Dusklands [ACRO Plot]

[Chaotic Bob]

Or what's left of it, rather.
The plot is almost done, but seems to enjoy getting buried in Outside.

So, for the final leg, it shall be taking place here.

The story so far (In rough summary form, from what I remember/have seen):

A good time past, the twisted shade Edict awoke from a slumber within the forests Outside. Not much time passed before he was off to his usual evil deeds and busily set about corrupting four small towns, unleashing small tides of shadow-blight from within each of them.

Somewhere else, Inside, the grand ship Haven was improperly introduced to the earth, and many died, although only the death of a Mrs. Ezekiel Xar'cha has any importance with this story.
Edict claimed her corpse and ferried it to a distant location, off within the Shadow Plane.
Experiments were performed, a chrysalis was found.
The shade sealed the chrysalis within a binding circle, although not the best of ones. After some questioning, she broke free and destroyed much of the captivity area. An elder was carried with her, oddly lacking its kind's usual homicidal tendencies.

The pair reappeared Outside, off in a sheep grazing area near the mountains.
Edict attacked, tested Zee, ignored his rogue elder, and was fended off with only a single casualty, that of the shepherd tending the area.

Zee and the elder traveled to the nearby village and spent some time there, before another person jumps into the story, by the name of Erin.
At some point in here, the elder is dubbed Bob and the trio moves off to find Edict's base of operations, thanks to concern over recent activities.

Some time and a shadow-wolf attack later, the three are at one of the previously-corrupted villages. Here more members of Bob's kind attack, with an advantage of numbers over the adventuring trio.
Erin unleashes a Hadoken during a dire moment.
Reality rips apart along the path of the catastrophic energy beam and everything in a nearby area is completely eradicated of Material components.
Bob falls, Erin and Zee escape.

Shadows reign and spread.
The village is no more, the Rift left behind by Erin's attack dominates the land and darkness pours fourth, twisting the countryside into a pale mockery of its former self.
Monsters spread.

Inside, Erin and Zee relocate to Trog's Tavern, where they gather a party to set out and correct the mistake they made.

The location to be known as the Dusklands has few visitors during the interim, which is likely for the best. The situation is unpleasant and fraught with danger.
One such visitor, known to be Trent, enters, fights local monsters, leaves, and is later recruited into the adventuring party that returns some time later.

Somewhere at this point, Professor Affidavit arrives at Edict's keep by creation proxy and the two discuss the situation.

The party's journey wasn't particularly pleasant at any stage up until this point.
They have fought off darkfire-wielding skeletons and strange roadrunner abominations, and currently an ambush of Affidavit's creations.


Elsewhere, the fellow Terumitsu has entered the Dusklands and is promptly attacked by a peculiar underground lurking beast.
Affidavit's newest, most intriguing creation is attacked by Nightwings.


As things stand:

Affidavit's spider creations have fallen, members of the party possibly afflicted by liquid agony.
The guardians prepare for their final stand some distance away, their rifles at the ready.
The darkness around the Rift looms only a short distance away.

The Nightwing that had tried to de-limb the white creation is doing a nice job of trying to resist being pulled around. The creation might have strength augmentation, but the shadow-beast had strength in spades to begin with.
So it tries the new tactic of chomping at the creation's head.
It can't pull the creation, yet the creation can pull it. So it must try to end things here.

At Terumitsu's front, he will be noticing chunks of ground collapsing behind him as he walks.
The enemy-below seems to have completely kicked aside stealth in favor of stubbornly trying to bring its foe down to its own level.

At Faded Keep, Edict seems to have finished with his project.
The three creatures/abominations/experiments/glorious-tools/desecrations before him were complete.
The skeleton of Zee. The flesh of Zee. The shadow of Zee.
The darkness swirls in the dungeon and they are carried away.
The shade nods to himself, satisfied that what needs to be done has been done. The shadows coil around him and he vanishes from his keep.

The Rift. The Darkness twining around it.
It expands, oh so very slowly, but insistently.
Below, at the base, the twisted mockeries of the Material realm, the beasts of Shadow, mass and prepare their decisive charge in the World of Light, starting with the fool heroes that approach.
Upwards, towards the higher airspace of the Rift and Darkness, a shade hovers.
From the safety of the Keep to the necessity of the Rift.
Edict watches the party and the creations, some distance away, and the beast below, plotting their death.

It is time for everything to end.

[XtheYeti]

Richard is on follow/guard mode on Erin...

[happyturtle]

Oscar will stay close to Slythynia as they head towards the Rift.

[Gnrlshrimp]

Right...

Well, the white creation would rather have its head on, and ducks its head out of the way, finally giving up on the "use as little magic as possible" plan by swiftly teleporting a short distance away and firing off a pair of blue fireballs at the beast.

*****

Just beyond the range of sight of the party members, the guardians aim their rifles.

They're trying to buy time though, not kill them...they probably can't kill the party anyway.

However, they've confirmed that one person has no way of deflecting projectiles.

*****

Slythynia clenches and unclenches her fist as she walks along close beside Oscar.

*****

One guardian fires.

*****

Slythynia peers into the distance, her eyes piercing through the dark, revealing the figures before her. But before she has time to inform the rest of the party, or properly figure out what they are...

The bullet hits Slythynia, shooting through her and opening up a huge wound in her side. Mercifully, it missed any bones, but blood is pouring out of the gaping wound, and she stumbles and falls as an almight cracking sound hits the party as the sound of the bullet chases after it.

*****

The guardian reloads, the other three keep their weapons at the ready.

In the skies far above, a winged creation calls out to the party, "We see you! Turn back now, or we'll all open fire on you!"

[happyturtle]

Oscar drops next to Slythynia, applying pressure to the wound. He knows she heals quickly, but she has to have the chance to do that.

[XtheYeti]

Richard sighs.

They want to play sniper war? Fine.

He holsters both is pistols. And starts pulling things out of his back pack. He rapidly assembles his sniper rifle.

Some one please heal her. I would feel terrible if she died. Especially since There's pretty much nothing I can do for her.

Richard doesn't even bother to go to a proper sniper position. He just stands there, and takes aim where the sniper shot came from.

Hey. Play with someone your own skill type.

[Darkcomet]

Trent resists the urge to facepalm at a sniper standing in the open and holding still when it's already been shown that they're under fire.

He does, however, decide to take advantage of it in that he makes a rather insane-on-the-surface charge toward the enemy, laser rifle readied.

Trent figures that they will be too busy shooting at Richard to stop him.

[XtheYeti]

Trent figures that they will be too busy shooting at Richard to stop him.

That would pretty much be the whole point of this. Richard would very much rather be the one being shot at. Since he...has...heh. They'll find out.

Richard is aiming at the other Snipers.

[Chaotic Bob]

The shade Edict looks down at them all from on high, unsure whether to be amused or clinically detached.
Amusement seems the better choice.

They are, after all, about to be part of an even grander experiment, and being apathetic towards the momentous occasion benefits no one.

An elder flies some distance away, with a notebook in hand and specific instructions to not become involved beyond record-keeping.

Edict turns towards the roiling darkness around the Rift and closes eyes eyes.
His tendrils snap into crooked positions in the air around his body, appearing more unnatural than usual yet possessing an air of significance.
He begins his chanting.


Elsewhere, a Nightwing is smacked by two unpleasant batches of magical fire.
Heat and light, a brutal combination against a creature of shadow.
Similar to a laser, yet completely different. Less controlled.
In the end, it doesn't matter, the creature shrieks and fades from view, deciding this is not the day it dies.
But it will remember. Oh will it remember...

[Hawkeye]

((repost))

[Dusklands]


[Dusklands]

Erin just might take up that offer, but, at the moment, she's too busy dropping to the ground, screaming, and clawing at her face. :smalleek:


A giggle is directed at Erin "What is the matter sweetie? Got something in your eye? I thought that you would have had a shot at me first before going down injured."

[The Bushranger]

[Dusklands]

Erin shudders and rolls up, gripping her staff tightly, still trembling from the effects of the Liquid Agony but with her system working it off. "Very fraking funny," she snaps. "Now come and get me, or I'll call you a coward. Bawk-bawk!"

[Hawkeye]

"Sticks and stones honey, sticks and stones. I could easily say the same about you for not coming towards me into the darkness, but I won't. As I am more mature than you. But I will humour you in this because indeed you have something that I want, though I can't understand why you want to cling onto something that is so worthless. Perhaps it is because you want to feel more comfortable as it is something that whines even more than you do."

Beyond where the light stretches and out of the darkness a figure emerges and walks forwards a few steps. It appears exactly the same as Melantha normally would, but it is in completely black and gray shades which appear to be, and correctly so, shadows. A few moments that it appears the direction in which it came begins to grow darker and darker as if something was dispelling the light in that area.

[Gnrlshrimp]

Ah...while Richard is making his gun, four shots are fired...at his gun.

The loud cracks will follow in just a moment.

Yeah, seems like the guardians dislike him having a gun.

As a result, Trent's rush is ignored, briefly, but the four creations quickly reload and turn to aim at him.

*****

Slythynia smiles weakly at Oscar, the bloodflow slowly...slowing down. "Th-thanks." she says, her voice barely louder than whisper. That was one hell of a shock to the system, her eyes seem half-closed, as if she might fall unconscious.

[XtheYeti]

The shots will hit Richard in his arms. He is barley managing to not get his gun destroyed. When he gets hit the hole closes pretty much as soon as it is created. Yeah shape shift healing. (Those are bullets not lasers right?)

Richard aims for the Guardians and begins to return fire. He's trying to do 2 things, distract them from Trent's charge, and get them to put there heads down. Basically, if he can hit them he will, but he'll settle for buying Trent as much time as he can.

Come on ya bunch a freaks. Shoot the assassin not the dude who's gonna actually kill you all.

[happyturtle]

Oscar tries to find cover for Slythynia and himself. Once there, he slices open his left palm and holds it to her lips, feeding her a trickle of blood in hopes it will keep her from going into shock.

[Darkcomet]

Trent grabs his black magi-crystal, which glows as a white barrier field forms between him and the guardian creations.

He keeps the crystal in hand, though he's rather ready to put it up and use that laser rifle he's holding in his other hand properly...

[The Bushranger]

Erin chuckles, and scowls at 'Shadow-Mel' as she approaches, holding her metal staff in a two-handed grip before her.

"You know, it's rather interesting just how you keep going on and on about how 'worthless' this bit of you in me is - and yet, you're clearly so desperate to get it back. Must not be completely worthless then if you want it so bad, isn't it?"

A slight crackle of green electricity arcs from her hands to the staff, but she doesn't notice.

"And I cling to it because regardless of my failings and regardless of the past or the future, she - you - is still somebody I consider 'friend', and therefore I'll do what I must.

"Even if it in the end means killing you.

"So - hit me with your best shot."

[Chaotic Bob]

Above the festive party below, Edict continues his monotone chant.
Wisps of shadow begin trailing from his form, trailing onwards into the Darkness around the Rift.
At the present, this seems to have no immediate effect beyond the apparently discorporation of some of his tendrils.


Meanwhile, precisely when Erin says "hit me with your best shot", a dark red string of flesh slashes out of the Darkness, a brutal looking bone-blade attached the end of this apparently massive tentacle.
It seems angled to presumably decapitate Richard.

And a chorus of howls, screams, shouts, roars, and shrieks fills the air.

The first Nightwalker steps out of the Rift's barrier, a massive hulking gray giant.
A pack of shadow wolves nip at each other around its feet as they rush with it towards the party.
One Nightwing, the malicious bat-abominations, flits out of the dark, followed by another, then another.
Several more of those road-runner-esque abominations streak out beneath them, flanked by a stream of human-shaped masses of blackfire.
A few creatures the size and approximate shape of blue grizzly bears lumber behind a pride of cat-shades, growling out what would appear to be orders, in some unpleasant language.
The ground lumbers, as more Nightwalkers appear.
A few properly human-appearing shades steps out as well, keeping a healthy distance from the less visually appealing invaders, with the distinct crackle of magic fluttering in the air around them.

In all of this, the battle-cries and roars of bloodlust rise, heralding even more.

Fear not, it is only Darkest before the fall of Light.


Above, Edict wrinkles his nose at the commotion below, but continues his chant unabated.
He won't allow these creatures to ruin his plan. They are of no consequence.


((And here we go. I recommend not reading a book by its cover.))

[XtheYeti]

Meanwhile, precisely when Erin says "hit me with your best shot", a dark red string of flesh slashes out of the Darkness, a brutal looking bone-blade attached the end of this apparently massive tentacle.
It seems angled to presumably decapitate Richard.


Richard's head absorbs into his body. And then his body shifts into a puddle with a sniper rifle in it...said rifle is still firing at the Creation snipes though...And just as accurately. A voice is heard from the puddle.

Oh would you all just shut the hells up. There're the good guys. They always win.

[Gnrlshrimp]

Except of course that the guardian creations deliberately positioned themselves to take advantage of the darkness that is limitting the party's vision. Richard's shots go wide.

Anyway, the guardian creations fire at Trent, perhaps testing the strength if this little barrier thing of his.

And since Trent is near enough to see them, he'll be able to see just how weird they are, with that large revolving orb six inches above their...neck, I suppose. Unfortunately the darkness of the dusklands means that he doesn't get to see the wonderful pattern of colours that would normally look quite impressive, especially when the orb starts rotating rapidly.

Of course, since the orbs are in fact giant eyes, what this means is that, while Trent currently has their attention, the guardians can still see everything that's going on.

*****

Slythynia tries to push Oscar's hand away, refusing to drink from him. "No! No, Oscar...I'll be fine in a minute. I'm not drinking from you." Her eyes flicker briefly, but the blood coming out of the wound has slowed to a trickle and her body is rapidly healing the damage done.

[happyturtle]

Oscar respects her wishes and takes his hand back. "Sorry. I can't get used to how tough you really are." He says, smiling at her.

[The Bushranger]

Erin, meanwhile, suddenly has her attention diverted from Shadow-Mel.

She spotted something.

Something...that awakens within her that hidden reserve of pure anger.

And anger leads to hate.

Hate leads to...


"...EDICT!!!!"

And in time with her screech, she lifts her staff, green energy flashing around it - then lashing out.


As a maximised, empowered, ghost-touch Scorching Ray.

Aimed squarely at Provost Edict.

[Hawkeye]

And shadow-Melantha takes this opportunity, she had wanted to get a word in before she struck but this was too good a moment to pass up. Her corporeal seeming body suddenly sublimes into a smoke like shadow and rushes towards Erin, aiming to fully engulf her.

Meanwhile, Erin's 'even if it in the end means killing you' comment doesn't go down well with a certain fragment of mind in Erin's brain. That part of Melantha pounds on whatever and every part of Erin's senses in desperation to stop her from destroying her body.

[Chaotic Bob]

The cold wrath of the Shadow Plane falls on the world.

The party better look up and shape up, for ugliness has arrived.

Out from the Rift they have so nearly reached, the patchwork army of darkness sets out to crush the first defense of light: the adventuring party.

Painful cold washes over the area, an almost literal wall of failing temperature.

The enormous glaived tentacle that had initially tried to decapitate Richard is joined by another, each trying to bisect him from separate angles.

The nightwalker and shadow-wolf pack move on towards the down Slythynia and aiding Oscar, the former breaking into a lumbering sprint to keep up with the wolves.
The mass of skittering roadrunner beasts breaks for Erin and her Melantha-problem, accompanied as before by what are probably best explained to be blackfire elementals.
More nightwalkers and the cat-shades streak off towards Trent and then guardians, tailed by the slower grizzly bear mockeries.

More beasts run from the darkness, believing quite fully in the power of completely overwhelming their foes in numbers.

Nightwings circle through the sky, emitting shrieks as the heavily augmented Scorching Ray flies past them.
The air ripples behind it, faintly, but is of no consequence.

The Provost Edict fails to notice, so intent is he upon finishing his magic uninterrupted.
That is, until his back and lower body are abruptly seared away.

What's left of his body jerks forward, closer to the Rift and a look of rage, not pain, fills his face.
"Stupid girl! This..."
Flailing remnants of his tendrils snatch at fleeing pieces of violet energy.
"Is..."
His hands rush through a hurried series of motions, trying to hasten through the spell.
"On your head...!"
The spell is escaping. His control broken when his attention was shattered.
Running away. Twisting. Changing.
Another calamity is coming, but the shade won't be responsible this time, either.

He's already collapsing into the aether, spent and destroyed.

[Darkcomet]

The bullets get blocked by the barrier. Yay.

However...

Trent is, reasonably, forced to change his plan when the shadow-army attacks everyone. "You want some 'a this!?" ...are you serious, Trent? "Well you're not gettin' it!" Oh, so he does have some hint of sanity. That crystal, still in his hand, glows once again, and he starts...running the hell away. "I suggest everyone take note of my course of action!" I think that's his own way of saying 'RUN'.

[XtheYeti]

Richard is suddenly a 6'6 human male, muscle bound, tanned, with a 6 inch high spiky Mohawk. He is wearing a sleeveless trench coat, and black jeans. He quickly disassembles his sniper rifle and puts it away, then draws both his pistols, and begins firing into the army, while running up to Erin.

You have some sort of plan for all this?

[Gnrlshrimp]

The guardians turn to face their new foes, reloading and firing again at the beasties that approach them, before slowly starting to backstep away. They don't want to fight these beasties just yet, instead choosing to try and cluster closer together before engaging.

*****

Elsewhere, the white creation, sensing the new danger as it is fed information about the guardians' current situation, spins round in the air and pumps its wings, rushing off to provide assistance, if it can. Affidavit would rather not lose four of one of his rarer models of creation.

If their loss can be avoided, it will be.

I hope this means you've had adequate time to prepare, Edict... He thinks to himself, now planning on pulling all creations out of the area asap.

*****

Slythynia's eyes dart up to Oscar's as the sound of new foes rings around her. She groans And tries to grab Oscar and use him to pull herself up. Might catch him off guard since she does it so suddenly, but hopefully he won't fall over. "No time...can't waste any more time...healing." There's a pretty big hole in Sly's side, and blood is still slowly leaking out of it. "Need to help fight."

[The Bushranger]

Whether or not Mind-Mel's attention-getting works is an open question; however as Shadow-Mel attempts to engulf Erin, she finds the former(??) ghost girl's body surrounded by an almost-skintight, glittering emerald energy shield, as she seems to pay no attention whatsoever to the shadowy assault that makes the shield flare.

"Not this time," she answers Edict, in her scary, "Wraith" voice...as she reaches out with one hand and seems to be grasping something...

Clearly, she's using the somatic components, as it were, to grasp hold of Edict's spell.

And take control of it.

"I started this. And now, I will end it."

[happyturtle]

Oscar manages not to fall over, and then to help her to her feet. He's pretty sure they're both going to die here. Supposedly they'll be reborn in the demon world Cuthan. But he doesn't believe it, not really. Not when all his memories and instincts tell him death is the end. He gives Sly a quick, hard kiss, then faces the onslaught.

[Hawkeye]

Both parts of Melantha pause, sensing that Erin was going through an epic plot based moment and so they'll wait until that was over.

[Chaotic Bob]

Epic plot moment indeed.
Also epic Self Created Problem Again.

The lesser members of the Shadow Army have paused, looking up into the sky where Edict's spell rages wild.
The roadrunners, the cat-creatures.

The shade-magi, too, have paused and look up, though they are gazing with something beyond the awe the other watchers possess.
Calculated intent.

The bear-beasts and Nightwalkers sense a change, but ignore it. this is their chance, and they will seize it.
The shadow giants are content to divide their number among the party members, each lumbering over and kicking lesser creatures out of their paths.
Party members can expect similar action to be taken against them.

And the bears are just rushing the creations, charging with a wild, vicious abandon that cares not for the holes being blasted through their flesh, only desiring the destruction of their enemies.

Oddly, reinforcements have abruptly stopped arriving, as have the air-filling sounds of bloodlust.


As Erin reaches out for the spell she'll find that it has already grown and expanded into a shape most unusual for a typical spell. At its birth it had undoubtedly been understandable, perhaps basic to control. But with it's freedom it has spread as a fire over gasoline.

Erin must work for her control.
Must seize the fleeing arms of energy and reign in their effects. As it spreads and bonds with the Light and the Dark, drawing it back towards the Rift like ants to their hills.
For now, in these initial stages of the spell's escape, faint results can be seen.
The darkness is collapsing back into the Rift, but so is the light.

[XtheYeti]

Richard keeps firing as fast as he can.

[Gnrlshrimp]

The guardians shift position slightly, preparing themselves to receive the charge. One more volley of fire, then the weapons are discarded, thrown straight at the bears. It might not do much, but it's probably a better choice then simply dropping them.

Then, as the bears reach them, the guardians reveal why they carry no melee weapon. Their fists are...power fists, of a sort, designed to deal considerable damage with every punch. And the guardians can put a lot of force behind a punch, each of them striking mercilessly at the nearest foe.

*****

Any more information, Lord Professor?

Yes. The guardians are being attacked and there is no sign of Edict. Get a bloody move on and get them out of there!

Yes sir, Lord Professor! I should be there in about a minute or so. The white creation continues its high-speed journey through the air, determined to reach the guardian creations before they fall.

*****

Slythynia sways slightly, putting one arm around Oscar, as much to keep herself upright as it is a gesture of affection. "We...we'll be fine. I...promise you, we're not going...to die here. Not if I can help it." And suddenly Oscar and Slythynia are surrounded by no less than a dozen illusionary copies of themselves, all of which immediately turn to "attack" any shadow creatures coming for the two demons.

All except one. One illusionary pair starts running in the other direction, away from the madness. "If this doesn't work...I'm sorry."

[Darkcomet]

Trent continues his fleeing away from the Rift, now boosted in speed by the magi-crystal. I bet you were wondering what exactly he was doing, there, weren't you? But there you have it.

[The Bushranger]

"Light and dark, both two sides of the same coin, one's just the absence of the other so they're always tied together..."

Erin whispers to herself, it seems, almost nonsensically as she tightens her outstretched fists, her own shadow/Far/ghostly/normal magic reaching out and seizing hold of the Wild Spell, battling the outburst of raging energy and its collapse, and, essentially, trying to place the scene of the spell in a bubble of shimmering emerald ecto energy. That also happens to be transphasic in nature.

[Chaotic Bob]

Punching at the shadow-bears is akin to punching an enormous office stress toy (those little pink things that bend faintly like putty, yet retain their shape in the end), so it has effect, but a diluted one.
It appears that their particular Shadow has a faint resistance to blunt trauma. Or maybe they all do, or perhaps that's just the translation of a normal grizzly bear's thick hide and fat converted to Shadow.

Not to say it's completely ineffectual, it does bungle up their charge and devour some of their momentum.
Though it doesn't really stop them from hacking back, with their oddly substance-piercing claws.


Richard fires and fires, rounds passing through Nightwalkers, ripping off pieces of their substance, blasting holes in their limbs.
But these abominations seem even more resilient than the bears, and launch off a volley of cold rays just before they reach their targets.
This, namely, would be Richard and the Slythynia/Oscar clones.


There's a working tactic, imprisoning the spell.
She has to work fast and have a slightly more mutable shape than a sphere, but it's a wise tactic.
With little streams of magic flowing outwards, her containment field will have to adjust accordingly, but it shouldn't be insanely difficult.
Trying to seize the spell itself is less likely to have immediate success, though her efforts slow it down.

Meanwhile, the stage of the spell that Edict actually managed to complete has long since fallen into the Rift.
Thankfully, this isn't any apocalyptic effect, we have here.

Though it might seem like one.

All shadow-material begins abruptly flowing back towards the Rift, which includes the lesser shadow-monsters, and wisps of energy from the Nightwalkers and bears. Even the air seems to be growing lighter.

But then, that's because light is flowing back towards the Rift as well.
A void, a limbo for sight, it approaches.
Light and Darkness may be the same coin, but what is left when they are both gone, even if only briefly?

On the bright side, the Nightwalkers and bears seem to be fighting in semi-slow motion, all of a sudden.
Mel will likely suffer a similar effect.
Oscar will probably find this uncomfortable.

[XtheYeti]

Dyna enchanted Richards guns to be super effective against shadow people's and stuff...

[Darkcomet]

Trent continues running. His tactic appears to be one of the more effective ones!

[The Bushranger]

Erin really doesn't want to find out. Which is why she's working on trying to surround the local rift with her force-prison as well.

But she'll settle for merely trapping the spell.

Of coruse, she's completely forgotten about Mel's presence, being busy trying to stop the world from ending again.

[Chaotic Bob]

Richard's weapons are indeed being more effective than a typical firearm.
A simple bullet would not do so much against a giant, let alone one made of shadow.
And yet, there he is, blasting holes in their semi-corporeal bodies.

Surprisingly, the word is not in so much danger here, anymore.

The Rift can be encapsulated (which will require a significant expenditure on Erin's part we imagine, considering the size of the thing), and it will likely stop the light and dark devouring effect.
Yay.

This might take a moment, however, so it would be best that she clamp down on the wild magic first and those not fleeing for their lives fend off the slowed nasty things.

[XtheYeti]

Yay! More gun firing for Richard! (I thought that he was being infective. my bad.)

Richard keeps shooting shadow stuff and things...

[Gnrlshrimp]

Time to show off Slythynia's final trick.

Looking a little more steady on her feet now, she grins and charges into the fight, nimbly dodging the rays of cold fired at her.

Anyway, any attacks made at the illusions will, err, pass harmlessly right through them...

Slythynia runs up to the nearest nightwalker and lashes out once with her spikes, then seems to just stand there...

And then suddenly one of the illusions seems far more real when it strikes out at another nightwalker...

And then the next illusion and so on, but only ever one at a time, as Slythynia reveals her last little trick, namely being able to instantly switch places with her illusionary copies. Rather useful really, though she'll probably tire quite quickly since it's far from easy to do so.

*****

Hmm, so the guardians aren't going to stand much of a chance against these bears. Indeed, one of them already has a nasty hole in its arm, said arm hanging limply by its side.

Thankfully the white creation comes shooting into the scene, wings a blur as they flap frantically, then stopping as it plummets out of the sky towards one of the bears, spear in hand, magically enhanced so that it should be quite lethal against them, aimed to pierce straight through its head. The white creation's glow is looking a little dull now. It's probably used about half the juice in its magical battery, so to speak.

[happyturtle]

Oscar feels his own light being drawn into the rift, and fights it, hard. But yeah, it doesn't feel very nice. He does have an advantage though, in that the shadows from behind him that would otherwise slide over him on their way to the rift get absorbed by him instead, feeding him. Giving him more strength.

To make his attacks more effective, he maneuvers to be 'upstream' of the shadow beasties before he launches light at them, letting the rift accellerate his attacks.

[The Bushranger]

Wild magic first, rift second, indeed.

Erin's drawing on reserves she didn't know she had.
Still doesn't know, really, actually.
Might make her a bit weak afterwards.
Hm.

But for the moment, she concentrates on keeping the crazy-cat spell trapped in its magic bottle, while channeling her magic energy from her raised staff, arcing and crackling like some giant Tesla experiment to the not-quite-a-sphere holding the spell. Reinforcing it.

One could be forgiven for mistaking the scene, energy and container for the construct effects of a Green Lantern Ring.

[Chaotic Bob]

Richard fires, foes twitch with the shots, they're energy draws off into the rift, they fall.
The Nightwalkers are struggling to keep moving forward, destroy these impudent creatures, but between the devouring suction of the Rift and Richard's shots, movement has become difficult, if not downright impossible.
They're losing ground. Sliding back towards their own realm.

Slythynia plays opportunist, whether she notices or not, and flickers around with her illusory clones, inflicting further pain on the unwillingly retreating Nightwalkers.

Strange, gray fluids are covering the ground at this battle site, slowly dribbling back towards the Rift as well.

The white clone will have to adjust course for the sliding target, and perhaps it's slow-moving arm reaching up to swat it away.

And Oscar gets clever.
His strategy utilizes the environment perfectly and should in theory supply him with more than enough energy for this situation, as long as he doesn't try to fire at an angle that would pull his attacks off course.

Many Nightwalkers are outrighting collapsing at this point, full of holes, cuts, and light-based burns and punctures.


Up above, the spell continues to rage against its prison.
Briefly flaring in strength and it becomes more concentrated, growing inside a closed space.
This would be a worrying situation, undoubtedly, if not unlike fire, this very growth proved to be fatal.
In this situation, it has lost further space to expand into, forced to feed upon itself and become more erratic and chaotic.
Uncontrolled and unguided by a proper hand, the spell becomes more of destruction than growth. And just as an explosive burst of fire, it's time has become very limited.

Flashes of random colors, bizarrely amplified and muted sounds, even strange scents have become present. Erin contains the spell, but somewhere, the senses are finding connections to the spell in its dying throes.

The Rift increases it's pull on the darkness.
As far as a status report goes, the dusklands have rapidly diminished in size and continue to do so, leaving a dead desert behind in it's wake.

[The Bushranger]

Erin finds her breath growing short, as she concentrates with her full measure of energy on maintaining the spell's prison just a little longer. Just a little...longer...

She doesn't let up, but that means her body, having consumed all reserves, now finds itself having to metabolise muscle and other "vital" resources, not fat or other "ordinarily expendable" resources, to keep up the massive energy burn.

Odds are she's only one or two postsminutes from passing out from sheer burnout...

[Gnrlshrimp]

Slythynia keeps up her assault, not even thinking about what's going on, just doing everything she can to keep herself, and Oscar, alive.

*****

The white creation pulls out of its dive, instead deciding instead to use up more of its limited magic and unleash a hail of small magical bolts at the things attacking the guardians.

Individually those bolts of magic won't do much, but there's a lot of them. Kinda looks like one of those silly fifty million missiles flying at your face attacks...you know the sort of thing I mean.

[The Bushranger]

((It's a Macross Magic Missile Massacre (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MacrossMissileMassacre)!!))

[Gnrlshrimp]

((Blah blah blah, whatever. I don't care what it's called, all that matters is the stupid number of things being fired at the other things! :smalltongue:))

[happyturtle]

Oscar's doing the same thing he did in his last post. And he'll continue doing that until conditions change on the ground.

[Chaotic Bob]

And so here we are.

The Nightwalkers are losing ground.
The active members of the party are pushing them back, and the Rift is pulling.

The Rift is shrinking, pulling in the Dusklands and nearby light and dark.

The Wild Magic is strangling itself.

Save for the Rift's absorption of light and dark, the situation is looking up.
Erin could even release the spell and watch it vanish like a puff of flame.
The Nightwalker assault is failed, the other shadow beings have retreated.
The mages who lurked about, merely watching the scene, they are no longer present.

Edict was discorporated and his plan here failed.

The lure of the Rift is growing, however. Light and Dark fleeing within ever faster.
Yet, it shrinks, at an equally accelerated rate.

[Gnrlshrimp]

Sensing this might be a good time to get out of here, the white creation dives down to the guardians, and with the last of its magical power, attempts a group teleport. Hopefully nothing will interrupt it, it doesn't have enough left over to do this more than once.

*****

Meanwhile...

The rift's continued devouring of light and darkness has not been missed by Slythynia, and the increased speed at which the stuff is being drawn in worries her. She stops her mad assault on the shadow creatures, shifting to replace the illusion nearest Oscar.

Oscar uses light...

And all the light is being sucked in.

Hopefully, it won't do anything too bad to him, but just in case...

She runs towards him, intending to grab him, throw him over one shoulder, and keep on running. She apologises as she tries to do this, "It's sucking in all the light...don't know what that'll do to you...don't want to know...we can leave now anyway."

[happyturtle]

:smalleek: Oscar was not expecting that. Slythynia succeeds and carries him off, but he doesn't respond to her apology or explanation.

Possibly because she knocked the wind out of him when she flung him over her shoulder.

[Gnrlshrimp]

And Slythynia just keeps running and running...

She doesn't stop until they're clear, and as she runs, one by one, the illusionary copies she left behind fade and disappear. Hopefully the rest of the group can deal with that little resistance remains, the only thing she cares about now is making sure the pull of the rift doesn't do anything nasty to Oscar.

And she'll only stop running once they're clear of the dusklands...

[The Bushranger]

Erin, meanwhile, has run out of juice.

And drops to her knees on the ground, burying her face in her hands as her constructectocontainmentsphere dissolves.

[Chaotic Bob]

As Erin collapses and her magic fails, the Wild Magic flares outwards, viciously spreading into the surrounding air, like a match throw on gasoline.

But it has lost all sustainability, devoured in the roiling chaos it inflicted on itself while it was contained.
As it flares outwards, the middle point fades into the air and decays outwards. The explosion dissolves quicker than it spreads, resulting in nothing more than a showy flash of lights and oddly frosty air, before nothing is left.

Surrounding the Rift is nothing.
The conflicting pull of Light and Dark pulls an ugly trick on most forms of vision, which will likely leave most rather blind, while in the zone or looking at it.
This may or may not include Erin.

The monsters' presences seems to have faded or is rapidly fading, similar to the colorlessness of the landscape.
The bright side to a magical catastrophe is the potential for complete reparation after the problem has been corrected.

This area will never be entirely the same as it was, but it will be better than now.

[The Bushranger]

Erin is, at the moment, crumpled on the ground - or more precisely on one knee, retching, as she suffers a magical backlash of her own.

She's not seeing anything, blinded or not.