. Or maybe a Summoning had gone wrong. That seemed possible. Many amateur magicians had gotten excited, reached beyond their grasp, brought something they weren't prepared for into this world. Often they paid the price. Max knew for a fact that at least three or four of the disasters reported by the press each year were a result of irresponsible and short-sighted Summonings. A pesticide leak in Hyderabad, a gas explosion in Norway, a sinkhole in Buenos Aires- hell, a snowstorm in Maine.

He pulled out his Thermos, poured himself a little coffee in the cup on the lid. The hot beverage was greatly welcome- even the interior of this insulated house was freezing. "Anyone else?" he said, offering the Thermos to his companions. He leaned lightly on the stairs, but was taken aback by the loud creaking. "Looks like the tenant was worried about someone sneaking up on them," he remarked. "Nightingale floors, like in the old samurai castles in Kyoto. No one can walk through undetected."

Max noticed the bricked-up basement door and frowned. "Something is down there," he announced. The taste of copper was thick in the air. "We'll have to bust this down, with a sledgehammer or something. We'll have to be careful though. Very, very careful." Max leaned in closer, hoping to see if there was any runes or Wards or anything to accompany the heavy wall, anything that might indicate what was down there.

There were no runes, no symbols, nothing magical in the slightest. Only a small metal latch near the floor. With closer inspection it could be seen that the stairs were not attached to the first floor anymore and instead held to it with the latch. Undoing the latch would allow the stairs to lift away most likely giving access to the basement. Given a little more time and new drywall could have been put up to cover the bricks. Clearly whoever lived here was trying to create a hidden safe room or workshop. With the current shoddy it work the occupant either wasn’t especially talented or was very short on time. The latch was horribly cold to even draw close to. While the area was already cold just placing a hand by the lock stung like an icicle stabbing through the palm.@Polyphemus

@jasonwolf

Drake's eyes fixed on the magnificent golem yet despised its icy element, of course first day on the job and he was dealing with perhaps one of his biggest weaknesses. Nonetheless he watched Jaklo charge in first guns blazing and a wild grin. Drake had to take this seriously but he couldn't help but grin with excitement at the threat before him. Not long after Jaklo charged in Drake would rapidly grow and mutate into a 10 foot tall beast of a bipedal lizard, armor molded into a more scarcely padded, south american native styled armor, his axe now seemed more suited to his size as he rushed towards the beast. flames one again ignited off of his body, which now made him look much more of a monster as he was encased in an inferno with much magic to support its flow, the fire itself resisting the blowing of the wind as it created a bit of its own air pressure from the heat itself. clawed feet plowing through snow as A bolt of fire flowed from his mouth and into the face of the golem, the fireball creating an explosion large enough to make an aerial smoke screen in hopes of temporarily disorienting it at the very least, afterwards he would leap up to one of the arms swinging at Jaklo's direction and swing his mighty axe, already embedded with flames, at the massive tree of an arm.

Azai was interrupted by Coal who opened the door quickly rushing into the house without a moment of thinking, the boy immediately started casting all kinds of spells and even ordering around! Azai face palmed himself as Lenya touched his shoulder. She was right he ruined any kind of plan he had, but he had to work with what he got now. He followed in after Max went in, he listened to Max's explanation as he was thinking of something to now, Max had also gone to the basement. Azai decided to go with the what was happening "Well Lenya, you go with Max and I'll check upstairs with Coal, I think I can handle the kid, maybe there is something that can tell who did this. Just call me if you need me." Azai went to see what kind of mess the kid did. He went upstairs to see that everything was scattered everywhere, he approached him and patted his shoulder sighing and calmly said "Kid, I know it's your first mission but so far you're making too many mistakes, I'm not gonna say that I did well on mine, but I think you could do better" Maybe Azai's way of trying to cheer him, was more like treating him like a child, but he didn't think that the alternative would make Coal think less annoyed, it maybe would've made him even more annoyed. He smiled as he continued talking "Leave this mess, I don't think there is anything useful in a bunch of canned food. Let's go check the bedroom maybe there's something there."

Azai walked upstairs to the bedroom and the closet caught his attention first, so he walked towards carefully and opened it to check for some kind clues...

Jaklo charged in with guns blazing, yes, literally blazing fire that melted or exploded part of the golem. Regardless, the monster had no trouble vanquishing the flames and quenching the heat in mere seconds. Snow and ice filled in the parts that were missing, and the thing then focused on the creature that had attacked it.

At this point, Drake had changed form, charging in with flames radiating off his new scaly body. He opened up a fireball on the golem's face. For whatever damage that did, he was at least able to distract it from Jaklo.

Baron and Cassandra would suddenly realize that Mithias had vanished. Well, he would have vanished, but his trail in the snow showed that he had merely moved off without their notice. Damn vampires were sneaky. His tracks vanished in the surrounding white-out. Hopefully, he was up to something useful.

Mithias was watching the fight from a closer vantage point, one that would be unexpected and advantageous. He had made his way on top of a tree/building/rock/<insert environmental object here>. So far, his compatriots had attacked with fire and force, which you would think would be logical against a golem of ice, yet he saw the creature heal. He studied the creature, taking his time, as immortals do, and he took greatest interest in the mass of blackness at the creature's chest. He narrowed his eyes at it, peering fiercely through the annoying snow. While the golem and Godzilla fought, Mithias looked for an opening to jump to it, the black mass. If it was a gem, he might be able to grab it and yank it free, if it was a magical aura, perhaps he could discern its nature. For the moment, he watched and delayed. Time would reveal more information.

Cassandra watched in amazement as her comrades laid into the giant golem, unleashing gouts of flame to liquify the mass of ice. Unfortunately their attempts at melting the golem were in vain. As soon as a piece was damaged, the golem regenerated itself. ”If fire can’t take this thing down,” Cassandra thought in distress, ”then what can?”

She pondered this for several minutes while her teammates launched into battle, Jaklo using his mystical arsenal, Drake assuming the form of a dragon (Cassandra could appreciate the correlation between his powers and his name), and Mithias vanishing into thin air. Wanting to be of use, she ran her hand over the rim of her cauldron, the spark within growing ten-fold, flames leaping from the Pit’s mouth, coagulating into a large sphere just above. With a wave of her hand, Cassandra cast the swirl of flames spiraling into the golem’s outstretched arm. The heat licked at the hardened ice, peeling off layers and turning them to slush, but just as before, the golem simply regenerated its arm from snow and ice.

Then it hit her! Perhaps the golem would continue to regenerate so long as there was a raging blizzard surrounding them. ”Maybe if there’s no snow, it can’t keep growing limbs back.” With that in mind, Cassandra again waved her hands above the Pit. The cauldron's internal flame was extinguished as it began to fill with water. The inside of the Pit was a swirling torrent, a clashing of waves. Cassandra removed a large tangle of knots from her person, a charm to hold the winds. When untangled, it would release a powerful gust of wind, but when cast into the Pit, it would allow greater control over the element. She cast the charm into the water, which sizzled and sparked as the knots splashed in. The water turned quickly into black pitch, then formed into a thick, black smoke.

With a wave of her wand, the smoke ascended from the Pit, a black pillar of condensed air. It swirled violently as it was cast into the sky, a powerful elemental force that could hopefully combat or part the current onslaught of wind and snow.

"Christ!" Max yelped at the stabbing cold in his hand, withdrawing his gloved hand immediately and trying to massage a little warmth back into it. On one hand, that was an encouraging sign that he was looking in the right direction. But on the other hand, going down into that basement would be a hazard to life and limb. He would have to take some precautions.

Firstly, he looked around the wreck of the living room, his eyes falling on a thick woolen afghan draped on the overturned couch. Grabbing the blanket, he draped it over his shoulders and wrapped it around his body as an added layer of insulation. That'd help at least a little. Next, he looked through the kitchen for a hurricane lamp, a lantern, something he could use as a source of both light and warmth. Finding nothing, however, he sighed to himself. Max disliked using magic for mundane purposes- it was beneath the grandeur and the majesty of such knowledge to be wasted on mere parlor tricks. But there seemed to be little option at the moment. Holding out one gloved hand, Max sang a brief incantation in Hebrew. A small but bright and warming globe of fire flickered into the air, hovering a couple inches above his palm. Light and a source of personal warmth.

With that done, Max edged nearer the door. Cautiously, he reached up with his shovel and undid the latch. As the door creaked open, he sighed, peered into the darkness, and descended into the basement.

Lenya shivered and pulled her winter jacket close around her slender body. She was a lean and long limbed woman and neither of those traits did much for heat retention. Instinctively she crowded in behind Max, taking a little warmth from his flame.

“I knew the Macabee’s cheated,” she murmured in his ear, her teeth nearly audible chattering and her breath visible in short puffs of vapour. She shoved her hands deep into her pockets and hope that if she needed to use her athame that she would be steady enough. It occurred to her to take the glock out of her briefcase but the thought of exposing her hands just to clutch a freezing lump of plastic and metal seemed intolerable.

“I suppose with all the banging around, if we haven’t been murdered yet…”

None the less she kept her mind as clear as the cold allowed, feeling it sting at the tip of her nose and exposed ears.

“We should have bought balaclava’s like real burglars,” she managed in weak jest as she followed Max down the stairs.

Lenya pulled in closer, attracted to his fireball like a moth to a flame. Not that he blamed her, this was the first warmth anyone had felt since leaving the office. A tall, thin man, Max felt the cold easily. He held the flame a little closer to Lenya, then passed over his Thermos of hot coffee as they descended the basement steps. "Have a little of this, it'll do you some good. I think after this I'm gonna ask my brother if I can borrow his condo in Key West."

Max hesitated for a moment, the unwrapped the afghan from around himself and draped it over both their shoulders, so they both at least had partial coverage. Two master magicians fighting over a blanket would be extremely undignified, so might as well share. "So far nothing is charging up the stairs at us," he said. Their descent was slow, the cold seeming to intensify with each step. "Unless it's just waiting for us. Like Satan, trapped in the ice of Cocytus, unable to move for the freezing winds he generates in his attempts to free himself."

With that cheery thought hanging over his head, Max coughed lightly. "A balaclava might have been good, but I have to admit, my head is literally the only warm part of my body right now. This hat is surprisingly good, I'll have to ask Maria if it's magic or something." He paused for a moment, regarded the flaps and plush ears of the foxy hat. "Maybe I'll buy it off her."

A dead rat!

A familiar perhaps, he thought hopefully. He nudged it with his foot. It remained still. Just a dead rat afterall.

Straightening up, and sighing with the utmost disappointment, Coal could already feel the disapproving head-shakes of this teammates. He luckily didn’t zone out with self-loathing thoughts this time.
Kicking off a few stray freezer burned cans away from his foot, he surveyed the very neat mess of items. Nothing interesting he concluded, a total waste of energy, and a great way to let any crazed cryomancer standing around to sniff out their location. However, Coal had full faith they were perfectly safe, sadly the team didn’t share his confidence. But Coal was sure he was-

"Kid, I know it's your first mission but,”

Coal snapped out of running thoughts with a confused “Huh?”, silently cursing both himself and Azai. Himself for zoning out, and Azai for somehow not realising his seething anger when being called a kid. Maybe he did know how much it annoyed him, Coal wondered, it wouldn’t surprise him if another person liked picking on the new kid, going on life threatening missions could make someone cynical.

"Leave this mess, I don't think there is anything useful in a bunch of canned food. Let's go check the bedroom maybe there's something there." Coal realised Azai was trying to be helpful, he failed miserably at it, but nevertheless, he tried. Wasn’t that worth something? Coal was mostly just glad he wasn’t the only one without the faintest idea of what to exactly look for.

“Whatever, sure,” Coal replied in unintended teen angst, as he shuffled towards Azai as they made their way upstairs, leaving the mess for someone to either clean up or burn.
The creek and groan of footsteps echoed within the wooden walls, drowning out Coal’s “hey” when he spotted the other two heading towards the basement. What first caught his attention was how cold everyone else seemed. Coal suspected their refusal to use magic was stubbornness. Were they trying to prove a point? Seem stronger than they really are? Whatever it was, it seemed silly to Coal that they wouldn’t just light themselves on fire. He shrugged off both the thought and the cold as they walked through the glittering staircase. Glittering?
Yes, Coal’s Rainbow Dust seemed to have splattered everywhere across the walls, the mess of magic he did in the kitchen most likely caused that. At least the walls sparkled prettily if you really focused on them. Glad he did something nice to the home, he finally reached the bedroom with Azai. He gently swung open the door, no bang this time, and strode in the room.

Coal wasn’t sure what exactly he was expecting to see. A little dust, maybe mold, old rickety furniture, but not this much. An evolving colony seemed to emerge out of every damp, green corner. Dust caked every surface, and it billowed everywhere with every step. (What he thought was) A bed draped in moth-eaten sheets. It could’ve been a table for all he knew, 4 legs draped with a cloth isn’t much to go on. A stool in the corner that looked like it could collapse at any moment, and Cerberus stalking from the corner before promptly coming at his side when he sensed Coal’s mood, rubbing his back sympathetically on Coal’s stick-leg.
He admired Cerberus’ help before taking his eyes off him, and scanning the room. Looking for something. Documents, stray spell ingredients, blood.

Something, anything.

Drake’s axe buried itself in the arm of the ice giant. At first it appeared stuck, but soon the limb cracked and the distal end shattered. Still the regeneration was in effect. Instead of growing back fully it produced a number of long spikes from where it was broken. As much attention was given to Drake Jaklo was still being targeted. The giant made a huge sweeping attack with its other arm. Jaklo couldn’t get left or right far enough, couldn’t jump it, and definitely couldn’t out run it, so he stood and took the hit. On impact there was a horrible cracking sound before a huge wave of force flew out. The giant's arm shattered up to the shoulder, and Jaklo stood in a small pit.

“Third law of physics. Equal and Opposite. Every bit of force you hit me with just hit you back.” Jaklo roared laughing.

At the same time he was horrified knowing visage wouldn’t recharge anytime soon. The giant began to regrow the arm, but soon the snow and ice from around the area was used up. It looked to the sky, but where it looked for snow was only a light rain now. It began to jump and stomp on the ground shaking it like a 6.0 quake. It spotted the witch and her boiling pot. Somehow it know the source of the weather change. The giant charged ready to trample her.

=====================================================================

The basement was just as frigid as outside, but upon fully entering the room it was obvious why. A huge section of the back wall had been destroyed and filled with snow. There had been something ridiculously powerful in here. The hole was maybe seven to eight feet around. There was a little trickle of light to indicate that it went right up to the surface.

Besides that the basement clearly got all of the inhabitants attention. It was actually a nice area to be in, at least for a mage. There were bookshelves of both magical tomes and a lot of manga. The Mage had a workbench set up just for putting together those little mecha model sets even. It was a very strange combination either way.

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Upstairs the duo would stumble upon a shattered bottle attached to a large rattrap. It would seem a rudimentary magical trap intended to shatter the bottle if anyone went into the room, but it was tripped long ago. Likely the reason the room was so decayed compared to the rest of the normal, but empty house. A rot bomb, more often a joke spell used by child mages to give people athlete’s foot and such, though this was much more potent. In the closet was a tiny safe still locked up tight.

Baron smiled when the Pit started to levitate at Cassandra's will. "By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes." He said in a sing-song voice, rather amused, as he turned his attention once again to their goal. The fingers of Baron's good hand flexed as their adversary emerged from the blizzard -a massive golem of ice and snow wading through the buffet of airborne snow. In the center of the creature was a dark mass that instantly caught his eye. Though his first instinct was to strike hard at this center, he was a bit distracted in watching his teammates onslaught against the monolithic beast.

"Lock and load. Hunt's on." Was the battle cry of Jaklo as he sprinted at the beast, opening a barrage of quite literal fire on it. Baron was almost impressed with the results of his attack, until he saw that the golem almost instantly regenerated the damage. Barons thoughts wandered to something he had been reading about in years past -mountain trolls living in the Alps known for their regenerative capabilities and brute force. He dismissed the thought as he further remembered the passage he had read -regenerative properties nullified by fire and acid. He remembered, disproving the hypothesis. His eyes narrowed, searching the battlefield. His limbs screamed at him, urging him to take action rather than wait.

Baron turned to watch Drake's assault, eyebrow raising as he stared. "Perhaps not entirely useless." He thought to himself as he watched a ten foot tall lizard-man replace the man. Still, Drake was dwarfed by the golem -it was truly doubtful that the wannabe dragon would do any lasting damage even with the massive ax. But hey, goddamn if it wouldn't be funny to watch midget godzilla get punted into next week by the icy monstrosity. He turned to comment on the rather hilarious image to Mithias, only to notice he was gone. His eyes narrowed as he searched for the vampire -had he abandoned them? He finally found the vampire, on a vantage point staring intensely at the black center of the golem. "Well, great minds..." Baron thought, as his legs bent ever so slightly, and he got into a fighting stance.

He glanced back at Cassandra, hearing a bit of commotion, rather eager to see what it is that her little pot could do. He almost ducked instinctively when he saw the massive sphere of flame emerge from the cauldron -he instead settled for taking a couple tentative steps away from the cauldron. He tracked the ball intently as it soared at the icy golem, resulting in exactly what he expected -nothing lasting. He chuckled at the meager attack before he stopped rather suddenly. The swirling column of black haze seemed to be working against the swirling blizzard that raged around them and Baron's stood confused for a moment before he realized the ingenuity. No real way to tell if it was actually going to work, but it certainly made sense. He admired the quick thinking, though he personally believed it was far more likely that they would have to target the black center of the giant.

Baron was proved wrong rather quickly by the ice giants fight with Jaklo and Drake. When he saw the arm fail to regrow, he smirked, surprised at how effective the Pit really had been for such an inelegantly named artifact. The smirk faded when he saw the ice giant begin to charge at Cassandra and her cauldron -and by extension Baron himself. "Ah, for the love of... Somebody hit the black thing already!" He shouted as he and his tentacles braced themselves as if for impact. Of course, though lazy, he was no hypocrite. His tentacles moved rigidly behind him, spreading out like wings. The mass of writhing appendages was a matte black metal, orange light peeking out through cracks.

Baron began walking at the ice giant to intercept his charge, slowly breaking into a run. With a flourish, he pulled out his sword and pointed the tip directly at the giant. Orange light sprung from the tip in a narrow beam, enveloping the ice golem in a pulsing glow. "Oh, you're not gonna like this part." Baron said confidently as he sprung from the ground. Magically strengthened, his muscles propelled him skyward up to the core of the giants chest. With a force rivalling that of a gunshot, he stabbed the blade at the black core of the ice golem. The blade of his sword shone with orange energy as it struck, a second attack of the same power springing from the air at the same target. At the same time, the pulsing energy that surrounded the golem detonated, amplifying his attacks again twofold so the simple stab with his sword hit with force more akin to being rammed by a truck. A truck with a sword attached to the front, of course.

Lenya’s teeth audibly chattered as she surveyed the room incredulously. It didn’t strike her as the lair of a powerful mage bent on evil designs. It looked like it belonged to a kid with too much power and too little sense. Not a new phenomenon that. Whatever the nature of the opponent it was clear he, or she, was not here and that now clever spell lay over the place to ambush intruders.

Reluctantly she abandoned the shelter of the afghan.

“It will be alright,” she assured Max in response to his unspoken concern.

“This will only take a minute. Despite her bravado the biting cold was enervating, she would need to work quickly. After a few moments of fumbling with the catches of her briefcase she tore off her gloves and pulled open the case. Instantly her fingers began to sting with exposure. Reaching deep into the case she withdrew a white stick of tropical coral. One of several she had been given during her time in Melanesia. Carefully she scribed a circle on the hard concreted, the rough surface abrading the coral like chalk.

Once she was completely enclosed she began to dance. A slow sinuous rolling affair, distinctly Polynesian in its tempo and gyrations. As she danced she spoke words in low tones, ancient tribal invocations to gods she didn’t believe in.

The whole procedure took nearly five minutes and by the end of it her teeth were chattering and her body was trembling uncontrollably from the intense cold. She reached forward with the toe of her boot and scuffed the circle open. A rush of almost tropical air erupted from nowhere, the warm salt smell of the sea. The temperature rose to just below freezing in a matter of seconds. It felt like a furnace compared to the chill settled into their bones. She opened a palm and poured a large handful of salt out onto the ground. It slowly began to dissipate, like a chemical accelerant devouring itself without oxygen.

She rushed unsteadily over to Max pressing herself close to the flame and wrapping herself in the afghan once again.

“It will last a few minutes,” she managed through chattering teeth.

“We should search and take what we need back to the office.”

Things were beginning to go their way. The new witch, whatever her name was, had done some weather magic with that mystic crock pot, and the giant had run out of disposable limbs. Baron and Jaklo had begun to directly attack the thing, not even taking into consideration Drake. Sighing, he noticed the lasting damage the other two had done. He wasn't the best at direct combat, and any of his more...dangerous acids would injure his coworkers. The golem was almost dead, and Atlas would feel bad if he didn't pitch in.

Rummaging through his bag, he pulled out the vodka. Stuffing the towel down the bottle, he screamed something incomprehensible in Russian, and lit the fuse. He tossed it with vampiric strength at the giant, knocking it square in the shoulder. It was at least three times the speed of a pitcher in your average MLB game, and this did the monster no favors. The fire, combined with the sheer force of impact, unbalanced the giant to a significant extent,leaving it open to attack.