Siris: Ugh!

Having felt a hand dig into his wounds, the young mercenary initially thought he had been blindsided by an enemy. As he was about to turn to see he noticed it was the healer of the group who seemed rather annoyed at the young warrior's actions.

After a short time, the pain quickly began to subside as his body began to reform.

Siris: Damn it Iddin, couldn't you have been less rough! he says as he scratched his head to remove the now crystalized blood from his scalp.

After hitting his now healed body a couple of times to make sure he was now completely healthy again, Siris began to walk forward more confidently. Still, however, not as foolishly as he did before.

Siris: Hmph, I can understand your reasoning though. Regardless, I thank you for the help. Shifting his focus to in front of him, Siris walks into the barely lit area.

The merchant chuckled a bit more loudly than he otherwise would have, watching the priest scold the rude Sirus, though admittedly, he wasn't being scolded for giving them the cold shoulder. Even so, it was nice to, if only for a moment, laugh a little, and ignore that they were in a very dark, very dangerous hold in the ground, potentially surrounded by enemies.

Letting out a brief after-laugh sigh, Zarif un-strung the arrow from his bow, pulled back out his short spear, and proceeded down the hall after Sirus, hanging back a bit due to his lighter armor.

"Hellions! Ahead our aim is in sight." Kastilus' voice is held high, echoing well through the squalid halls. With a spring in his step, the scholar bounds up just behind Siris, similarly placing himself under the gaze of the yeeks beyond the shadow, nevertheless, he continues to speak. "The final resting place of Dumuzid. . . Ahh, I can make the tomb out just ahead. Onward--!" As he cries out, the sound of crumbling sandstone draws his eye, he sucks upon his teeth.

With a mighty heave from that mighty man, the broken up wall comes to an end, revealing the warrior's suspicions. As the others trudge ahead to meet with last vestiges of Yeek-kind in the Zigguarrat, the roar of hidden foes splits their attention.

AMA-SIN: "Damn. . ! We won't lose the element of surprise, cut those Hellions down once and for all!" Shrouded both in the royal purples of the rival merc band and the gloam of the ancient temple, a fierce-featured lithe figure gives the call to advance.

AMA-SIN: "So. . . That Sage was right after all, to think we could take our revenge today. . !"

The rival mercs begin to funnel out from the hole moments after Lyun had revealed their hiding spot. Without delay a bladesman charges past the broad shouldered brute and hacks deeply with a fell motion into Iddin's left shoulder. A spray of crimson marks the renewed flames between the two bands.



An arrow pings out of the crumbling dark, the sharp sting of metal embedes itself deep into Lyun's shoulder as another of the Scorpions stands at the piled rubble, before the figure could knock another arrow they're nearly bisected by a hand axe flung with all might, felling them in one swoop.

AMA-SIN: "Don't think we've forgotten what happened at Larsa, you animals!" A hide-wrapped man with a penetrating eye darts past his fallen comrade. Unable to react in time through the pain of his wound, another sharp sting of metal finds its way into the man's abdomen. Yet even so, the stalwart warrior is able to bring another hand-axe quickly to draw Scorpion blood all the same.

Still. . . Those ahead couldn't immediately snap around, those damnable blue-skinned freaks yet remained in the darkness of the expansive chamber beyond. Grumbled words of their god, Zuug-Agblish fill the hall as zealous fervour enrages the last of the Yeeks. One of the two patter down from the dias toward the scholar, yet a mere glare stays its weapon, sending it toward the man beside -- A gnarled spear finds its mark 'tween the gaps of Siris' armour, while Zarif deftly parries the next. With a will, they strike back.

Another of the foul priests steps down from the central platform, raising up a fetish of their petrified god, another incantation of guttural speak fills the room. Here and there, Siris can feel patches of his skin begin to calcify, yet quickly he manages to shake it away.

Were that not enough, the hastily cobbled together wall to the east of the main corridor began to rumble. Iddin could only just snap his head to see new shapes in the darkness.


AGGA: "Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey! Gesties we thought ya were Yeek food! Grahahaha!" The stout figure of squat and hideous countenance bore an axe about the size of an average man upon just one of his shoulders, evoking the same image as the Red Yeek slain just before. "The hell yah doin' with 'em? Com'on lets kill these dogs!"


GESTIES: "Y-You guys! Damn, I thought all that blood was yours! Figures that Shulaar's Scorpions wouldn't die to some mangy rats." The bald man hefted up the sickle sword he bore, twisting his head back to the others. "Y-Yeah. . . We'll kill 'em." He stammers, whether his trepidation was for the skill he'd witnessed or something else, none could say.

Siris couldn't understand how, but it seemed that the yeeks had managed to more than once perfectly find the weakest parts of his armor to attack. However, the damage was not enough to critically injure the warrior as the yeek soon found out.

After dealing with his current predicament, Siris began to understand what was occuring. As he turned his attention back to his allies he saw his teammates Iddin and Lyun being attacked and badly injured from a surprise attack from a rival mercenary band.

Siris: SHIT! he shouts as he begins running back to his comrades.

After deciding to pay back his allies for their kindness and his own stupidity, Siris had resolved himself to act as a decent member. At least for now. Watching himself instantly fail to protect them elicited a more serious range of emotions than Siris has had for a while.

As he was about to attempt to run to his injured friends, Siris felt his skin begin to harden making it increasingly difficult to move. This wasn't enough to stop the young warrior though who used all his strength to force himself to move causing his skin to turn back to normal, immediately allowing him to break into a sprint.

A random opponent from the rival mercenary gang attempted to block the way to his allies, but with a quick side step and push of his shield Siris managed to run past him without losing time.

The man who had attacked the healer Iddin was already preparing for the berserking warrior's arrival, this however would not stop Siris's charge.

Both men raised their swords and swung them at the same time. Siris's armor managed to stop the cut from being too deep although the damage was still evident; the swordsman in front of him was more damaged but showed no sign of going down.

A split-second after the attack, as the 2 mercenaries were attempting to recover their stance, Siris heard footsteps coming from behind him.

The merchant half listened to their overly excited employer's ramblings as he drew his spear, hearing his own breath much too loudly in the stuffy darkness. No sooner had Zarif drawn his spear, the eerie quiet that had hung over the Hellions, more oppressive than even the darkness that enveloped them, shattered into chaos. The wall in front collapsed, and several of Tiamat's wreched blue spawn charged out from behind the bricks. It was all Zarif could do to sidestep the unsteady spear thrust, and return with one of his own.

Before he could follow up the attack, from behind, Zarif heard voices... human voices. For the briefest of moments, Zarif felt hope, glancing behind himself as the Yeek staggered back from his wound. Though it took but one glance for that sigh of relief to turn to strained hiss of despair. Despite the color, those robes were as noble and royal as Salador's hindquarters. The Scorpions! But we... trapped, and we even buried ourselves for them.

They were surrounded, the blue devil's streaming in from in front, and those savages from behind. Before the merchant could even account for what was happening, an arrow shot out from the shadows behind, and caught the brute Lyun in his lower back. No sooner had Lyun retaliated with a brutal hand axe to the Archer's skull, than the talkative ill-dressed commander knifed him savage in the side, though he paid for it in turn with a grizzly wound down his chest.

Trapped... surrounded... on all sides... no way out anywhere. Zarif began to panic, remembering that night a few years ago, his merchant caravan had been encircled by bandits, picked off one by one with arrows from their damn chariots. Every last one of the people from his homeland, his friends, his idols, his own master... it was happening again. They were going to-

The merchant gritted his teeth and growled, drawing his bow as he saw Lyon stagger back in pain, and ran towards him. No, that had been then. He wasn't that terrified boy anymore. He'd cut them a path before they all lay dead in this tomb. From the corner of his eye, Zarif saw that damn priest, Iddin, take a brutal wound, which seemed surely to be lethal... and yet, as he aimed his shot, squinting in the darkness, the priest did not fall.

Zarif let the arrow fly, and turned around on his heel at the same moment, staring down Gesties a look of fury replacing his trademark whimsical expression. Despite that, the brief scream, followed by the unmistakable sound of a body crumpling against a stone floor made Zarif smirk darkly in satisfaction.

Zarif: To think I freed you, betrayer! Move and parish, thankless one.

AMA-SIN: "G-Gaaah. . ." A guttural sound escapes his lips as red quickly swells about his cloak. 'How could things change so quickly. . ?!' Zarif's arrow had struck true, embedding itself into the Scorpion's back, narrowly missing his heart. Simply put, it seemed that the Hellions, even as harried as they were, still stood a league above. Leaving his knife behind in Lyun's wound, the bloodied merc begins to squeeze what little motes of strength he had left to flee down the entryway. His footfalls quickly vanish into the dsrkness abound, beyond the purview of the focused mercenary band.

"You think to escape? I'm afraid that's not part of the bargain dear friend. . ."


AMA-SIN: "That voice. . . T-The sage? Where are you?!" He clutches the gash at his chest, only to slam into a wall, xrumbling to the ground.

"Die here with dignity, you can do that for me, can't you?"


AMA-SIN "S-Sbulaar. . ." He wheezes, a sudden shock tearing through his body as those fingers dig into the cracked sandstone. As the man dies, his blood seeps, filling little channels on either side of the hall, 'neath murals of ancient warriors marching to their judgement.

[Hr]


ASHÜR: 'Behind. . .' He mutters, his voice low and harsh, just enough for the hot-blooded warrior to hear him, along with his footfalls. As Siris bore the brunt of the rival sellsword's blade, Ashür caught him unawares, darting in to sever the viscera of the man's throat. In the instant of the figure's fall, the desperdo called out, "Lyun! The ugly one!" His cautious eyes having scanned the field afore quickly and concisely. Thereafter he turned, to the Yeeks beyond, and to Gesties the same as Zarif cursed.



[Hr]


Gesties was many things -- A drunk, a braggart, a womanizer, and a crappy mercenary, yet he was no fool. As Ama-Sin fled, dying in the dark, while another two of his comrades had fallen, he couldn't help but feel his hands shake with that blade in their grasp. Picking himself up after being battered by Siris, he rose to Zarif's words, "B-Betrayer!? I had no idea! I was certain they'd all been killed!" It was all he could muster in that moment. Only then did his last words seep into his bones, now indeed they were to fall. But perhaps not all of them. . . Or so he'd hope.

The brute's body was getting heavier with each wound, more and more difficult to keep upright as his blood slowly painted the stonework flooring below. Quite the danger for a band of mercenaries to find themselves in: ambushed, surrounded, bloodied. And yet, in a matter of seconds, Lyun is reminded of the motives behind his choice. Why join the Hellions? Because a grim situation was just about to become yet another tale, whispered in disbelief, of those crimson dogs defying the odds.

With the scorpions going down one after another, Lyun soon feels his body become lighter yet rigid as the divinely-touched theurg works his incantations. He takes a few heavy steps, past the merchant, desperado and warrior, giving each a simple nod.

Lyun: "Leave, Gesties. The field of battle is no place for the likes of you. Too much of a coward to join them in death." His words grate against his throat as he pulls an arm back. Two quick axe throws before the last ambusher can even react, leaving him a red mess of meat and blood.

Etor makes his way through the dark corridor, feeling his way around he feels a door. The locked door confuses him and as he makes his way further down the corridor reaches the end of the room he's in. He feels around and the rubble used to conceal a passage way brings a startling realization to light.

Etor: "Ambush!"

They had been following along the whole time. Scurrying along like rats. Or like snakes. waiting for the right time to strike. Etor breaks down the rubble and gives chase.

Etor makes his way through the dark corridor, feeling his way around he feels a door. The locked door confuses him and as he makes his way further down the corridor reaches the end of the room he's in. He feels around and the rubble used to conceal a passage way brings a startling realization to light.

Etor: "Ambush!"

They had been following along the whole time. Scurrying along like rats. Or like snakes. waiting for the right time to strike. Etor breaks down the rubble and gives chase.

AGGA: "Ama-Ama-Sin!" The awful faced brute moans as the first axe enters his chest, he struggles to fight back but in his heft, is unable to do a thing, or make a single difference. As the next axe flies, Agga falls to his knees oozing a fountain of lifeblood out into the cobbles below, in hast the concoction finds its way into the subtle channels chiseled into the stone. "You. . . You Hellion fuckers. . . We'll haunt you. . ." He groans, collapsing dead.

Lyun can just make out another of the Scorpions in the shadows beyond the mess that is his foe's corpse, they bare their fangs, their brows furrow with all the hatred that they could muster.



Meanwhile, unbeknownst to the the pitched battle further on beyond the few sounds that echo back to him, Makeen pries the latch from a stone coffer from days of old. He leans over it with avarice in his eyes. Within, a sword that appears practically hewn from a slab of polished smooth stone. He takes it, feeling a meagre sense of artifice, of thaumaturgy within its antediluvian confines.

GESTIES: "Bastards. . . Bastards!" He cries, yet while taking a step back all the while. As each of his prior comrades falls, their hollow eyes begging for aid, he realizes that through his inaction, he has already betrayed them. With a roar, the bald man charges the nearest Yeek priest, with all his misdirected rage, he hacks the ensi's head clean off. "That sage sold us to our deaths. . ." He mouths, turning about to protect himself.

KASTILUS: "All for good reason. . ." He bemuses to no one.

The swordsman staring down Lyun quickly exchanges himself in the dark with another of their band, yet more arrows trained on the brute. Another is let loose, unable to deflect it, yet more ire and blood is spilt between the two mercenary companies, another retaliatorily flung hand axe marks the end of their enemy's life. All while footfalls echo through the small tunnel. Out of the shade, the last of Shulaar's Band here in the ziggurat skids to a halt before Etor shocked by his appearance to ambush the ambushers.

Zarif watched as Gesties, clearly in turmoil, charge into a wall of Yeeks, screaming as he did. Does he wish to die, as his allies did? He blames himself... He is a betrayer, but not to us.

The sounds of a berserker rampage from Lyun hacking down doe after foe at his back, Zarif took off after Gesties, suddenly feeling a pang of guilt in his chest from his words moments before. He dashes beside the former Scorpion, draws his bow, and shoots the Yeek Ensi, landing a shot deep in its chest, but not killing it

After breaking through the rubble Etor scanned the corridor and saw an approaching scorpion. No words were necessary from Etor. While he was a newer addition to the hellions the young spearman was already indoctrinated into the blood fued between his band and the scorpions.

Watching his allies quickly eliminate all the enemy forces one by one, Siris realized he had been underestimating them.

Siris: They’re much stronger than I thought. he mutters to himself, quickly realizing and hoping no one heard him.

As the battle begins to de-escalate he sees Zarif charging towards the rival mercenary group member they had previously picked up, who was attempting to fight off the nearby yeeks.

Siris runs after his ally but was surprised to see him shoot an arrow to the nearby yeek rather than killing the distracted mercenary. Not one to ponder things for very long, Siris quickly followed suit and finished off the injured yeek with a quick stab through the skull.

Unknown whether the enemy mercenary was still a threat to them or not, Siris quickly removed the sword from the yeek’s head and turned towards the man with sword and shield ready.

Siris: Are you an enemy.

Whole once more. The theurg's methods and beliefs may be arguable, but the results speak for themselves. With newfound strength, the brute however leaves his side, running down that side hallway towards Etor and the remaining Scorpion. The kid might be talented and more than able to hold his own, but in Lyun's mind there's no shaking the feeling of them all being responsible for him.

'D-Damn it. . .' The voice of the purple enshrouded marauder eeks through alongside a spittle of blood. He grasps tightly the gaping hole in his abdomen from the blue-haired merc's speartip. It is of little avail. As his life drains down into the ancient cobbles, collecting in channels, glistening in the dim torch light, he musters a few more words, "Enki, why have you cursed me. . ?" He raises again the blade in his feeble grasp and takes a single step more towards Etor who blocked off his only retreat. "Just a boy." They croak with an eye sealed shut. He charges, "Can you live with all the death you deal!!"

Etor sidesteps the man's final act, and fells him with one last thrust. Etor gains 34 XP.

Across the tight, musty passages of the Ziggarut, now rife with the stench of Yeek bile and man flesh alike, Makeen cracks open the other coffer of stone. His treasure-seeking fingers digging quickly within the confines to grip around an old bug-eaten pouch. There's still the remenants of a stark white grainy substance within, dryer than the desert dunes. The mere whiff of it sends the thief's head into a brief rush. -- Makeen found VITAL POWDER! (( One time use consumable that permanently increases the VITALITY of the one who uses it by +2 ))

KASTILUS: "You've done exceptionally Hellions." The scholar of weary countenance muses aloud. His words reverberate in the depths of this once great temple. Each of the mercenaries, though haggard from their string of battles with the detestable Yeeks and the Scorpions too, they've managed to see yet another job to its conclusion without the dead to carry upon their shoulders. Or so perhaps they believed. . .

"Love, war, beauty, justice, politics. . . Inanna, goddess of these things bore the gallu to cast down her consort, Dumizid the Shepard, to Erṣetu for the pleadings of her blood-lusting cult." The crimson-black concoction of Yeek and mercenary essence seeps slowly, like that of honey from the comb, down the many carven channels of olde between the Hellions feet, heading toward the central dias from which Kastilus stands. He continues his history lesson while counting out the coinage for which to reward them. "For failing to mourn Inanna's passing they did this, their hatred having summoned her back from Erṣetu, and her heart corrupted by the failings of man, together these things drug Dumuzid down to the bleak. But one thing remained here in this mortal world -- the Crook of the Shepard."

Crimson coalesces deep into the cracked sandstone, blue flame gouts from braziers across the chamber, illuminating the mercenaries and their employer in ominous light. "Sealed by the massacre of grudge-bearing men, so too could it only be unsealed by way of a bloody grudge!"

KASTILUS?: "The Hellions of Gyr and Shulaar's Scorpions. . . It would seem your spite for one another was enough." As the flash of fire dies down, replacing the frail archaeologist's tattered clothes are royal robes trimmed in golden runes reflecting the divine language. In the same moment, the dias for which he stands shifts, dust plumes into the dank air and a little unceremonious crypt for which a long decayed skeleton holds a gnarled etched staff. In one enshrouded hand he grips tightly upon the artefact he saught after, prying it from the grip of the long dead. . . "I can always trust the hearts of humans to never change."

GESTIES: "Wait a minute. You damn bastard! You were that sage!!" Suddenly the balding Scorpion raises a fist, while retrieving the blade he'd dropped to the ground in defeat. "You sent us on a wild goose chase to die?! Traitor! Blackguard! I'll kill yer freakin' ass!!" Gesties ascends but one cracked stone step before he finds his body completely numb. He's unable to muster another movement, even despite the fury that smolders within him.

KASTILUS?: "You could say that. But the truth is, whoever succeeded was irrelevant to me." Producing a coin pouch from his robe, he tosses the money that was promised toward Iddin. "I'll most definitely have work for you in the future." He adds with pursed lips.

GESTIES: "Damn it. . ! Bastard. BASTARD!" The forlorn Scorpion struggles but yet still cannot move his body. "I'm gonna find ya." He seethes, leg still glued to the first step of the dais, where the blood of his comrades runs thick. His fist waivers with the sickle blade in its grip, "I'm gonna kill ya. . . For what you've done to my band!"

KASTILUS?: "Perhaps you should have aimed your fury at the Hellions and died with your companions then?" The sage as Gesties referred to him, raises an en-robed arm while the other begins to trace a pattern in the stagnant, iron-tinged air. The man's body begins to turn translucent in the darkness.

GESTIES: "SAGE!!!" The merc cries out.

KASTILUS?: "Unlike the Hellions of Gyr, you have nothing to blame but your own weakness. Farewell!" A plume of azure flame the likes that illuminate the subterranean chamber engulfs the scholar, seemingly burning him painlessly to ashes, leaving no other trace of his presence.

---

After a brief delay of watching the man languish in his utter defeat and deconstruction, the Hellions count their coin and gather themselves for the trek back into civilization. Somewhat uncharacteristic of him, the bandit, Ashür, is the first to address the otherwise broken figure of Gesties.

ASHUR: "Come you fool." He says at first, drawing again the length of his curved bronze blade. "Or perhaps you'd prefer we assent to Kastilus' words and send you to join the others. Hm?" The tip of his sword nearly reaches the man's hairless forehead, but is quickly battered away.

GESTIES: "I could not. . . I would not join you." The merc replies, rising from his knee. "I cannot forgive you Hellions for this. But neither could I turn back to the Scorpions, facing Shulaar, surviving this travesty. . . I am despicable." Gesties voice trails off and he's the first one to leave the Ziggurat. Shortly thereafter, the Hellions do the same.

ASHUR: "My gut tells me that I do not wish to see that scholar's face again. Even if the pay is so good. . ." The man addresses the rest of the band as the falling sun greets their flesh, "Let us make for the rendezvous with Captain Doan at once, this place gives too deep a chill in my bones."