A cacophony of noise brought Arras to the waking world at long last. Mostly that of insects, miniscule creatures that almost nothing bothered to hunt, whether because of their oftentimes poisonous nature, or their lack of genuine value.
Grmmmmble...
However, that didn’t exactly matter at the moment. To Arras, only a few solemn thoughts pressed upon his mind. For how long he’d been asleep… and how hungry he was.
With an exhaustion that he’d never known, Arras backpedaled and gingerly pulled himself out of his currently appropriated resting grounds. Slowly blinking the drowsiness out of his eyes. He wanted nothing else but to go back to sleep, but… he wasn’t sure if he’d be able to sleep much more if he didn’t find something to eat and soon.
It was dark out, darker than usual anyways. What little moonlight bled through the trees provided at the very least some amount of visibility to the forest. It was certainly a good thing that it was night time though, if he was seen by anything remotely competent in combat he’d be as good as dead. The best case scenario was to avoid anything and everything, and for Arras, the cover of night was a great boon.
He needed something to eat. Anything at all… save perhaps the underbrush up to his ankles that spread across the forest floor, permeated by the ever present magic that infused The Grand Forest. He’d… tried some time ago. Learning the hard way, that it was not edible. Among a few of his siblings.
The forest was quiet as usual, and Arras saw fit to not disturb that order. Making his way around the vicinity of his den with as little noise as he could possibly manage, which was somewhat difficult when it came to avoiding every stray piece of flora. It… had been easier near home. The vegetation was thinner, less pervasive. The tree that sheltered them was massive, a giant among giants in The Grand Forest. It blotted out almost everything. Even the magically induced plant life would find it difficult to thrive under such a beast.
Arras was careful to not stray too far from his current residence. Having a place to retreat to in case of danger was imperative to his safety, and he was seldom willing to compromise that promise of haven.
Slowly, surely, cautiously, Arras searched through the underbrush in pursuit of any familiar scent, any species that he was learned of, anything edible. Anything. Absolutely anything at all. He’d eat Wila Herbs or anything adjacent if he had to in order to survive.
And then, he stopped, a familiar scent making its way to his nostrils. He… could’ve sworn those were hira berries. Tantalizingly fresh, and unbelievably tempting. And so, he went off the beaten path ever so slightly. Breaking away from his den for just a moment.
Quickly Arras made his way to the source of the scent, as fast as he could with his battered body, anyways. And sure enough, there hanging on a bush somewhat obscured by the flora around it, was a small orange berry, and another, and another, and another. An entire bushel of the stuff!
Arras almost rammed straight into it, the overwhelming relief from finding what was quite possibly the absolute best find for himself in that moment nulling all sense of caution… but only for a moment.
Just a moment away from biting down, Arras leaned back ever so slightly. Something… something was off. He… couldn’t put his paw on it, but something… they smelled odd. Ever so slightly, almost imperceptibly.
…He sincerely hoped that in that moment, he was wrong. Arras blinked slowly, and when he next opened his eyes, a small flame had been conjured into existence under one of the berries.
And Arras waited, and waited… eventually, the berry even started smoking. And then… the “berry” split into three, a chorus of quiet, horrible shrieks crying out as the three maggot like creatures wriggled towards the insides of the bush.
…VIlo Parasites. Out of every single thing that his parents had taught him… nothing had been stressed with as much importance as these simple creatures. They mimicked a plant, reproduced, and their offspring took on characteristics similar to it. Mimicking the scent and appearance of a certain fruit, in order to trick unsuspecting victims into consuming it. Dooming them to a slow, gradual, miserable death. He’d never forget how fervent his parents had been about it. It was need to know information with how prevalent they were in The Grand Forest.
He… couldn’t even muster the energy to cry. He just couldn’t. With a misery that couldn’t possibly be put into words, Arras stared at the hive of Vilo Parasites for a short moment, before turning the other way and simply… walking away. That explained the abandoned den.
…He just hoped that the location wasn’t entirely infested.
Minutes more passed as Arras slowly circled around the radius of his current den. He really didn’t want to go any further, but he’d likely have no choice. There was barely any distance left to go now, so it was unfortunate but…
But… actually, what was that in the corner of his vision? It… really, what was that? Slowly, he made his way forwards. It was a little far away, it was frankly lucky that he’d even spotted it as dark as it was, but… the shape stuck out. It was different from the rest of the land, and as he got closer, his eyes widened.
Hanging from a bush in the dozens were an assortment of blue berries that he’d never seen before. His parents had told him about every single breed that they knew, and this certainly didn’t fall under any of what they’d taught him and his siblings, but… that also meant it likely wasn’t poisonous. There was always a chance, but… it was either eat them or starve.
After conducting the same parasite test that he had with the previous "berries", Arras sucked in a breath of fresh air and tentatively took a bite. They were sweet, yet simultaneously they held a bitter aftertaste after the fact. And then, he waited. He waited for a long while, obscuring his position with illusion magic as he continued to hold. If they were poisonous, he might still be able to live with a small amount ingested, but if he simply gave to his hunger…
And so he continued to wait. Staring anxiously out at the world around him as his stomach continued to grumble, his body shuddering, longing for the meal directly within his reach. But still, he waited…
He couldn’t have been sure about how much time had passed, but either way the gnawing pain in his stomach only grew worse and worse. He’d been able to ignore it somewhat, but now that he had something he felt to be so obviously edible directly in front of him…
At long last, his will power cracked under the strain. Finally relenting after what felt like hours, Arras nipped another off the stem. And then another, and another. He gobbled down most of them as quietly as he could. After however long it had been since he last ate, he couldn’t help it. It likely wasn’t a good idea to eat so much so fast, but… he couldn’t bring himself to care about it as hungry as he was.
He continued to rustle through the bush, quietly snatching fruit after fruit from their stems, his prior illusion magic hiding his physical form being cast to the wayside… he heard something else.
Immediately he snapped to attention, ripping his head away from the bush and towards the source of noise that had caused his ears to twitch involuntarily. Another bush in the nearby distance was what it seemingly had come from, his eyes widening as he reflexively began to cycle his magic, ready to cast a spell at a moment’s notice.
His heart was just about pounding out of his chest, each pulse literally painful as it beat against his ribs. He continued to stare unblinkingly at the disturbance, a complete lack of faith in his safety evident in his tensed legs.
.....
Utter silence. But, he didn’t buy it for a moment. And he certainly had no inclination to let it pass. His gut instinct had saved him just before, after all.
Arras steadied his breathing as best he could for a short moment, raising his tail to act as a conduction point. He knew there had to be something there. And following that thought, he conjured a singular ball of flame into existence, slowly pushing the spell towards the bush in question.
And still, nothing moved. Even as the extremely dangerous ball of flame approached, there was no reaction, no fear in whatever was there… was… was there really something there…? He didn’t want to go against any gut reaction, but standing here just maintaining a spell would certainly have him found-
POMF
Before Arras could even finish the thought, a small rodent burst from the leaves and flew over the fireball, soaring towards Arras with its claws outstretched for his throat!
With his wounded body, Arras just barely managed to toss himself out of the way, falling to the side a moment before impact and “cleanly” rolling away from his assailant. His heart pounded even harder, but he quickly tuned it out as the noise of the world went silent to him, only a dull static burning through his senses.
As the creature whipped around to face Arras, whom was splayed out on the ground, Arras whipped together the fastest spell that he could possibly manage in that moment, manifesting a wall of flame between himself and his assailant. Immediately, it leapt backwards at the sight of it, hissing at the spell. In that same moment, Arras clambered to his feet as best he could, barely obscured by the flame of his spell.
However, it didn’t last long. The spell had no power in it, not enough to maintain itself for more than a second, or to even burn as a flame should. It was barely even warm, it had been a mere feint. A gamble Arras made instinctively to avoid certain death. Fortunately enough, it had obviously worked. The bright light scaring his attacker away for a moment, buying him precious moments to work.
As the flames quickly dissipated, Arras’s assailant seemed to quickly realize its mistake, charging forward and through the rapidly dispersing flames, shattering the spell to bits with its charge before it had the chance to fade naturally. Though, instead of ripping Arras’s head off with a well placed bite, its teeth instead ripped through an illusion of the fox. Mind you, a terrible one. It was about as good as chicken scratch in comparison to what his family could do, legs displaced and back hunched, eyes dopey and head misshapen, but in that moment it had been enough to buy Arras even more time.
Shortly after, four similar copies of himself formed in a square formation, each of them hastily constructed through illusion magic, easily discernible at an eye's glance, but that was exactly what he wanted. To force his attacker TO glance at them. The, what now Arras recognized as a farrahm, rapidly twisted around as it identified each “copy” of himself, yet it charged for none of them.
Because of course, Arras wasn’t any of the four. In fact, he’d barely even moved. Everything that had happened had gone his way, he’d been lucky enough for the Farrahm to hesitate at every turn. To fail to recognize what he was truly doing at the drop of a hat. A fault that Arras certainly didn’t suffer from. His flight or fight response had gone into effect immediately, the entire world fading to a dull grey, slowing down the moment the first attack had been thrown.
And he chose to fight.
Dropping the illusion magic, Arras’s form shimmered into existence directly beneath the Farrahm, the clones similarly disappearing as the real instance appeared right under his enemy's nose. Betting on his enemy’s slower reaction time, Arras exposed himself for a short moment, focusing every drop of his magic into a single spell as he abandoned any other effort. Much of it was wasted, like pouring an entire bucket of water into a single glass, but in that moment it didn’t matter.
The spell was ready practically instantly, a single blue flame manifested into existence with a hope and a thought. Perhaps the Farrahm would’ve had time to evade the attack, but once again… Arras had bet correctly. The precious moments, the fractions of a second, the instants that the Farrahm took to respond to the presence beneath it, bought him the opportunity to land his attack. Thrusting a paw forward, Arras launched his attack with as much speed as he could muster. It didn’t matter how unbalanced he left himself, how much danger he put himself into, this one spell, his one desperate blow, needed to land.
And smacking into the furred chest of the Farrahm, Arras’s paw loosely made contact, before the flame did as well.
“SKREEEEEE!”
Instantly the Farrahm’s fur caught ablaze, the overwhelming heat of Arras’s gambit incomparable to the mere feint he’d worked not ten seconds ago, blue flames quickly turned to red, and his magic faded entirely just a moment later, but it didn’t matter. Regardless of the flames short lived duration, it had produced enough heat for one instant to do one thing.
The Farrahm smacked Arras away, scraping his side at it cried out in pain. It drew blood, glistening and gleaming, but the flames continued to spread, taking hold across the Farrahm’s fur with an unavoidable inevitability. As he tumbled away, Arras scrambled to his paws as quickly as he could manage, backing up as quickly as he could as the Farrahm writhed in agony. It was just about as good as dead, even if it ran, the underbrush would quickly catch aflame. The natural magic permeating the environment would no doubt bolster the wildlife enough to shake off the flame, but for the short moments in which it had a fuel to burn, everything nearby would catch fire. There was no escaping it.
And… the Farrahm knew that.
Amidst the burning agony, its eyes flashed towards Arras with an incomprehensible rage, even as they slowly began to burn out of its sockets. He sensed it before he saw it, but the Farrahm’s legs tensed… and it leapt forward.
Arras barely reacted in time yet again, taking a step back as the Farrahm’s claws lashed out towards his neck, barely grazing him and drawing even more blood, mixing Arras’s with its own bubbling blood. Yet despite the overwhelming pain it was no doubt suffering, it struck out once more against Arras, nicking the foreleg still extended as it advanced in the same movement.
All Arras could do was avoid the attacks as best he could. It certainly began to slow as its flesh charred and decayed, but Arras had been so heavily wounded that the disparity was still obvious to any onlooker. Collapsing to his side, Arras rolled out of the way and winced as another crack wormed its way into his ears, crying out as a pair of claws slashed through his back as he completed the turn.
Fueled by nothing but adrenaline, Arras shot to his paws and took another step back as the flaming whirlwind of fury continued to strike out at him, nicking his throat once more, mangling his right ear as he barely ducked out of the way of a strike aimed for his head, before finally…
CRCK
With a sharp gasp, Arras felt his legs giving out, a much louder snap ringing through his entire being emanating from his chest. He wasn't sure if that was another rib or something else, but in that moment it didn’t matter, he blinked once in shock, and when he next opened his eyes, the claws of his assailant were on track to pierce through them and straight into his brain.
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…So. That was it, then.
Time seemingly ground to a halt, the claws moving closer and closer, instant by instant… until they just… stopped.
Everything stopped.
Arras was left only with his thoughts.
He stared onwards, into the hollow sockets that had once contained the eyes of his opponent, the contents having melted out by now, the most damaged part of the Farrahm’s entire body. It had been the initial point of contact, but Arras supposed it didn’t matter now.
He’d… done his best. But, now there was… nothing left for him to do. Nothing he could do.
He could die knowing… knowing what…? That he’d killed his attacker with his effort? That his life amounted to the single death of one creature?
…What could he die knowing?
Not the world, not what became of his family, and certainly not what life would’ve had for him in the future.
Why did… why did he have to look at this? What was this? He’d failed, he didn’t want to think about it any more.
He just… wanted to forget about it, like a bad dream. Forget his failure.
But… more than that… he didn’t want to die.
He wanted to see the world, know and learn more, he wanted to grow… wanted to live.
Time still stood still. He couldn’t move, nothing at all moved. Only his thoughts.
Arras didn’t want to die.
In that painfully slow void, that truth echoed through Arras’s mind, again, and again. Over and over it was repeated to him, until… he repeated it himself.
I don’t want to die.
He didn’t want to die.
Arras’s toes twitched, and with it, time began to move ever so slightly once more.
He wouldn’t die. COULDN’T.
Not when there was so much to do, so much to see, not in such a miserable way…!
His body burned, more than the Farrahm before him, every fiber of his being bursting into flame in an instant. One thought repeated into oblivion atop every other part of his existence. Something deeper than a feeling, more than an instinct. Something so deeply ingrained into his existence, yet something that he couldn’t possibly describe.
Time moved faster, and faster, each fraction of the world restored to its former order another chant amongst the pile, he would NOT die here!
All at once, the fire in his soul extinguished, a burst of magic flooding its way through his being as he pulled his head back, buying himself even an extra fragment of a second of time to live. It hurt, it was agonizing, his head pounded and his body screamed, but he would not stop. He wouldn’t lose anything, he refused to die.
Once more pouring every part of his very existence into a single spell, Arras worked a miracle in that very moment. Despite his injuries, his frazzled mind, the uncontrollable energy that surged through his being, he took it all into one point.
THUNK
For something so impossible, the results were certainly mundane. A single spike of earth jutting from the ground, catching the claw mid flight, centimeters away from Arras’s muzzle.
Its screeches rung out as it tried its very hardest to tear through the wall, but within a matter of seconds the flames overtook its will to persist, searing into its flesh and killing it as Arras panted in and out, collapsing to the ground coughing and hacking, flecks of blood spattering against the earth before him.
He just… stayed there for a moment, struggling to breathe as the body of the Farrahm burned into his mind.
…He wouldn’t die… he wouldn’t…
So badly he wanted to just collapse, to fall and not wake up again… but he wouldn’t. Struggling against everything, forcing his eyes open, Arras pushed back his pounding headache and ignored his screaming body. The fractures that had formed in every part of his being causing him to wobble… but he didn’t fall.
Continuing to take one breath in after the other, Arras’s eyes locked onto the still smoldering corpse. In order to live, he needed to continue eating. Despite everything, he refused to do anything less. Despite the heat, he bit into it, ignoring the scalding flesh as he dragged it back to his den.
...
…The morning was a blur. Arras’s head had still been pounding, he wasn’t sure what he’d done to save himself, but regardless of whatever it was, he’d used… a lot of magic. Too much magic, more magic than he should even reasonably have in him. Multiple times more, all pushed towards a field of magic he had no idea how to use.
He’d seen it in Darai, the overuse of magic often resulted in negative effects, but…
Arras breathed in sharply, before butting his head into the dirt and grumbling. However long it’d been, he was hungry once more, so… he turned and dug in. His headache didn’t abate for a moment, but it didn’t matter.
The meat did taste a little funny, but again he didn’t care. As long as it wasn’t rotten, he didn’t care. And from there… he passed out again.
…
When Arras next woke up, he could think. He could “think” before, but the indescribable pain coursing through his head certainly hadn’t helped. Now, at the very least, it hurt less than it did… whenever he’d last gone to sleep. He wasn’t sure how long it’d been, but he could hear the occasional chirping of birds outdoors.
He… needed to get up. Needed to move, needed to leave this den behind. And so… he tried to do just that.
It was cramped, narrow and claustrophobic. He’d grown significantly, to the point that it was difficult to move. So, moving slowly, Arras backed out of the den, leaving behind the bones of the Farrahm that he’d previously picked clean. Dirt tumbled and crumbled as he pulled himself out, the entire burrow threatening to collapse if he moved too quickly.
That… would be a very sad death. Arras very much didn’t want to die after everything else he’d made his way through. But, fortunately enough, his life didn’t end in such a manner.
At first, he moved to shake the dirt off of himself, but paused when a familiar pain flared up in his chest. He scowled, but was at least grateful that his leg hadn’t broken. He quite literally hadn’t been certain in the direct aftermath of the fight. He’d completely ignored his body in order to make the final stretch.
So now… Arras huffed as he continued to blink the sleep out of his eyes. He’d been unconscious for a long time, he figured at least… three moons in total since he fell down the waterfall. He needed a new place to stay while he recovered. If there were vilo parasites around, there were likely very few creatures in the area. The Farrahm he’d killed was likely one of the few, in pursuit of the valum burrower that had left its burrow behind.
Arras was fairly certain he’d be alright to move a bit further from the burrow… and in fact, he was quite certain he needed to. It was all or nothing at this point. If he was caught, he was too big to reasonably retreat into the burrow now.
…It was going to be a difficult day.
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Beastiary
Hira Berries
A small berry that grows on a bush-like plant. They are a dull orange in color and hang low to the ground.
Hira Berries possess an odd magical affinity related to healing. They are edible raw and are nutritious. Consuming them can also lead to an increase in natural healing for a short period of time and they are often used as base materials for healing potions.
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Wila Herbs
Leafy plant with hallucinogenic properties. Edible raw, but not particularly nutritious. They grow plentifully in the wild and are often sold illegally, either raw or processed.
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Vilo Parasite
An uncommon parasite found anywhere with dense plant life. They are cursed with an almost inability to use magic, only having the most basic of access to physical strengthening used to keep themselves alive in a host.
Their colors vary wildly, but generally they imitate various kinds of fruits by huddling together and emitting various smells from their scent glands to imitate the smell of a specific plant. They can however, be told apart by a slight flaw in their scent mimicry, that being their own scent mixed in with it. Additionally the plants they nest in are usually not the same kind of bush they imitate. When threatened with physical harm they will generally scurry off to the hole they crawled out of.
Vilo Parasites can survive off of surprisingly little food. Usually only needing to eat their own weight about once per year. But once given the opportunity to eat they can easily pack down over fifty times their own weight and digest it in as little as four hours.
Anybody who consumes a Vilo Parasite is in for a vile fate. They burrow deep into their hosts intestines and eat ANYTHING that enters the body. Unless they are somehow removed it is almost certainly a death sentence to consume one.
Upon killing their host they create a hive out of their dead body, attracting many other Vilo Parasites to reproduce and swarm to catch more unsuspecting victims.
These Parasites have unnaturally long lifespans, almost living up to five years. But fortunately they cannot extend their own lives. At least as far as I’m aware.
"Vilo" is a prefix added to truly vile creatures. Due to the gruesome fate a Vilo Parasite brings upon anybody who may happen to consume one, it has earned the title.
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Farrahm
A common weasel like carnivore, it is also somewhat sapient. They have adapted to hunt down valum burrowers specifically, but are still capable of taking down other prey if desperate. They are adept with strengthening magic and can harden their claws to an extreme degree. Effectively making them unbreakable, which results in an enticing find for would be alchemists and blacksmiths.
It is long and slim with a gray coat, built to break into dens and burrows in order to get at that which lies inside. It has naturally sharp claws and is sleek and agile, but their bodies are naturally frail.
It is simply not large enough to take down larger prey, but is extremely deadly to those of a similar size. Easily being able to cut them down with a few glancing blows from its claws.
They do not mate for life and are antisocial creatures. Usually leaving their children to fend for themselves mere days after birth. Fortunately for them, they grow to maturity relatively quickly, that being in about two weeks.
Farrahms can be found almost anywhere valum burrowers can be found. They specialize in hunting them and thus follow them around the globe.
Farrahms are fiercely territorial and brash. They will attack whatever enters their territory (including other farrahms, aside from potential mates) and will not give up until either it or they die, or are otherwise driven from the claimed territory. Fortunately for the Farrahm, they often are moving and never begin these death battles. They do not have a set territory most of the time.
As a Farrahm becomes stronger its coat begins to turn to a pure white instead of a dull gray. Its claws also become somewhat sharper, despite already being able to pierce most anything.
Farrahms have short lives, but gain a comparatively large boost to their lifespan through growing stronger.
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Dictionary
Magic conduction
In order to actually summon and manipulate magic, the user of said magic has to manifest the spells that they’re casting near their body. This range can increase based on the user's own mastery of magic. But generally the closer to one's own body their magic is, the more powerful it will be.
Magic that creates and or manipulates physical objects or forces will generally follow this rule. As an example; Say a mage were to create a ball of fire near themselves. This fire will burn hotter and burn brighter. This mage then moves the flame away. It will gradually become colder, dim, and become harder to control.
This is because a spell is created with a fixed amount of magic. Different types of magic and different spells require different amounts of magic power to properly create, and a spell consumes the magic given to it in order to remain active. Some magics require less magic to maintain, but this is a rule that applies to all spell casting.
After a spell loses all of the magic that keeps it active, whether that magic be recycled into the mage who casted it or an opponent skilled enough to bring it under that control, or by simply running its course, the spell and all of its effects will fade. However, any effects caused by the magic itself will not. If a flame conjured by magic is hot enough to set something else ablaze, the fire caused by heat itself will not magically disappear along with the magic.
This also holds true for spells that manipulate already existing objects. Say for example, earth magic. After manipulating the earth with a usage of earth magic, the molded earth will remain in the shape it was magically corrected to until all magic from the mage disappears. This takes longer for earth magic in particular, but all magics that manipulate already existing objects will eventually return their target to normal, unless something other than magic were to interfere with the magically displaced substance.
In conclusion, any magical effects will be undone once the spell stops or is manually disabled. Effects caused by the magic will however, not be stopped.
While magic does need to be casted near oneself. Certain body parts and objects can make the casting of magic easier when done through them. For an easy to understand example; If a spirit fox were to cast a spell such as simply summoning a fireball a few feet in front of them, then they would have an average amount of difficulty casting the spell and an average fireball of their skill level to show for it.
But say this same spirit fox used their tail as the summoning point for the spell. Due to the tails higher concentration of magic, it would conduct the magic more easily and create a stronger fireball with less effort.
The same holds true for other species with body parts that are magical in nature. Artificially created parts imbued with magic can also be used for this. Or in other words, artifacts can increase the casting power of a spell.