[ OPEN ] you seem so out of context

[crimsonpride]

Who: Asch and You!
What: Asch relearns old skills and practices new ones
Where: Near Silverglen
When: Mid afternoon to early evening
Warnings: None

Fire has never been Asch's strong point. Manipulating Ice always came more natural to him, and swordplay more naturally than that. A unused skill is a wasted skill, though, and Asch despises waste. He's found himself a nice patch of rocky ground not far from Silverglen, something difficult to set ablaze. His skill of choice for today: Dragonbreath.

He's relieved to find he doesn't actually need to breathe fire. The familiar motions of casting artes are much more comfortable for him, and he's using them to end the lives of the scraggly bushes around him. He's found that practice can come in two varieties, this way--for every bush he sets on fire, he switches back to a more familiar arte and calls jagged blades of ice down on the flames. Before long scorched patches of earth and clusters of still melting ice surround him in equal measure.

He practices, and he practices hard. It forces him to take multiple breaks, leaving him increasingly cranky each time he does. Even so, he can tell that he's making good progress and doesn't leave him looking unapproachable--especially not when he finally allows himself to sit down and have a simple dinner.

Comments

[crimsonpride]

Now that's a new sound, and an unmistakable one at that. Asch pauses, leaving his most recent victim burning for the time being. It's hard for him to track where where the source of the new sounds has gone while whatever it was is still so difficult to spot, but he doesn't think it's managed to get behind him. He tracks his gaze carefully back and forth across the tress in front of him, but he doesn't expect to find his target based on sight alone.

"I know you're here." His voice comes out firm and just a little angry sounding; if he can't see his visitor, maybe he can intimidate her into showing herself.

[venombite]

"Yes, and?" From the trees somewhere, is a young voice of someone maybe in their early teens, female and distinctly wary. She's almost certain he can't actually see her, and if she keeps moving, wings carefully tucked, holding onto branches carefully, he might not be able to find her. "If you're expecting me to come out, after you've been burning bushes and then freezing them all about, you must think I'm pretty stupid."

After all if he can do it to a bush he could probably try it out on her. It's fairly reasonable for such a young sounding voice, but it may not make Asch's brittle temper any better.

[crimsonpride]

Before Cynder speaks, Asch's gaze is fixated somewhere far to her right. After her voice sounds out he manages to zero in a little better, this time setling his gaze somewhere a little to her left instead. She sounds young, whoever she is, which doesn't do much to reassure him. Anise and Arietta are both young, too, and Asch wouldn't want to take either of them in a fight unexpectedly.

"I could just set the whole forest on fire instead." Which he absolutely will not do; Alexstraza would eat him alive, maybe even literally. The important thing is that he doesn't think Cynder knows that. "Or you could prove that you're not here to try to sneak into the Sanctum." The red flight might be open to visitors from the others, but Asch has no intention of leading someone that might not even be Dragonsworn back to his home.

[venombite]

She keeps moving. Staying still is unwise, it gives a fixed position. Nor is her path straight-line enough where it might be easy to guess she's heading left or right. Malefor's teaching hadn't faded with his power, and she still remembered how to avoid being easily tracked. Asch is not going to find her easily.

As he's armed and has significant literal firepower at his disposal, that's probably for the best for Cynder. "Go ahead," is the response, sharp. "There's some people not so far from here who'd love to have an excuse to use all their weapons." She has no idea he's even a dragonsworn, never mind what flight he's beholden to! But she does know there's guards lurking and that they're more than happy to put their weapons to use.

She moves on, cautiously creeping into the welcoming boughs of a towering oak. She could leave, but she's... not going to. What if he was serious about trying to set fire to the forest? She'd have to at least try to stop him.. "And anyway, what Sanctum? Is that where all the purple people keep coming from?"

No those are night elves, that's a different kettle of fish.

[crimsonpride]

Whoever she is, she's both fast and good. Asch can barely keep track of her, pinpointing her previous location just in time for her to speak up from her new one. It's frustrating, but fortunately for both of them it takes up too much of his focus for him to try to vent that frustration.

"The Ruby Sanctum." That's something he probably shouldn't share so readily, but between himself, Luke, and Zelos he's heard so many jokes about his hair color and corresponding flight that his instinct is to head off the inevitable joking query before she has a chance to make it. He's not to worried about her knowing his place of residence, though--especially not when she just said something pretty revealing herself.

"No. Those are the elves from Sin'thalas." Or one of the other cities, perhaps, but Asch isn't about to list them all off. "If you didn't know that you must have only just arrived in this world."

[venombite]

"They don't exactly hand out maps back home."

And home was now a turbulent lava pit. She didn't mind it so much. Did other Flights get maps? She wanted one now, just so she had a better idea of where she was beyond her cautious searching flights. Dodging demons had gotten her lost already once, but luckily she'd stumbled across a hunting party of her own sort and just followed them back to the Obsidian Sanctum. If she did have a map, she'd know they were far indeed from Sin'thalas, and the purple folk likely from Silverglen proper. But she doesn't, and the name is filed away to be investigated later.

But 'Ruby Sanctum' meant red dragonflight. She's certain the blackflight and redflight were not friends. There was a way to reach it nearby, then. That might be worth finding out. She hadn't really had any intention of trying to find the ways to other Sanctums, but maybe it would be useful information sooner or later. "Is everyone from there as violent and fond of destroying random bushes as you are?"

Would reporting the location of a way to get to the Ruby Sanctuary gain some sort of reward? She settles on a limb carefully, thinking hard.

[crimsonpride]

"Tch." Well, at least now he knows for sure she isn't from the Red Flight--which unfortunately does little to narrow things down. He already knows that he's not going back home until he's sure he's lost whoever this is, though. He'll spend the night in Silverglen if he has to.

"Someone from another Flight would have picked a closer target." Asch won't deny that he's violent, but he's gone out of his way to avoid setting anything important on fire. The implication (imagined or otherwise) that he's not being careful rankles just a bit.

[venombite]

"Really? How much do you know about the other Flights?" This time a little to the left, and curious sounding.

She's not going too far. Cynder didn't know if his threat had been genuine, but she was going to make sure it wasn't.. and then possibly see where he might wander off to over time. Probably somewhere burnt to the ground or half frozen given what he'd already done to this place. "I've been told the Redflight all but worships life, and here you are destroying it. Why? Are you trying to pretend to be redsworn, and really belong elsewhere?"

Her tone never slides into accusatory, or even anger. She didn't yet understand what led a being to one group or another, and so far what she'd seen of Asch (bad temper, tendency towards destruction) made it seem like maybe he actually was blacksworn and just pretending otherwise. Why?

[crimsonpride]

Again, Asch swings his gaze over to where he guesses Cynder to be. He's given up on actually hoping to locate her, but he's not about to let her get behind him if he can help it. The question is a good one, and that Asch hasn't really given much thought it. Maybe he should be nicer to the bushes... but ultimately, in his mind, the answer is simple.

"Because if I didn't practice on these I wouldn't be any use in a fight." It's a rather unfair estimation of himself, but he feels like it's valid point. "I can't protect life if I can't even hit a target."

[venombite]

That draws a snort. A little higher up this time.

"You could have decided to practice on a rock, or already cut down logs, or even a stuffed piece of clothing shaped like a person, but you chose live bushes. You don't need to burn or freeze a forest to hit a target. Unless you're planning on fighting shrubs in the future this is kind of pointless killing. It sure won't help against a moving target."

She didn't see a point in destroying things for no real reason, and practice didn't count. There were lots of other things to attack for a good workout! "If you're Blacksworn, I won't tell anyone you're here, but you don't have to pretend."

[crimsonpride]

"I'm not Blacksworn." Asch doesn't sound particularly offended by the implication--just a little aggrieved by the whole situation. Asch doesn't want to talk about himself and pointedly ignores the question of morality when it comes to using poor defenseless bushes as target practice.

"And what about you?" He lifts his gaze up higher, once again making as close of a guess as he can as to Cynder's location. "Unless you're a terrible liar you aren't from Red, but you certainly sound like it."

[venombite]

Spyro, she's almost certain, would try to drive Asch back to wherever he came from before more burning and freezing can happen. Well.. Cynder wasn't about to attack someone with skills she was uncertain of. Even if he was practicing, which suggested he wasn't as good at them as he might want her to think.

"No. I've only met one red dragon before, and he's far, far away." Ignitus would probably not be thrilled about the burning shrubs either. All dragons were guardians, weren't they? "I guess I was just raised better than that." Which is truthfully as bald-faced a lie as one can EVER get, as Cynder was raised by an evil monster dedicated to wiping out all life on the planet, but she's not mentioning that part. Nor is she mentioning that she only cared because she was certain her brother would have. "If all you're interested in is target practice, you should find something else as a target. There's plenty of rocks and I'm sure you can find a fallen over tree or a demon or something."

[crimsonpride]

Asch's shoulders slump just a little--in tired annoyance, not defeat. He's sick of getting hassled by his invisible visitor over a bunch of shrubbery. The thought of just walking away and finding a different patch of ground to terrorize, but he waves it away. He doesn't want to try to retreat until he can be sure he won't get jumped on the way out.

"There are worse targets to use than bushes." He knows a lot of people wouldn't have bothered finding a less flammable part of the forest to practice in, but he doesn't feel like comparing himself to hypothetical somebodies--especially not out loud. "All you're doing is being annoying." He makes a sharp chopping gesture with his hand as he speaks. "If you're not going to show yourself, then go away and bother someone else."

Cause that's... totally going to work.

Sorry for the huge delay, got sick. :(

[venombite]

Attacked as he tries to leave? No. But she probably would follow him. Almost certainly, in fact. If there was trouble, Cynder wanted to know where it was. "And there are better ones," her disembodied voice says crossly. "You should be thinking of improvements, not ways to make things worse. What kind of redsworn are you?"

Maybe he really was a Black! That was okay, but still...

"And I'm not going away. Not while you're busy threatening to burn down a forest. I'm your new invisible friend." She can match annoyance with annoyance very easily. Spyro would want to make sure things stay safe too. She might not really genuinely worry about the woods, but she knew it was something a dragon should be doing. Protect the natural world, keep people from rampaging all over.. right?