The towering figure of the yellow-eyed man sprinted down the stairs towards Kya. She was still sitting, a sharp aching pain resonating on one side of her head, her hands bound behind her back, and feeling entirely dazed and unprepared for what was happening around her.
She had pinned the quest timer to the corner of her view and could watch as the time slowly ticked down.
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Quest - Closeted Cultists
- Time Remaining: 4min:25sec
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Kya’s brain was working so quickly, she felt an almost profound sense of certainty that there had to be steam coming off her head in wisps.
She had just over four minutes to stop Arthur from casting this spell and killing her in the process.
The man reached the bottom of the stairs and pelted towards her. Two of his steps landed differently than normal, both visibly and audibly resonating, like he’d tried to curb stomp the ground itself. Immediately after his feet hit the spots, he'd done this, never breaking his stride, two basketball sized chunks of stone ripped themselves out of the ground and shot up in front of him. Then, looking like a boxer, he brought his hands and arms close to his face, and he punched the stones, firing them at her like cannonballs.
Though he hadn’t quite reached the limits of her aura yet, the stones rocketing towards her very much had. She could feel them the moment they did, like asteroids hurtling towards her. Not knowing what else to do, she pushed.
What happened wasn’t exactly what she’d been anticipating. She hadn’t exactly been the biggest science girl in the whole world and knew that physics especially wasn’t remotely her strong suit. So, when she pushed on the stones, expecting them to stop or hopefully reverse directions, and instead they ricocheted off to either side of her as though hitting an invisible wall, she was left sitting in a stupor. The look on the man's face was probably exactly what Kya assumed she looked like at that moment, until it was replaced with a suddenly shadowed look of horror and rage. One of the deflected stones had slammed headlong into one of the several golden bowls dotting the massive glowing ritual lines around Kya, spilling out their gray and lifeless contents. The glow got ever so slightly dimmer as the discolored and misshapen heart fell to the stones with a much-louder-than-it-should-have-been wet splatting noise. This was exactly what Kya had needed to know. Fuck with the ritual, and it would get less stable, or at least less powerful. Hopefully, shutting off at some point.
This was all well and good and would have been easy enough. But the six-foot three-inch train of a man that had finally entered her aura with a look of pure determination and rage on his face wasn’t likely to be the best help here.
Deciding she might as well get started as best she could, Kya did the first thing that came to mind. She looked at the clear, perfectly white skeleton next to her, launched the entire thing directly at the man.
Kya would later look back on this, and knowing more, feel the slightest bit of empathy and remorse for the man and for Arthur. Especially for this action. But in the moment, Kya almost grinned, settling on a half grunt, half sharp exhale when she saw his face.
She hadn’t launched the skeleton with any real force, just trying to startle the man and buy herself a few moments to not only think, but to act. However as the man stumbled to a halt trying to catch the skeleton that, of course, broke apart the moment he touched it, His face went from rage to terror to almost the same white of the bones themselves, and then flooded so quickly back to red, she thought he might be having a stroke.
He bellowed out in a strangled cry “You fuckin’ bitch, I’ll make you regret ever waking up, ever touching her! How dare you-”
He didn't get to finish. Kya had, unceremoniously, pulled another of the golden bowls that was behind and to the left of the man, both weakening the glow a little bit more, and hitting him upside the head with a hollow gong sound.
He didn’t fall unconscious or anything, that would have been too easy, but he did stumble forward, dropping and breaking the skeleton even more. The head was still connected to the spine and several ribs, as well as the right arm. But a few ribs, the other arm, the hip, and both legs were scattered haphazardly around him.
Kya had, at this point, summoned her rat fang dagger to cut at the bonds holding her wrists, while at the same time, pulling bowl after bowl away from their designated locations.
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Quest - Closeted Cultists
- Time Remaining: 3min:42sec
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Each displaced bowl hurt the spell, and each spilled heart made Arthur, chanting on the balcony some thirty or forty meters ahead, grow more and more panicked in his chanting of the spell.
“That is enough!” Shouted the man in in front of her. He was absolutely livid, and she could see it. Not only in his voice and body language, but his golden eyes had literally taken on a shadowed color. The whites of his eyes had turned to a blackish gray, and just she finally cut the bindings on her wrist, he slammed his heel into the ground like trying to kick a ball backwards.
Kya was already on high alert, and more than that, he’d tried the same trick on her earlier to knock her out. This time, though, this time she could see exactly what he had done as he did it.
When he struck the earth, it was like a lightning quick pulse of energy had temporarily linked him to part of the ground behind her, and with the kinetic force of his strike, the earth responded. Dropping as quickly as she could to her stomach, she caught herself on her now free’d hands in what was the achingly familiar position of collapsing after doing too many pushups.
While the man grunted in surprise, he wasn’t by any means unprepared. Looking up to see him make a claw-like hand gesture and then thrust his hand down, she felt the stone that had been about to strike her head instead rocket downwards and lock itself around her thigh, ratcheting her in place against the cold stone floor.
He ran towards her and wound up like he was planning to punt her head for a field goal, before she hastily pushed against his boot with as much force as she could muster.
The effect was almost comical. His right leg, about to slam into her, shot out behind him, taking him with it. He spun like a lopsided boomerang, landing heavily some ways away, slamming right into one of the only two remaining bowls.
Panicking, Kya reached down and pulled and pushed and heaved awkwardly at the stone now holding her leg in place. She tried sliding out and away from it, realizing only now that her cloak wasn’t on her back, but it felt like when she had put on a ring at the jewelry store that just barely fit going on, but sure as hell wasn’t coming off. For now, she was well and truly trapped against the cave floor.
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Quest - Closeted Cultists
- Time Remaining: 3min:05sec
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Things suddenly and horrifically took a turn from bad to worse when, out of the ground, another band of stone seemed to grow and take hold of her other leg, then another around her waist, and another around both her arms.
“You must think yerself so fucking powerful” Growled the man as he walked towards her.
Arthur's voice, unceasing in the background, took on a tone to it like he was both panicked and exasperated with the younger man.
Waving him off with one hand, the man continued “Dad told me about you, said you had only just registered at the guild what same day he was there, likely just got yer class then too. Are you tripping on power? Are you delusional or what? I’ll be honest, I am impressed you were able to take care of that hellhound problem. But yer not even a few days into this shit and you thought to take on a more powerful more prepared opponent without even knowin’ what they were tryin’ tah do?.”
As he talked, he continued towards Kya, while she struggled fruitlessly against the bonds holding her in place.
“A couple times you came close to derailing the plan. Killing the beasts was the first, we thought you’d get taken by them and brought back here. But then we had the backup of inviting you tah dinner. Except, you didn’t hardly eat or drink a damned thing from the table. You nibbled at yer food and took sips from yer cup, but not nearly enough for the poison to take effect.”
A crazy, stupid idea had materialized in her head. She didn’t know why she’d thought of the dumb green haired swordsman in this moment, but without many other options, she bided her time as he talked about how she’d unintentionally almost messed up their master plan or whatever. This was a classic villain monologue, she just hoped he would explain some of the shit she couldn’t fathom on her own.
Stopping off to her left, just in the corner of her eye, he said still growling out the words like he was chewing on each one before spitting it out at her “But none of that matters now. Yer here in the circle, you’re alive, your blood flows with power. All we need tah do now is rebuild the skeleton, and I have a good two minutes or so to do that after I git a few good kicks in.”
She couldn’t see, but she just knew he was smiling as he said that last part. What she could see was the same boot as before lift away in preparation. He evidently thought either Kya wouldn’t be able to react the same way, or wouldn’t be able to see him, or both, but with her aura, it was like she saw each movement he made before he did.
So then, with the best timing she could manage, she activated her desperate plan: Operation Zoro.
She summoned her viper fang dagger directly into her mouth, while at the same time pulling on his boot until his foot impaled itself directly into the dagger.
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Quest - Closeted Cultists
- Time Remaining: 2min:07sec
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Howling with pain, and jumping back, she then blew him away with an almighty push, helped by the effect of her aura. He himself now was sent airborne until he slammed into the ground, sliding and skidding to a stop.
Immediately, Kya turned her attention to several bindings holding her in place… before turning elsewhere. She still had no idea how to deal with those at the moment, and without an obvious solution to the problem, she would have to work on something that she could actually affect.
She spied the last of the golden bowls, and without a second thought, yanked it towards her with a mental command. The glow of the lines had, by this point, become quite dim. But with the last bowl being removed, it now sputtered like a dying candle.
To finish the job, Kya pulled all of the death crystals to herself, putting them in her storage the moment they touched her body. With this final act, the glow entirely left the lines and circles of the ritual site…
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Quest - Closeted Cultists
- Time Remaining: 1min:45sec
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The timer was still going down, and Arthur was still chanting with a zealous fervor.
For good measure, Kya launched the skeleton out of the circle, leaving only a few ribs, the neck, and the skull within any part of the circle.
Still the timer ticked down.
Fuck, what was she missing? She had removed every part of the ritual she would have thought… essential… She craned her neck from the limited perspective on the ground and, heart sinking, saw the several large alcoves dotting the side of the main chamber, each lit like an active volcano. There were still several of the smaller ritual sites all around her.
She still didn’t know what the whole point of this was, though she’d assumed much of it by now, and was sure as shit she didn’t want to be a part of it.
Focusing all of her will power on the stone restraints, she blasted each one of them with waves of force, causing them to erupt in small frag grenades fashion. She’d tried a weaker push earlier, but now was the time to pull out all the stops.
Even as her own blood poured out from the several small cuts and gashes caused by the stones, she rose to her feet and downed a healing potion.
Then, holding the glass vile in front of her, she launched it up at Arthur with a final, defiant blast… he ducked down, hands over his head, and continued chanting.
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Quest - Closeted Cultists
- Time Remaining: 59sec
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“God dammit!” She cursed, beginning to sprint towards the elderly man. Looking off to one side, she saw that earth user, whoever he was, was currently staring up at the ceiling of the cave, a line of drool coming from his mouth. The dagger still protruding from his leg had inflicted its venom, and he was having a nice trip at the moment.
Turning back to Arthur, she was going to try and-
He was running down the opposite set of stairs just as she was running up them. “What is this, musical chairs?” She shouted at the man, who just continued chanting louder and louder.
At this point, the glow was rekindled in the central ritual, as the skull, partial spine, and four total ribs began to glow as well, levitating back towards the central circle.
Not liking the sight of that even remotely, Kya gave what she well and truly hoped to be the final pull of this fight, dragging Arthur sideways off the stars, and dropping down four feet to the ground.
This… finally… stopped the ever-ticking timer.
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- Quest Update -
- Objectives:
1) Escape from Arthur’s spell and/or stop it from being cast
2) Kill, incapacitate, or capture all cultists participating in the spell. 2/3
3) You still need to figure out what exactly is happening down here! Determine the goals, motives, and affiliations of Arthur and his two companions.
- Time Remaining: N/A
- Rewards: Rewards contingent on manner of quest completion. Plus, you aren't dead yet!
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Kya breathed out a sigh of relief, before asking herself “Wait… two companions?”