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"Meng, did you get the files I forwarded to you?" Ezrihel stood with his arms folded, braced against the wall of a small gray alcove somewhere in the lower commercial levels of the hub. Arthur leaned casually next to him, his observant azure eyes scanning the crowd in front of them as the General got to fussin' on his invisible device.
The logician's voice came through crystal clear on his integrated neural communicator, soft and mousy as ever as she spoke into his mind. "The files from Doctor Jane Foster? Yes sir. I have them right here."
"I need a couple of soldiers prepped for a detail with me, planet-side. Sari al-Waheed and Ruedlen von Saerhaus. I expect them, along with P’thaeyl, to meet me at the third level of the docking bay by the top of the hour."
"Sir- I, uh. Permission to speak freely, sir?"
Ezrihel von Althaus impatiently tapped his foot. She was about to raise some sort of objection, certainly. He already knew it was coming, and huffed with a roll of his eyes. "Granted, Meng. What is it?"
"Are you sure that Saerhaus is ready to go back into combat already? I uh mean... She has only been up and walking around again for about a week."
"... And?" He asked dryly. There was something so annoyingly rote about being able to predict, and the expected need to field, the constant tedious concerns of his underlings. By the love of the gods' eternal blessings, what part of 'we don't have time to futz about' did the rung of officers running in his crew not understand? Getting Ruedlen processed and restored had been an extensive pain of politicking with his direct subordinates that he normally despised getting involved with. And what, now he was going to hear it from his logician too? The andromedan scoffed aloud, earning a curious glance from his cowboy companion.
"Well, standard protocol is for two weeks time to be given post-"
What was she, andromedan resources officer? "Meng, my lovely. Respectfully. I really wish that I cared about standard-protocol-this and standard-protocol-that at the moment but I so desperately do not." He dismissed bluntly, his tone laced with a curt and ever-so-slightly-plastic sweetness. “They have a job to do by obligation of honor. I expect them to do it. We don’t have the luxury of protocols.”
The logician sighed dejectedly at his response, utterly loath to abandon the principles and guidelines that kept things working smoothly. "Was she at least cleared by C.M.O Isra, General Althaus?"
"Ugh. Redundantly so." Ez rolled his eyes, pushing himself off the wall and silently gesturing to Arthur to walk alongside him. Foster had forwarded the relevant information to him between rather excited requests, now all they had to do was make it down to the ice sheets, if his crew wanted to stop digging their heels in and actually go. "Do you think he would allow her to wander around if she wasn't fit?"
"I..." Meng's soft voice stumbled, going silent for a long moment. "No sir. He is a competent doctor and I could not speak ill of his ability."
"Hm. I am sure he would appreciate your trust." The aristocrat remarked flatly. “Make sure that they are ready for a several day long embarkment befitting this barren ball of hostile ice. Mind giving me the details on the native fauna we should expect to face?”
Meng hummed softly. “It’s... Really not a friendly place, General. On the surface you are looking at permanent sub-zero temperatures, howling winds and snowstorms that can bury an encampment in just a few hours. Xenomorphs and necromorphs parasitize their prey- the xenomorphs being prone to a hive mind structure and a penchant for capturing their prey for... ah... live incubation- uhm -ehem- whereas the necromorphs are more akin to a post-mortem metamorphosis... The cthonians and remorhazzes stalk and burrow through the ice sheets, wampas- large and bipedal white furred mammal-like beasts- take refuge in caves... And that’s before you consider the locusts, the ost’lakas and deep elves with their--”
“You have got to be kidding me.” Ez interrupted with a groan of exasperation. “Ost’lakas?”
“Well, the locals call them ‘mind-flayers’, and say they have octopus faces, but that is accompanied by reports of a malicious psychic methodology...” Her voice faded into the background as the noble’s stomach lurched rather violently.
“Augh...” Althaus came to a stop so suddenly that Arthur paused to check on him. He was practically green- well, as green as a purple-blooded alien could look, given the lighting and circumstance.
“Sir?”
“General?”
Both Meng and Morgan had managed to pipe up at the same time.
“I’m fine!” Ezrihel hissed at both of them, swallowing back the bile that threatened his composure. Once again that dreadful wave of nausea washed over him before he shoved the burgeoning intrusive thought to the back of his mind and kept walking. “What in the sevens hells is a remorhaz or cthonian, anyway?”
“Uh... Gigantic ice-worms living on and within the ice sheets, according to reports, sir.” Meng chirped over the connection, as if she wasn’t describing a terrible ecosystem of misery.
Ez scowled, rolling his emerald eyes and shaking his head. From one spiteful world to another, the nasty creatures never seemed to end, and Inverxe was beyond the normal ranges of hostility, as if the gods themselves sought to punish the puny little dirty snowball for the offense of merely existing. He supposed that this was how he got his fun these days. “Just make sure Saerhaus and al-Waheed are ready for this frozen hellscape, okay? Althaus over and out.”
The general glanced at Arthur as the channel closed, a certain chaotic gleam to his expression. The cowboy chuckled, only slightly put off, because he just knew that look meant something sideways was surely soon to come from the wily alien. “What, General? You don’t get that look in yer eye often, ‘sides when your scheming up something devilish.”
“Morgan!” Ez gasped, a delicate hand feigning mock dramatism as he pantomimed shock. “I am as pure as a lamb, I’ll have you know, my darling cowpoke~”
Arthur scoffed in amused disbelief. “Yeah? And I ain’t nothin’ shy of a saint.”
“Oh, I didn’t dare to assume you were anything but, my dear friend~” The andromedan assured with a playful little flourish and feline grin.
The cowboy smacked his lips and smirked with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Sure, General, if you say so.”
The ride down to the surface was about as gentle as a last minute ticket down to hell could be on the capitalist showboat known as the Hub. The pilot was a short gruff woman who appeared weathered by snowstorms and stress until she was left with nothing more than her diminutive height and impressively bullish attitude. She had told the five passengers, in no uncertain terms, to secure their shit in the metal lockers, get seated and buckle the fuck up. She had agreed to bring them to Gnawbone camp and not an inch further, and made a big tedious point about the fact that she wasn’t planning to stick around and wait around for them, and that they would have to just ‘figure something out’ when the time for them to return from the ‘ice coffin’ came, if it came.
Ezrihel thought the squat woman (who’s name he had already swiftly forgotten) was incredibly grating in her abundant profanity and obnoxious repetition, and was simply thankful to leave the cramped starship as soon as he was given the all-clear. A moment longer spent around the patronizing crone was going to make his ears itch to the point of frivolous homicide. He stepped down off of the ramp, the rugged spiked soles of his insulated waterproof boots bit into the snowy ice with sharp crunches. He pulled the black hood of his fur-lined double breasted overcoat close around his face against the bitter cold as he walked off, only stopping when he fully trusted that he had given that short-tempered pilot more than enough space to take off without torching them with the engines.
Behind him, garbed in similar cold-weather gear and hopeful prayers, came Sari, Ruedlen and Arthur, and in the very back P’thaeyl brought up the rear, carefully scanning for possible threats that sought to get the drop on their little squad. The organics with him all looked to him, he assumed waiting for his valued direction. With little more than a thought the coordinates that Doctor Foster had sent him were displayed on his optical overlay, and he made quick work leading them through the barren white landscape to Camp Gnawbone.
Ruedlen stared vacantly to the sky as she shuffled onwards, her large ghostly eyes fixated on the bloated looming form of the humongous purple Ioun, the parental gas giant of this decrepit little moon. It lorded over them like a cold, profane god, indifferent to the suffering inherent to the child it clutched so closely to its bosom. It felt all wrong, deep in her bones this wasteland felt empty and wrong, as if existence itself had suddenly decided to take a ninety degree turn to the left for no reason at all.
Her world had shifted in a terribly implacable way since she had reawoken a week ago, and in a way that left her feeling awfully dizzy and out-of-place. Like coming out of a long hibernation, she found her memories hazy and incongruent and knew that like a portrait left a half-degree crooked something was terribly wrong, and equally implacable, within her world. She had wanted to speak with Raphael about it, desperately, but his mind worked in secret, and he had made himself frustratingly content putting as much distance and as many barriers between them as possible. Like some sort of small frightened creature he had delegated the tasks of checking her over and talking with her to one of his assistants, Zelena.
Frankly, it made her want to wrap her lithe fingers around his pencil neck and wring it until he gave her the respect she deserved, because she knew that they were close enough for her to be treated better. She just wished she understood why she was being scorned and avoided like some sort of sickly plague victim, threatening contagion. Finally Rue looked over to her azure-haired friend, and gave him a gentle nudge on the arm. "Sari, I..."
Sari turned towards her, his dark face half-obscured by the fur lining of his hood but he did not miss a single effortless stride, instantly noticing that glassy-eyed stare of hers, and quirked a brow. "Yes, my friend? What is it that troubles your heart and mind?"
Ruedlen glanced forward at the General and his dusty human tag-along, then back to Sari, gently prodding at the edge of the assassin’s consciousness with her own. He was slow to lower his mental guard, even for her soft whispers. ‘Haven’t felt right since they brought me back up...’
’Ah... But that is to be expected after such a procedure, no?’
’I guess. I’ve just always been more prepared in the past... And it just doesn’t feel right, Sari.’
’And you are certain it is not the madness moon inflicting the Malaise upon your psyche? I’ve felt an odd weight prickling across my skin since we landed.’
’No, not the moon- I mean. The moon is pretty creepy, but I usually enjoy creepy barren landscapes- this is different... Did I do something to piss off Raph?’
There was a noticeable hesitation from the alien Madjai, and he was careful to not allow any unsanctioned thoughts or feelings to slip through their psychic connection. He knew that Isra was sensitive, deep down. Sensitive and probably terrified, let alone avoidant. ’He is not speaking with you?’
’He won’t even see me, Sari. He keeps to himself in his office and instead sends Zelena or Contoti to check on me. I... The apparent months leading up to last week are... unclear at best. I remember a ship, and an angry god. I remember vague flashes of an all encompassing pain and salty ocean water...’ Her feeling of loss and frustrated confusion was plain and clear across their mental tether, and it ached like a stiff and bruised muscle.
She did not understand. She could not possibly understand. Sari knew that in a heartbeat, because it wasn’t his conversation to have. Instead all he could offer her was a firm and reassuring squeeze of the hand and, ’I am sure that Isra simply needs time to work through processing everything. Needing to do what he did has no doubt been hard and heavy on his mind since. I think he will speak with you when he is ready to.’
Rue was only half-convinced, if only because she knew better than to trust the Doctor to be so straight-forward in any prompt manner when it came to his private feelings-
“Hey, lovebirds. Quit holding hands and get over here. This isn't some romantic get-away.” Ezrihel’s demand cut through the frail mental bond between them and brought them both back to reality. Sari was quick to drop her gloved hand and hustle over to the General, P’thyael, and Arthur, who stood across the desolate worksite on a ridge. Rue only joined them a moment later, taking her time to stroll through the silent camp, a fact that annoyed the impatient noblethem, though he chose to not press it. He knew better. She was probably still adjusting to being alive again. He just wished that she would manage it faster and less like a dazed sheep shambling along.
His calculating emerald eyes focused out in the distance, against the endless glare of brilliant white snow and icy foothills, and locked on to a stand of verdant trees maladjusted in appearance to the frigid desert. “Does that seem normal to any of you?” He paused, as if giving a chance for his rhetoric to be challenged. “No? Glad I’m not the only sane one here. Keep your guard up. Doctor Foster called it an ‘unmade poison’ on the world. Who knows what manner of beasts slink around it, lying in wait for foolish and curious prey. Weapons out.”
The General, first to take initiative, readied Rose and stepped forward with a rather casual saunter off the ridge. Whatever the hell this unmade rot contained could not possibly be worse than a half-carcinoid decaying octo-god with a scottish accent filling his lungs with putrid oil. At least here the ground was far more solid underfoot... Or so he thought before he saw the full extent of the gaping chasm in the ice. He took one step closer, curious to peer down into the ravine and physically felt the air shift, as if he had crossed some sort of actual boundary. Before it had been windy and biting with cold, but here the air was held perfectly, artificially still.
A dreadful unease came over him as the long thin blades of grass and flowers swayed gently back and forth, the hairs on the back of his neck standing to prickle with an instinctual warning. There was no wind here, yet the vines draped over the sun-bleached tree branches rocked ever so slightly, as if barely brushed past. The flora was lush and verdant, alive in all appearances to the normal naked eye, and yet there was no light within it. They moved in time with a singular motion, not the logical chaos befitting a natural environment, the unique and individual motes of life were missing, replaced by what could only be described as a monotonous smear, a low and flat hum that denoted a singular one Thing despite seeming to be many.
It felt utterly unholy. A mockery of the natural order, regardless of its odd and alien beauty.
The General glanced back at his squad, only a meter or two behind him, looking first to Sari, then Arthur, P’thaeyl, and Ruedlen. “Burn it down. It is nothing but profanely tainted--”
Suddenly Ruedlen sucked in an intense gasp, her gloved hands flying up to her mouth as her eyes widened, the world around them draining free of what little color and light it possessed, as if O’sotlia herself had abandoned the miserable world to a bleak drabness. The cavern gaping by their feet shuddered, a rush of real wind gusting up in some massive exhale before warping into a demented wailing scream. The skull piercing lament burrowed into their ears and rattled their minds, the ground underfoot splitting even further open to plunge them all down into the unknowably dark depths below...
The logician's voice came through crystal clear on his integrated neural communicator, soft and mousy as ever as she spoke into his mind. "The files from Doctor Jane Foster? Yes sir. I have them right here."
"I need a couple of soldiers prepped for a detail with me, planet-side. Sari al-Waheed and Ruedlen von Saerhaus. I expect them, along with P’thaeyl, to meet me at the third level of the docking bay by the top of the hour."
"Sir- I, uh. Permission to speak freely, sir?"
Ezrihel von Althaus impatiently tapped his foot. She was about to raise some sort of objection, certainly. He already knew it was coming, and huffed with a roll of his eyes. "Granted, Meng. What is it?"
"Are you sure that Saerhaus is ready to go back into combat already? I uh mean... She has only been up and walking around again for about a week."
"... And?" He asked dryly. There was something so annoyingly rote about being able to predict, and the expected need to field, the constant tedious concerns of his underlings. By the love of the gods' eternal blessings, what part of 'we don't have time to futz about' did the rung of officers running in his crew not understand? Getting Ruedlen processed and restored had been an extensive pain of politicking with his direct subordinates that he normally despised getting involved with. And what, now he was going to hear it from his logician too? The andromedan scoffed aloud, earning a curious glance from his cowboy companion.
"Well, standard protocol is for two weeks time to be given post-"
What was she, andromedan resources officer? "Meng, my lovely. Respectfully. I really wish that I cared about standard-protocol-this and standard-protocol-that at the moment but I so desperately do not." He dismissed bluntly, his tone laced with a curt and ever-so-slightly-plastic sweetness. “They have a job to do by obligation of honor. I expect them to do it. We don’t have the luxury of protocols.”
The logician sighed dejectedly at his response, utterly loath to abandon the principles and guidelines that kept things working smoothly. "Was she at least cleared by C.M.O Isra, General Althaus?"
"Ugh. Redundantly so." Ez rolled his eyes, pushing himself off the wall and silently gesturing to Arthur to walk alongside him. Foster had forwarded the relevant information to him between rather excited requests, now all they had to do was make it down to the ice sheets, if his crew wanted to stop digging their heels in and actually go. "Do you think he would allow her to wander around if she wasn't fit?"
"I..." Meng's soft voice stumbled, going silent for a long moment. "No sir. He is a competent doctor and I could not speak ill of his ability."
"Hm. I am sure he would appreciate your trust." The aristocrat remarked flatly. “Make sure that they are ready for a several day long embarkment befitting this barren ball of hostile ice. Mind giving me the details on the native fauna we should expect to face?”
Meng hummed softly. “It’s... Really not a friendly place, General. On the surface you are looking at permanent sub-zero temperatures, howling winds and snowstorms that can bury an encampment in just a few hours. Xenomorphs and necromorphs parasitize their prey- the xenomorphs being prone to a hive mind structure and a penchant for capturing their prey for... ah... live incubation- uhm -ehem- whereas the necromorphs are more akin to a post-mortem metamorphosis... The cthonians and remorhazzes stalk and burrow through the ice sheets, wampas- large and bipedal white furred mammal-like beasts- take refuge in caves... And that’s before you consider the locusts, the ost’lakas and deep elves with their--”
“You have got to be kidding me.” Ez interrupted with a groan of exasperation. “Ost’lakas?”
“Well, the locals call them ‘mind-flayers’, and say they have octopus faces, but that is accompanied by reports of a malicious psychic methodology...” Her voice faded into the background as the noble’s stomach lurched rather violently.
“Augh...” Althaus came to a stop so suddenly that Arthur paused to check on him. He was practically green- well, as green as a purple-blooded alien could look, given the lighting and circumstance.
“Sir?”
“General?”
Both Meng and Morgan had managed to pipe up at the same time.
“I’m fine!” Ezrihel hissed at both of them, swallowing back the bile that threatened his composure. Once again that dreadful wave of nausea washed over him before he shoved the burgeoning intrusive thought to the back of his mind and kept walking. “What in the sevens hells is a remorhaz or cthonian, anyway?”
“Uh... Gigantic ice-worms living on and within the ice sheets, according to reports, sir.” Meng chirped over the connection, as if she wasn’t describing a terrible ecosystem of misery.
Ez scowled, rolling his emerald eyes and shaking his head. From one spiteful world to another, the nasty creatures never seemed to end, and Inverxe was beyond the normal ranges of hostility, as if the gods themselves sought to punish the puny little dirty snowball for the offense of merely existing. He supposed that this was how he got his fun these days. “Just make sure Saerhaus and al-Waheed are ready for this frozen hellscape, okay? Althaus over and out.”
The general glanced at Arthur as the channel closed, a certain chaotic gleam to his expression. The cowboy chuckled, only slightly put off, because he just knew that look meant something sideways was surely soon to come from the wily alien. “What, General? You don’t get that look in yer eye often, ‘sides when your scheming up something devilish.”
“Morgan!” Ez gasped, a delicate hand feigning mock dramatism as he pantomimed shock. “I am as pure as a lamb, I’ll have you know, my darling cowpoke~”
Arthur scoffed in amused disbelief. “Yeah? And I ain’t nothin’ shy of a saint.”
“Oh, I didn’t dare to assume you were anything but, my dear friend~” The andromedan assured with a playful little flourish and feline grin.
The cowboy smacked his lips and smirked with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Sure, General, if you say so.”
The ride down to the surface was about as gentle as a last minute ticket down to hell could be on the capitalist showboat known as the Hub. The pilot was a short gruff woman who appeared weathered by snowstorms and stress until she was left with nothing more than her diminutive height and impressively bullish attitude. She had told the five passengers, in no uncertain terms, to secure their shit in the metal lockers, get seated and buckle the fuck up. She had agreed to bring them to Gnawbone camp and not an inch further, and made a big tedious point about the fact that she wasn’t planning to stick around and wait around for them, and that they would have to just ‘figure something out’ when the time for them to return from the ‘ice coffin’ came, if it came.
Ezrihel thought the squat woman (who’s name he had already swiftly forgotten) was incredibly grating in her abundant profanity and obnoxious repetition, and was simply thankful to leave the cramped starship as soon as he was given the all-clear. A moment longer spent around the patronizing crone was going to make his ears itch to the point of frivolous homicide. He stepped down off of the ramp, the rugged spiked soles of his insulated waterproof boots bit into the snowy ice with sharp crunches. He pulled the black hood of his fur-lined double breasted overcoat close around his face against the bitter cold as he walked off, only stopping when he fully trusted that he had given that short-tempered pilot more than enough space to take off without torching them with the engines.
Behind him, garbed in similar cold-weather gear and hopeful prayers, came Sari, Ruedlen and Arthur, and in the very back P’thaeyl brought up the rear, carefully scanning for possible threats that sought to get the drop on their little squad. The organics with him all looked to him, he assumed waiting for his valued direction. With little more than a thought the coordinates that Doctor Foster had sent him were displayed on his optical overlay, and he made quick work leading them through the barren white landscape to Camp Gnawbone.
Ruedlen stared vacantly to the sky as she shuffled onwards, her large ghostly eyes fixated on the bloated looming form of the humongous purple Ioun, the parental gas giant of this decrepit little moon. It lorded over them like a cold, profane god, indifferent to the suffering inherent to the child it clutched so closely to its bosom. It felt all wrong, deep in her bones this wasteland felt empty and wrong, as if existence itself had suddenly decided to take a ninety degree turn to the left for no reason at all.
Her world had shifted in a terribly implacable way since she had reawoken a week ago, and in a way that left her feeling awfully dizzy and out-of-place. Like coming out of a long hibernation, she found her memories hazy and incongruent and knew that like a portrait left a half-degree crooked something was terribly wrong, and equally implacable, within her world. She had wanted to speak with Raphael about it, desperately, but his mind worked in secret, and he had made himself frustratingly content putting as much distance and as many barriers between them as possible. Like some sort of small frightened creature he had delegated the tasks of checking her over and talking with her to one of his assistants, Zelena.
Frankly, it made her want to wrap her lithe fingers around his pencil neck and wring it until he gave her the respect she deserved, because she knew that they were close enough for her to be treated better. She just wished she understood why she was being scorned and avoided like some sort of sickly plague victim, threatening contagion. Finally Rue looked over to her azure-haired friend, and gave him a gentle nudge on the arm. "Sari, I..."
Sari turned towards her, his dark face half-obscured by the fur lining of his hood but he did not miss a single effortless stride, instantly noticing that glassy-eyed stare of hers, and quirked a brow. "Yes, my friend? What is it that troubles your heart and mind?"
Ruedlen glanced forward at the General and his dusty human tag-along, then back to Sari, gently prodding at the edge of the assassin’s consciousness with her own. He was slow to lower his mental guard, even for her soft whispers. ‘Haven’t felt right since they brought me back up...’
’Ah... But that is to be expected after such a procedure, no?’
’I guess. I’ve just always been more prepared in the past... And it just doesn’t feel right, Sari.’
’And you are certain it is not the madness moon inflicting the Malaise upon your psyche? I’ve felt an odd weight prickling across my skin since we landed.’
’No, not the moon- I mean. The moon is pretty creepy, but I usually enjoy creepy barren landscapes- this is different... Did I do something to piss off Raph?’
There was a noticeable hesitation from the alien Madjai, and he was careful to not allow any unsanctioned thoughts or feelings to slip through their psychic connection. He knew that Isra was sensitive, deep down. Sensitive and probably terrified, let alone avoidant. ’He is not speaking with you?’
’He won’t even see me, Sari. He keeps to himself in his office and instead sends Zelena or Contoti to check on me. I... The apparent months leading up to last week are... unclear at best. I remember a ship, and an angry god. I remember vague flashes of an all encompassing pain and salty ocean water...’ Her feeling of loss and frustrated confusion was plain and clear across their mental tether, and it ached like a stiff and bruised muscle.
She did not understand. She could not possibly understand. Sari knew that in a heartbeat, because it wasn’t his conversation to have. Instead all he could offer her was a firm and reassuring squeeze of the hand and, ’I am sure that Isra simply needs time to work through processing everything. Needing to do what he did has no doubt been hard and heavy on his mind since. I think he will speak with you when he is ready to.’
Rue was only half-convinced, if only because she knew better than to trust the Doctor to be so straight-forward in any prompt manner when it came to his private feelings-
“Hey, lovebirds. Quit holding hands and get over here. This isn't some romantic get-away.” Ezrihel’s demand cut through the frail mental bond between them and brought them both back to reality. Sari was quick to drop her gloved hand and hustle over to the General, P’thyael, and Arthur, who stood across the desolate worksite on a ridge. Rue only joined them a moment later, taking her time to stroll through the silent camp, a fact that annoyed the impatient noblethem, though he chose to not press it. He knew better. She was probably still adjusting to being alive again. He just wished that she would manage it faster and less like a dazed sheep shambling along.
His calculating emerald eyes focused out in the distance, against the endless glare of brilliant white snow and icy foothills, and locked on to a stand of verdant trees maladjusted in appearance to the frigid desert. “Does that seem normal to any of you?” He paused, as if giving a chance for his rhetoric to be challenged. “No? Glad I’m not the only sane one here. Keep your guard up. Doctor Foster called it an ‘unmade poison’ on the world. Who knows what manner of beasts slink around it, lying in wait for foolish and curious prey. Weapons out.”
The General, first to take initiative, readied Rose and stepped forward with a rather casual saunter off the ridge. Whatever the hell this unmade rot contained could not possibly be worse than a half-carcinoid decaying octo-god with a scottish accent filling his lungs with putrid oil. At least here the ground was far more solid underfoot... Or so he thought before he saw the full extent of the gaping chasm in the ice. He took one step closer, curious to peer down into the ravine and physically felt the air shift, as if he had crossed some sort of actual boundary. Before it had been windy and biting with cold, but here the air was held perfectly, artificially still.
A dreadful unease came over him as the long thin blades of grass and flowers swayed gently back and forth, the hairs on the back of his neck standing to prickle with an instinctual warning. There was no wind here, yet the vines draped over the sun-bleached tree branches rocked ever so slightly, as if barely brushed past. The flora was lush and verdant, alive in all appearances to the normal naked eye, and yet there was no light within it. They moved in time with a singular motion, not the logical chaos befitting a natural environment, the unique and individual motes of life were missing, replaced by what could only be described as a monotonous smear, a low and flat hum that denoted a singular one Thing despite seeming to be many.
It felt utterly unholy. A mockery of the natural order, regardless of its odd and alien beauty.
The General glanced back at his squad, only a meter or two behind him, looking first to Sari, then Arthur, P’thaeyl, and Ruedlen. “Burn it down. It is nothing but profanely tainted--”
Suddenly Ruedlen sucked in an intense gasp, her gloved hands flying up to her mouth as her eyes widened, the world around them draining free of what little color and light it possessed, as if O’sotlia herself had abandoned the miserable world to a bleak drabness. The cavern gaping by their feet shuddered, a rush of real wind gusting up in some massive exhale before warping into a demented wailing scream. The skull piercing lament burrowed into their ears and rattled their minds, the ground underfoot splitting even further open to plunge them all down into the unknowably dark depths below...
2,784/2,500AN ARBITER'S RAGE
NON-REPEATABLE
Quest Giver: Up to the player
Quest Length: 2,500 words
Quest Location: Inverxe
Quest Prerequisites: N/A
Quest Description: Your character is going about their daily business when a strange sensation overcomes them, leaving them somewhere between burning rage and infinite sorrow. As they look around, they begin to notice that something isn’t right: their surroundings are… dimming, like some great spirit in the sky has switched out the lights. Suddenly, in the distance, the screams begin. A Voice that you instantly and ineffably recognize as your world’s Arbiter screams, as well. The ground cracks beneath your feet, whole chunks of landscape swallowed by pockets of void-like darkness. The world around you devolves into chaos, and you’ll have to fight your way out as corrupted flora and fauna begin to swarm the area. You need to find somewhere safe, if that even exists anymore.