Xaltwind

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Wooh, we did it guys! We're almost done with the prologue! Wretch, get ready. Your intro is just on the threshold!

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Forgotten Ruins, East Gate

Things weren't looking good for the rear-guard of the Imperial army. With more than half of their footmen fleeing, a quarter lying dead or wounded and the other quarter now engaging and being mauled by a giant lizard and a scowling, trying-to-look-intimidating-pretty boy elf, along with their archers atop the walls being harassed by a tiny, crimson gloop-monster and a woman throwing electric spearheads.... Well, it was safe to say that anyone, even a complete novice at tactics and strategy, could see that things had turned - as they say- tits-up for the Empire here. With the shrieking angel-summon moving in for another dose of otherworldly terror-tactics, the men who had attempted to join with their allies finally had enough of this situation.

"R-Retreat! RETREAT! RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!"

A chorus of panicked voices, each screaming different versions and variants of the same message, rung out from the among the dozen remaining men in the streets. Somehow, this tiny group of adventurers had managed - against considerable odds - to beat down and chase off over two dozen foot soldiers, as well as a small squadron of archers, all on their own. Veritable pats on the back were in order, but now was not the time for such frivalous gestures. Seeing the state and end-result of their opposition falling back and abandoning their charge, the way to their ultimate goal, the eastern gate, was now left unchallegend and unbarred.

"Alright, score! We can get the hell outta here!" Serafaye chriped, happily, while bouncing from one foot onto the other, in a very vutesy, bouncy, excitable fashion... Causing certain torso-allocated bits of her body to also bounce up and down - not that she seemed to notice.

Calming down a bit eventually, the dracokin soon began to stride towards their desired exit - at that weirdly unnatural speed of her's. Although both Vani and Kaze had been infront of her, and Cecilia and Annabelle were up on the walls, she'd be the first of the group to manage to actually pass through the old, decripiti stone archway and lay eyes on what actually lay outside the ruins to the east!

... And it was grass.

... Lots and lots of grass. Stretching on. Forever. Not even joking, there was pretty much nothing else, apart form the lonely spruce tree or small, low shrub. The rest? Just field upon field upon knell of grassland.

How... Anti-clmactic... Serafaye thought, as her smiling, excited face turned into that of a deadpan disappointment. Kind of like how an excited kid on Christmas Day looked when they were opening their present, only to find it contained one of those itchy, hand-made wool sweaters from their granny. Yeah, that kind of face.

The good news, however, was that due to the rickety state of the gatehouse itself, the archers inside wouldn't actually be able to easily get into a position to fire at them as they were leaving the ruins. Incredibly convenient, but beneficial also! This meant that, barring any chance of the Empire sending cavalry or flying beast-riders, the group would be able to escape unharried from this cursed place.

Turning back towards her allies still within the walls, Serafaye made waving and beckoning motions with her hand, urging them to come her way and hurry up.

"C'mon! We're almost there! Let's go people, move it!" She half-yelled, half-said-in-a-loud-voice.

Really though, if you squinted reeally hard, you could make out the outlines, or tops at least, of a woodland or forest straight east - just going right forward from the gate itself. If they wanted to avoid being pursued or followed, heading there and hiding out in the undergrowth would likely be their best plan. Of course, you could always head north, or south to Palagria... If you wanted to risk that whole mess.

Meanwhile, Annabelle and Cecilia would deliver a final combination of Carpenter body-net and electric throwables to the archers, before the Spellblade of thunder used her wind-powers to elegantly leap off the side of the wall and let the winds carry her down. Meanwhile, the hemomancer used her little familiar as a whip, swinging down from her perch in a very Indiana Jones-like style. It was all very impressive, really.

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Aww, sucks to see you go Rodey. :(
I hope you find something you enjoy more elsewhere though, until next time. o/

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Just reminding peeps that there're 4.5 hours left until that deadline.

Goblin Slayer: Newblood (CANCELLED)

Druid Girl's eyes went wide at the sight of the pin-point precision that her ally had with her bow. It was truly impressive that someone could hit a goblin's head, a rather small target, from that kind of distance in this dimming light. She must've been a magnificent and truly gifted huntress indeed! The caramel-skinned nature-mage was very impressed. She was equally impressed when Big Red suddenly rose from his supposed hiding-spot, lurched forward and hucked one of his home-made javelins at the little green gobbos.

Now, unlike a metal-tipped arrow, a fully wooden spear, made from a freshly plucked sapling, didn't exactly have the same piercing-power - no matter how hard you chucked it. However, that didn't stop the sharp stick from striking one of the little green men square in the chest, causing him to let out a 'Gfffuuuuuuh!!'-sound, before flying backwards, tumbling comedically and then laying flat on his back, eyes staring wildly into the cavern ceiling as his mouth hung agape. Now, with two of their kind caught in traps, one lying dead with its head split open like a watermelon and another being knocked out by a stick, the remaining two goblins didn't seem to feel as confident as before.

Stopping their charge against Big Red midway-to-him, they turned and began to flee back towards the cave, shrieking and screaming loudly, making a lot of ruckus. Druid Girl, not wanting to be completely useless, stood up from behind her fallen log, and took a bunch of the small stones from her bag, and began throwing them after the little fiends. However, unlike her allies, she lacked both the precision and skill with ranged weapons, as well as the physical strength and familiarity of using thrown weapons in any capacity. As such, her stones flew, but landed harmless behind the fleeing freaks. She let out a low growl and puffed her cheeks in frustration. It was kind of cute.

Steppe Archer would have had the time and skill to launch another arrow and possibly take one of the retreating duo down before they could both reach the cave interior proper, but alas, taking both of the little gremlins down would have required her to be able to shoot two arrows at the same time. Big Red's javelins wouldn't be able to reach either, as their craftsmanship and unbalanced make-up would make them too inaccurate, even with his impressive strength propelling it forward. It seemed their ambush had both succeeded and failed - they'd taken out all but one of the little creatures, but now that one little runt was likely going to slip back down into the lair and alert all of its brethren... Which either meant a large group was gonna come charging out, or they were going to turtle up and stay safe inside their underground nest... Either result wasn't exactly desirable.

"What do we do now? Chasing after them could be dangerous... But if they come swarming out, the three of us might not be able to take them all on. We don't know how many are in there after all." Druid Girl asked and stated at the same time, concerned for what their next move should be.

Meanwhile, the two goblins dangling from the traps were still making a fuss, and the one lying on the ground after being punted in the solar plexus by a javelin, seemed to have passed out.

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Yo, dat IC is all like updated 'n shit.

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Forgotten Ruins, East roads & alleys, near the East Gate

With the giant lizard batting people around, the sudden arrival of a shrieking, otherworldly being in glowing white armor, and the tandem tag-team fighting of the Paladin who had been screaming nonsense before, the initial force that had moved to apprehend Yinha suddenly found their frontline crumbling like a house of cards. When the sudden cries and hollering from their archer-allies back up on the walls suddenly began to call out over the fighting, the Imperial soldiers' morale dropped even further, and those who were not already caught up in fighting for their lives began to first slowly back away, then more hastily so, then full on turned on their heels and began retreating, screaming and yelling in a mix of fear, confusion and frustration.

The back-up dozen or so men that had moved to try and intecept Vani were met by these, their fleeing and panicking brothers and sisters, who in turn also became privvy to the plight of their archers on the walls, now being assaulted by flying spearheards that crackled with lightning! In addition, a familiar small, red blob-like creature was now bounding along the roofs, jumping onto one archer after the other, either trying to suffocate them or cause them to lose balance and slip onto their ass, or fall off the side of the precarious elevation. With limited space to move around up there, coupled with the relentless hounding of a certain Spellblade and the difficulty in trying to shoot an amorphous flubber, the archers were completely forced to abandon any hopes of supporting their street-locked comrades with supporting fire. ... Which worked out great for the team of rag-tag misfits!

With the initial force battered and broken, fleeing from the fight in the alley, the archers rendered helpless - or at least pre-occupied - Serafaye took a moment to survey the immediate situation. Much to her surprise, she found that whule she knew she should have been disgusted, outraged and appalled by the death and destruction wrought upon these Imperial soldiers - these fellow humans - Serafaye found herself strangely... Indifferent. She... Didn't feel anything. Like, at all. It was if the deaths of these men were no more of a concern than stepping on an ant, or swatting ana nnoying fly... Which terrified the girl internally to no end.

Just what the actual fuck is going on?! Back in the real world, whenever there were news-casts or reports of people being hurt or killed, I always got so damned upset and... ANd... Now nothing? Even though people are killing each other left and right, and I'm even a part of it, in the damn midst of it, I don't even care? Just... What's happened to me? Am I really... Me, anymor...?

Existential crisis aside, the dracokin managed to eventually pull herself together and focus on the actual task at hand. It seemed their plan of beating the tar outta the enemy had worked, for now. Which meant that, while they still had the momentum, they should probably try and capitalize and make the most out of it, right? Serafaye glanced over at Vani and Kaze, and their angelic friend who had came outta nowhere... Wait, who was this!? Where'd they come from and what the actual hell ... Oh, no, wait, this wasn't a person. This was just some low-level summon, she recognized its design. One of their mages must've called on it. Huh, handy. Anyway, now was not the time for that!

"I think we should all maybe try and make a break for that gate-thingy now." She said, looking at the elf and lizard. "Doubt we'll have a better chance than now. Maybe we can even just scare off the rest of the mooks if we run at 'em, screamin' and howling like lunatics, yeah?" She suggested, smilingly sheepishly.

She turned to look back at where Yinha, Artemisia and Locke were, supposedly, amdist all of that black, nasty tire-fire smoke. With a beckoning and waving hand, she tried to make some kind of signal for them to move up or come along, or something of that sort.

The gate itself, at this point, was largely free of any Imperials. The archers couldn't get to it, due to the jugglign boomerang-spears thrown by Cecilia and the interference run by Carpenter. The soldiers who had fled from the fight with the dynamic quartet had turned to flee up north, not south towards the gate. This meant that the only real obstacle left, wwas the dozen or so men who had chased after Vani, who had been stopped in their tracks at both the sight of their fleeing fellow soldiers AND the pickle-of-a-jam that their archers were in atop the walls.

This was it, one final push and freedom would be theirs!

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Locke thinks himself and his civilization is above everyone else, yet for all his smarts he couldn't do anything when he was bum-rushed by a savage barbarian woman and got the snot kicked out of him. That's the reference.

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

Oh wow, no last-minute, half-an-hour-before the deadline-posts today? Is it Xaltmas? :o
Regardless, since everyone's deigned to already post, I suppose there's no need for me to wait until 10 PM, and I can get to work on a post whenever.

@Kazemitsu
Everyone thinks they're soooooooooo smart, until they end up on their back in the middle of a street, getting pummeled by a heavily tattooed woman with barely any clothes and the mind and manners of a tantrum-throwing 4-year old. It'll pass, you just keep being a lizard-bruh.

From Oubliette to Oublioth [R.I.P]

A little less than 11 hours left until the deadline. If you're stuck or having problems coming up with something to post, I strongly recommend hitting me up ASAP for brainstorming. If you're busy with the aftermath of yankee-holiday celebrations, you shoulda thought of that before you engaged in imbibing ethanol.

Well then, I'll be waitin', watchin' and judgin' from the shadows until the time comes, as usual. ^^