May Event Log A: The Song of Suffering.

[usirmods]

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🜙 Mod Note
	The Song of Suffering's resolution is jointly dependent on the choices all our players make (Who will take charge of the city?) and on the resolution of the Return to Einjar excursion. After you have read through this post please respond to This Poll as soon as you feel comfortable making the choices in it. Please respond even if your character is not participating in this event as the choice made effects the game world/all players.
🜙 First Blood April 26th
	In the late afternoon a challenge is made over the courier by Captain Lykos challenging the 'King' to come and properly fight him for control of the Defenders the way the old orc custom the Defenders were built on demands. In the message, he calls Koroc a coward and a thief, unfit for his role in the Defenders and unprepared to handle the even larger role he has claimed for himself. He accuses Koroc of not even trying to manage the werewolf curse he and Lykos share and says he may be to blame for Koroc's affliction, but Koroc's reckless endangerment of the city is to blame for the rise in werewolf attacks on the city. Lykos sets the battleground as King Ardis' camp outside of the city, a neutral ground away from the citizens who could get hurt in the crossfire. An enraged, Koroc takes a large group of his Defenders' newest forces out of the city to lead an attack on the former Captain and the invading King Ardis supporting him only to find the camp deserted of anyone but Lykos. The discussion between Lykos and Koroc appears publically on the couriers within the city, and everyone with a courier is treated to the impromptu visual of their meeting and the fight that follows it. Lykos gets Koroc to admit to working with the cult and imprisoning and using werewolves to attack the city, as well as implicating both himself and Koroc as werewolves as well before the feed ends, and the abrupt ending leaves the fate of the former captain uncertain.
Lykos Alice Lorna Ardis Koroc Cult Leader
🜙 Children of the Revolution April 26th-May ??
	With clear evidence now out that Koroc and the Defenders are not only working with some form of undead in their ranks, but also that both Koroc and Lykos are werewolves, Koroc's allies, Lorna's rebels, the strange travelers, and King Ardis's soldiers are all spurred into action, bringing the fight for the City of the Free People to a final confrontation for power. The city splits, rallying behind different sides in the battle. The battle encompasses the city streets and spills out into the surrounding land to the South and West of the city. The Defenders, their numbers padded with risen soldiers, hold the city. From within the rebels and the strange travelers fight the Defenders to force them out fo the city streets. Alice, Amy, and a small force of armed civilians and former revels focus on getting people out of the battle zones, teleporting people out where possible and defending them in an escape route out of the city with larger groups, while outside the city King Ardis and his knights storm the warcamp and put pressure on the Defenders, helping to clear a path out of the city. As the fighting overtakes the city another terrible set of howls sounds from the West beyond the city, and a pair of creatures join the fray. The white one assaults the city with unbridled destructive rage while the red one seems fixated on the people, hunting like a starved beast without pausing to feast on its downed prey. The beasts are unaffected by silver, wolfsbane, and other standard werewolf weaknesses and stand at around eleven feet tall, nearly twelve when straight-backed. They are closer to the size of a small swamp troll than an ordinary werewolf, their eyes glowing blue. The protrusions coming off of them are hardened bone and sharp enough to cause damage equivalent to spearheads or daggers if used to attack. Bites/Scratches from these creatures do not inflict any curses. They do not seem to fear anything but also appear to be mindlessly enraged. At different times during the onslaught from the mutated wolves a large white wolf appears, drawing the monsters away from fleeing citizens and members of all sides of the struggle, outrunning and distracting the creatures.
🜙 The Song of Suffering April 28th-May ??
	Two days later an unsettling prophetic orc threat from the not so distant past begins to ring true. The river that flows from the Northern mountains down through the City of the Free People begins to sing with ringing, echoing hums and runs red with a dark, thick liquid that looks like blood and smells like copper and rust. The touch of sound or liquid begins sending citizens into fits of raw, violent, amplified emotions. The fight for the city devolves into one of almost directionless, desperate violence and begins to lose what little point or meaning it had, spurred on by a madness that latches on to everyone within earshot or touch of the river and its endless ringing song. People quickly begin to change in more than just mood. Paranoia, Fury, or Desperation overtake them, causing mental and physical changes that reflect the emotion. More than one reflection can overtake people and while the infected waters remain so do the symptoms. Reflection Cause & Symptoms ⤛ Paranoia Caused by exposure to the ringing song of suffering. The sound of the ringing roots out and pulls to the surface every negative, lingering, violent, uncertain, or angry thought the person has had toward or about others and amplifies it, transforming emotions over a simple comment or fleeting thought into defined certainty and righteous fury. Twisting even the clear-minded or pacifistic until they are willing to kill others to protect themselves or those they are defending. While under Paranoia's influence they are beset by an unquenchable thirst and hunger, but no other physical symptoms. The only way to 'cure' someone affected is to disable their hearing or relocate them far enough from the river that the ringing can no longer be heard. ⤛ Fury Caused by any physical exposure to the water itself. Contact with the liquid causes a surge of wild, furious power that infects those it overtakes with a fury that is not their own. This fury is undirected and will cause the affected to lash out at anything near them, living or non-living. Once a target has been found they will not stop until that target is dead or completely destroyed. While under Fury's influence their skin begins to harden and grey starting at the hands and their strength, physically and magically, doubles. Fury can only be cleansed by fresh water or light magic. ⤛ Desperation Caused by ingesting the water or prolonged exposure to the water. If submerged, the person will find their vision quickly adjusting to the water and if they open their eyes they will feel as if something is looking back at them from the depths, reaching out to them. Once they emerge from the water or cease drinking the water they will either see or feel the thick coating of red liquid that does not drip or move, clinging heavily to their skin or muscles. The liquid seeps into their skin or muscles and their eyes turn bloodshot and then solid red. While under Desperation's influence their eyes remain solid red and their movements become sluggish with erratic bursts of speed and wild strength. Until they are doused with fresh water or light magic they will be consumed by desperation and singularly focused on their last goal or thought as if letting go of it would kill them. Without direction or a goal to latch onto the desperation becomes a consuming need to stop the noise and fighting around them through any means possible. 🜙 Top ⤛ Navigation

Comments

Courier Visual, Anonymous User.

[usirmods]

Koroc's intimidation force of the Defenders surrounds the pair in a semi-circle behind Koroc in silence, unmoving. The smaller elf captain stands before Koroc with a sword against his back and Koroc draws his broadsword, aiming it threateningly at Lykos with a twisted grin on his scarred face.

The orc king openly boasts that he will crush Lykos easily this time and Lykos responds by offering to teach Koroc to control and manage his curse if he agrees to release the other werewolves he has created and imprisoned into Lykos' custody so he can help them, and to step away from the city and return only when he is not a threat to himself and others. The offer makes the orc laugh, asking why Lykos bothered to come back at all if all he wanted to do was throw his life away, and informs him that even if his friends are waiting nearby they won't be quick enough to save him, avoiding directly acknowledging any of Lykos' comments.

When Lykos confronts Koroc about the Long Night, keeping Lykos captive, and how long he and Dervish had been planning their coup of the Defenders he gets no answers, but he continues by asking who Koroc's new allies are and what they want with the city. Disinterested in Lykos' attempts to get Koroc to implicate himself by agreeing or responding to any of his accusations and questions, Koroc asks if Lykos intends to talk him to death, and comments that Lykos never used to be so chatty before launching a brute force attack on the elf with his broadsword.

Koroc stutters in his onslaught when Lykos asks if the cult has promised to remove the curse and the misstep allows Lykos to draw his sword in time to parry Koroc's attack. The orc's face contorts into a snarl and his eyes flash red. He slams his sword down onto Lykos' again and again, forcing the elf back and Lykos makes no move to dodge, only parrying the attacks and allowing himself to be continuously pushed closer to the waiting swords of the silent Defender spectators. As Koroc raises his sword to bring it down on Lykos again the former captain drops, rolling to get behind Koroc. The orc's broadsword cleaves right through one of the waiting Defenders' arms, severing it.

Lykos watches the Defender for any reaction but the now one-armed soldier just stands there without making a noise, no blood flowing from what should have been a devastating injury.

"So you are working with them." Lykos answers for Koroc, readying for another strike from the enraged orc. Koroc launches a furious attack on Lykos and the two fight blade to blade with Lykos visibly holding the upper hand. Koroc's attacks are brutal but uncontrolled as he repeatedly tries to knock Lykos down, the elf managing to dodge or parry almost all of his attacks but losing ground as a wall of Defenders closes in, circling the area the two are fighting in.

Lykos manages to knock Koroc's sword out of his hands, his own sword lodging in the orc's shoulder with a snarl from Koroc, who shouts something in Orc-tongue. Lykos jumps back, trying to get clear of the orc, and stumbles a step when an arrow strikes him in the shoulder of his sword arm. Koroc laughs, rubbing a handful of dirt over his own wound and picking up his sword while Lykos switches his sword into his other arm. He breathlessly asks Koroc what he intends to do with the people he's been biting and imprisoning once the city is his and why he chose to attack the city with an army of the werewolves. Lykos continues to parry but his strength appears to be weakening quickly and Koroc knocks the struggling elf to the ground, his broadsword bearing down on on the former captain's blade while Lykos fights to keep his sword held up enough to prevent the orc from landing a killing blow, his arms shaking under the force.

Koroc spits on Lykos and tells him he talks too much but that that doesn't matter now. Mockingly he tells Lykos his allies will cure him of his problem as soon as he gets the city under control and no longer needs the extra strength Lykos' bite has given him. Confident he has Lykos now with one foot on the captain's upper torso Koroc says he'll put all the dogs down, just like he's going to do with Lykos now, and that the city will thank him for ridding them of the werewolf threat. He claims he will do what Lykos was never smart enough to do and teach these people the true meaning of power, mentioning that only those who are willing to take it and use it should ever have it in the first place.

As Koroc swings his sword downward, intending to finish off the former captain, the feed vanishes, leaving the city uncertain of how the battle ended. Their only clue is a howl of rage that carries on the wind.

courier voice, shortly after this

[redwhaling]

[ locked to Daud, Shura, Ardis ]
Lykos is fine. We got out of there without running into further trouble.

[ It's a short message for the handful actually in on the plan. Do they really need more than that? She doubts it. ]

[ locked to Alice ]
Don't worry, he's still alive.

[ ...just because she's sure she's wondering. ]

fighting the red wolf

[exaomori]

You know what really sucks? Being prepared to fight werewolves but fighting towering wolf monsters who are conveniently not weak to silver or wolfsbane! This is great! Shura loves this so much!!

Swords and arrows don't do a thing to thing guy. A fly buzzing around was probably just as effective as any of weapons around here. So, however reluctantly, Shura forced to pull out the big guns the pistol Alice had given her. Has Shura practice with this? No, not really, but she's just confident enough to load the thing and shoot it from a close distance. And it works! Partially. That thing definitely is not dead, and now it's super angry and coming right for her!

Well, at least it's focusing on her and not the injured civilians trying to flee the area? But dodging this guy is about all Shura can do, and she's been at this fight for a while by now. She knows perfectly well that she won't be able to get another shot in like this, and she's being forced back. Great! This isn't how she wanted to die for the third time! She just had to hope someone else would come in quick to back her up.

[forswore]

The red wolf's rampage was difficult to miss, but what Daud had seen of it through Mercy's eyes had been enough to guess they weren't dealing with an ordinary beast here, necessitating the detour to an apothecary's shop for enough sedative to fell a goliath. Killing it was the obvious, unspoken option, but he didn't think he needed to justify to Billie why it was worth waiting to resort to that. You could only learn so much from dead things. Assuming there was a sentient human mind in there, somewhere, there was possibly more to learn there about it origins.

Their swift transversals across the rooftops bring them closer to the area where Mercy last spotted the red wolf -- not that it would have been hard to miss, in any case, as the sound of the shot and the answering snarl of rage that follows echoes off walls. An unexpected complication is the familiar figure fending off its attacks, something that draws Daud up short when they come to the edge of a rooftop.

Shura's evidently overwhelmed, but Daud can already tell at a glance, the creature's too enraged. Whether it would even be slowed down by a knife through its throat is debatable.

"I need you to draw it out where it's in clear view of the rooftops," Daud tells Billie, voice clipped as he passes Billie his own pouch of pilfered sedative. If she feels like telling him she doesn't take his orders anymore, too bad, he's still acting like he fully expects her to comply. "When it stops moving, I need you to get as much of the sedative in it as you can."

[redwhaling]

No justifications needed and not arguments granted. There are times to pick a fight over orders. This isn't one of them.

It's easy enough to fall back into that same routine from over a hundred years ago, now, racing across the city without a word needed between them for her to know which way they're going, what the target is. The only thing missing is that they're alone now, no one else scattered across the area to watch from all sides. Later, she may dwell on missing that — them, the rest of the gang, even the ones she never got along with — but not while monsters are tearing the shit up out of this place.

Daud's request once they hit the last rooftop, the one he's staying back on, doesn't make sense to her, but there isn't a whole lot of time to question him. So, she takes the extra pouch and only looks at him curiously, if the cant of her head is telling where her masked face is not, before simply saying, "Sure thing, boss."

Even if he really isn't her boss anymore. Old habits and all, but she's already gone as soon as she's said it, transversing down to street level first and then again, immediately into Shura's path. Sedatives stowed for now, she holds an arm out towards the other woman.

"Here!"

An offer to get her the hell out of the way... kind of. Should Shura accept, she does teleport them both out of the way! Only not far out of the way. They'll still be within the red wolf's sight, if off to the side and out of immediate striking distance in hope that the wolf will turn and follow.

That's right, the plan was only kind of to save Shura, but mostly? To use her as bait.

[exaomori]

Shura sure does appreciate Billie avoiding the nostalgia or the bickering route, because she sure is in trouble! She hops out of the way of one clawed hand, but she's too slow to dodge the claws of the wolf's other hand, and that mistake leaves her with some nasty looking gashes on her arm. When Billie appears out of nowhere and holds out her arm, Shura thinks that she might be hallucinating. But it's a hallucination Shura has to trust, and she'll take Billie's arm.

That teleportation trick sure is neat, and it throws the wolf off for a moment. Where did his prey go?? Uncool, prey should't just disappear!! But that confusion only lasts for a few seconds. As soon as he spots Shura again, he'll follow after her. For her part, Shura's relief at getting out of the way also only lasts for a few seconds, as she realizes that this isn't far enough away to regroup and get another shot ready.

"Are you using me a bait?!" There isn't much time to actually fuss since the red wolf is lunging at her again.

[forswore]

The plan probably doesn't make sense to Billie because it doesn't make much sense to Daud, either. It's a far cry from the meticulous jobs he once ran as the Knife of Thalassa, every contract's movements planned down to the detail ... but they're a hundred years from here and that blood-soaked battlefield, in another life Daud's left behind. Here, with so little, he claws for every small advantage he's offered.

The wolf lunges for Shura and Billie, swift and merciless and far faster than its bulk should allow, but swift reflexes keep them from getting a chunk torn out of them, while Billie leads it out to the open. Maddened by the repeated attempts to frustrate his attacks, the beast hurls itself forward one more time -- and balks, suddenly, coming to a stop with one limb raised to swipe at them, its head jerking like a marionette puppet's as its gaze is suddenly wrenched towards one of the roofs.

Daud's crouched on the edge, fingers of one hand curled into the crumbling eaves to hold himself steady, the other raised and gloveless, pointing a strange ring directly at the creature. The tiefling doesn't even seem to breathing, and the wolf shudders as though it's having a seizure, frozen in place for a few more beats until it abruptly raises a hand again.

This time, its aim isn't to catch Billie or Shura. Instead, the wolf ... turns its claws on itself. As though controlled by a will independent of the wolf's own, it begins to beat and tear at its own head and chest, something that would be a comical sight if it wasn't beginning to open up lines of gore across its own flesh.

[redwhaling]

Then it's a good thing Billie can improvise, much like how she's coaxed the wolf into range by dragging poor Shura around from one spot on the street to the next. It isn't until the wolf begins to shudder and fight with itself, its pursuit coming to an abrupt and utterly disturbing stop, that she, too, will stop. She won't glance back towards where Daud is, even if she is wondering just what the hell he's up to, how he's even doing that.

It's only then — looking up at the mess the beast is making of itself with its claws — that she offers Shura any kind of apology and, well, seeing how this is Billie, that comes in the form of a very insincere, "Sorry, you just seemed like the tastiest morsel at the time."

But she does let go of Shura at that point to crouch down to the ground for a moment, distracted for a few seconds by pulling a coil of rope and the pouches of laudanum out of her coat. While she does that, she adds, "How's your arm? If you're really hurt, you should keep running."

[kingsroads]

i bless the rains down in city of the free peoples
Everything has gone to shit, people are turning violent, they're hurting each other, he knew he shouldn't have come back here, this is a mistake, he should just go right back to Didymos!

But people are hurt and Strange knows how to cure this. Fresh water helped cleanse that girl who fell in the water when they were in Einjar, it should help cleanse these people now. So despite every fiber of his being telling him otherwise, here he is, trying to help out people and possibly get hurt in the process. Unfortunately, he can't do anything about the river, but he can do something about all the others.

And Jonathan Strange, being Jonathan Strange, is going to try and help cure people in a big show-offy sort of way because he can't do anything subtle to save his life. So, he's standing near one of the busier parts of the town just making it rain. There's a small rainstorm covering about half a city block and Strange is just constantly murmuring under his breath, hands out in front of him, in order to keep the spell going, having the fresh water of the rain wash that blood red water off of anyone entering the area. Unfortunately, he also looks like he's about to pass out: manipulating the weather like this is harder than expected.

Little help, guys?

wolf fight. closed to Rey, potential for violence & character death
Strange has unfortunately locked himself into a stalemate with this wolf. He went into this thinking it was a werewolf! It looked like a werewolf! But the silver didn't do a thing except make the wolf charge at Strange, catching his arm and slicing it open with one of those bone-like protrusions.

What started off as him trying to capture the wolf has turned into a cycle of sorts: Strange bringing forth rocks and earth to try and pin it down, the wolf using it's massive strength to toss off the rocks and earth, Bell nipping at it's heels and trying to disable the wolf that way, Strange bringing forth more rocks and earth, etc. It's a stalemate for the moment but Strange knows his magic can't last forever.

"I could use assistance!" he calls out, trying desperately to hide his terror as the cycle continues. That ringing sound seems to grow louder in Strange's mind as his hesitation slowly shifts to paranoia. Maybe he should kill this thing instead. It would be better, wouldn't it? After all, this thing wants to kill him, he should just kill it first.

[reyquest]

If Rey had known the state the city was in before she showed up she might have kept right on going. With three dragonets in tow and no backup being suddenly thrust into a war had caught her off guard. But she hadn't kept going, she was here in the city and being here had meant helping the people she could and scavenging up a new weapon. The sword she has now is too heavy and the weight of it isn't right for her but it's better than nothing.

The ringing has faded in her observation, pushed to the back of her mind, and in its place are rising conflicted emotions of anger and paranoid concern. Maybe Poe and Kylo never actually intended to come back. Maybe they had seen the dragonets as a threat or a burden just like her and had decided to ditch her here. Why would they stick around? Everyone else abandoned her, including her family, so what would make them any different?

The rising concern keeps brushing up uncomfortably against the certainty that people are giving her weird looks as she tries to help them because they know. Of course they know. They know she's a dhampir. They know she's hiding three baby dragons from the world. If they weren't busy running for their lives from monsters and soldiers they would be locking her up and taking the dragons, to kill them or turn them into some kind of tools for power.

When she hears Strange shout she whirls, her grip tight on the two-handed hilt of her sword, but he's not coming for her, he's struggling with one of those towering beasts that have been killing people and ripping the city apart. It gives her a moment to stop thinking as she leaps into action. She's glad she left Thorn behind with the dragonets. There's nothing her tiny lizard friend could do to help in this situation.

She grits her teeth and sprints for Strange, avoiding the hare. It's obvious she's more accustomed to a blunt weapon with the first hit she makes on the creature. The sword momentarily lodges in the side of one of its arms and she is thrown off balance trying to pull it free again, but she jumps back, holding it at the ready off to the creature's side and away from Strange. Her hair and her eyes are wild but she isn't scared.

"What's the plan here?" She calls back, the wolf's attention now on her. She has to swing again to force its claws back, dodging out of the way of a vicious swipe.

[kingsroads]

As he hears Rey's voice, Strange looks up. He's bleeding from his arm and is dusty and dirty all over but looks momentarily happy to see her. He gestures back to the wolf and the rocks and earth start to creep up again, as Strange attempts to hopefully bury it, definitely slow it down. It'll still take a fair amount of time, though.

"The plan is to deal with this thing!" Strange calls out, as he continues to try and bury the wolf. It'll attack him, it wants to kill him, he needs to kill this thing before he dies himself, the magically induced paranoia and tenseness of the situation overrides the rational part of Strange's brain.

"Either kill it or distract it so I can bury it myself!" The hare continues to dart forward and charge at the wolf, biting at it's heels in a manner that's downright bloodthirsty.

[reyquest]

Rey makes small slash after small slash into the creature's thick skin, making very little progress as Strange continues to try and bury the thing. She stumbles backwards on a rough dodge, narrowly missing claws slashing toward her gut, and springs back to her feet, jumping up onto the wolf's back the moment Strange has one of its claws pinned.

She slams the blade down, point first into its shoulder, angled toward its neck. There can't be a person under this monster. She refuses to believe this could be anything like the other werewolves. It's some forgotten monster that has been unleashed on them to hunt them down like a ferret after rabbits in a warren.

She shudders at the awful screeching howl that the injury rips from the wolf beast, but it doesn't stop it from moving and even as she tries to hoist her weight down into the blade it sinks too slow, much too slow, and its other arm comes at her again and again, trying to rip her from its back.

Strange's blood, the beast's blood, and her own are all in the air around her, and her mind races down dangerous threads, goading her into fighting back teeth for teeth. So much power must be in this thing's blood but it smells awful, makes her stomach roll even while her mouth waters. Fire flares up around her hands like an aura and she screams right back at the howling thing, tapping into survival instincts fueled by the racing dhampir blood in her veins. She lets go of the blade, sticking out of the creature, lodged in muscle and skin independently of her efforts, in favor of grabbing the beast's face with her hands. Her fingers search for its eyes and the smell of burning fur sizzles into the air around them.

[kingsroads]

That paranoia continues to leech into his mind. As fire wraps around Rey's hands and she goes for the face, he's momentarily taken back. She's not human, she can't be, acting like that, she's got to be as feral as the wolves. No sane person would grab the beast by the head.

But she is. And the moment Rey grabs the werewolf by the head, Strange realizes that shit, if that thing manages to pick her off it's back, she's dead. Thankfully, a flaming dhampir near it's face is a good distraction: the creature isn't paying much attention to Strange. So, he ups the ante, practically uprooting the street with magic as more earth rises up in a column, trying to envelop the werewolf's arms.

Unfortunately, exhaustion is hitting Strange at the same time. He can do this for maybe a minute more before passing out? It isn't good. So, voice strained, he yells in Rey's direction,

"If you're going to keep doing that, then hurry it up!"

gruesome descriptions and monster death ahoy

[reyquest]

A voice drags her from her animalistic fight for survival. Rey digs in with her fingers and the beast screeches right next to her ear, that painful ringing building on top of the ringing 'song' of the river. She sees teeth snap dangerously close to her face and feels blood running down her back, and the combination clicks something in her. Its skin is thick and difficult to break, but that mouth leads down into sensitive muscles that can't possibly be as hard to cut through.

Earth captures the arm trying to rip her off the creature, and she wrenches her sword free before the earth can trap it and lock it out of her grasp. A flicker of a thought insists Strange did that intentionally. He didn't want her to have her weapon, but she can't focus on that thought. Her eyes are glowing white now, and she sets aside thoughts for actions the next time the blind wolf goes to snap its mouth shut on her.

She slams the sword pointy end first into the oncoming mouth and the wolf keeps going, trying to the last to grab her. Its determination becomes its undoing as the two opposing forces meet, forcing the sword deeper and deeper into its throat. Blood comes up out of its mouth and over her hands, both on the hilt of the sword. Rey doesn't stop there, the panic and the violent desire to force more blood out of it combining until her hand and part of her arm are inside the creature's mouth, pushing the blade until it won't go any further.

When she comes stumbling off the buried, gurgling monstrosity her arm and sword are both a bright, unsettling red and Rey's breathing and white eyes are wild and frenzied.

[aceso]

{ children of the revolution }
Not this again. It seems every time Christine is hoping for peace and quiet, what she gets instead is an all out battle. Though she's been supporting King Ardis these last few weeks by tending to his soldiers and the farmers outside the city at his request, she really doesn't see him being the leader the city needs. Perhaps he's tired of co-ruling Didymos with his sister, perhaps he really does have the city's best interests at heart, but Christine believes Lykos knows what this city needs in the end, whether it's himself in charge or not.

And so Christine can be found first in the back line of Ardis' forces, healing them when she can, using defensive spells to protect when she sees an opportunity. Later she veers more towards where the rebels are fighting within the city as well. All the while, her actions are shown to mainly be defensive. Ice walls to block enemies from winded rebels, gusts of wind to push the Defenders back, and always as much healing as she can spare before she's sapped of strength and has to fall back to rest. When the two great wolves arrive, she sends Azoth flying above while she hides in an alley so she can look through Azoth's eyes and get a better look at the wolves. They're different, certainly, but they must have weaknesses too.

And what she learns is strange. Azoth follows the white wolf, and this one is ripping up the streets themselves, hardly attacking people unless they stand in its way. It runs full on into building walls, shaking its head before moving back to rip up the streets. Christine can't tell why it's doing this, or if running into buildings is something it's meaning to do. If it's a cursed creature, perhaps there's a person inside trying to knock themselves out? It's hard to say, but once there's an opening, she calls Azoth back to her and runs from the alley, reaching for the nearest person.

"Are you seeing what that white wolf is doing?"

[redwhaling]

i. song of suffering, open [cw: blood, death, and violence]

Between the clashing armies and the river running red, the past few days have been getting under Billie's skin. She can feel it, the humming song from the water following her everywhere she goes. It's easier, further away, but there's always a reason to go back again. The first day or two, she observes, for the most part. She intervenes where it seems reasonable but she's no hero.

The longer it goes, though, the longer it goes... The longer it goes on, the less she feels like retreating from near the river. Why would she? Where would she go? There's too much to do, enemies at every corner, and she already knows — a thought that plagues her endlessly, a conversation replaying itself again and again in her head — that Daud's too much of a coward to take advantage of the chaos. Whether that's true or not stopped mattering when she found the first Defender straying from the rest storming through the city. She left him for dead and moved on to the next one, and then the next one after that.

It's in the middle of doing just that, kicking one more dead man off of her sword and to the blood-spattered street, that she can be found. She raises that same weapon immediately, turning as if expecting to continue the fight... but no, whoever finds her isn't a Defender or one of Koroc's risen army. So, she holds, still poised to attack, expression hidden from behind a now-bloodied mask.

"Why are you out here?" Even muffled, her voice sounds sharp, irritated, like she suspects the worst answer. "It's dangerous."

Well, obviously.

ii. a beastly end, closed to Shura [cw: also blood, death, and violence]

And when the song went on long enough, Billie Lurk couldn't help but vanish into it. She never returned to the house, never to the smithy. Courier calls begun going unanswered, ignored. What she did do, though, was leave a trail of carnage behind her. Hoping someone would find it, someone very particular. Whether it was a cry for help or a mockery of their previous life, even she won't be able to recall in the end. What began as a hunt for Koroc's people bled out into an excuse to pick off the worst the city had to offer, from gang members to corrupt clerks to shady dealers who sell poison as medicine. She hadn't been in the City long. That doesn't mean she didn't already have a list, if only in her head, of what the Defenders had left ignored in their rush towards power.

It started out cleaner, the deaths, but the longer it went on, the sloppier the kills, messier, until it's obvious what had been a human putting someone to the sword has become a beast. That's the easy thing to forget about shiftlings, isn't it? It's still a curse. It doesn't lay as heavily as a real were-creature but it isn't all cats and dogs and baby deer, either. Get them mad enough and any will take your hand off and, with Billie, the anger that's built up could only ever boil over into this. A monster, hunting through the night, smaller than a werewolf. Quicker than one, too. Looking for something, something specific, but the hum from the water and the bottomless hunger it stirs is distracting. She can't focus enough to remember what it even was.

It's the latter that's put a stop to her rampage, for now, if only to tear into her latest victim. Some other madman, one who must have touched the river water. The rat — human-sized, human-shaped enough to, perhaps, pass as beastfolk, if one squinted — has to pick around skin hardened like stone. Blood hides easily against black fur, but not on her teeth, not on her claws. That's what Shura will find at the end of this trail, in a dark house already abandoned days ago by people with the sense to leave the very moment the world began to sing.

iii. or wildcard, if you want to hit her up before, uh, all of this mess

[exaomori]

Shura had heard a frantic man rambling about a new monster on the street. He wasn't sure, but he had seen the werewolves, and this monster was just like them! Smaller, different, but the same bloodlust and rage. A coin in his hand, and he told her all about the creature and its bloodlust. He was sick with the same sickness that was infecting the rest of the city, but not so much that he wouldn't take a payment for something as simple as a story. It didn't add up, but Shura was willing to look into anything at this point. Besides, there was something familiar about the creature he described

What Shura finds after following the man's advice isn't the werecreature promised. It's something probably worse and definitely more inconvenient. Billie's second form wasn't something that would easily be forgotten, and though the house is dark, Shura can tell that something here had gone very wrong. Maybe Billie was hiding that she had certain gourmet tastes, maybe she was mad as the others on the streets. Either way, something had to be done.

Her steps are light, soundless as she approaches, grabbing a small trinket left behind on a table and tossing it in Billie's direction, meaning to catch her attention, not to hit or startle her.

"Sorry to interrupt." She doesn't want to draw her sword, not yet.

[redwhaling]

Shura will get her answer as soon as the trinket hits the floor and rolls off to the side, getting Billie's attention immediately. She jerks her head up and away from the dead man, snapping towards where the item landed first, but it's Shura's voice that has her whipping around to hiss at her. There's no thoughtful pause or recognition there like there was the first time, back in the swamp. Instead, just a beast, riled up, bloody teeth bared, and none too happy to be intruded upon.

[exaomori]

Well, crap. This definitely wasn't a good sign.

"I ain't here for a fight, Billie." Shura says her name, though she's not sure if it will help or not. Shiftlings weren't exactly Shura's specialty, and she can't think of any spell or curse that might cause her to become suddenly feral. "Just drop it and come with me, okay?"

Fang remains sealed, and Shura tries to keep her posture neutral. But at this rate, with everything else going to hell and everyone going nuts, she isn't about to drop her guard.

[redwhaling]

Same story as everyone else going wild in the streets, only Billie can't quite warn Shura, not wound up in that same madness and hunger herself. She doesn't seem immediately violent, however, in spite of all appearances. Hearing her name gets a curious reaction. Hackles lower, her head tilts a little to one side like she's listening—

She knows the name. Billie. That's familiar. That's her. Is this someone she knows? It's difficult to tell through the haze the sound has pulled over her, so, discarding what looks to be someone not interested in a fight from her immediate attention, she turns back to the corpse. That's her more immediate problem, the hunger. Relentless, neverending, no matter what she does.

The name may have gotten something, some spark of comprehension, but Shura's request itself goes ignored.

closed to daud [cw: yep, more death and violence]

[redwhaling]

She's dying. It's hazy thought in the back of her mind realizing that, some detached part of her that's sensible enough to realize it, even if she can't do much more than that. The rest of her is just looking for a quiet place to curl up in and hope that everything stops. The noise, the wretched hum from the blood-red river, the pain from her final, desperate fight with a friend.

That had been a friend, hadn't it? Does it even matter anymore? Billie doesn't know and she reckons she doesn't much care as she reaches the end. Bleeding out in a filthy dead-end alley in some shithole neighborhood. If that same fear and paranoia wrapping so tightly around her weren't so keen to keep her in her shiftling form — smaller, faster, safer — she may have had the sense to laugh over that and tell herself it's exactly where she deserves to die...

At the wall of the alley, where it runs itself to an end against another building, is where she gives up, collapsing there in exhaustion, curling up. Not quite dead yet but with how heavily her sides rise and fall, wheezing piteously, it's only a matter of time.

[forswore]

It's inevitable, in some way, that Daud should lose touch with Billie. The tiefling's figured out that wax earplugs seem to do the trick for blocking the worst of the influence, which means he's taken to wading further into the thick of it, thinking little of needing to check in on Billie when he'd already given her the same warning he gave the rest: stay away from the water. Don't listen. There's a comfort in the simplicity of cutting the inhuman ranks of Defenders down, whittling their numbers, though he half-expects to run into Koroc himself in all the madness. Given how swiftly he'd nearly put an end to Lykos, that's not an encounter he's thrilled with.

Eventually, though, he starts noticing something odd. Dead bodies that don't belong to Defenders or rebels, easy to miss if he wasn't using the dark alleys they've fallen in. It's little effort after that to pick up on the trail, to come across the signs of one that put up more of a fight than the others had. Two trails of blood and agony leading in different directions -- only one of them involving fur and distinctly inhuman tracks.

Daud's quiet as he comes into the alley, stepping carefully because he isn't sure what he'll find at the end of it. The cloak the tiefling's wearing has the trick of making him to seem to fade in and out of view as it flares around him, obscuring and revealing his form by turns, but stealth is the last thing on his mind as he approaches the wounded shiftling.

"Lurk."

He says her name, quietly, hand already on the hilt of the blade by his side.

[redwhaling]

She had stayed away from the water, she had tried to ignore the sound, that endless humming from the river, but all it ever needed was one weak spot to latch onto — laughably enough, that same weak spot has finally shown up, every doubt in her head turning the corner into the alley, saying her name.

Billie doesn't give much more of a reaction than moving her head, turning it just enough to stare at him with one beady rat eye, trying to keep track of where he is as he fades in and out of sight with the cloak falling around his form. That she reacted to her name at all may betray some comprehension but how much exactly, it's hard to tell in this state. It could be enough to recognize him, it could be she's only reacting to someone, anyone at all, approaching her, but there's no immediate rush to violence, not yet. If anything, the sheer lack of reaction could be construed as reserving that energy for something else.

[forswore]

Daud assesses Billie’s injuries swiftly and clinically. It’s fatal, he can tell that much — though hard to discern the exact extent of the injury or what caused it. He knows the shiftling can’t manage language in this form, not that he could hear her even if she could.

It doesn’t change what he knows he needs to do. He draws his sword with the soft hiss of metal on leather and steps closer, still poised and alert.

Daud | OTA

[forswore]

Sounds of fighting was what had drawn Daud's attention, in the end, distant and foreboding. A peek through Mercy's eyes, scanning the ground below for trouble as she usually was these days, revealed a world slowly starting to go mad. Mercy starts to dip closer to the river for a better look at the red running through it, but she veers away the moment she starts to hear the ringing. She remembers Einjar.

And so does Daud. He acts swiftly, of course, letting Billie know through the courier what he thinks is happening, telling the leaders of the Free City -- the ones he thought wouldn't run it into the ground, anyway -- a warning as well. After that, it was on to helping Alice and the rebels shuffle people away from the city, all while he racked his brains on what to do next. Something must have happened in Einjar, for this corruption to have traveled all this way, and he has a damn good idea of who might be behind it. But for what purpose? Even the kidnappings had ended up serving the purpose of trying to control a dragon, in the end. But if the curse in Einjar was dragon-laid ... was this an attempt to satiate the bottomless hunger of the spirit that had caused it?

Too many questions, and not enough answers. Mercy stays far above the waters and keeps an eye on the chaos while Daud wades through the worst of the fights to cut down risen Defenders and help teleport angry individuals to safety, though not without incurring a bruise or worse in the process. As it turns out, people who are trying to kill each other are sorely vexed when they're interrupted.

After the third red-eyed individual that tries to stick a knife in Daud's ribs, he stops using his hands and resorts to using magic to grab them, hold them, and dunk them into the nearest bit of clean water -- whether that's a horse trough or a bucket.

There's plenty of opportunity to spot the half-masked tiefling flitting through the madness, occasionally blinking in and out of sight as his cloak helps him fade from view -- or maybe you're one of those he so rudely interrupts.