"Hah! Good haul we got today! Even got some really young ones! They'll sell for good money once we're out of the border!" "Don't much care for us stopping though. We gotta keep pace, else we find ourselves caught." "Shut up you big oaf, who asked you for your opinion! All your good for is kicking down doors and carrying goods. And Hey! One of you idiots do something about the kids crying in the cage! I'm not listening that noise the whole way. Good Gods, I don't envy the arsehole that buys this lot of little savages." Leaves fall like ellipses amongst the trees. A judging silence surrounds the encampment of slavers known for plaguing the people living in the Brisshal area. Their campfire crackles merrily as the slavers take a few moments to relax. Their last haul was a big one, and they are celebrating. "Hey! Don't get too loud ya jackals, I'm gonna go take a piss!" The slaver places their beer stein on the ground by the log they are sitting on. A tried and true symbol for saving one's seat. The slaver leaves the safety of the campfire. "That idiot, who the hell has the gall to try and bring us in, ehh? We've killed men up and down the Brisshal border for months and the authorities are none the wiser. Not wanting to be the victim of a prank. The slaver moves further away. They could hear the others talking loudly, too loudly the idiots... as well as the sound of the children sobbing. They moved a bit further, the sobs were giving them a headache. "What does it take to get those kids to shut the hell up?! Should I threaten them some more? And that big stupid oaf, why, I don't even think the dears have an inkling of a sense as to who we are, and even they did, we aren't some group of farmers we're war veterans! Hell, when I was enlisted they used to call me--" The dagger slipped cleanly through the back of the skull. Panic set in as the slaver tasted the steel of the blade jutting through their mouth. Their tongue traces the blade's edge from their mouth to the bark of the tree in front of them slicing itself as it goes. They begin gurgling blood. Adrenaline pours into their system. Hands and arms flail wildly. The slaver claws at the tree desperately trying to unpin their face. A cold laugh, like freezing gas being let from a cylinder, echoes behind. "Hey? Hasn't that idiot been gone a long time?" "Maybe they're taking their time? No one likes to be rushed." "Ah, shut up you big oaf! Who asked you? You know what, get your shit and go check on them. And get a move on, we need to start moving!" The oaf got up slowly, and took his leave. "If it wasn't for the fact that he was so stupidly strong, I would have said we should have gotten rid of him months ago." "Hey, shouldn't someone go with him? What if there's an ambush or something?" "All the better for us, at least then we wouldn't have to deal with him anymore." Getting up, one of the bandits heads to the cart holding the cage. He reaches into a sack and pulls out an apple. Taking a bit, he grins and the children. Chewing slowly and thoroughly, he gathers the apple seeds in the front of his mouth and spits them at the children. They shield themselves with their forearms. He laughs heartily, mouth full of apple. As he does, the oaf's dull scream echoes through the trees. "What was that?!" "Get your shit! Let's go!" The slavers scramble forward grabbing whatever weapon is in the reach. They move quickly but remain on the lookout for an ambush. As they move towards the direction of the scream, they see and hear nothing. Reaching the oaf, the first slaver on the scenes stops and vomits. Another walks up, his face contorts in disgust. "Good, God's..." A third slaver speaks up quietly while covering thier mouth. "What, I can't see, what--" Coughing and gagging, the next slaver turns away. In front of them, the oaf kneels on the forest floor as in prayer before their lost comrade, now meticulously and cleanly divided from the back of the skull down the ribcage. Blood pools almost elegantly between the halves like a serenely macabre pond. The heart has been fixed to the tree by way of the slaver's own blade. "Oh gods... oh gods, oh gods, oh gods, oh gods, oh gods, oh gods." "Get a hold of yourself! We're veterans. It's grisly, but nothing we haven't seen before. The oaf must be in shock. Come on you fucking nitwit! Get up! We have to go!" The oaf doesn't move. Gently, a slaver went carefully maneuvered towards him. "He-hey, come on it's time to go." Placing their hand on the oaf's shoulder, the oaf's upper torso began to fall forward. His bottom half remains still. Hitting the ground with a thud, the oaf's entrails spill onto the ground along with an apple-sized metal ball. "Ah! AHH! AHHHHHH!" The slaver jumps backwards in panic. The ball explodes into a thick cloud of white smoke. Breathing in the gas sets the slavers lungs ablaze with pain. Each of them begins coughing violently while tearing at their throats. Streams of blood begin to dribble from their sides of their mouths. Their eyes water from the sting. Acting quickly, one of the slavers covers their mouth their cloak. Through blurred vision he watches as a cloaked figure, wraith-like, eyes burning in deep crimson slowly walks amongst the dying. Approaching one slaver, the figure gently raises the slaver's head by the scalp. In one slash, the head is freed from the body. The monster tosses the head aside like rotten fruit. It moves on to the next, lifting and turning them over with it's foot. The slaver begins to flail but the gas has made them week. Dropping down to one knee, it brings out its dagger and buries it deep in the slaver's chest. Moving smoothly, the ghoul cuts in a circular path then punches through cavity it has made. Reaching in, it rips out the heart and tosses it aside. The last slaver begins weakly crawling away. He has to move, but his body has no energy. He has to get away. Whatever that thing is it can't be human. It's a monster. It's a ghoul. A demon. He's being hunted. He needs to move. Oh please, he pleads to any deity that will listen to him. Please save me. His eyesight begins to dim. He can't escape. Something is holding his leg. He tries to move forward again but he's too weak. He tries to yell but his voice wavers. Everything goes black. From the cage, the children watch the campfire. They huddle like rabbits. Some sob. From the edge of the darkness something horrendous appears. A nightmare made manifest, cloaked in black and painted in blood and gore. The children scream as it walks slowly towards them. They scramble backwards trying to get away from it. It nears the cage while bringing out a dagger. One of the braver children yells out, voice quivering. "Le-leave us alone! We're we-we're not sacred of you! Just go away!" The phantom raises its knife and brings it down hard breaking the lock. The cage door slowly creaks open. It pokes its head the cage. "Don't... forget. To do... your homework..." The monster leaves. The children rush to leave the cage, a jumble of tiny hands and legs spilling out of their prison. They run home, terrified. The campfire begins to smolder. Slowly, the fire dies.
"Freeing slaves, huh?" The man drew his cloak tighter about himself as he walked. The autumn air was far from cold, but it held an edge, and a promise of much lower temperatures. It cut through Chaol's trash-tier garment as if it were not even there. The natives to Terrasphere knew nothing of item rarities and traits, so they simply saw the pathetic cloak for what it was - a quality piece worn by a wealthy aristocrat. That was what he had wanted them to see, after all. "That does not strike me as an issue that our mutual friend would concern himself with." The man who escorted Chaol drew his lips into a tight line of displeasure. There was a beat of silence as he collected himself, before he answered, "It would do you well to avoid questioning the Master." "The Master," Chaol echoed, letting the word roll of his tongue. The sound came heavy with condescension, but it was spoken softly enough that perhaps the other man did not hear it. If he did, he gave no indication. He was an NPC, after all, so it was unlikely that characters could be programmed to pick up on all of the nuances. Or it was entirely possible, and he was simply skipped over because he was just a pawn in a bigger game of chess. His name was Grimswell, for crying out loud. That was about the most typical name for a corrupt politician's right-hand-man that Chaol could think of. Grimswell pursed his lips; perhaps he had heard Chaol after all. "He heard from a reliable source that slave-catchers were working within his jurisdiction. That cannot be allowed to happen." Not when the Master does not have a stake in it, Chaol thought to himself, though it was amusement, and not bitterness, that the notion evoked. He cared very little for the slavers, the slaves, Grimswell, or his master. He simply found great joy in studying people. And this was an especially intriguing case. So he remained silent, content to let the quiet cloak them both as thoroughly as the darkness. It was not until the pair reached the remains of the camp that the player spoke. "Well now," he drawled, a smile quirking his lips. "Looks like someone did our work for us." The plot thickens.
Euler waited silently in the trees. She had dispatched the group of slavers, brutally, and released their captives. Now she waited to see if any of the slaver's allies would show. If and when they did, they would also be dealt with. Though Euler herself often hunted underage players, these NPCs were different. This wasn't a game to them, this was their life. These slavers were putting their captives' actual selves in danger... and also keeping them from their studies. So the slavers needed to be dealt with. It was as simple as that. Unfortunately, the group Euler had just massacred was large, and for the most part moved as a pack. They were definitely veterans which would have given her trouble, which is why she decided to go with subterfuge. The trap she had set had worked, but unfortunately the last slaver had died from the gas before she could interrogate them. Now she could only wait and see if others associated with the slavers came looking for the slaver group, and if they did, this time she would be sure to capture one alive. As she waited, she heard the crumpling of leaves approaching the site. She could tell by listening it was two distinct people. Moving silently through the trees, she spotted two individuals approaching. One, a princely aristocrat looking individual, and the other probably a servant, guessed Euler. Listening intently, Euler could discern that these two were also hunting the slavers. If that was the case, she had no reason to capture or interrogate them. She also wasn't sure if they're actual combat abilities. Instead of physical combat, she would rely on psychological warfare to see if she could pry any information from the two. After all, using fear as a weapon was one of her strong points. Euler waited for the pair to reach a point in the camp where they could be studied. When they reached the position, she called down to the pair in her frozen voice. "So... is it another that wishes to tempt death... or just a curious onlooker..." She waited for an answer patiently, the black of her cloak keeping her hidden with the exception of her eyes, which glowed like coals in the darkness. @Chaol
Grimswell did two things in rapid succession, both so contradictory in nature that Chaol had to grin. At the same time the man grabbed for his thin, envelope-opener of a dagger, he took a hurried step back the way they had come. He was slipping from "middle-aged" into "old" territory, and his gaunt fame added another decade in appearance. As he moved backward, his shoulders hunched, and he seemed to shrink into both himself and the shadows simultaneously. Chaol, on the other hand, took a confident step forward. It was a simple move, but he angled it in just a way to position himself between the voice and Grimswell. This was not to protect the man - on the contrary, Chaol moved to demonstrate his dominance over the smaller, weaker man. Sure, Grimswell was far higher on the Master's ladder, but this stranger did not need to know that. "The latter, I assure you," the dark-haired man answered. Though he spoke in a rich tenor, his voice was still somehow warmer than the decidedly female stranger. His expression remained relaxed, neutral, but his gaze swept the darkness rapidly. When he saw the blazing eyes, he caught and held their gaze. "So tell me," he asked, his calm as cool as the evening air, "is it you that we have to thank for this?" At the same time, he kicked at prone form that lay a foot away. The toe of his boot struck soft fat, and the body shifted, before plopping back into a pool of crimson blood. Though he could not feel it, the man suspected that the body still retained some of the heat not yet zapped by the night. His fought the urge to shift into investigation mode - a change of eye color in such a precarious moment might have dire consequences. @Euler
"Hah... maybe... who wants to know? You seem excited. Horror movie fan? Or just someone that likes to see people get what's coming to them. Haha, I'm guessing you're not a fan of slaver's either? Or just not a fan of these slavers?" Euler watched as the aristocrat's eyes moved about the area. He looked like an inspector being forced to wait to be let into the scene. "Itching to go inspect the scene? Heh, go on then. I'll wait. I have... questions for you as well. More than just the basic 'how do you do' anyway." Euler eyed the aristocrat's companion now being shielded. "What's the matter? Scared of something?" Euler let out a cold chuckle. "Well go on with your lord. Inspect the scene. I want to see your faces when you do. Don't worry, I'll be watching from distance. You can call me Euler. Haha, a little math joke." Euler pulled her cloak over her face. Her two eyes vanished leaving only a voice. "I'll be near if you want to chat more..." @Chaol
"You do ask a lot of questions," Chaol responded flippantly. He stuided the space that the eyes had occupied only seconds before, the gears in his mind whirring. What exactly was he experiencing here? Was this another NPC, leading him into a new quest? Or a new threat? Nothing protected him from an ambush, were he to follow the direction f the disappearing eyes. Or was this another player, jerking him around for their own twisted amusement? At the thought, Chaol's lips twisted into his own private sneer. Okay, he decided, we'll go with that. And two could play at this game. "So let me address them all for you. I am Chaol, and this is Grimswell." At the mention of his name, Chaol felt the NPC stiffen by his side. Good, let the man sweat a bit. He was a giant worm, anyway, and maybe some additional stress would help him grow a spine. Or a pair. Whichever he was most laking in. Chaol continued without flourish or fanfare, as if he were reading his order from a grocery list. "I'm not particularly entertained by horror movies, though the Saw series is fascinating." He appreciated the level of thought put into each game, regardless of how wicked it all was. "I do not care for slavers, these, or otherwise." Truth be told, he did not care about them, but wording was very important here. Revealing his lack of emotional attachment would lead to more questions, and further speculation. "I am eager to inspect the scene as that is what I was sent here to do. Nothing is the matter, nor am I scared of anything. At least, nothing here." His smile was bereft of humor. "Is there anything that I missed, Leonhard?" Ball is in your court. @Euler
"Well, I'll be... haha... you are a brave one. Well, go on and inspect, inspector. That's what you came here to do right? Over by the tree is a few of the slavers, some are kind of scattered around. After you're done inspecting... I'd love to hear your thoughts on my handy work. Haha..." Euler vanished into the darkness with her laugh still ringing in the air. She was dying to see what the noble would make of the way she dealt with the slavers. Would he be disgusted? Amused? Would he be terrified? The thought of any of these excited Euler in a way she hadn't expected. She had ambushed the slavers to protect the children they had stolen. She had hacked them apart viciously to drive home a message to any would be slavers. But there was something else... it was fun to outwit her prey. She liked see them falling into her traps. To see fear grip them in their last moments. Euler wondered if this made her a bad person, but she shrugged. This was a game anyway, and there were definitely horror games out there. She was just playing the monster. @Chaol
