Considering was merely a few days since her sacrifice in the battle against Azog, Eleanor was still somewhat mentally shaken by the ordeal. She had been rather unprepared for all of the obligations that had come her way, from the initial battling, to the final plunge. Things had moved so fast, and the entire experience had resulted in quite a test of strength. This test was one that Eleanor deemed herself a failure. She had to find better ways of controlling her power and managing it. If she knew not how to control her power, then she would be of little use in conflict. Up to that point, the detective had been giving herself the mental excuse of being a non-combat character, but talk could only get so far. In the confines of a game, combat prowess was one of the most important things. She could not idly stand by much longer with powers untamed, if she wished to continue living. The battle with Azog had proved that to her, more than anything. Getting another flashback of the incident, she winced, raising her hand up to conceal her face. Her mind flashed with the images of her final glance down in the maw of the elemental prince. Then the vision of that giant, black core at the center, before her body burnt away. These flash images obscured her reality for mere moments, though felt like eternities. Her memories of the incident, nevertheless feeling quite chronological in origin, had the hint of fragmentation, as though some things happened after they aught to, and others happened before they could. Luckily, as she lowered her hand from her face, she had already ventured quite far into the forests of Brisshal. Small creatures shuffled about, many harmless, at least to the detective. Paused in an outcropping, she glanced around again at her surroundings. Paranoia always ached at her mind, as caution made a constant effort to claw it's way to the surface. There was never peace for her, was there? Regardless, she had not ventured to the forest to mope and cry over the misdeeds and tribulations of her past. She had a much different motive lingering her mind. She had entered into the wooded outcropping to refine her wit. No area seemed to suit the situation better, than returning to the beginner area that she had spawned to practice her magics. Rather, it reminded her how foolish she had been to skip through the tutorial sequence without learning more about the functions of the world. Considering that she was a less than adept gamer previously, she cursed herself for such hubris. Having purchased a set of talismans for quite a sum of gp, Eleanor summoned them from her inventory. Not long after she held them, with hands emanating with the reminiscent purple radiance of the arcane, the set of three red charms began to levitate about her. One on each flank, whilst one hung directly in front of her. With uncertainty on what precisely to test first, she reached forward for the charm that lingered ahead of her. As her fingers moved through the air, it was as though they met some sort of contact with a surface not physical. It was similar to feeling some magnetic resistance between her palm and the charm. While this was not the most intense of sequences, the unknown intrigued her, setting her heart to rattling. As the rate of her pacemaker increased, it seemed the charms began to dance along with it, following the rhythm of her pounding cardiac organ. In a slow, uneasy movement, she brought her hand back, closer to herself. Following her movements, the charm she had reached out towards followed, as if magnetically fastened to her hand. Perhaps as she had reached for it, it had tethered itself to her. She wondered... Yet wondering did nothing in comparison to blatant experimentation. With due haste, she placed her arm in front of herself, returning back into the sequence she often did with her casting. As she mentally pulled back the rubber band of her arcane power, the tension and energy began to grow taught and strained, before she released. Her mind blanked for a moment, having released the arcane bolt mere instants before it's expiration. Not yet on the verge of panting, she felt the fatiguing effects of her magic, taking mental note of this commonly occurring adverse effect. It was a moment later that she observed the actual effects of the spell, and what damage it had done. Peering forward, she watched, as a tree wobbled on it's axis. Eyes widening, she had not expected the talisman to be so effective! Perhaps she had grown in potency, or maybe she the expensive weapon was aiding her more than she knew, but it appeared as though her spell had been able to knock a decently sized hole through the side of a moderately sized tree. With much caution, she was unsure of what to do. Curses! For all of the factors that she had taken into account, she had not remembered to consider what exactly she was aiming at! Someone, somewhere, could have gotten hurt! She was wielding quite the dangerous weapon, she now knew, after all! She considered walking away from the forest, and at a rather fast pace as well, pretending that she had never been there in the first place. Nevertheless, the tree's teetering came to a conclusive end, as it bent towards one side, and began to fall. Unfortunately for Eleanor, it seemed to be falling directly towards her. In a panicked motion, she attempted to reach back to one of the charms at her flanks to fire another shot at the tree, as it quickly plummeted towards her defenseless figure. This shot, much less focused and charged than the last, lingered for a moment in the air, before the paper lost momentum, fluttering back towards her. As she winced, she attempted to move out of the way, though it was much too late. And just as she felt the bottom of the collapsing tree brush the top of her hair, Eleanor was free... She had not perished in some silly accident. Glancing around at her surroundings, she didn't easily recognize where she was. Of course, an instant later, she heard it. The loud, earth-shattering quake of the giant tree, collapsing onto the ground about thirty feet away from herself. Turning to notice the distance, it seemed that she had not only managed to fell the mass, but also had somehow teleported to escape the consequences! Hurrah! It had been a triumph. Though, birds from the trees fluttered about, feeding the scene that she had created. As she approached the fallen tree, she stared down at it, then up and around, wondering and hoping that no one had heard the incredibly loud racked she had created. "Hello?" She whimpered into the quiet forest, wondering if a response would return to her. Rubbing the back of her neck, she fearfully grimaced, chuckling weakly to herself. An incredibly triumphant mess, her attempt had been. Hopefully, she had not given any new players spawning in a heart attack.
Several hundred meters away from where @Eleanor Loan was, Aden found himself back in another forest in such a short amount of time. Lately, he discovered areas outside the major cities and towns to be much more rewarding in terms of progressing his knowledge of this world's terrain, and the flora and fauna inhabiting it. Not only does the forest serve as an escape from the hustle and bustle of town life, but it also serves as an avenue to increase his proficiency with the bow. The fundamentals need to be mastered if he had any hope of getting better. Right now, he was carefully tracking a wild boar that he'd been stalking for quite some time. now. Since he was still fairly new to the game, he had not quite been able to place enough points on his Rogue mastery yet, making it difficult to follow the boar undetected. He needed to be more cautious each time he managed to spook the beast away either by overestimating how much of his movement could be detected by the boar, or sheer recklessness like stepping on a twig. As a result, what should have been a 15 minute hunting exercise had escalated to an hour of playing cut and mouse with the boar, weaving through dense foliage and shrubbery. By sheer luck, he had managed to again get close enough to the boar and take a shot by hiding behind a patch of bushes, away from the observant eyes of the boar who, up until now, was still in full alert of its surroundings. Nocking an arrow on his bow, he proceeded to aim it at the boar's neck, to take it down quickly with a fatal wound. He wasn't sure if his arrows now had the piercing power to penetrate the boar's skull so it was better to aim for a vital spot unprotected by a thick layer of bone. This would still enable his arrows to cause lethal damage while making sure his shot still connects. But moments before he let loose the arrow, a loud crashing sound spooked the boar, prompting it to scamper away like a bat from hell. This was now the second time a prize was denied from him by a mysterious sound, much to his chagrin. He would not let this incident slide without investigating the source of the sound and potentially what had caused it. Trudging to the source of the sound, Aden discovered a fallen tree with a gaping hole in its trunk. That would explain what had caused the crash. In front of it was... a rather familiar blue haired girl dressed in detective garbs looking a bit jittery. Based on her reaction, Aden had reason to believe that she's the one responsible for this mess but he couldn't get himself to get angry at her for some reason. If one were to analyze the situation a bit more, it would seem that she came here for the same reasons he did. Training. And from the looks of it, she had good reason to as practicing such a devastating attack near a populated area would be irresponsible and not to mention, dangerous. "I was out hunting when I heard a loud crash. Are you alright, though? You looked a bit more shaken than I am." Aden told Eleanor as he put away his bow and approached her. Upon closer inspection, one could really judge how much power she released to fell the true and he was glad that it wasn't directed at his direction. Otherwise, he may have lost more than a boar if that attack had managed to hit him. "Geezus though, you really are quite strong. I'm impressed. But may I suggest going to another forest the next time you practice? Since this is the beginners start off when they first sign in to the game, it'd be catastrophic if you managed to hit one as they log in. A death affliction this early on in their game would be a heavy blow." the red haired archer reprimanded Eleanor in a calm and gentle voice. "Just be careful, okay? Someone might seriously get a heart attack with surprises like these."
The shaken woman gave a final glance towards the fallen tree, mere moments before the arrival of @Aden. Staring down at what she had caused, she gave a small shift of her sight towards her hands. In this world, she did seem to be much more... Substantial. After all, she had been playing for quite a while. The initial, earth shattering quake still resounded in her heart and ears, as it had rattled her to her very core. "Oh!" Eleanor came off as somewhat surprised by the arrival of @Aden. She had expected her commonly sharp senses to have warned her about the incoming archer sooner, though his voice had been a well enough sign of his arrival. "I'm quite alright." She dismissed his concern, closing her eyes and shaking her head. She smiled, as a nervous laugh escaping her throat. "Apologies..." She bowed her head in shame. As he spoke in regards to her power, and the unknown arrival of other players, Eleanor mentally began to placed these concerns higher upon her list of priorities. While she had not considered them so thoroughly before, now that she had a much better grasp on the scale of her potency, she realized that extreme caution and heed would be required when training. "This was..." She glanced down towards her ruin. In the weeks that followed, the fallen wood would certainly become a carcass of what it once was. "An accident." "Yeah, death afflictions are... Quite a thing, huh?" Eleanor gave a weak chuckle, rubbing the back of her neck, eyes still glued to the tree. Her facial expression, though one of a shy smile, faded briefly, a shimmer of something interrupting her conscious. The sound of the fallen tree reverberated into her ears, vibrations wracking her mind. The plastered image of the gaping maw of the prince of fire, as Eleanor plummeted into it, glued itself to the corners of her mind, reaching out with claws to strike at her conscious. The echoing memories of her own previous death. Realizing this shift, she flinched back to reality a mere moment later, quickly turning her face to look back up towards her company, weakly smiling in an attempt to hide her unusual antics. She did not remember his face from the conflict with Azog, though she had not spent as much time battling the giant being than many of the others. There was quite a substantial gathered group there, so it ultimately became very difficult to recall a specific face from the crowd. If he had been there, he would have been able to recall Eleanor's final plummet into the great fiery beast's maw, though Eleanor felt as though there was an air of freshness about him. Perhaps he was a newer player. "Very sorry, again." The detective, lowering herself into a deep bow, further exaggerated the extent of her shame, with her hands placed upon the top of her thighs. Leaning back up she rested a hand on her hip, wincing as she stared down towards the fallen tree. "Were you hunting perhaps? Whatever you were doing previously, I will assist however I can. I apologize for interrupting. I must have caused quite the disturbance..."
Aden sighed in relief when Eleanor confirmed that she was alright. The danger of handling such powerful magics isn't limited to the target or anyone on the caster's immediate surroundings, but the caster itself. A simple mistake in the incantation could have cost Eleanor an arm, or even her life. Even if the players were given the benefit of resurrection, he could attest that almost none of them would be keen on dying, even in virtual reality. Sure masochist could get a kick of experiencing pain without bringing actual physical harm to their real life bodies but dying altogether cause enough pain to bring anyone who would experience it in a state of shock. Fortunately, the console itself should automatically shut down and eject the user when that happens. @Eleanor Loan then explained that it was an accident of sorts. If he had to guess, she fired off her spell but did not anticipate how powerful it was nor how destructive it could be. Noticing that she seemed quite depressed by what could only be fittingly described as an accident, he decided to pat her in the shoulder and flash her a gentle smile in order to convey that it was alright. "Well then, you said it yourself. This is an accident so don't sweat it. Can't be helped and it already happened. Just be careful next time, okay?" Aden told her in a calm, reassuring voice while beaming at her. For a brief moment, Aden could see Eleanor's expression shift from a bashful smile to that of deep lamentation while her eyes were still affixed to the true. Perhaps he managed to screw up and remind her of a particularly troubling memory? Could it have something to do with Death Afflictions? He didn't want to dwell on it but the arcane archer couldn't help but think that she was all too familiar with the penalty one receives in this game upon drying and coming back to life. If that was true, then there's a chance that she was thinking about how she died or what had killed her in the first place? Then again, he knew little to nothing about the blue detective so perhaps she was contemplating on an entirely different matter. For all he knew, she was just deeply regretful for felling the tree by accident when she failed to comprehend the power of her spell? Or it was a real life issue that Aden had no place to be part of. Whatever the case, he would let her ruminations go undisturbed even though it created minutes of awkward silence between them. It did give the red haired marksman ample time to observe and appreciate the beauty of his surroundings. Glancing at the verdant green trees and the lush vegetation all around him, as well as the wild life that can be found either in the real world or in the realm of fantasy and imagination, one could only wonder how the creators of this virtual reality managed to make such a highly detailed and startlingly believable world. Unlike with other VRMMO's he could hardly remember that this world is part of a game. All of it, not just the physical world itself, but its inhabitants as well as your experiences grant a feeling of belongingness to this world unmatched by other VRMMO's where you are constantly reminded that you are in a game rather than living another person's (your character) life in another world. Removing classes and levels may have also contributed to achieving this feat since not only does it take away from the fact that you are in a game but it gives you the freedom to be anything you want through mixing and matching specific masteries. Finally, he noticed that Eleanor had snapped out of her thoughts when she asked him whether he was out hunting. Even though he wished to keep the fact that her "accident" cost him the boar he was hunting since she'd probably feel even worse for the blunder she'd caused, it would be even more cruel to deny the truth from her, specially now that it was obvious she was eager to make it up to him. With a heavy sigh, Aden decided to lay bare the truth to Magical Detective. "Actually, I was stalking a wild boar a while ago. Took a couple hours of trial and error since my Rogue mastery isn't that high yet but I managed to sneak up to it and was about to fire a shot when the blast from your spell spooked it off. It's not that big of a deal though! I can find other game to hunt. You can come join me if you really want to help. Two hunters are better than one after all, don't you think?"
Ah, so a hunter, he was! Eleanor listened to him as he spoke, bringing her hands in front of her stomach, twiddling her fingers together idly. Not having pockets was really starting to weigh on her harder than she had thought. She was most definitely going to need to find a new coat sometime soon. Such garments were a necessity! It all seemed to make the uncomfortable, awkward speaker more... Uncomfortable and awkward. "Oh, boars. I've seen a few around!" She nodded hopefully, a semi-confident smirk leaking across her cheeks. "Let's see about boars, then." Raising a hand up she hung her palm just lateral to her cheek. With her index and middle finger resting upon her temple, a indigo hue emanated from her eyes, as she began to scan through her surroundings. Having spent quite a bit of time doing some alchemist research in these parts, most of the names of the vegetation within her proximity became apparent. Small, translucent, label like name tags floated above each of them. Dismissing this information, an unnoticeable smirk came to her face. She had a sense of pride in her collection and assortment of knowledge and information that her character had amassed. Whilst the information was rarely of dire necessity, she enjoyed being able to spout the name and function of an herb, if a situation called for such action. Turning around, her eyes flickered across the ground, as she scanned for some sort of tracks. Boars, as she had observed them previously, left a particular appearing print in the ground with their hoof type feet. This print, like a signature, was precisely what her eyes scoured the dirt for. At first, no results were too striking, as most of the ground was covered. Between the shroud of leaves, or beneath dense bushes or ferns, much of the ground below was disguised and hidden. Staying at her efforts for a few moments longer though, Eleanor came upon a result. "Here we are..." She quietly whispered to herself. Walking towards the hoof imprint she had found upon the ground, the detective tread carefully through the forest, intent on not disturbing the ecosystem any more than she already had. Squatting down, she moved some leaves out of the way, finding a few more of the tracks. The Hunting mastery had turned out to be quite the useful tool, after all! Not just for pursuing criminals within the confines of a city, but for tracking beasts, just as its original purpose had been! "These are some tracks we can follow here." Taking her hand down from her temple, she exited investigation mode for just a moment. Motioning her index and middle finger downwards, she placed them in the tiny indentation within the ground, turning her head to look up at the archer. "If you ever discover tracks like these, just follow them, and you should find boars." She added, before turning her head back towards the ground, and standing. Her fingers rose back up to her temple, glow renewed. Trudging onward with her her small shoes, rather unfit for off road travels, she parted branches that stood in their way with her free hand, remaining within investigation mode to pursue the lead. It would not be long until they came upon that which had created the tracks.
