No Salvation (Closed)

[Aerious]

OOC: You know if you are allowed in this thread or not.

IC:

It had been a few days of travel with Elly and Nayru. The two of them had been spared little time for their own conversations about their real mission, but they could manage a little bit when Elly would go out to do the hunting, or gather some wood, or something of that nature. Aerious and Nayru had both kept the little girl completely enamored by their various tales. Of course they made sure to omit how long ago said tales were, but most of them aged well enough.

It was on the fourth day out of Bern when the fort finally came into view. The scent of death that Aerious had sensed in Bern was now very obvious to him, and maybe Nayru could feel it as well. Elly, however, seemed as oblivious as always.

[red]"Take caution." Aerious spoke. "I doubt this fortress is empty, and I don't want any enemy to get the jump on us."[/red]

From this far out the fort looked disheveled and in ruins, but something else hung around it...like something had been making it's home within the walls of wood and stone.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

The vague feeling of unease had been growing as they traveled, a dull weight that sat on her shoulders, but one that she could never quite pinpoint to dislodge. Of course she had had plenty of time to think of how to describe it - it felt as through gravity was gradually becoming stronger as she flew, gradually making her less than she was.

Not that she had told Aerious about the feeling, of course - she'd never been good at admitting weakness in the first place, and in the aftermath of the episode with Elly nearly killing them both, Nayru had somewhat withdrawn into her shell again, hesitant to show weakness again. It didn't help that she felt as though she should be able to reconize the sensation far better, but centuries spent amongst humans, suppressing her nature, had dulled her senses - Aerious doubtless recognized it for what it was, but he hadn't seemed especially worried, so she had held her peace.

Now, faced with their destination, she almost reconsidered - but a sideways glance at the focused Aerious convinced her to leave it be for the time being. It would be better to focus on the immediate issues, anyways, like whatever was holed up in the fort. Bandits, perhaps; she didn't think that Aerious would have brought Elly along if any of the darker creatures were in the immediate vicinity. "Bandits? I suspect that the denizens of the area are unlikely to simply let us investigate peacefully. Perhaps we should reconnoiter, assuming we have not already been seen?"

Or maybe he would have intended to introduce Elly to those horrors in order to toughen her up. Perhaps - if they were to try to help humans face the shadows, measures like that would have to be taken. The more who could stand and fight rather than falling in fear, the better. Courage was an admirable trait to cultivate, the act of swallowing one's fear and facing its cause.

Nayru could only hope that at some point she would be able to channel that inner strength herself.

[Elly]

Elly's mouth fell open slightly at the sight of the fort, a low hum of interest escaping her, eyes sparkling with curiousity. Real ruins? Those were always filled with treasure in the stories. And the heroine always walked away with it, and defeated the evil wyvern in the end! Or, um, any other villain, she guessed. Now that she thought of it, pretty much all of them had wyvern riders as villains. She wondered why? Oh, they probably hadn't really met any, she reasoned. Yup, it made plenty of sense, now that she thought about it; Bern was pretty far away, after all. Or maybe she'd just been lucky, and only met nice wyvern riders so far. She'd have to ask the commander about that; maybe the entire wing could travel down to Bern someday, and they could clear it up once and for all.

Anyways, there were more interesting thoughts to be had. She snapped back to the present with a smile. A real fort! Did it have real traps, too? Maybe they'd actually be chased by a boulder, that'd be pretty neat! Nayru's words broke past her musings, and she turned to her, barely able to hold her excitement. "Recon? I can totally do that, y'know!" Alright! She'd show Nayru just how great pegasus knights could be! "Y' both can trust me, I'll take care of it, I'll be back before y' know it!" She dashed towards Heather, unpacking her bridle before the others could object. Score!

[Aerious]

As Elly ran off to leave the two in relative silence Aerious just chuckled. [red]"Bandits? Oh you wish it was something that mundane. No, can you not feel it? There is an evil presence here. I can sense it. Something...natural and unnatural at the same time."[/red] He watched Elly setting things up for a moment, and then looked back towards the fort. [red]"As long as she stays in the sky, she should be fine. None of these things can fly, as far as I've seen."[/red] Aerious said, staring over the fort.

Something about this place just didn't sit well with him, like it was some nest of unspeakable horrors. And he didn't doubt that if he and Nayru were not there, they would certainly have come out to attack. But these monsters must have sensed him like he could sense them. And they knew to fear him, an ancient foe.

[red]"Don't act unless she is going to die."[/red] He explained. [red]"There is no growth without danger. We cannot help her in that regard."[/red]

If one was not willing to risk their own life, then they would never really understand the limits of their own power and the value of such. They could show her the path, but it was her choice to walk it.

[Clair Feldsky]

Sacae. In a way, it felt like things were all coming back to where they started. It was here that she'd been hired for her first job after leaving Ilia. Here that she'd faced her first full sized battle. Here that she'd finally stepped up and become more than an officer simply in name. Salvation Point felt almost like home to her, even in its disheveled and broken state. The collapsed segment of the stone wall: Without Aeros the dragon to break it down, they never would have escaped. The charred ruins of the chapel near the back: That had been where High Officer Arriston had finally revealed that he had been ordered to "cleanse them". With fire. He'd tried to torch the building with Richter and his soldiers, including herself, inside. Thankfully, that hadn't worked out. Coming back to Salvation Point was incredible after all this time. Not that she was overly willing to stay for long. They still had a job to do in Bern.

Clair looked down on the fort from the misty bottom of a cloud whipping its way across the Sacaen sky. She was wearing white, except for the red trim on her armor, and the pegasus was white, so the effect made it difficult to detect her within the swirls of cloud. Of course, at the height she was gliding, it would matter very little if anyone spotted her. She was glad of the sturdy thigh high boots she was wearing, but had to question the practicality of the skirts again. She didn't question it as much as she used to though. Regardless, she was wearing one now. Especially after that last battle in Etruria had left her entire outfit bespattered with blood.

Leaving Etruria had been a relief. Even if she didn't know all the people leaving it with them. She hoped Cefia, Garith, and Derick were on their way back to Bulgar, or to meet up with the army, but she wasn't about to turn back to that hornet's nest and look for them, when her own orders were to try and meet up in Bulgar.

And so their path had led them back past Salvation Point. She was glad she was running recon as they moved in from the west. It gave her a chance to see more of the fort. And.... something about Salvation Point was setting her on edge, and she never liked to be on the ground for long like that. Whatever it was, it was a familiar feeling. Probably just some of the bad memories mixing in with the meaningful ones.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

"I-" Now it made sense; the loathing, the disease, the feeling of danger. An ancient enemy, hatred so vast it was encoded into each race's very existence. There was no salvation to be found for the slavering beasts of the coming tides, no need for displomacy and honeyed words, only total eradication. Whether it would be the shadows that were burnt away or the remnants of her once-proud draconic ancestors remained to be seen, but there could be no peaceful coexistence.

Nayru found that she did not like the direction her thoughts had turned, always having preferred the diplomatic approach. It was chilling that her perceptions could be so thoroughly tainted by age-old feuds - and yet she knew that they existed for good reason, for should the world fail to hold back these creatures, they would eradicate all life on Elibe.

"We would do best to raze the entire structure," she grumbled, equal parts annoyed at herself and the obstruction. "A home to hatred and these... things. It is nothing more than a monument to the failures of humanity, those we would eventually replace with virtue." A little more speech than she would have preferred, but the undercurrent of just wanting to completely annihilate the menace was quite clear, enough that even she had to admit to herself that she just wanted the feeling gone.

"To answer your question, I did feel that sensation, but did not recognize it for what it was. So long spent suppressing what I am has left me something less. I can only hope that I can regain it, in time." The manakete watched Elly taking off, vaguely amused at the girl's enthusiasm, but troubled by her thoughts as well as the mention of danger to Elly. She spoke of helping Elly, of saving humanity from itself, and yet she could not even face herself? Some savior she would be - the blind leading the deaf, a cavalcade of fools merrily riding down the path to hell. "If I am to lead even one girl down the path to heroism, much less the world, I have much to learn."

Nayru returned to staring at the crumbling structure, trying to think of how to word her next request without sounding too pathetic. It was a curious feeling; she wasn't used to asking people for help, much less admitting her own weakness so openly, but the well of emotion was proving remarkably difficult to close. She wasn't even sure exactly what she wanted; training in some form from an older dragon, yes, but they couldn't very well just turn into dragon and try to kill each other - a conflict she would certainly lose, even disregarding the issues the fight would cause - and there would be plenty of time to pick his brain for facts as they traveled regardless.

It seemed that getting real training would be difficult, though if Aerious was willing to move in on the old fortress she fully intended to be on the forefront of the fight, but perhaps she could make do. "...Would you spar with me sometime? In - either form." Unsaid, but implied: whichever was more reasonable for the area. Dragon-fight in the middle of Bern probably a bad idea, dragon fight on a deserted island a thousand miles away from civilization probably easier to set up. "I have had very little combat experience against anything legitimately dangerous - bandits tend not to wield legendary weapons. Or great wit, for that matter." It was a poor attempt at a joke, but it gave her something else to focus on. "Sparring is not exactly war, but I must start somewhere."

Maybe she could learn something while teaching Elly, too.

[Elly]

Elly felt her stomach do a cartwheel as Heather jumped into the air vigorously, her white wings unfurling to the sides gracefully. Whatever had gotten into the filly today? She shrugged, shaking her head as she adjusted her grip on the bridle. She was probably just excited, anyone would be, why, this was the first time she was actually doing a real job! Not that it was official or anything...but still! The thought was enough to make her feel positively giddy with excitement.

Oh, right, Nayru said she was supposed to focus more when flying. Like, not let her mind wander. She could totally do that! Just like some of the older knights, they sometimes had this blank expression on their faces when practicing that just made her want to wave her arms in front of them to see if they were actually asleep with their eyes open...

Actually, that wasn't such a bad idea.

Maybe once she was back at headquarters, she ought to check that? Maybe it was a secret Ilian concentration technique, and it was kept secret for all but the most advanced knights. She'd have such an advantage if she could figure out something like that by herself. Why, the commander would be so proud! And then she'd become a full knight, too, and a real heroine...images flashed past her eyes, a special congratulatory ceremony held just for her, and all of the other recruits clapping in the background...

She was jolted out of her daydreaming by the chill of moisture as she plunged straight into a cloud with Heather. The sudden rush of cold air made her shudder, and she pulled on the bridle gently, directing Heather out of it. Focus, Elly, focus! She shook her head energetically. She ought to fly a bit lower to get a good look, right?

She kept her hands steady; it had taken a few days, but she'd finally understood what Aerious had meant by his words that day on the inn when they met. Nayru had pretty much had to explain it to her, but that didn't really matter, right? Actually applying it, however, was a lot harder than she thought it'd be; she kept trying to go back to her usual motions. Really, it was boring to just tug on the reins a little bit at a time! The thought of hurting Heather kept her motivated on learning the proper way, though; she felt awful whenever she thought about how much it must have hurt the poor filly to be pulled around like that.

The young recruit circled the ruins slowly, steadily dropping lower. The plains around them seemed empty, or, at least, she couldn't spot anything. She ought to go back and tell Nayru and Aerious it was safe, right? Though...well, it wouldn't be a bad idea to double-check, right? Or, maybe land and make sure? She wasn't sure if Nayru would be mad at her for doing so, but who knew, maybe bandits were hiding inside the ruins, and she couldn't really look inside those from the air, right?

[Aerious]

Aerious smirked a little bit at Nayru's response. [red]"Indeed. And we could destroy this hive in moments, but what would that prove? If humanity is to survive this, they need to be the ones to strike out at it. Besides, for us to help her would only weaken her. To overcome ones own trials is the first step towards growth."[/red] He mused, watching Elly fly into a cloud. He had then registered Nayru's other comment.

[red]"Indeed."[/red] He said with a smile. [red]"It has been quite some time since I have been able to spar with one of my kind. I would be honored. Have you mastered channeling the elements yet?"[/red] He asked. It was never a sure thing if you went by age, it tended to jump around a lot.

All of a sudden Aerious sensed something, something wrong. [red]"Elly!"[/red] He shouted in surprise as a shadow shot up from the ruins like a streak of lightning. Whatever it was flew right by her, narrowly missing her, and coming around for another pass. What on Elibe was that? Aerious squinted his eyes, but from this distance it was hard for even him to tell.

What Elly would see is something out of a nightmare. A humanoid creature with black leathery wings, a snarling maw of jagged teeth that seemed to form into a grotesque smile, and the very sharp lance it held that had very nearly hit her. It began to bank, coming around for a second pass.

[Elly]

Post Soundtrack: Endless Despair

There was no time to react.

Elly closed her eyes as a strong gust of wind buffeted the two of them, causing them to tumble aimlessly in the air for a few seconds while Heather struggled to stabilize herself. The pegasus whinnied pitifully; she could feel her mount's agitation spiking almost into unchecked panic. She looked up, scanning the sky.

And then, she saw it.

It was as if time had stopped; the world seemed to freeze in place, and only the sound of her heartbeat seemed to reach her ears, dully echoing in a rapidly increasing pace. An ominous chill crossed her body, turning her blood to ice, and she felt her hands grow cold, her fingers suddenly unresponsive.

It was a nightmare. A monstruous, deformed mockery of a living creature. Horrible leathery wings grew from its back, bones jutting sharply against the taut, thin tissue the appendages were made of. Its skin was black, almost necrotic, cruel-looking claws gripping a foul lance that seemed to be aiming straight for her heart even at a distance. But worst of all was its face. The fiend grinned sadistically, scarlet eyes shining dully, rows of mismatched, pointed teeth filling its mouth. It was sentient, and yet, completely alien...and evil.

She should run.

No sane person would ever think otherwise. She wanted to run away, run back to the headquarters. No; run back to her papa's pub, go upstairs, and hide under her bed, like she used to when she was a little girl, and her papa's stories got too scary. He'd always hold her afterwards until she fell asleep. She wanted to cry, beg it to let her leave, but one look into the abomination's crimson eyes told her it'd stab her as soon as her back was turned...and it would enjoy doing so.

She bit back a sob that threatened to escape her, turning it into a low hiccup. This...this wasn't like the stories. This wasn't how it was supposed to be like. Wasn't the heroine supposed to defeat the villain? And, yet, looking at it...she'd never felt more vulnerable or scared in her entire life. She saw it bank to the side, dipping its wing as it turned in midair, preparing to attack again.

She had to escape.

She had to survive.

Her left hand twitched. Where would she run to? It could fly too. Nayru and Aerious couldn't save her. They had no weapons; Nayru didn't even have her wyvern. Running towards them would just place them in danger, too. And yet, maybe, she could run away while it was distracted with the two of them...if it stopped, if she could just escape while it...

No!

How could she ever consider that, even for just a split second? She'd never felt so ashamed of herself before. Was that how a pegasus knight was supposed to act?

But, she didn't want to die.

A tiny, traitorous voice in the corner of her mind told her that it was her best chance. She supressed it ruthlessly, tears forming at the corners of her eyes. If that was how she really was like, how could she ever be a knight, much less a heroine?

And, suddenly, time sped up again.

She barely had time to react as the beast charged at her again at dizzying speeds. Her breath caught in her throat, and she let out a loud shriek of panic, her left hand pulling on the reins as strongly as she could. Heather whinnied loudly, falling to the side, barely dodging the demon's strike.

There was nowhere to run to.

She had to survive.

She had to fight.

She let go of the reins, fumbling with her right hand, tugging at the lance that was tied at the filly's side wildly. Her fingers closed over the unfamiliar metal, the knot becoming loose under her persistent attempts. The lance dipped dangerously, nearly falling as it came free; it was awkward to hold, and felt heavy in her hand. The monster growled fiercely, the sound grating agains her ears almost painfully, before turning to attack once more.

And then, she realized she had made a fatal mistake.

How on earth did the older knights manage to hold these things and direct their partners with just one hand? She struggled with the reins, trying to find a way to hold them, only succeeding in tangling them around her weapon. It rushed towards her once more, its spear pointed straight ahead.

She screamed as she was nearly tossed off Heather, the sudden jolt much more violent than the last two. Her voice was joined by Heather's own distressed cry. She had reacted out of instinct, but it hadn't been enough. A deep gash appeared at her side, blood quickly matting her white hair; her wings beat erratically, and she began to lose altitude quickly.

"Heather! No!" An horrible, discordant sound seemed to fill the air around her, mixing in with both of their screams.

It was laughing.

[Clair Feldsky]

A pair of specks on the other side of the fortress snagged Clair's attention as she soared overhead. No... there were three, and one was rising in the sky. The telltale white giving away the presence of another winged horse rising into the sky. The Falcoknight felt doubts about who they could be easing their way to the forefront of her mind. The only people who would come to an abandoned fort that she could think of were returning Etrurian Soldiers, or scavengers of some kind.

There isn't a large group, so scavengers are the more likely.... The blond haired Ilian considered her options, banking her steed upward and further into the damp of the cloud. She could watch for awhile, and see what they did. Revealing herself would be the typical response of travelers. They could swap news, and possibly trade needed supplies. In addition to that, she hadn't encountered a fellow pegasus knight in a long time. Never, in fact, except when they had gone to Edessa, Ilia. Even so, something was holding her back. Something was making her edgy, and her pegasus had picked up on it.

Clair was just working her way out of the cloud, when she heard something. It was faint, and difficult to make out over the constant wind in the sky, but it was something her instructors had made certain she could recognize. Buffeted across the wind, Clair heard the sounds of a terrified pegasus. She wasn't going to stand by and just leave this stone unturned.

Shifting in her seat and giving a light tug on the reigns, Clair turned her pegasus into the wind, and towards the sound. Fighting through the airs was like trying to swim across a current, so making headway was difficult, but eventually, they made it to visual range, and saw the grotesque abomination rushing at the other rider a little below her.

What IS that?! An expression of revulsion crossed the Falcoknight's face, accompanied by a deep seated fear which she'd only felt on one other occasion. She felt her blood chill as she remembered the anguish that had come from the monsters at Ostia. The winged mare she was riding started to pull away, but Clair stopped the beast, steeling herself and aiming directly for the creature.

It was a leathery thing, darker and fouler than even the bull wyverns Ariston had kept. She watched, unable to help as it darted in and struck with a lance it carried across the side of the other rider's pegasus. She saw them starting to flail and fall away through the air, as the vicious monster started laughing in triumph.

That was it. Whether or not the others were friendlies or not, the Ilian was positive they would unite against this creature. It looked like it was about to plunge after them to finish the job, but Clair had other things in mind.

"This is my airspace, Cretin!" The Falcoknight urged her pegasus into a dive and raised her iron lance just as the thing turned around. She felt the satisfying thump as the lance connected with the monster's stomach and left a long black oozing scrape along the outside as it was sent flailing to the side. She frowned at the result as she pulled up out if the dive. That thing should have been skewered like a kebab, but its hide must have been tougher than she'd anticipated.

It snapped its wings open as they both continued their fall, and turned in the air towards her, malice glowing from its eyes. Clair refused to let herself quail under their intensity, and instead turned towards it again. As she neared it, it gave a few mighty flaps of its wings, opened its mouth in a roar of fury. It looked as though it was getting ready to try and take her right off her pegasus.

Seeing it coming for her, Clair did the best thing she could think of. She pulled her arm back and jabbed her lance forward as hard as she could. The resulting thrust going straight down the creatures throat and out the back of its neck.

She just barely managed to hang onto her lance, letting the thing slide off of it and fall the hundreds of feet to the ground below. It was only after the fight that she realized how hard her heart was pounding, and how panicked her pegasus was. Steering away from the fortress, she looked around, trying to spot Richter, the two on the ground from earlier, the falling pegasus knight. Anyone, really. She just needed to get her bearings, and the high sun on the plains was not helping.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

"You are right. I merely -" She was worried about Elly, as dumb as it sounded for how recently they'd met, and the oppressive aura drenching the fortress was grating on her nerves. "What was born there cannot be allowed to leave." Nayru wasn't exactly sure how the girl had already made such an impression on her. No, she knew, to some degree; their talk atop the inn had been the catalyst to even taking the girl along, Elly's simple but pure hope untempered by bitterness and a broken world.

The sudden wave of hatred was palpable, steel and claw born aloft on wings of night. Her conscious mind, honed by the mild persona she had adopted so long ago, wanted to flee - but the ancestral hatred within, the nature of what she was, curled her lips into a feral snarl, a crouch, ready to leap through the sky and butcher it.

But she was not a dragon, now, just a woman, and Aerious seemed hell-bent on bring the pegasus rider face to face with her nightmares. Every muscle in her body screamed at her to rise, to transform, to do something, anything. She did nothing, too focused on trying to hold back the urges to speak or comprehend.

Nayru saw a beautiful thing, then. Elly stayed. She fought. The manakete had expected her to flee, would not have thought a whit less of the girl had she done so, but the human dared to stay and confront that which so many of her braver, more experienced, peers might not. As useless and powerless as she felt, groundborn and unable to help, Nayru couldn't help but feel a swelling bit of pride in her breast, a reminder that there their dream world was possible, that there were those even in the ruthless world they lived in that still had that spark.

"More to her than meets the eye, is there not?" She hadn't missed Aerious's initial reaction to Elly, and could certainly empathize - she had felt the same way. It was still hard to think of Elly as a conquering hero, a dashing cavalier, but there had been a brilliant spark of greatness that raged within its confines, that threatened to erupt into a new star, that she had felt during their talk that evening. Another pegasus shot out of the clouds, ramming into the gargoyle with a vicious impact. Another human.

No details to be made out from so far away, but backup for their companion. "...If Elly falls, I will catch her." It was a statement of fact more than a question, but also a tacit acceptance of Aerious's words; she wasn't happy with it, but they had agreed that simply saving humanity over and over would do nothing to bring the mortals forwards as a species. With another pegasus rider, they could win.

She simply stood as blood rained down, a crimson shower of foul ichor. Heather had taken damage, too, but further away - the angle at which the second rider had impaled the grotesque creature, and the wind, sent the droplets their way. They splattered across the short grass, splotches of red joined not long after in a plume of dirt by the creature's corpse, accompanied by the horrific cacophony of crunching bones and rending flesh. Natural flier or no, nothing was meant to fall hundreds of feet at terminal velocity.

The creature, apparently, hadn't been clued in on that particular bit of information; broken as it was, it still let out a hoarse wheeze followed by a fluid gurgle as it choked on its own fluids, the magic animating it not entirely dispelled, before finally expiring with a dull hissing sound - whether it was from the creature's brutalized vocal cords or the escaping magic, she couldn't tell. Secretly, Nayru was grateful for that; she would have finished it off had the situation required it, but something that could survive a fall that devastating was not a creature she wanted to underestimate.

Arching an eyebrow at Aerious before returning her gaze to the descending pegasi, curious to see what his reaction to the scene would be, Nayru finally spoke. "I - admit to somewhat regretting having seen channeling as unnecessary." She was trying to sound calm and collected, but there was a hitch in her voice that spoke to the dragon's slightly less tranquil mindset even more than her words. "How trivial the events of half a millennium can seem when one realizes how little they have prepared one for real combat."

[If I went too far in describing it lemme know, I'm just kinda working vaguely off of gargoyle/deathgoyle idea from FESS]

[Richter Abend]

Richter stood atop a nearby hill, stopping his march to angle his eyes upward. Above his head flew Clair, atop her pegasus, gliding and darting about; a white streak against the pale blue sky. As was the usual, she didn't walk with Richter, instead opting to be his eye in the sky, but Sacae was flat, and there couldn't have been much she could see from up there that he could from down upon the ground. But whatever, even from here he could tell she was enjoying herself, and he had no desire to spoil that over minor wants.

The Ilian then turned his gaze to the carpeted plains spread vast before him. Verdant grasses swayed in the wind as the bright sun of Sacae shown down upon the rolling veldt. In the distance, a team of horses galloped with the winds. It was a beautiful sight, one that he hadn't been in the mind to appreciate the last time he had been here. No, his last visit to the plains had been filled with death, blood, and pain, and the black stain that lay at the foot of the hill, marring the near perfect surface of the plains, only stood as a reminder to that.

Salvation Point.

How Richter loathed those words, mouthing them silently as they passed through his mind. While for Clair these ruins may have been a sign of beginning and battles won, all Richter could feel when he looked at these charred remains was shame. But Richter would not allow himself to be haunted by shadows of time past. He had learned to turn his shame into purpose and strength, because dwelling on it wasn't productive in the least.

And there was little time to dwell on it, for as Richter contemplated his past and future, he heard a loud cry shriek from the fort. His head swiveled towards the source of the noise, but his eyes could barely register as a black dart shot from out of the Etrurian ruin towards a pegasus knight riding in the sky. Clair!? Richter began to run towards the fort as the black figure struck the rider, knocking her off balance. No, it wasn't Clair. The pegasus was smaller, and the rider's hair was bright magenta. But still Richter ran. What kind of foul creature had decided to make its residence in Salvation Point now? Could this be what Ardus had been talking about?

As he ran, Richter spotted Clair diving towards the winged beast, striking the monster like a bolt from heaven. The rebel commander assumed the blow met its mark, for Clair's target plummeted to the ground as if it were dead or at least severely injured. He trusted Clair was alright, but what of the other pegasus rider? What was she doing here? Etrurians?

[Aerious]

Aerious saw Nayru tense up and placed his hand on her shoulder. [red]"I know. But we have precious little time in which to act. If she is in danger, then we will act. But until then...[/red] Aerious continued the watch the fight while moving closer to the fort. Elly had actually dodged a strike, impressive. She wasn't that lucky a second time though, and Aerious could tell he rmount had been injured. Grabbing his stone from under his shirt he prepared to charge in, when a streak of white flew across the sky. Another Pegasus Rider? He smirked as he saw her.

[red]"See how humanity surprises even itself? Strength and courage do exist."[/red] He said, watching the impaled beast fall from the sky. It fell like a boulder and crashed upon the ground. At first Aerious wore a pleased expression, but that quickly turned sour as a chorus of shrieks filled the air. The things death cry and it's meteorite impact with the ground...had it been an alarm?

As if in answer, a cloud of black erupted from the fort. At least a dozen winged demons taking to the sky and fanning out to protect their nest. Elly and the new Pegasus rider were cut of from where Aerious and Nayru were by this cloud. Meaning Elly would have to land on the other side. Aerious gripped his dragon stone and felt the power coursing through it. He focused it to allow his voice to carry over the roar of the winds.

[red]"Get to ground!"[/red] He shouted, more in a roar then speech. The force split into two, with half of them heading for Nayru and himself, the other half chasing Elly and the other rider.

[red]"Well I hope your preperations are done, because you're about to get a crash course."[/red] He spoke to Nayru as the first of the winged creatures approached and tried a quick stab. Aerious let the feeble lance scrape off of his arm, where it did nothing. They weren't very strong, just agile and tough. Still, more then a match for a human soldier. Aerious grabbed the lance, ripping it from the things hands as he then smacked the creature with it with such force that the lance snapped in two.

[red]"Urgh, I hate human weapons. So fragile."[/red] He muttered as the others began to close in.

[Nayru Al-Saiduq]

The scents of acid blood and burnt ozone mixed in an unholy symphony as she touched her earring, the world slowing down around her as reality shifted into intense focus. Perfect clarity, the hyperaware senses of something beyond human struggling to feed a massive flow of data into what she could comprehend in her limited form. It was luxuriously overwhelming, a sense of rightness, of power that reminder her of what she was. Intoxicating to the degree that Nayru had to consciously force herself to focus on the fight ahead, remind herself that she could finally use her existence as it was intended.

The first creature lanced past her in the blink of an eye, a hurricane of force. She swayed to the side, avoiding the lance by an inch. There were more, though; vicious leers and obsidian glares, two more bearing in on her as the first slowly began to bank around for another pass. Its great speed worked against it; agile as they seemed to be, aerial combat was much less immediate than fights on the ground, more time passing between each clash. Combat distilled into its purest essence - brief instants of absolute focus followed by nothingness.

Her smile turned feral as the first creature reached her, her left hand crushing the head of the lance, the unstoppable force continuing to crush the wood shaft as her right punched through the creature's chest in a shower of blood, arresting the creature's momentum in a display of wanton savagery. The jolt as its kinetic energy transferred to her threatened to send her flying as well, but she leant into the oncoming mass, skidding back a few inches as she hurled it to the ground in a plume of dust.

There was no time to ensure that it was properly dead before the second was upon her, latching onto her body with inhuman strength, its lance discarded in the wake of what had happened to the first. Whether or not the creatures had legitimate intelligence, they certainly possessed a bestial cunning, capable of reacting to a rapidly-changing situation with lurid ease. Nayru found herself rapidly rising into the air, unable to casually dislodge its grip as she had the first - it was profoundly worrying that only one short showcase of her tactics had allowed the second creature to adapt so well.

It was clear what the monster intended - she was flightless, and it was not. Were it to release her a mile up, only one of them would reach the ground in any condition to continue fighting. Even if she managed to wrest free of it, once they reached a high enough altitude the gesture would be irrelevant. Her companion won either way; no matter whether or not it survived, she would die. In that moment of clarity, she realized that she needed to free herself before they reached the apex of their ascent, long before, and she renewed her struggle with sudden desperation. Two inhuman monsters locked in mortal kombat, beastly strength enhanced by the darkest magics facing raw draconic might.

The gargoyle had the decency to look somewhat confused as its left arm simply tore off at the elbow, a jagged stub of blood and necrotic flesh left behind. She was in her element; there was nothing graceful about this combat style, but it was how she had learned to defend herself, and the brutal pragmatism of it had always spoken to her. Her opponent was not human, but much of the anatomy seemed similar, and in the frenzy of battle her training took over.

Its right knee buckled backwards under the first blow, shattered by her own as she earned her freedom - its other arm still grasped at her, but the force of the impact loosened its grip and sent them both rotating, freely rising separately into the air for a moment. It spun to its right, but the recoil of the move had sent her rotating more quickly and Nayru found herself faced with the creature's back before it had finished half a full rotation. An idea blossomed; unable to brace herself to actually bring her prodigious strength to bear directly into blows as on the ground, the manakete opted to grab one wing in both hands, bracing her legs against the creature's back as they began to spin, and pulled.

The flailing limb tore off with a sickening pop, a cry of discordant hatred from the gargoyle following almost instantly before being cut off as her elbow found the back of its neck, slamming into it with enough force to shatter its spine into a hailstorm of razor shards. Her death-grip on its left shoulder barely kept her attached as the entwined duo began to plummet, gravity taking over in short order as what lift it had been able to generate while struggling vanished entirely. Curiously, for how agile the creatures seemed to be, they were surprisingly heavy, very dense and heavy muscled; it spoke volumes of how vastly powerful their wings must be, the muscles that propelled them enhanced by magic.

Its remaining arm snapped under the next methodical blow, purposeful calm falling over her again as training took over. Regulated movements, using whatever was necessary to incapacitate her attacker, targeting weak points, breaking joints and bones with equal fortitude; pragmatism at its purest. Incredibly, the monster still lived; she could feel the hateful rumbling through its body as it snarled, the sea of muscle still rippling as it struggled to bring its body to bear against her once more. What the hell were these things?

The ground approached rapidly already; they had only ascended a few dozen feet before she had broken free, though it had already seemed like hundreds at the time, and she was astride a twitching mass of hatred given flesh, with little else between her and the hard earth. She would have to make do with what she had, Nayru realized, calling on more of her power to bolster her body, hoping that she could at last reinforce her bones enough to keep them from shattering on impact. Unlike Aerious, she had little practice in simply passively hardening her entire body; the power coursed through, responding to her will, conscious and subconscious, but only actually focused in areas she was actively focusing on.

For now, it was her legs and arms, for that would take the majority of the shock. She might have mumbled something Sacaen, Nayru wasn't really sure, and couldn't very well hear over the rushing wind that filled her ears. A glint of light, the tiniest hint of her essence as she drew a fraction too much of her power, and then the ground was already upon them.

They struck like a thunderbolt, the gargoyle's head disintegrating under the force of a massively reinforced punch coinciding with the arrival of the ground. Caught between an unstoppable force and an immovable object, the object found itself not so immovable after all; her opponent's head disintegrated as the earth around it cratered, a cataclysm of detritus - mixed with the vile ichor that flowed through its veins - coating the sides of the indentation in lurid majesty. The shock almost overwhelmed her; she could feel her own knees groan and shudder at the impact as they do came home, not as well reinforced as her arms had been due to the lack of practice, but the job was done. The corpse's lowered spine simply disintegrated into fragments of bone, tearing through the flesh around them.

Nayru rose slowly, trying to cope with the stress on her body. Channeling power into one's human form was detrimental as simply as it could be said that taking a sword to the heart was mildly detrimental to that organ's continued operation. Human bodies had never been designed to channel a dragon's power, and the more that flowed through them the faster they threatened to break down; combined with the entirely natural stress from the impact, Nayru was easily regretting having reacted too slowly to keep the creature from taking her for a ride. Gods but everything hurt!

That was only a third of the assault force, though, and already there was another, a thinner creature brandishing a set of javelins and a wicked leer that suggested it would enjoy skewering her on all of them in rapid succession.

This was one of those times where being able to breath fire or lightning or ice would have been exceptionally useful, Nayru decided.

(Bonus points if you envision Nayru yelling LET'S GET DANGEROUS just before punching through the first deathgoyle. Also minor trivia: yes I am essentially ripping off krav maga as envisioned by someone who can punch stuff really hard.)

((edit: ...yeah I just noticed how long this is. It took place over somewhere around fifteen to twenty seconds in-character, for the record; the first gargoyle hit her pretty much right around the time Aerious spoke and the latter creature only a few later))

[Elly]

Elly gasped in surprise as a white bolt cut through the air, realizing only seconds later it was another pegasus. Such speed! She stared in wonder, mesmerized as the knight cut through the air effortlessly, lance at the forefront, striking at the fiend. So cool! A deep-seated sense of satisfaction filled her as she saw the weapon approach its midsection. It deserved so much more, after hurting Heather. That...that was how a knight should be like, definitely!

She felt a lump form in her throat as the two of them dropped a few more feet; despite Heather's best efforts, it was clear that she couldn't stay in the air much longer. She rubbed the filly's neck, careful not to move her left leg around and hurt her more, and turned to stare at the ground beneath them, steadily approaching, tearing her attention away from the battle above. She couldn't exactly direct her while holding the lance; not that her hands were steady enough at the moment to do so, anyways. She was afraid she'd drop the weapon if a strong gust blew past.

A loud shout caught her attention, causing her heart to leap up once more, dread filling her as Aerious' voice echoed all around her eerily. Fear spiked as the sound of flapping wings reached her ears, clearly audible past the rush of wind. The image of the monster she had barely escaped from flashed before her eyes, and a single word echoed in her mind.

Survive.

Heather panicked, wings beating faster against the air, yet she couldn't gain altitude. The Sacaean plains approached rapidly; Elly closed her eyes, trying to block out the creatures' screams. If only she could vanish from this very spot; she wished she were in Ilia, back at home, or on the inn's rooftop once more. Wind buffeted her face, strands of hair coming undone from her braid.

Survive.

A yelp of pain escaped her as Heather impacted the ground, haphazardly trying to break her fall by galloping. She succeeded for a few steps before slipping, falling sideways, sliding across the grass; the young rider was sent flying, the lance torn from her hands and falling to the ground as she curled up, spinning and tumbling before coming to rest a few feet away.

Her left leg hurt, but otherwise seemed okay; her head throbbed painfully, the world swimming dizzyingly in her eyes for a moment as she stared up into the sun's glare. She shook her head, disoriented; everything seemed muted, somehow, the thumping of her heart filling her ears, playing in counterbeat to her rapidly-intensifying headache. Was Heather okay? A shadow, or perhaps two, seemed to fall from the heavens, headed straight for her.

Survive.

She scrambled away as something landed next to her, causing the ground to quake briefly. A soft whimper escaped her before she could help herself; no matter how much she tried, she couldn't bring herself to turn around and see the monster again. Was it just one? Two? Ten? Had the knight killed the one that had hurt Heather? Had she run away and left her alone?

Survive.

She focused on the lance. She had to get to it. The lightweight metal shone dully under the sun. She stood up shakily, stumbling, her steps wobbly, nearly falling down as she picked up the weapon, its pointed tip held low. The ringing in her ears seemed to die down slightly; she could hear the creature's steps. Elly placed both hands on her lance. With a loud cry, she spun around, wielding the weapon as she would a laundry pole, swinging it sideways with as much strength as she could muster.

The weapon nearly flew off her hands as the monster parried her clumsy attempt with ease, causing her entire body to shudder; she closed her eyes in surprise at the loud, hollow sound. The fiend's wooden shaft flew at her before she could react, its movements dizzyingly fast, its blunt end diving into her solar plexus forcefully. Her vision blurred with tears as the air was expelled from her lungs; she tried to cry out, but couldn't utter a sound. She doubled over in pain, her own lance falling to the side, forgotten, arms crossed around her stomach in an attempt to protect herself from further harm. A soft mewl of fright, what might have been a full scream under other conditions, left her mouth as she found her feet swept from under her, causing her to fall heavily towards the ground once more, grass, sky and darkness swirling together. Her armor, though light, seemed to drive into her back like a blunt knife. She closed her eyes.

Hopefully, the last blow wouldn't hurt as much if she didn't see it coming.