warforged | your hands protect the flames

Entry tags:

your hands protect the flames

Who: The Dragonsworn
What: The first arrival of the Dragonsworn goes a bit...awry.
Where: Scattered around the perimeter of Suramar.
When: Dawn on March 21st
Warnings: Please PM the mods if any warnings are needed

It is almost as if you've woken from a daydream when the ground meets your feet. The stench of fire is overpowering, and though dawn is just approaching in the canopies of Kalimdor, bright flashes of green can be seen between the branches of impossibly tall trees. If that doesn't snap you out of your surprise, then the sound of nearby spitting in demonic tongue may persuade you to get a grip and notice your surroundings -- you are not alone. There are others like you, huddled just a bit too close, with a somewhat familiar face keeping you from advancing further. Looking down at your hands may briefly reveal a momentary flash of color, but nothing lasting more than a few seconds.

The mages of each flight take the helm of their charges, and they are quick to notice any movement from their groups despite channeling some sort of spell to keep you protected. Stray fire will bounce off an invisible shield that ripples when anything make contact with it. There seems to be nothing in sight but your new comrades, and your guardian -- at least not on the ground. The sky has flying demons swarming a pack of dragons -- and the dragons are very clearly losing. Look just a bit farther, and you might find more dragons, though these clearly have different colored scales than the ones above your head.

While distracted, you may hear your guardian speak to you. "There may yet be wounded nearby -- if you care to, bring them here, and we will tend to them from the Sanctum." Briefly, they gesture skyward, toward the dragons flying overhead. "Do not bring to us any that are not our own, lest you invite their demise!"

But the mage is focused on casting -- they are in no position to halt your advance, and they know it. They speak with concern -- concern for you, concern for the dire situation at hand. The demonic cackling is drawing near. The forests are rapidly becoming overrun, and there are already a few dragons slain on the forest floor.

"Take care, Dragonsworn -- I am bringing us to safety, but it will take time. To wander far is to invite your ruin, and we cannot afford the loss of your life."

[OOC: You are free to mingle on this post as you choose, despite the flight groups being scattered through the forests around Suramar -- after this log, you will be separated into your sanctums, and your interactions will be watched much more closely. Attempting to enter the city itself will result in a vicious attack from demons that will kill. The Dragon Mages will be tagging sporadically to heroes of their matching flight, and the conclusion of this log will lead Dragonsworn through portals to their Sanctums.]

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"No, and I don't have any items with me to help either. But we have to do something and that's the only idea I have. I don't think we can take on all those monsters by ourselves."

Again, one or two, sure. An army? Noooot so much.

"Let's get down there furst. Maybe we can figure something out."

"If we have to haul it, we have to haul it!" Mar said philosophically. "It wouldn't be the first time."

Welp! If they were on the same team, best to be prepared! With a quick gesture, Mar placed the Blessing of Kings on the pair of them, augmenting their strength in the hopes that it could make up for some of the weakness he felt. Then, without hesitation, he slung his shield free, drew his mace, and advanced towards the fallen dragon as if this were the most normal thing in the world.

"Right!" Reassured by her new teammate's can-do attitude and somehow... bolstered by a force she didn't really understand, Nepeta resumed her slinking towards the dragon, focused completely on the task at hand as she tried to figure out the best way to go about this.

She was, however, interrupted by movement from the forest. A small squad of five little cackling creatures came bounding forward towards the fallen dragon, their intent quite obviously malevolent. Nepeta bounded towards them.

"No you-"

And abruptly reappeared behind the whole group, facing their backs.

"Don't?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa! ALWAYS LET ME PULL THEM!"

Mar charged forward as fast as his legs could carry him, hurling his shield as he did. It blurred into a golden disc of light, bouncing from one of the imps into a pair of its friends before returning to the paladin's arm as if guided. "If they attack you, run this way!"

"I didn't mean to do that!"

Pause.

"Whatefur it is I did!"

Seriously what the hell, since when could she teleport? She's not a space player. Still, it's kind of cool. Maybe she could do it again?

No sooner had she thought it than she was suddenly warping around the battlefield, slashing imps one after another as though it was second nature. It only lasted a few seconds, but wow, the rush.

"W-wow... he wasn't kidding about unlocking potential..."

"Argh, this is just like every dungeon ever! They are going to claw you!"

Maridian would not let that happen. Practically diving into the middle of the fray, he let holy energy explode out of him, its brilliant radiance blasting each of the little imps. The energy's blessed purity did more than harm the creatures, though -- it burned at their insides, leaving them unable to do anything but howl for a few seconds.

Putting the time to good use, he smashed his mace into the nearest one, sounding forth a ringing chime as force cascaded around him and through the others. "Are you okay?"

"Fine, fine! I'm just... trying to use these new powers but I don't know how!"

Which, in retrospect, kind of made sense, after all it wasn't like she'd received any training. "I don't even know how I'm doing any of this!"

She spun around to jab her claws as one of the other nearby ones, her left hand moving faster than her right for reasons she couldn't account for.

"Well, I'm no rogue trainer, but I know a few things about causing harm to foes." By this time the demons had recovered from the ravages of his spell, but thanks to the righteous fury that coursed through him and infused his every blow, they had clearly abandoned the young whatever-she-was as a far lesser threat to focus on slaying the paladin. He was in his element now, ducking behind his shield to block their blows. "I have their attention, and you're not going to be able to get it back easily, so you have some luxury to practice now!"

Taking enemies down while they focused on a bigger, more intimidating threat was something she was very familiar with (thank you Equius), so she just nodded in response and moved behind one of them to begin slashing like a whirlwind.

Striking from behind seemed to greatly amplify the strength of her attacks, to the point where the imp she was after dropped to the ground dead after only a few swipes. Her plan made for her, essentially, she moved up behind another one and went to work, dicing and slicing like some sort of living blender.

For his own part, Mar had fallen into the easy routine of slash, spell, slash, throw shield, slash, judge, and occasionally slamming an imp out of nowhere with his shield. Between the two of them, these little demons had little hope.

"These were the weakest footsoldiers of the Legion," Mar warned her as the last one fell. "Anything larger, in this fight, might be too much. Be careful, and if we attract something too dangerous, run while I guard the retreat."

"I thought they seemed a bit wimpy. We'd better get the dragon inside fast befur something stronger gets here then."

Bounding back over to the dragon's side, she placed a hand on its chin and began to carefully shake. "Wake up, please! We're here to help you!"

She had no idea what the odds of this actually working were, but she figured she could at least try before they moved onto trying to drag it. Even if all it could do was limp that would be better than they would be able to pull off.

Mar had built up a reserve of holy energy during that fight -- now he gestured with one hand, discharging it all into the dragon as one healing burst.

Then, assuming that wouldn't do anything but clot the wounds, he moved to the dragon's head, lifted that up, then began eeling his way beneath its long neck to its torso. "I remember the days when everything just went into your backpack, nice and neat. But now, everything's complicated!" he grumbled as he planted his shoulders in the dragon's sternum and forced its torso off the ground with the strength of his back and legs.

"I don't think you could efur put a dragon in a backpack... or a sylladex even."

She'd kind of liked to have tried that, but the dragon was probably too big. As it was, she stared briefly at him actually succeeding in lifting a freaking dragon before she ran over to start helping, moving behind him to give a little extra lift so they could start pulling.

Growls emanated from the forest and she grimaced in its direction. "I think something noticed we killed those little ones."

"You'd be surprised. They fit in mailboxes, you know."

Really, he had less of a 'lift' and more of a 'prop the torso off the ground' going here. The hindquarters still dragged as he put his back into walking, but it was easier going than if he'd just grabbed the thing by the nose and pulled. "If they catch up, get to me. It wouldn't be the first time I had to stop hauling a large object around because of an attack. In fact, I think the higher powers of existence generally hate anyone carrying a large object around, the same as they hate anyone traveling with another person."

This was a power of mailboxes Nepeta had been completely unaware of, and now she wished she could talk to Terezi about it.

She nodded at his instructions. "Okay. You draw their attention while I claw them down furrom behind, right?" She was getting used to this plan of attack quite quickly, she thought. Ambush seemed like a great plan in general.

"You've grasped the basics quite admirably. And, uh, try to avoid Shadowstepping to the enemies when they're at range. That usually means they start clawing you instead of me, and I think we'd both rather have me taking the injuries here than you."

His ability to deliver this mini-speech while dragging a dragon was testament to his stamina more than his strength.

"Shadowstepping? Oh, that must be what they call popping up behind the enemy like that, right? I'm not sure I can control that yet... the last time it just happened beclaws I wanted to be close so I could deal with them. I guess I'll try to avoid wanting that too hard until I get it under better control."

She didn't really question the name. It was pretty obvious, really, being able to appear in the enemy's shadow. Of course it didn't work so well if the shadow was in front of the enemy rather than behind them, but maybe you could use something else's shadow? She could really use a full briefing on this sort of thing.

"That would probably be a good idea." She'd at least grasped this concept pretty quickly, unlike some people who cheerfully charged on ahead and then blamed him for their inevitable woundings. "Also, while I'd appreciate you not trying this while helping me haul a giant reptile around, you'll probably find that when enemies aren't engaging you, you can sneak around them fairly effectively."

That would, in her opinion, qualify someone for the "complete tactical idiot" title.

"I see. Even when there shouldn't be anything I can hide in?" Sneaking and pouncing at opportune moments were things she was intimately familiar with, but usually one needed things like cover.

Mar nodded, failing to consider whether or not she could see the gesture when his head was somewhere underneath a dragon. "Stay out of large flares and you'll be fine."

They passed beneath the shield at last, and with a groan, Mar practically let the dragon flop, then crawled out from beneath it, breath coming in heavy pants. "What's following us?" he said between breaths. "How's the shield holding?"

"There doesn't seem to be much behind-"

And in the middle of her sentence, a roar from the forest announces the arrival of a pit lord, clomping out onto the battlefield and looking around for something, probably the dragon they just dragged to safety.

She gulped.

"Um. On second thought, there's defurnitely something down there. It's huge, it's got four legs and a huge bladed weapon, its face looks like it's mostly teeth..."

"Oh. That's wonderful. Here's the plan."

He picked himself up, one hand resting on the wounded dragon's side for support. Why was he so tired?

"You get back to safety with the others, where they're gathering the portal."

That was it. That was the plan.

"Wait what?"

That was her immediate reaction. She turned to him, jaw agape.

"You aren't seriously planning to fight that thing! Espurrcially not on your own!"

Mar shook his head. "Define 'planning'. My hope is that the shield will stay up and prevent it from getting in and attacking. If it falls, that's when I stand honorably at this dragon's side and attempt to save its life."

"Throwing your life away won't help it! You're no match fur that thing-"

Her aggravation suddenly evaporated as an idea suddenly came to her. She looked back over her shoulder at the group. It wasn't that far, really.

"Alone..."

The shield had to hold long enough for this at least. She turned and dropped to all fours, bolting back towards the portal, eyes narrowed in determination. All she had to do was make it to the group and back with reinforcements before that thing made its way past the shield.

"I'll be back fur you! Don't you dare die while I'm gone!"

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