NPF Avatars IV, Chapter III: The Sphinx on the Doorstep

[Arhra]

The sphinx, perched above the massive, vine thread, obdurate structure of the temple's gate, openly sighed at the various speaking going on. "They really don't pay me enough for this crap." she muttered to herself.

Straightening, she replied to Flare's query, "I was hired here to act as gatekeeper to the Earth Temple by the Concordant Sodality. Those who wish to enter the temple are asked my riddle. Any attempt to answer the riddle constitutes a verbal contract that you understand and accept the outcomes of failure, which were stated at that time. Should you refuse to comply, the Sevenfold Compact empowers me to enforce the contractual obligations imposed by said verbal agreement by any means I deem necessary." The slightly glazed look the sphinx had and smooth monotone definitely suggested it was a rote phrase that she had just rattled off.

Pausing to consider Phoenix's statement and subsequent threat, the sphinx seemed to stare into space, as if reading something off an invisible screen. "On closer inspection of the contract, you are correct. As the correct response to the riddle was given before you answered, your words were of no consequence. However, I am obliged to follow through with the enforcement of the riddle's failure clause on your companion. I'll keep to my previous offer of just a mauling though. Hand the green skinned one over," the sphinx indicated Newb just to be clear, "and you're all free to enter."

What was Arhra doing during this important decision making time you ask? Why, aside from trying to decide if 'feet' was a valid answer to the riddle as well as parallel speculation on whether 'teeth' really had been the right thing to say, given the sphinx's cryptic statement, she was doing nothing at all.

[Dragonsbane]

Dragonsbane levitated Stylugg into the air, placed him down before the sphinx, and marched through the door with a swish of black robes, humming softly.

"Mauve, what do you know of this Earth Temple?" he looked back at the other mage as he spoke.

[Tarrin]

"Oh" Tarrin looked a little abashed at his actions, Fear wasnt one of his normal reactions, However seeing a sphinx wasn't a normal day in his life either.
Sure some of the NPFer's could take some awe inspiring forms, But this was a living breathing creature of legend and that took some getting used to.

Tarrin did take something away from the encounter however and he couldn't wait to see if it would work.

[Mauve Mage]

Mauve prepared for the fight that was bound to ensue.... At least, she did until she noticed the sphinx's pearly white, very pointy teeth and crescent-moon shaped retracting claws. She looked over at her companions, but they were already drifting inside. Fight the sphinx alone..? The stories of the sphinx's annoying habit of eating young women and unfortunate adventurers popped into her mind.

"Well, have fun, New Treefolk!" Mauve chirped to Syttulg. "I have the utmost faith in your abilities to kick her ass. I'd help but... ummmm... Dragonsbane is calling me, and you know what happens when you ignore an Archmage with violent tendencies." She waved a hand apologetically, as though she had no control over the situation.

Thus saying, she jogged over to the Archmage who was already halfway through the door.

"Mauve, what do you know of this Earth Temple?" he looked back at the other mage as he spoke.

"This particular Earth Temple?" Mauve echoed. She chewed her lower lip for a moment, thinking. "Not much, I'll admit. I certainly didn't expect sphinxes to be involved. I'd always heard it was more of a 'populated by living statues and golems and spiders crafted of rock and lava' sort of place."

She smiled grimly, thinking about this.

"Speaking of which," she said, "I've been trying to figure out what spells would be effective against a stone creature. You wouldn't happen to have any suggestions, would you?"

[The Wizard Who Did It]

A hand, black with dirt and soot, reached out and grabbed the shoulder of the blond haired Mauve Mage.

“Well, stone creatures are fickle little things. There‘s many things that you can use to kill them, such as water spells, possibly by freezing the water as it seeps into the crack and crevices to break the monster‘s body, wind, and possibly even gravity. But I‘ve found one method that works the best. Simply put, pure and point blank annihilation.”

The man now standing behind Mauve was the Wizard Who Did It, of course. However, he was almost unrecognizable. Blood drenched his once fine brown cloak and dripped down his light brown hair, washing away the soot and filth that covered his face, hands, and angelic wings. His garment also had burn marks here and there, as well as small bullet sized holes here and there. Overall, he looked like he just got back from a war.

“So, it seems that you all have started the slaughter without me.”

[Toastburner B]

"Something that involved not killing everyone in 300 square miles would be a nice bonus, DB." Toastburner added dryly, walking quickly away from Newb. Toast was digging around in the pockets of his lab coat, trying to find anything he could pass off as a weapon. "Blast it, I could of sworn I left at least one death ray in this coat." TB muttered, keeping an eye on Raiden who had, in the past, had killed Toast in the hopes that he would respond as a more helpful form.

His search proving fruitless, TB sighed, and pulled out a roll of duct tape and a pocket knife. "Fine, I guess I'll just have to improvise a weapon. Does anyone have a ballpoint pen?"

Then Twiddy appeared, and did, if TB's experience with the two was any indication, a nigh suicidal act.

"Hiya, Twiddy. Would you mind standing over that so that when Mauve goes ballistic on you, I don't get caught in the shockwave? Thanks."

[Mauve Mage]

The mage spun as the hand grabbed her shoulder. She half-expected it to be the sphinx, or some denizen of the Earth Temple, but instead she found herself staring at a ragged-looking Wizard.

"Sheez, you scared me!" Mauve scolded him. She looked him up and down, her dark blonde eyebrows raising.

"Man, what happened to you?" she asked. She stared at him again, and after a moment a wry smile spread across her face.

"This isn't the result of a failed 'dropping-bridges-on-ladies'-houses' stunt, is it?"

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris looked at the Sphinx.

He gulped audibly; thinking games were never his forte. He decided to step back, and let them do the thinking.

'Heh, coward.'

'What part of leaving him alone don't you understand?'

Fenris had realized that he hadn't heard the voices with his ears, and decided to ponder the matter more.

[The Wizard Who Did It]

Oh, you think you’re so clever, don’t you, little girl? Oh hush, you inane jackass. The Wizard grinned slightly at the little joke. Sadly, the smile was quickly wiped off his face when he remembered what immediately came after the infamous bridge dropping. He coughed lightly, and then proceeded to speak,

“No, it was not because of a failed bridge dropping. It’s actually quite a long story.” Not really. “It is a tale filled with excitement.” Okay, it definitely isn’t that. “It would be quite an enjoyable tale, but it’s length begs that I do not repeat it.” Again, it really isn’t that long… unless… god no. “But, if you insist, I will with great dismay tell you the epic story.” You’re a fuggin’ liar. You know that, right?
___________________
The room was dark. The air still. Soundless abyss in a small crevice of the world. Broken by a flash. Light streaming down toward the ground. A rush of wind, a dull thud.

Another flash of light, the arrow came down. The Wizard’s face was illuminated. His fair face, light brown hair that feel gently across his brow and illuminating blue eyes shone threw the night air. A quick movement to the left, leaving a hazardous mistake barely avoided.

More flashes. The Wizard‘s Pearly white clothing that matched his large angelic wings was clearly visible. The arrows dropped quickly toward the ground. A step forward, a jump back, a couple shifts to the sides. Barely succeeded.

The flashes were speeding up. The arrows were falling rapidly. A quick step forward, to the side, the other side, forward, back, forward… It became a dance. A merry jaunt where a single wrong move could spell absolute failure.

As the flashes sped up, the Wizard noticed something out of the corner of his eye. Fur as pale as sleet bounding across the now illuminated room. Damnit… not now… Before the Wizard could resist, could stop the oncoming attack, the canine figure had leaped into the air, pressing his minute paws on the Wizard’s chest. He quickly lost his balance, arching backward as he fell toward the ground. A flicker in his eyes told that another arrow had come down. He had missed. He had failed.

Through the still air, a voice, not unlike that of an announcer at some game in energy and echo, was heard, “I won’t forget your dancing.”

The Wizard reached up and turned off the PS2. He kicked his DDR pad out of the way, sending it flying into the plant-like wall of his house. Damn. Stupid dog, I was going for a high score. You do realize how sad that is, right? The Wizard sighed lightly, and looked at what the puppy, Charon, wanted. Clenched in the dog’s jaws was a letter, presumably mailed to the Wizard himself. He let loose another sigh, and reached for the letter. The puppy growled a little, warding off his approaching hand, when he heard a knock echo through his house. With a third sigh, the angelic figure spoke mournfully, “Damnit, hope it’s not that girl again looking for apprenticeship. I swear, if she comes around one more time…”

And with that, the Wizard arrived at the door. He opened it cautiously, carefully. He didn’t know what awaited on the outside of the door, but he was careful not to gain it’s ire. When the hatchway had finally opened, the Wizard something of interest in his eyesight. There was the usual vine-like ramp leading to his house, and the usual endless plains with a far off forest covering a far off city. The grass was green, the sky was blue, the clouds were pale, the dew was new.

Only slightly out of the ordinary was a large group of people, ranked and filed and standing at perfect attention, wearing greenish clothes and possibly have rifles in their arms. The Wizard released his fourth sigh of the morning, and called out in a slow and bored voice, “Goddamnit, this is a house in the middle of goddamn nowhere. Obviously I don’t want any solicitors.”

With that, he slammed his door shut. He crossed his opening hallway and sat himself down at his table. He wiped the parchments and spells of his table before giving a sharp whistle. An ivory bullet streaked past his eyes and again tackled him to the floor. He reached up, lightly picked up Charon and gently removed the letter from its mouth. Without getting off the floor, he read the letter slowly. “Apocalypse, huh?”

He quickly got up and assembled his gear. Walking through his armory, he swept his eyes past the rows of crimson phoenix blood, ignored the navy blue magic potions, and instead picked up his usual brown cloak and ebony black katana. He attached the katana to his side, and slung the cloak over his shoulder, heading toward the door. It was then that he heard another knock, so he sped up his pace. Te door swung open before he got to it, but he still didn’t see anybody there. Well, except for those goddamn solicitors. He called out to them while swinging the cloak over his shoulders, “Goddamnit, go home already!”

“Um, Mr. Did It, we are here-”

“I really don’t care right now. I have to be someplace real soon.”

“Uh, we have orders to-”

“1.”

“And we really need to-”

“2.”

“Why, Sir, are you counting?”

The Wizard released his fifth sigh at this moment. He didn’t know what these people wanted, and he didn’t care anymore. He had places to be, and things to do. He stood a while in concentration, his hand beneath his cloak glowing a deep blood red. He didn’t hear precisely what was said by the filthy humans in front of him, but it seemed mighty clear that their intentions weren’t good. What, with the aiming of the rifles and all. The Wizard charged forward, as the sky turned black and started raining hellfire upon the soldiers.
_______________
“And then I proceeded to beat the crap out of the soldiers.” The Wizard ended, in a highly dramatic. No one knows how much time had passed since he began recounting the tale, but it seemed that they had made it quite a way through the entrance by the time it was over. The Wizard bowed, assuming that he had told a long epic poem of great delight to his listeners.

[Flarecobra]

I sighed. "If there's any place that I'm going to be at my weakest, it'd be here, or a water temple.....I mean, Water for the obvious fact, though Earth......it's my elemental weakness......Fire's not effective, and I can't use my Dragoon ability to Jump through Earth-element attacks......" I said, more to myself then anything.

[Bailey]

"Well, I guess I'm fighting this thing off on my own then."

Syttulg dropped into a fighting stance, ready to spring, directed the nannites to throw dirt in the sphinx's eyes, and fled, running to the front of the now-bickering group.

"I find that ice magic works well on earth stuff, as do plant growth spells."

[Arhra]

The sphinx looked distinctly unimpressed as the dust hurled at it appeared to bounce off an invisible wall extending from the edge of the ledge it was perched upon. It seemed that there were defenses in place. She looked at the bunch milling around, trying to get into the temple with some exasperation.

"I haven't unlocked the door yet. You'd have noticed if I had opened it. I hear it's quite impressive. Now if you'll excuse me, unless you have some alternative offer, I have some mauling to do." The sphinx jumped lightly off her perch and headed for Newb. You could the purring already.

[Skyshot]

"An alternative offer? Uh..." Skyshot's mind began racing. He'd never thought he'd ever use this riddle, but with this opponent, it was their only hope. He called out, "Hey, sphinxy! Here's your alternative offer!

"I am there by what is not there.
I am what strong men cannot bear.
Cold water burns me.
Lightest touch is greatest agony.

"What am I?"

OOC: You guys are gonna hate me for this one.

[Premonitions]

Premonitions appeared behind Syttulg in that creepy, maniacal villian way, with that creepy, maniacal villian smile "Well, guess like there's no running away from this-" he pushed him forward slowly with one hand as he spoke "but it's okay, I'll stay and help you, it'l be funnnn" Syttulg suddenly felt more at ease with the sphinx....

[Darth SS]

Darth stepped in front of Syttulg.

"No. I can regenerate. Verilly, I shall take this blow for the team, and spare the probie his suffering."

Then Darth's brain caught up. It looked over what he had just done before yelling "I fucking quit!" Darth then caught up Darth. Darth realized what he'd just done.

"WAITITAKEITBACKTAKETHELITTLEFUCKER!"

[Flarecobra]

I just shook my head. "I'll never understand humans." I said. "Anyway, can we just tie him up for now and be on our way? I'm sure after you're through he'll just somehow regenerate somehow and join back up with us. Hell, I think I'm the only one that DOESN'T have a regeneration ability."

[Bailey]

"I only regenerate well in the sunlight! If we're going underground, it'll take forever!"

[PyrosNine]

Pyros did worry for the strange green one called "Newb" and "Syttulg, but it was plain that he was not going to die, only just mauled, and he had only himself to blame for it anyway.

As for the cave, he worried little. He'd been in numerous earth dungeons before, and he'd yet to meet the rock that didn't melt in his presence. He'd even taken a dip in lava before to grab an important relic, although it was the single most painful thing he'd ever done, as it not only hurt, but the resulting rocks that hardened over his flesh continued to sting and were near impossible to remove.

"I am ready to enter this place. Hurry up your business and let us in." He called to the Sphinx.

[FenrisWolf]

"I can't regenerate either," Fenris said to Flare. "I can't even heal myself."

Fenris sighed. He was glad he wasn't the one to get mauled by the Sphinx.

[Toastburner B]

"Define regeneration." TB Professor said. "Sure, my dead bodies dissapate so I can respawn in them...but I would hardly call that 'regeneration'."

TB looked around the group, at the Sphnix, at Newb, then back at the car. "Fine, if no one has a ballpoint pen, I'll just have to make due with the car."

TB professor walked over to the vehicle, and popped the trunk. With naught but almost an entire roll of duct tape and his ball point pen, he turned the pulse laser turret into twin laser pistols for his use. When he was done, he rejoined the group. "Right, I'm back...has Newb been mauled yet so we can move on?"

[Arhra]

OOC: Hmm, well I think we've delayed here long enough. Thus, in the interests of moving along, let the mauling commence.

It was rather like watching a cat play with some small animal in had cornered. In fact it almost exactly like that, seeing how the sphinx was predominately feline, larger than Syttulg and predisposed to play with her 'prey' while Syttulg was (probably) a mammal.

Sparing the details - we've all seen cats toying with something, batting it with their paws and such - a short time later Syttulg had been mauled. The sphinx left him where he lay, in need of medical attention. A thought seemed to occur to her, "You're the first people I've seen here since I took over the job. Why are you here?" she said to Arhra.

"The Invisible Moon is coming."

"Ah, but why would you...?" The sphinx trailed off, "Bah, I don't care any more."

It was, as she had said, unusually impressive for a door opening. Pieces of it withdrew, twisted, shifted in and out and then entire thing irised open as a complex jigsaw of parts.

Her duty discharged, the sphinx decided to attend to more personal matters. As the others began to enter the temple, she sauntered towards Skyshot something about it unsettling. "I know the answer to your riddle." she said breathily, "What's lightest touch brings agony, even the strong can't bear and exists because of an absence? Desire." The last word was openly suggestive as she smiled at him.

"As for cold water burning it, well, it really kills the mood." she purred. Sphinxes love someone who can make a good riddle.

[PyrosNine]

"Actually, I heard somewhere that cold water only made desire burn all the more, but that's just my word." Pyros pointed out as he stood over the mauled body of Syttulg.

As he stood over Syttulg, and inspected his many, many wounds, he decided that since the others were quite unlikely to do anything helpful for their foolish party member, he might as well.

"Forgive me for not aiding you earlier, but this was a valuable lesson for you to have learned. Now, if I may, I shall tend to your wounds. For, as Kings would say, 'You got mauled the F*(k out.' "

Pyros pulled out a gourd of fresh water and mixed it with some mud laced with herbs Pyros had in his possesion, and laid them on Syttulg's scratched and bleeding body. Then, using some spare cloth and Pyros's own hair needles, he erected a crude sling for Syttulg's broken right arm, sewn the more open wounds shut, including reattaching his left leg and a few fingers.

Then Pyros made a small prayer for him, and stood up. "There. Now you should be fine, aside from the excruciating pain you must be going through. I'm afraid I'm all out of pain relief powders and have never had normal money in my possesion to buy modern pills."

Pyros thought about this. He supposed he could fly back down and obtain both money and some tylenol, but he was pretty sure that if Syttulg was left in his current state, the others would do something even more horrible to him. He would just have to keep watch and Syttulg would just have to bear it.

"If you want, maybe I could knock you senseless. That would ease things a bit for you. Or just press on your wounds a bit until you naturally pass out from the pain."

[Flarecobra]

"Come on." I said, walking into the temple, and getting ready to light up my arm just in case it was dark and a light was needed.

[Bailey]

Syttulg tore off the random accoutrements and threw them at Pyros.

"If you wanted to help you would have made the sun brighter!"

Sure enough, Syttulg's body was completely healed after a few minutes in the sunlight.

[Skyshot]

Skyshot shook his head at the sphinx.

"Nope," he said. "The answer is 'mouth ulcer.' Infravision." Skyshot's eyes glowed red for a moment. "Well, I guess yours was sort of valid. See ya, sphinxy." He hover-walked into the temple. "So, I'm thinking my earthquake spell would be great here. Since it makes earth quake, it should do weird things with their constitution..."

[Tarrin]

Tarrin stood watching the mauling, and then the regeneration of Syttulg form,
Then looking around he saw the others prepairing to enter the seal's resting place.

"You know when i was alive a sphinx wouldn't have let you off with a mauling, Oh you'd be dead and eaten" the spirit was back.
Tarrin caught up with the rest of the group ignoring his mentors comments.

[PyrosNine]

Pyros took a bloody stitching out of his hair. "You know, I may very well knock you senseless just for your rudeness. I was only trying to help."

To emphasise the point, he punched a wall as he entered the temple, making a deep gaping hole in the rock.

"Besides. Increasing the sun's brightness would both kill you and everyone else on this planet."

[Bailey]

"Nuhuh, Me, Flare, and a coupla other people would have been just fine."

[PyrosNine]

"Fire powers do not block Solar Radiation, the resulting solar-flare would kill any electric or electronic based being, and you would die of cancer."

Pyros called out from inside the Dungeon.

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris was suddenly glad he was inside the temple with the rest of the group.

'I'm bored, when will something interesting happen?'

'Will you shut up?'

'Hey, it's as much my brain as it is yours!'

'Wha-buh-it's-guh...' Fenris stammered inside his own brain. He weakly thought 'Is not...' and went back to thinking only to himself.

'Now look what you did!'

Fenris suddenly longed for silence, despite the lack of sound around him.

[Bailey]

Syttulg glared after Pyros and then muttered to some of his nannites.

"See if you can drop some icecubes on his head, alright?"

With that, he followed the others in.

[Darth SS]

Darth was right behind Newb. Darth also had his normal whimsical theme music playing in the background. Darth was singing an incredibly annoying song in his best Blondie impression.

"Newb got mauled by the Sphiiinx, Newb got mauled by the Sphiiiiinx. It was fuuuuunny, so very fuuuuunny. Newb got mauled by the Sphiiiiinx, because he's duuuuuumb."

It just kind of repeated like that.

[Bailey]

"And put some ice under that wannabe bard's feet too." Syttulg muttered.

Some nannites flew down and began complying.

[PhoenixFlame]

"Wotonly using advanced technology for common jokes like placing ice-cubes under someone's feet is looked down upon in most circles, Newb." Phoenix chided.

"Like mine." she added as she returned her revolver to her coat with a cold, metallic snap. "Mainly because we technomagi would end up throwing people's planets at each other with colossal mass-drivers for shits and giggles." That said, Vampiress Phoenix had made her way rather quickly through the gate and into the dungeon.

"Fear whatever the creative ones would do to you." She muttered, "Ice cubes... Amateur..."

[Darth SS]

Darth then shrieked like a five year old girl at a Backstreet Boys concert. Everyone spun to look. He'd taken his shoe off because his shoe itched. Never mind the odor, when he put his foot down briefly, he found his arch resting on something cold. Very cold. In fact, cold as ice.

Darth slapped his shoe on quickly then glared around. He dropped his voice lower than normal and tried to sound tough and manly.

"Yah. I'm fine."

He then pointed his gun at Newb's head.

"It would be so easy. Everyone would know, no one would care."

Thankfully, he restrained himself and put the gun away. However, he made a mental note to give Newb a christmas gift. Said gift? The gay talking boxers from the last grand adventure.

[Dragonsbane]

"He's right, sadly. No one WOULD care." Dragonsbane shrugged, his eyes effortlessly piercing the veil of darkness as he walked into the temple.

[Toastburner B]

"You have no idea how right they are," TB added in. "I die all the time, and no one cares. Of course...I come back, so that might have something to do with it."

[Mauve Mage]

"We're such a warm, caring group of friends, aren't we?" Mauve said to noone in particular, with a smile on her face. "I can practically feel the love oozing out of us."

She took another step and tripped over a rock.

"Dang it, it's dark in here." She looked back over the others, or at least what she could see of them in this near-blackness. "I don't suppose any of you would happen to have a light spell or lighting device of some kind that WOULDN'T kill half the party when used, would you? I can do some fire spells, but it's all offensive stuff. And unless Toastburner would care to become a human torch to light our way-- unlikely-- they're kind of useless for this sort of thing."

[Bailey]

Some of the nannites gathered on Syttulg's hand and began glowing at a mental command.

"This'll drain me after awhile, but if any of you wonderful mages know some lightning spells, I can be recharged."

[FenrisWolf]

"Well, depending on how fine you can make your fire shot, I can provide a solution. If I take all of my personal belongings out of my knapsack, and you could store them in your pockets of holding or whatnot, we could set the cloth on fire. It could make a handy torch."

[GARUD]

"Screw lighting the place up, the more shadows I have around me, the stronger I am. Besides, when the fighting starts, I can materialise any weapon anyone wants. Seriously. But if you are that intent on getting some light in here, then start giving in your requests now."

[PhoenixFlame]

Phoenix sighed as several people clamoured for light while several others less did anything at all to acquiest. While she too was of Garud's persuasion regarding light, Phoenix didn't want to seem like she wasn't a team player. In perfect silence, she clicked the hammer twice on her revolver to cycle the cylinder, and, in perfect blackness, fired down the hall.

Likely suprising everyone with the sharp, deafening crack.

Like a signal flare, the 30mm Plasma Rocklet flew true down the hall as Phoenix literally attacked the darkness. Soon, the warhead detonated as it hit the cave's ceiling as the path began to descend, showering bright-green, light-emitting plasma all over the cave walls and floor.

"Let there be light." She proclaimed while reloading the cartridge.

[GARUD]

"And it was shit."

Garud finished Pheonix's statement, quoted from the book of Krylotology. Everybody knew that phrase. He walked down the hall, using what little shadow was left to create the Blades of Chaos, an ever reliable weapon inspired by the game God Of War. They were conveniently effective and reminded him of sword chucks.

"Let's go."

[Flarecobra]

"Just what kind of rocket WAS that PF?" I asked.

[Bailey]

"If I had to guess, I'd say it was a Beta 290 Gigaflash Classic"

[PhoenixFlame]

"Incorrect. That was a thirty millimeter plasma-ignition rocklet, designation GJ-.30P. Curiously, it doubles as a flare just as well as it eats through armor and shielding. It even comes in 6 unique colors." She responds to Newb and Flare at the same time.

Waving the oversized piece over her shoulder and clicking her tounge, Phoenix chuckles, "It's freakin' awesome, innit? She's a bit big for mere mortals, though."

[Bailey]

"Well, the Gigaflash is about the same size and has the same visual effect. If you had shot at some shielding, I probably would have figured it out."

Syttulg looked at the damage.

"I don't think that 'awesome' is a big enough word to encompass the GJ-.30P."

[Arhra]

Love was oozing out of them? Arhra surreptitiously adjusted her clothes to check for a leak. She needed her love for herself. It had been bad enough last time it had happened...

That moment of panic over, she heard Mauve's request for something to light their way and ignored Garud's reply. "Certainly!" said Arhra brightly. "Let there be light!" (Phoenix is a future line stealer). She clapped her hands in the semi-darkness and what appeared to be an extremely large glowing slug appeared in her hand.

"Er... there you go." Arhra said, handing the slug to Mauve and idly wiping the phosphorescent slime it had left behind off her hand. "Now, no time for materialising weapons or attacking the darkness! We must act now!"

The corridor wasn't really much to see. It was old, stone and intricately carved in blocky, geometric patterns along the walls. The faint smell of loam also pervaded the place. It was your average mysterious old temple interior.

Further on through the corridors, they came across something a bit out of the ordinary. The tunnel opened out into a vast chamber, seemingly open to the sky. Closer inspection would reveal that it was covered by a huge dome of what appeared to be glass. But the eye was far more pulled in by what lie beneath the arching glass. It was a forest primeval, giant trees that had trunks meters across, but they all seemed to have been petrified long ago. Many looked weathered and had partially collapsed, but stranger still, some looked much like they had when they were alive and stone fragments of broken leaves littered the ground.

Arhra looked around at the impressive sight, "Yes, the taint of Chaos is definately here. Its why these trees are like this. I think the more intact ones might actually still be alive. Chaos is corrupting the element of the seal." She started heading into them, "Well, we'd best get through to the other side."

Of course, something was watching them as they entered the petrified forest, moving from tree to tree like a ghost, waiting for them to approach the forest's heart. Arhra was the first one attacked. She stopped to peer at a tree and something burst out of it, slashing at her with long, flinty claws. Arhra cunningly dodged by falling on her ass as the razors slashed out, just grazing her. Arhra caught a glimpse of a sharp, lovely face screeching like a banshee surrounded by a long mane of leafy hair before it spun around and vanished back into the tree with a momentary ripple. Arhra edged away from the tree a bit and clambered to her feet, feeling off balance, "What in the seas of Limbo was that?!" she felt necessary to exclaim. The forest suddenly resounded with eerie screams, coming alive around them. The stonewood dryads burst out of ambush.

OOC: The dryad (http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showpost.php?p=424676&postcount=53) battle as a whole is a higher end Can of Spam (http://forum.nuklearpower.com/showpost.php?p=421096&postcount=14). It is a pretty hard fight and there is one dryad per person. As noted in their description, dryads are Insane. Expect to get hurt. They'll be using extensive hit and run tactics, they won't stay and fight face to face.

[PhoenixFlame]

Phoenix too, walked through the eriee petrified forest with a sure-footed, proud gait. After all, dark and eriee forests were her speciality, being a vampire. Perhaps not as special as the stone spectrelike being that had dashed from tree to tree behind her a moment earlier.

Phoenix stopped, and turned slowly, eyes scanning the trees. She'd have sworn tha-

*SWIPE!* needlelike stone claws ripped forth from the tree, undamaged, toward Phoenix's face.

She instinctively raised her right arm, gun still in hand, and moved to interdict the strike, a blow which tore into her sleeve and the lifeless flesh beneath alike. The dryad made another strike, pressing forward now, and Phoenix backed up to compensate, rotating her arm to catch yet another quick swipe of the deadly appendage. Firing the GJ-.30 at such close range would hurt her just as much as it would the stone fae assaulting her... So Phoenix did the first thing that came to mind. She ran away.

It wasn't a full retreat. A quick leap back and a jump between three to four trees put some obstacles and distance between Phoenix and her assailant, giving the vampiress time to draw her vibroblade...

[Flarecobra]

As I walked along, and hearing Arhra's scream, I whipped around, only to come face to face wthi a female face, grinning with an insane grin. "Um, can I he.." Was all I got out before getting hit with a kick to the head, knocking me to the ground, and sending my dragon helmet off. "Ok, THAT was uncolled for, as I reached over, and grabbed my whip, lashing out at her leg with the bladed tip, hoping that it'd knock her down.

[Skyshot]

Skyshot wisely dove away from the tree he had been standing nearby and took up Nightstorm.

"Not cool..." One of the dryads was heading for him. "Cause critic."

Large wounds burst open over his target, causing it to scream and retreat into the nearest tree. Skyshot let out a sigh of relief and watched for more, but after a few seconds, it burst out of the tree and started coming after him.

"NOT COOL!" He shifted Nightstorm into a quarterstaff grip and swung it like a bat, hitting the dryad across the cheek. He continued to hold it off, backing away, making quick jabs into traditionally sensitive areas, and working to stay away from those claws. It wasn't easy.

Abruptly, he felt a shooting pain across his back. He reflexively dove to the side and spun around. A second one had been behind him, now sporting bloody claws. Very bad.

The one he had been fighting dove for him. Immediately, he ducked and swept his legs, knocking the dryad off its feet. He quickly drove Nightstorm's tip into its throat as hard as he could before the second dryad moved toward him. He stepped forward on an impulse, but wasn't able to get the staff positioned before it slashed his belly, knocking him backwards onto the very irritated dryad he had just attempted to choke. Feeling its claws rake at his chest, he flailed his arms to block and rolled back.

"Little help?!" he yelled out, swinging Nightstorm to awkwardly deflect another swipe.

[FenrisWolf]

"Oh shit!" Fenris exclaimed. He quickly counted the number of dryads.

'Shit, looks like I have to fight,' Fenris thought.

'You're fucked.'

"Now is not the time for that!" Fenris yelled, clutching his skull.

'Quit yer whinin' and kill something. I'm bored.'

Fenris blinked a couple times. And stood back up, only to get clawed in the face rather viciously by a dryad.

Fenris screamed. He whipped out his hammer and started flailing at his assailant, stony blood dripping down his face and freezing around his eyes.

'Calm down, calm down, calm down, happy thoughts, happy thoughts, oh god I'm gonna die.'

'That worked."

'Will you just leave him alone?!'

Fenris took about 7 deep breaths while the Dryad retreated to a tree, healed, and flew out again. Fenris picked up his mallet. He looked at the quickly approaching dryad. He waited, waited, waited, waited, and just as the dryad came to attack, he slammed his hammer into the outstretched claws of the dryad. They, being rather thin, snapped under the pressure. The dryad screamed, but Fenris brought his hammer up into the jaw of the dryad. The dryad pulled her other claw back, and stabbed Fenris in the chest, narrowly missing his heart. Fenris coughed up blood as the Dryad pulled her claws out of his chest. His blood looked scarily like mercury, as it adopted a grey hue. Fenris clutched his chest, the silvery liquid dripping between his fingers, and hacked up more blood. All was silent, even the mysterious voices in his head. Fenris's grip on his mallet started to slide, as all started to fade around him, the Dryad retreated to heal in the tree.

[Bailey]

Not being attacked at the moment, and seeing Skyshot being overwhelmed, Syttulg dropped to a crouch, his hands brushing against the ground, his nannites doubling the length of his fingers with the addition of steel spikes, then rose and dove for one of the dryads fighting Skyshot, attempting to impale her face.

[PhoenixFlame]

"Hmph. That oug-" Phoenix began to remark, as she powered up her Vibro-Katana, it's hum ringing through the petrified forest. She'd hoped putting three to four trees between herself and the dryad might make it difficult for the latter to charge straight at her... But as the fae burst through the trees as if they were not there, Phoenix was rather taken aback.

Another claw, longer this time, made a quick thrust at her, but was quickly caught as Phoenix slid her vibroblade through it's fingers, the weapon's engine whining as it attempted to power it's way through the formidible stone.

Magic stone. Any other stone would be cut like butter.

The dryad reared it's other claw back, making to impale Phoenix's head while her sword were trapped, but a quick wristroll pivoted the weapon and brought the hilt to intercept, at no small cost to Phoenix's fingers. No matter, at least losing a finger wasn't as lethal as losing one's head. It did hurt, however.

Sword freed now, Phoenix made a wide cut at the Dryad, lunging after it as it attempted to escape, only to find that it had fled through a tree.

*BZzzzrrrKzzrrt!* The vibroblade whined as it bit deeply into the stone-tree and began, by it's own volition, to work itself deeper into the petrified trunk.

"This is a very bad day." Phoenix sighed sarcastically, letting go of the trapped weapon and taking a moment to look at her hand, which had now become partly... Stonelike. Not enough to lose it's flesh, but enough to be grey and have a noticable lack of finesse. "A very, very bad day indeed."

[Mesden]

Amazingly, Mesia wasn't autoattacked by however many dryads there were like everyone else, because she wasn't so damn hasty as to walk into a forest before Soul Scanning it.

"No no no! Everyone RUSH in. Don't let the goddess get a good look around. I mean, that'd just be sensible so of COURSE it couldn't happen."

After she vented in her own head for a moment, Mesia walked out and approached one of the Dryads hidden in the chaos struck vegetation. With a steady sigh, she did nothing more than stand steadfast in front of it.

Fast and deadly came the claws, piercing towards Mesia's chest, only to miss their 'lethal' target, from what bit of a dodge Mesia could muster, and strike into her shoulder.

As the Dryad emerged from its stone engraved sanctuary, its other claw struck forward, aimed towards the lower belly of the Goddess. A small shift of the weight over only allowed it to strike her upper thigh.

The creature's eyes stayed locked to Mesia's, a dull blue showing no sign of any feelings. No fear. No pain. Nothing. But it was not the same for the assailant. There was a pleased, nearly sadistic smirk spelled across its face. A near bloodthirsty and thriving gaze that tried to pierce through the clouded azure Mesia donned.

And slowly, her body began to crack and harden where the attacks had struck, the petrification all as much lethal to Mesia as any other. The Dryad could feel itself slowly reverting as well, that smile becoming all the more pleased, all the more fulfilled.

But that smile was ripped away as Mesia's hand struck out to the creature's neck. The crimson metal gauntlet clenched the throat tightly, digging the white claws into the rockhard flesh.

From this vicelike hold emanated a soft, white glow that began to spread slowly across the Dryad. Every second that passed, the being could feel itself growing...tired and weak.

"I shall break your soul before you break my body." Her voice was content and her eyes sparked. That former, listless blue being replaced with a convicted white blaze that seemed to pierce all dark and dim.

((OOC: Well, Arhra, I'm gonna leave it in your hands how far petrified I get before I completely shatter the Dryad's soul. Everyone else can take on two and whatnot, I'll just dramatically tear this one apart from within!))

((And it is decided))

Through her effort, Mesia couldn't break the creatures soul before it could solidify her body.

There stood the statue of a Goddess.

[Dragonsbane]

Razored claws ripped right out of a stone tree trunk, tearing out one of Dragonsbane's eyes and gashing his face horribly. He stumbled back, clutching his ruined visage as blood trickled between his fingers.

The attacking Dryad shrieked in triumph, believing she had won, unaware of the words he whispered, disguised under the cover of his ragged, near-sobbing breaths, or the way that the gore coating her claws was sinking into her skin. Dragonsbane could see that she was covered in a stony armor, and doubted she would give him time to cast any more spells...he had to make this count.

"Stone to Flesh..." the spell was unusual, enhanced, and entwined with the one that had sank his blood directly into her body. Even as he began to petrify, the process reversed itself, his face greying...then returning to normal as a new eye began to grow in, while the Dryad's hand slowly turned pink.

[Mauve Mage]

"...the hell is this?!??!" yelped the Mauve one as the tree beside her suddenly made a lunge for her head. It's aim was a bit off; Mauve ended up on her butt while the dryad was left with nothing but a large pink mage's hat in her fists.

Mauve did the one thing she could do. She flung the glowly slug thing at the dryad. It stuck to the creature's face with a wet shluck.

"Ha!" Mauve cackled. "How'd you like tha-- Oh."

The unfortunate slug was swiftly losing its luminescent quality. With a sickening series of cracks, like eggshells being stomped into the ground, the slug turned a stony gray and shattered into a hundred little slug bits. The dryad beneath did not appear amused.

"Ah." Mauve said. "Well, crap."

The next thing she knew, the dryad was rushing towards her with extended claws. Mauve let herself fall back as the dryad pounced, kicking the stone woman in the gut and making her fly over the mage's head. Well, that's what was SUPPOSED to happen. Basically, what DID happen was that Mauve ended up on the floor, the dryad threw herself at her, Mauve kicked her in the gut--- And Mauve realized that kicking stone didn't do much aside from really, REALLY hurting her foot. The dryad didn't soar over Mauve's head from her own momentum, as expected, but instead sort of flopped over sideways, just a foot or so to Mauve's left, while sinking her claws into the mage's left wrist and shoulder and tore through her skin like it was tissue paper. Had Mauve been thinking clearly at this point, she may have thought, Oh good, her claws missed my throat, where they were aiming. Instead, she was thinking something along the lines of SHIT SHIT SHIT OH HELL THAT HURTS OH SHIT DAMMIT DAMMIT DAMMIT! and so on.

The dryad recovered faster than the mage and was back on her feet while the Mauve one was still cursing. The creature bore down on her, eager to finish her off and move on to the next victim. At the last moment, Mauve shoved both hands out towards the dryad's face. Strangely, only her right hand seemed to respond correctly. Mauve didn't have time to contemplate this right now, though.

"Blizzaga!" she snarled, and the dryad's head and shoulders were encased in ice. This sudden change in weight threw off the dryad's balance and she crashed backwards into the ground.

"Blizzaga!!" Mauve yelled again in an attempt to freeze the creature to the ground. Now that both hands were extended towards the ground in front of her, Mauve noticed that the bleeding arm was covered in ribbons of grey. The blood in her veins was turning into stone. The shredded ribbons of skin were doing the same, and the patches of granite-like flesh were spreading at a disturbingly rapid rate. Already her hand was becoming harder to control. Oh no.

She had to kill this thing. Once it was dead, Mauve would hopefully be restored to her normal state, or at least be able to get some kind of healing spell. But how do you kill a stone dryad?? Wait. How do you kill ANY kind of dryad? The answer came from somewhere within her memory; from some book of Greek myths that she must have read back in high school. She was pretty sure that wood dryads died when their trees were cut down. Would stone dryads have the same weakness?

It was worth a try. All she had to do was get back to the tree that her dryad came out of and find some way to destroy it. Maybe trick the dryad into stabbing it with her claws, or maybe toppling with an earthquake spell, as Skyshot had earlier suggested.

She hugged her arm to her chest and ran for it. Almost immediately, a nearby tree thumped her on the skull with a branch. Mauve saw stars, and then she saw the floor.

Her arm wouldn't respond. Her back and neck felt frighteningly stiff. The dryad was recovering from being frozen to the floor, and she didn't look happy. Around her, members of the NPF were already being turned to stone. Fenris and Mesden were now statues. And Mauve was about to be the next addition to the collection.

"Somebody help?" she managed to say despite the massive headache and the stiffness that was slowly spreading to her jaw.

[Rhiya Ravenwing]

"Fu-urk!" Rhiya's impolite cry ended in a small gurgle as a dryad slammed headfirst into her stomach, knocking the breath out of her. The stone-worked fae slammed her claws into the unresisting flesh of her victim, and tore out Rhiya's spine. The light faded from the winged woman's eyes as she slumped down lifelessly, her body petrifying in the dryad's grasp.

Oh GAWD that hurt like hell, Sub-Rhiya rubbed where her spine had been torn out. She waited a moment, looked at her watch, and looked at the dryad calmly turning towards her next victim.

I'm coming back to finish you, biatch, she said vehemently. The dryad - surprise surprise - didn't hear her.

~~~

Five seconds later, a violently swearing Rhiya crashed down into her respawn point a few yards from the sphinx. The creature took one look at the disheveled woman and decided not to make her take another Riddle. Rhiya gave it to the creature anyway.

"Rock! Now shutup."

She was a blur in the next few moments as she raced to get back to where the others are, in a highly pissed-off mood. Yes, the RFS was still working.

It was currently making a small whistling noise and steaming at the top.

~~

"KILL ME WILL YA, YOU BITCH!" Rhiya screamed as she leapt - dragon form - onto the dryad who had turned and was just about to attack Mauve. All four claws from the chaos-diamond dragon hit hard and fast, finding purchase on the stone dryad's body and toppling them both over.

Rhiya, full of screaming fury and eyes glowing bright red, grabbed the dryad's shoulders with two paws and slammed her head down viciously. The dryad's head cracked painfully against the earth, bouncing off from the force Rhiya exerted, before it happened again.

Rhiya was using the time-old belief that Diamond was essentially much stronger than rock. However, what Rhiya didn't realise that while her chaotic composition granted her temporary immunity to the dryad's stony petrification ability, it's starting to wear away that as the chaos molecules inside Rhiya gradually absorbed more and more of the petrification curse.

But the Dryad didn't like her predicament. On the third time her head cracked against the floor and sent hairline fractures coursing up the back of her skull, the creature attempted to escape Rhiya's furious head-banging. Her feet feeling rather free, the Dryad planted them thusly on the base of Rhiya's spiky tail and kicked.

A surprised Rhiya flipped over with the force of the strike and crashed heavily down. With frightening speed, the dryad rolled to her feet, staggered for a moment, before fleeing into a nearby tree.

Still fuming, Rhiya got to all fours and snarled at the tree - which subsequently sent a hail of stony acorns at the dragon. It bounced harmlessly off her draconic diamond hide, and served only to make Rhiya even more angry.

Then she saw Mauve getting thumped by the same tree.

The RFS themometer exploded into small fragments of glass, before reforming - only now, the liquid inside was black.

"DON'T YOU FUCKING HIT HER YOU [blank: something to do with a rooster and a cat getting wet]!!!!!" Rhiya roared, and one of the petrified trees trembled and screamed in pain as part of itself was vaporised.

Rhiya's eyes were bleeding and boiling black and red. Her draconic face was fixed in a permanent snarl so rigid that the diamond in her almost cracked with the effort.

With a single, fluid movement, Rhiya drew up - grew a few feet, even - and charged with a roar that deafened the nearby allies and enemies.

The dragon leapt nimbly over the fallen Mauve and ploughed into the petrified tree, throwing her entire weight like a massive wrecking ball that had just broken its chain and decided it likes to go for a little spin. With a shuddering shriek, the tree fractured at its base and toppled, the dryad within.

She wasn't done though. Before the dryad could escape from her stony fortress, Rhiya's ever-growing hind-foot came crashing down, smashing the base of the tree into tine stone fragments. Her other limbs came down after that, growing in size as Rhiya expanded to a size that allowed her to grind the large tree into rubble.

Out of the fragments of tree, Rhiya was satisfied to note broken bits of arms and legs and a shocked, stony face.

Rhiya suddenly felt very tired. She looked down, and realised part of herself was very gradually becoming the stone she had shattered moments before. Dryads - infuriated at the loss of one of their kind - were darting in and out of trees nearby and striking her, conveying their stony curse onto her gradually - while turning them more flesh-like.

Rhiya got an idea. Slowly, painfully, she lumbered over to where Mauve lay and encircled the mage with her bulk. She plucked the stoned goddess from where she stood and placed her with Mauve, before covering them with a petrified wing, shielding them from further attacks made by the warped dryads.

While more of the dryads looked more flesh-woven, Rhiya closed her eyes... and became stone.

[OOC: have fun recovering inside, Mauve]

[GARUD]

A blade of Chaos soared over and smashed a tree. And it got stuck. Another blade sunk into the thick trunk of the tree. It had a decent cut, and now it needed to be deepened. Garud needed to try topple it.

"Aren't you a tough little bugger. Better to try kill the tree and even up the odds."

The demon slayer had yet to see the Dryad with his name on it, but it was around. Somewhere. Garud ran in circles around the wood until it had chains tied around it. And he pulled. The demon slayer pulled with all his might trying to topple the flailing plant.

"C'MON! C'MON! MOVE YA BASTARD!"

As he tried to take the tree down, a figure crept up behind him... and lunged with a screech. Garud stepped to the side hastily, ad the Dryad smashed into the tree. A gaping hole opened up, and the demon slayer tugged as hard as he could. The tree fell beside Garud, who was sweating furiously.

"Oww... what the? My hip is not... uggh."

Garud's hip area was turning to stone. The Dryad must have gotten him after all, and it was getting back up for more.

"Shit."

Creating a shadow potion, the acid decay was able to hold off the stoning, but he couldn't use the acid to cure it and fend off an onslaught at the same time.

"Okay ass. Try catch me."

Garud ran along but he was losing his flexibility due to his hip. He tried to gather anough shadow for more potions, but he was fading quick. Garud looked over and saw Mesden, Mauve and Rhiya, and it seemed Mauve was the only one not completely encased in stone. The charging Dryad leapt and Garud ducked down to avoid it... just. Looking at his own stoned leg and arm, he used his other arm to use the potion... but not on himself. He threw it at the pink mage and yelled,

"Catch!"

The Dryad turned and lunged once more this time knocking Garud off his feet. Both rolled to their feet, and the demon slayer launched a beam at his opponents face. He was not going to last too long though...

[Tarrin]

Tarrin stood watching the battle unfurl around him,
"Behind you" the voice of his spirit guide whispered, Suddenly spines shot out of Tarrins back, Quills to be exact.
The dryad seamed to shift in mid leap, Twisting it's body around the newly grown defences of its target, Watching the attacker land to his right, Tarrins reaction wasn't fast enough to to stop what came next.

Two razor sharp claws raked across tarrins chest, Blood flowed freely from the newly opend wounds, "gargh" was the only noise Tarrin let out, His mind already searching for his attacker and a solution to rid himself of the vile thing.

A noise, Ever so faint, Yet enough for Tarrin to hear the direction his attacker was coming from,Found his ears, Swinging his quilled back towards the Dryads direction, This time however the move was an attack, Several foot long quills shot out towards the leaping attacker, The Dryad, Not ready for this turn of events found two of the spear like weapons catching it in the side, A loud shreek eminated from the vile fiend as it lept back into the trees.

Tarrin felt a preasure on his chest, No not on....in, Looking down he could see his chest turning from it's normal tanned flesh to a pale stone,
"Crap, This could be bad"no time for that right now however,
Tarrin new he only had a few seconds before either his petrification or the return of his attacker, Reaching once again through the veil he pulled his spear back into the physical relm.

A rush of wind was all that came this time, The Dryad lept directly down towards Tarrin claws extended, A Weapon of force and death hurling towards his position.
Tarrin stood there and at the last second rolled to his right, The Spirit lance however stayed where it was, The Dryads limp form lying at its base not a wound to be seen.
"At least they have souls" Was all tarrin got out before more of his form turned into stone, "Now how do i get my ass out of this situation?"

[PhoenixFlame]

Phoenix sighed at her helpless, still Kzzrt'ing Vibrokatana with a distraught gaze, while calling to mind page two of the Tactica Imperialis.

"A weapon is only as useful as the situation in which said weapon is employed. If a weapon cannot be employed, it will contribute to failure. Only through modification or unorthodox use of said weapon can victory be secured."

As they said, 41 millenia of constant war tended to make these people right, even if they were insane. Slipping her revolver out of her jacket with her unstoned left arm, Phoenix waited for her Dryad opponent to extricate itself from the tree it was hiding within. She slowly circled the tree, finding a similar, larger trunk of stone to hide behind.

And no, she wasn't hiding from the dryad.

Clicking the hammer back, Phoenix leaned around the larger tree with a triumphant, psychopathic grin. If this didn't work, she didn't know what would, and that Dryad was getting mighty annoying, what with cutting her fingers off and all. She'd wait, and slowly squeezed the trigger lovingly, waiting for it to show it's ugly, tormented face for merciful cleansing...

Then the Dryad burst out, seeing her in a moment of weakness, hiding behind a tree it could easily move through. It had suprised Phoenix with it's strange powers before, but today, she would suprise it with her strange weapons.

Yes, it would appear the Dryad had been in the ancient forest long enough to be ignorant to what a gun was.

*K-crack!* A massive muzzle flash accompanied the rocklet as it spun it's initial 45 degrees and deployed it's spring-loaded fins. Phoenix used her enhanced speed to duck fully behind the tree in the 1.21 miliseconds before the primary ignition went off, propelling the rocket at one-thousand feet per second into the Dryad's chest.

*B'Voom!* Came the explosion, showering smaller tree-parts past where Phoenix had been standing. She looked around her hiding place, and saw the rear half of the torso-deprived Dryad as it fled back into the forest.

Phoenix grinned. Things were beginning to look up.

[Arhra]

Arhra found herself beset by a swift and strong foe, flickering through the forest like a ghost. She decided to try and rely on her energy drain to save the day. Her current incarnation was suited for beating things up close and she knew her current stolen ability repertoire wasn't well equipped for hurting rocks.

Thus, when the dryad next jumped out at Arhra, it was slightly taken aback to find Arhra jumping right back at it. Crimson eyes met leaf green ones as the pair crashed together in midair.

Arhra began to wish she'd thought this through a little more when she found a claw entering her shoulder while her arms wrapped around to wrestle with the twisted fae. Regrets rapidly multiplied when the pair crashed to the ground, Arhra ending up on the bottom. Even with their slender builds, the dryads' stony bodies were very heavy.

Now, wrestling with a living rock is not the smartest thing to do, even if you have stolen enhanced physical might from someone. Arhra knew she was stronger than the average bear, but that strength wasn't really enough to hurt a rock being easily. But Arhra was relying on her trump card - the ability to drain life force off an enemy she was in physical contact with.

Unfortunately, she had been too busy to notice Mesden's similar problems with trying this kind of stunt. Her major trump card seemed to be one-upped by the dryad's touch. The two rolled about grappling on the ground, the dryad frantic about its life being agonisingly torn out of its body and Arhra discovering that she suddenly felt very heavy and inclined to crush puny organic life.

Making the mental connection as she felt the dryad's body softening and taking on a more fleshy appearance, the two exchanged a long look that basically stated a mutual unwillingness to see who died first. Arhra, currently on the bottom, being pressed into the ground by the dryad's lessening weight pushed up on leg and used the leverage to hurled the dryad off her. The half-unpetrified dryad, for its part, didn't resist this turn of events very hard, instead agilely twisting around in midair and vanishing into a tree trunk.

Arhra clambered to her feet, not really wanting to experiment with chaos magic in an attempt to neutralise the stony infection at this time. She'd be screwed if a spell focused around something like 'Soften' went wrong. Assessing the damage, the shoulder wound wasn't very severe and her minor regenerative powers (stolen) had taken care of the scratches the dryad had given her while they wrestled. Her skin felt tough, taking on a marble hue and she felt a general slowing of her movements. On the plus side, she felt that she'd managed to extract an appreciable portion of the dryad's essence. Looking around warily for another attack, Arhra tried to keep as far away from the trees as possible.

A draconic Rhiya then charged back into the fray, evidentally deciding that she was Godzilla and the forest was Tokyo. As she toppled a petrified tree and ground it into rubble, Arhra yelled, "Wooooo! Go Rhiya!"

Her encouragements stopped when she saw several dryads swarm Rhiya like a cat being swarmed by rats. While her diamond hide might be strong enough to turn a sword blow, it was no protection from the stony caress of the dryads. A large angry dragon became a large, dragon shaped rock.

"Oh, right... dragons are big targets. But we can still do this!" Arhra commented. After all, the dryads were not limitless in numbers and Rhiya had managed to kill one before getting taken out.

But now the dryads seemed to be at work crafting some new trickery. They held back as perhaps half a dozen sprouts of glowing green energy crawled vinelike over the rubble of the tree Rhiya had destroyed and threaded into the rocks. The entwined masses of rubble rose on crude legs, vague lumps of heads swinging to and fro as if looking around. The dryads working this magic vanished back into the trees, moving aorund to attack again. One of the larger piles, seemed to fix its gaze on Arhra and opened a rough maw lined with jagged shard-teeth, bellowing a silent roar as it began lumbering towards her.

All around, things were looking bad. Some of the NPF'er's numbers had been fully petrified, almost everyone looked to have some degree of stoniness to them and now these rubble-creatures looked to be entering the fray. Seemed the NPF'ers might fall in their first real battle.

Arhra decided there was only one sensible thing to do, "To me!" she yelled as she charged straight for the rocky monster pounding towards her. She saw a dryad leaping nimbly from tree to tree, planning to cut her off. The rubble monster swung one rough fist at her, but hurled her leaden body over the blow, letting it plow into the ground, and ran up its arm. The dryad shadowing her leapt off a tree branch, Arhra recognising her as the one she'd fought before by the branches woven into her hair, intent on finishing the job she'd had started. Arhra tore a rock off the back of the rock monster and lifted it just in time to knock aside the flinty claw it slashed at her. Rising and continuing the arc of her swing, Arhra bashed it in the face with the rock.

The dray hissed as she wiped sappy blood off its face, looking mostly flesh after having aided in petrifying Rhiya. "You won't find me so easy a second time." Arhra declared. A mouth then gaped in the jumbled rocks beneath her feet, seemingly intent on making her eat her words.

"Ah shazbot." Arhra decided to summarise her feelings towards this turn of events.

OOC: Yep, 'Mysterious Ability X' was the ability to create those rubble monsters.

[Steel Shadow]

Steel had been watchful, but the attack had surprised him. One of the dryads had jumped him from the side, apearing out of a tree. It grabbed his arm before he even thought to react. He had to resist the urge to rewind time, he didn't know enough yet. Instead he tried to shake it off. It's grip was solid. It drew back it's other arm to strike again.
"Fine" He muttered, rising into the air. The dryad lost it's balance, missing it's next attack, but it's grip remained solid. Steel clenched his teeth as it's claws began to cut into his arm. He sheilded his arm, stopping the pain, although it also trapped the drayads hand. Using that to steady itself, the drayad swung at him again. Steel tried to dodge, throwing it off a little, but his arm was still stuck in the sheild and he couldn't move far enough in time. It's claws scrapped through his side, sending pain shooting through him. He shook his head, trying to focus, but the pain was making it hard. His free hand found his sword. He drew it clumsily, his sword hand still trapped by the dryads grip and his own sheild. It knocked the blade from his grip with ease. He saw it spin away slowly in the corner of his eye. But his mind was focused on the enemy infront of him now. The pain had lessened now, replaced by a feeling of disturbing numbness. He watched it swing like a hawk, trying to anticipate it's next move. All the while they were rising higher and higher.
It kicked out at him, but he'd seen it coming and dodged it easily. Now they were near the peak of the glass dome above them. This was the best he was going to do. Quickly he swung up and kicked forward with both legs. At the same time he released the sheild around his arm. The impact, combined with the unexpected release of the sheild freed Steel of the dryads grip. They both fell for a moment before Steel resheilded beneth his feet. The dryad continued it's speedy descent, followed by an accelerating Steel. If it reached the trees before it reached the ground, it would probably survive. And Steel definatly didn't want that. He had to kill it before it got there. He was racing gravity. Fortunatly he could go faster than it could. Unfortunatly that meant being upside down. It wasn't pleasent looking up at the ground speeding towards you. Or looking down and seeing nothing but open sky.
The dryad smiled. It was almost to the trees. They seemed to rise up to meet it, promising whatever healing it needed after fighting that weak orange clown. It reached out to touch the closest stony branch. Then smashed into a barrier that hadn't been there a split second before. It shattered on impact, stone fragments going everywhere.
Steel righted himself, slowing himself down and pulling himself to a halt inches from the ground. He looked around. One down. He saw his sword pointing out of the ground nearby. He reached to pull it free, the stopped, looking at his arm. It was compleatly petrified. Remembering his side, he looked down. Stone apeared to be eating away at his stomach region. He looked back to his hand and flexed his fingeres. They were a little stiff, but ok. The sheild must have interupted whatever magic it had been using. even as he watched the tell-tale grey seemed to pull bac a little, exposing move pink flesh. It must have been fading from him after the dryads death. Still, not much time for that now, he thought, pulling his sword free. He looked about for the others. There were various sounds from the surrounding forrest, but no one in sight except a partialy frozen dryad. It was facing the other way, so it didn't see him. It was aparently focused on a large boulder infront of it. Steel glided over to it quietly and rammed his sword through it before it could free itself from the ice. It wasn't a fancy, graceful or even skillful move, but the fadding stone added alot of weight to the thrust, and the tip emerged out of the other side of the already weakened dryad. It slumped forward lifelesly, ripping the sword from Steels hand. He was suddenly very, very tired. The wound in his side began to hurt again as the petrification dispelled, and his sword arm arched from the claw wounds accross it. He tugged on his sword a few times before managing to pull it free, then looked around. He couldn't see anyone. He needed to rest. He sat down with his back to the big strangly shaped rock the dryad had been looking at, watching the forrest around him. He put a hand to his wound, hopeing to slow the blood flow down a little. He coughed, spraing blood in front of him. He'd been hurt worse than he'd thought.
"Uh.... anyone out there? I'm hurt kinda bad. Could really go for some healing." He coughed again. "Flare? Skyshot? Anyone?" He thought for a moment. Was he that desperate? He coughed again. Yes he was. "....Pyros?"

[Inbred Chocobo]

The dryad staring down Arhra was suddenly thrown to the side, looking to be wrestled by a flying orange blob. The dryad began rolling across the ground, and without it's stony form, unable to simply shrug off the kicks and punches that it was dealt. It went to sink a claw in its attacker, only to have the attacker jump off, avoiding the claws.

"I see why you guys are having trouble with this dryads." IC said as he pulled the Wind Edge off his back and charged the dryad, who ran away. IC struck hard on the tree, tearing a peice of the stony tree off. IC jumped back, and starting watching the shadows that danced in the woods, listening to the ruffles of the stony leaves as the dryads danced within their safty. IC smiled, because this would be their last day to do their dance.

[Flarecobra]

I knew that I was in trouble, after watching the whip start to petrofy, I let it go and threw a hastly-formed fireball at the dryad, who was caught off-guard, givimg me some time to quickly Jump into the air. "Ok bitch, let's see you like a little Mega-Flare." I said, landing on a high branch of a still-living tree, and started to charge. Just then, I felt a sharp pain in my leg, and looked to see the Dryad, her claws stuck into my left leg armor. I knew I could kick it off of me, so I decided to take her down with me. I shot off the Mega-flare at the little rubble monsters, grabber her other wrist, and game my own little insane grin. "Let's go for a ride." I said, and dropped off the branch, taking the Dryad with me, who now looked like she was panicking. Right before I hit bottom, my wings flared, and I sent her smashing into the ground, making a bit of a mess. "Ok, That fucking hurt..." I said, landing nearby, my wings strainged, and my left leg wasn't moving too good. I casted a quick Cure-2 on myself, only to find that my leg was still not moving too good. "Oh, shit....." I said to myself, feeling out of the fight for now.

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris lay there, his mind reeling, his muscles not responding to his brain's commands. He spent all of his remaining energy into two words:

"Little... help?" and passed out. His life was fading quickly.

[Skyshot]

"Thanks, Syttulg!" Skyshot let the New Treefolk deal with the backslasher while he returned to the one working to get off the ground. He immediately kicked it in the chest with his boot sole, knocking it back onto its back, put his feet on its shoulders to pin it down, and went back to sticking his staff into its throat. "Die."

He looked down at his front to assess the damage. Strange, it had scabbed over rather quickly. Or...oh no. He was turning to stone.

His feet felt strange. He let out a yell and jumped off, only making it a foot or so back away from the dryad. The monster leapt up, considerably quicker now with its more fleshy build. He swung Nightstorm with his right hand, hitting the dryad across the face and stunning it for a second, but felt a sudden pain in his wrist -- possibly a sprain. Time for fast action.

"HARM!" The dryad fell back and screamed before scrambling away from him into the nearest tree. Skyshot didn't bother to give chase, considering his boots and feet were made from stone. He instead looked around during his moment of pause. His eyes widened. "Fenris! Oh great. Summon Fenris!" The hobo immediately appeared at his side, sans bravado. "Heal."

The wounds began to knit together, and Fenris rose to his feet.

"Wha...?"

Skyshot pushed Nightstorm into his hands.

"Here. Use this. Don't worry, it's indestructable." He took out his dagger with his left hand and prepared for the next assault. He heard Steel's voice saying his name, and suddenly had a Brilliant Idea (TM). Why fight alone when he could fight in a circle? "Summon Steel Shadow." The spell worked, unlike some of the target's body functions at the moment. "Holy crap, Steel. Cure Critic. Hey, is Arhra calling us?"

OOC: I talked to Fenris before making this post; he's cool with it. I didn't talk to Steel Shadow beforehand, but since he was calling for help, decided to go with it. Steel, if you don't like this, just let me know and I'll change it.

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris groaned and wielded the staff. Sure, it was a bit heavy, but he adjusted to the weight. Adrenaline was flooding through his system, and that seemed to help remarkably. A dryad rushed at Fenris, Skyshot, and Steel. Fenris stepped in front of the dryad, and with a deft blow to the face of the creature. This dryad looked... familiar to him. His mind raced back to when he nearly died no less than a minute ago. His eyes widened and locked into a look of determination.

"This time, you're going down."

'Oooh, tough words.' Fenris ignored him.

Fenris reached out, and grasped the Dryad by the neck. She hissed and slashed, and his hand turned to stone due to the direct contact with the creature, but her neck became less stony. He shakily raised Nightstorm with one hand and drew it back. He swung the heavy staff like a baseball bat, releasing his grip on the dryad moments before the staff struck true. Nightstorm hit the dryad in her weakened neck, and rammed into her spine.

Fenris panted as the stone overtook his hand and started spreading up his arm. He awkwardly repositioned that hand on the dryad's neck, revealing more and more vulnerable flesh. Drawing out his uber-longknife, he slit the throat of the stunned Dryad.

Fenris stood up, and held up his stony arm.

"Can anybody reverse this? And could you also reverse the stone on Rhiya? It looks like she needs it more than I do."

As he uttered those words, a rubble critter loomed over and behind him.

"Oh shit."

[PhoenixFlame]

Phoenix, ironically, was unmolested for the time being. A time being consisting of only a few seconds as she waded through the mass of trees to get a look at the majority of the battle. Her eyes settled on a stone Rhiya and a mass of felled trees. Ironically, her uncaring tactical mind said, "Yes! Vantage point!" rather than "Oh noes, Rhiya is petrified!"

Phoenix made her way, as quickly as she could, towards Rhiya, ignoring the nearby Dryads whom were more or less occupied with the other NPFers, aswell as the stone constructs dealing with Arhra. Dodging a swipe from a fleshier foe as she approached the Rhiya-monolith, Phoenix deftly began climbing the stone dragon, reaching summit in what would be considered a record time amongst professional dragon-climbers.*

Grabbing hold of one of Rhiya's scales with her stony, now barely manipulatable right arm, Vampire-Phoenix slung her left arm, gun in hand, out over the battlefield with a triumphant grin.

"Fire in the hole!" she yelled, taking aim at a random Dryad from atop her stony high-ground, and began firing double-action into their masses.

*In the year 1029 BC, Dragon-Climbing was made an official sport in the annual Olympic Games.

((Person next can determine who gets handy-dandy fire support, while I'm sure Arhra is going to have them try to climb Rhiya after me. Luckily, having the high ground is an advantage. Hurray for salvaging bad situations.))

[Bailey]

Syttulg was knocked backwards as the Dryad he was hanging off of took multiple bullets, knocking it over. This would in most circumstances be helpful, but here, it meant that he had handcuffs in the shape of a statue's head. Making an attempt at picking himself up off the ground, he discovered that his legs from his knees down were made of stone, and a call to his nannites proved to show that he was out of batteries.

Dragging himself over to a tree, he managed to get himself upright, using the tree as a brace, and stayed there waiting for something to come within range.

[PyrosNine]

Pyros had, for the most part avoided any such encounter with the Dryads. Sure, a few had come near, but he'd flown up and away before they could become too close. They seemed to have some frightful power, and it would not be good to just run in and fight.

Pyros scanned them well, gauging their strength and considering his own, judged them to be some warped mix between tree and rock, when the chaos hit these tree's earthbound roots. They seemed to be able to become part of the trees as if immersing in water, and when outside were able to petrify and be unpetrified by attacking others.

Fortunately, Pyros did not approve of Pygmalionism, and always kept a few soft's handy. But it was most important for now to not be made stony before he could use it, and to best conserve them he'd need to deal with the dryads before they could afflict those healed again.

Pyros did devise some strategy. He was nowhere near the others, but he called out. "Forgive me for being late to aid, but I have been watching closely. They seem to lose their rocklike composition after using their petrification attack, so those who have attacked the most should be the easiest to pierce with weapons."

Pyros flew up and over another dryad whom he'd bumped into before, as apparent by the deep slash in it's face from Pyros's sword.

"But in using that to our advantage for a group of this number would be ill-advised, as waiting for them all to become soft would involve leaving only one of us non-petrified and then hoping that person could destroy them all, then unpetrify the others without become stone himself."

Pyros doubled back and gave a strong thrust of his blade into the center of the offending dryad and smashed it into a nearby tree. Naturally, it cackled with glee at being repaired and replenished.

"But do not worry. I have another theory."

Pyros's hand lit ablaze. "Trees can burn, so therefore that which is one with trees should also."


Pyros torched the tree with the Dryad still in it.

[FenrisWolf]

"Forgive me for being late to aid, but I have been watching closely. They seem to lose their rocklike composition after using their petrification attack, so those who have attacked the most should be the easiest to pierce with weapons."
"Yeah, I figured that out already!" Fenris yelled while avoiding the rubble monster that was on his ass. "That's how I killed one of the dryads. It's also how my arm's all fucked up, and I can't fight back against this guy!"

The Rubble monster decided to start lobbing its body parts at him. Fenris reflexively held up his arm to block. Unfortunately, it was his petrified arm. The rock began to crack. Fenris's eyes went wide.

"I NEED HELP!" he yelled, holding his arm together.

[Mauve Mage]

Mauve was still face-down on the cold ground beneath Rhiya's wing when Garud tossed the shadowy potion at her. Plink! It hit her stone shoulder and bounced.

"Eep!" yelped the mage, realizing what would happen should it hit the ground and break. Her right hand shot out and grabbed the bottle just before it impacted with the earth. Instead, it broke in her hand.

"Oh look. Broken glass in my hand." Mauve commented dryly. "Well that's lovely, isn't it? It bounces off the rock just fine, but the moment it hits my nice soft hand, it-- OW! What the..?" The strange potion seeped into the cuts as though she were made of sponge. Seconds later, the left side of her neck began to feel normal again, aside from the hot sting of the acidic potion as it ate away the stone curse.

"Oh-kaaaay, I don't think that was supposed to happen," Mauve said warily, eying the cuts on her palm. "But y'know, whatever works is cool. As long as the curse goes away, I can deal."

Clumsily she forced herself into a crouch, leaning against Rhiya's frozen side. The petrification was slowly going away, but it still clung to her hand and lower arm. Plus, the acid didn't feel incredibly pleasant as it washed over and through the very-much-alive upper shoulder wounds.

A few drops of the potion had pooled inside some of the concave bits of broken glass that fell out of her hand. It definately wouldn't be enough to revive a dragon, but it might have some effect on Mesden. Mauve edged over to the goddess and dropped the potion and the glass on Mesden's stone shoes. (Up to you whether it works or not, Mesden.)

Mauve crawled out from underneath Rhiya's wing and stumbled towards Garud. He had given up his potion to help her, so the least she could do was distract the dryad for a minute. There was, regrettably, nothing else she could do for Rhiya and Mesden right now; she had already checked her right pocket for Soft potions and found none, and her left pocket was still frozen solid in rock.

Garud didn't look good. A patch of blood tinted with grey stone was steadily growing on his hip. He shot a beam of shadow at the dryad, but it was clear that he was weakening.

"Heavenly Strike!" called the mage, and a chair-sized ice crystal formed directly above the dryad's head and crashed down on her. It didn't harm the dryad much, but it was a nice little greeting card. The dryad's head swiveled towards Mauve in annoyance, but the mage turned her attention to Garud.

"Cura!" she commanded. She didn't have the white magic to undo stone, but she figured that if she healed the wound, the poison might spread less quickly.




With a series of cracks, the stone fell away from her hand. Mauve could feel her left fingers again. She would have danced for joy, if her left leg still had all of its feeling. Instead, she settled for a "Wheee!!!" of joy. Now her Pocket of Near-Infinite Holding was free, so she took a break from the fight to look for a Soft potion. There was only one that she could find. Damn. She supposed she shouldn't have left the other six or seven in her medicine cabinet at home.

But there was nothing to be done about it now. Turning, she hurled the Soft at the frozen Rhiya. Hopefully one Soft could revive an entire dragon.... And she hoped that Rhiya wouldn't end up hurling Phoenix into a tree if/when she returned to life and jumped up...



She turned back to Garud and his fight.

"I owe you one," she said, throwing a fireball at the dryad. Suddenly, she got an idea.

"Hey, can your shadow magic lower the temperature around the dryad?" Mauve asked. "Enough to freeze water?"

[Steel Shadow]

Steel gasped as his wounds healed. The spining world settled down and pulled itself into focus.
"Thanks man, I owe you." He said as he pulled himself to his feet. Hearing Fenris's yell he spun around to see the giant rock monster about to pound the hobo into the ground. Ignoring the voice in his head screaming at him to run, he ran between them and intercepted another attack, sheilding seconds before it hit him and smashed itself apart. He let the sheild drop and looked back to Fenris and Skyshot.
"Any ideas how to kill this thing?"

[Mesden]

The curse ate away, only to reveal a shell. The body fell over, lifeless in every regard. Whatever glow of vigor she had, whatever emotion her body could depict, anything you could call truly human was seemingly gone.

(Arhra, you're getting irony)

[PhoenixFlame]

"But in using that to our advantage for a group of this number would be ill-advised, as waiting for them all to become soft would involve leaving only one of us non-petrified and then hoping that person could destroy them all, then unpetrify the others without become stone himself."


"Well thank you for that beautiful ray of useless sunshine!" Phoenix called back in her angry, sarcastic voice. Generally, Phoenix would have been polite and happily discussed tactics with Pyros over tea and chips. Unfortunately, a distinct lack of tea and chips, accompanied with a vastly hostile enviroment was contributing a great deal of stress.

It didn't help any when Phoenix witnessed Mauve attempt to heal Mesden from her perch atop Rhiya's stony form. "Oh, bloody hell..." she groaned, whipping her pistol around to fire at a dryad attempting to climb Rhiya. The rocklet impacted it's head, and sent it reeling back down to the ground in a rather comedic fashion, but still failed to kill it. No matter, as long as it was far away from her, Phoenix didn't mind.

Grumbling at having fired her entire cylinder, Phoenix popped the breach of her weapon open and inserted her handy speedloader. Fumbling with reloading now was not a good idea. With a stone arm however, Phoenix soon found how difficult it was to load such a weapon even with it's excessively large speedloader. While requiring all the dexterity of a lethargic house, it was all her stoned arm could muster at the moment.

"I NEED HELP!" Fenris screamed.

"Don't we all?" Phoenix muttered sarcastically to herself, and turned around to find the Hobo and his assailant. Any second now, she'd finish snapping the weapon back together in a hollywood style wrist flick. Maybe two wrist flicks. If Tom Cruise could do it, Phoenix could do it too. Or so she thought.

"Fenris! Take Cover!" she felt compassionate enough to warn him, before finishing at a dramatically appropriate moment and fired the first of her shiny new plasma cylinder's cartridge at the stone construct.

[GARUD]

(OOC: Mauve, you can use my character for your plan whatever it involves. It's just so you don't have to wait for me to respond.)

The beam connected well but it didn't knock the Dryad off it's feet.

"Look at me, not her. She's not the one you want, I am."

The Dryad charged at the demon slayer who met the creature, punching it with a stoned hand. What was better was that he hit a soft bit, which broke a couple bones. However, he was losing movement as the rest of his arm became solid rock.

"No Mauve, I can't use my shadows to freeze water or make it colder... but I can use my sorcery. Just tell me what I have to do because I don't have much time. I used alot of the shadows in the room to make that acidic potion, so I can't heal myself right now."

Garud saw the Dryad spring to her feet, and concentrated. He needed to have a clear head to carry out Mauve's plan.

"And for the record, if I become completely petrified, just know that you owe me nothing. I broke a promise I made to myself before our arena match and it was the least I could do to make it up to you."

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris heard Pheonix yell at him to take cover, and he did. If taking cover means falling flat on the ground, and snapping the stone arm in two. Luckly, the nerves were stone, so he felt no pain, but it was still quite freaky to witness his own limb getting cracked in two.

[Flarecobra]

I saw Mes fall, seemingly lifeless. "Shit, MES!" I called out, and made my way over to her. A trio of Rubble Monsters started to come at me, but I blew them back by hitting them both with a fireball. "Ok, let's see if this works..." I said, as I started to cast Life-2 on Mes. Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw a Dryad poke out behind Syttulg and was about to claw his face. "LOOK OUT!" I called out to him.

[FenrisWolf]

(OOC: Phoenix has told me to decide the way the Rubble Critter reacts)

The rubble creature loomed over Fenris, who cowered, holding his stump of an arm, as a shining blue streak slammed into the monster's back. A large explosion rose from the creature's backside, coating it with a chemical that seemed to be quite combustable. The heat emitted was extraordinary; Fenris could feel it even though there was solid rock between him and the source. The monster turned his rocky head towards the vampiress on the dragon, and started lumbering at her. Fenris could see that his back looked like it was literally eating itself, the rock was melting and dripping onto the ground, leaving little charred splotches on the earth.

Fenris lay on the battlefield, cradling his arm.

[Mauve Mage]

(Hope you don't mind how much I took over your character, Garud.)

Another chunk of ice hit the dryad in the side, throwing her off balance ever-so-slightly and distracting her from another leap at the demon slayer.

"Don't be silly, Garud," Mauve said curtly. "It was no big deal. The whole point of the arena match was to try and beat the living daylights out of each other, and neither of us really even managed that." She turned her attention back to the dryad.

"Now, here's what we do..."


By now the dryad was more than a little annoyed at the constant interruptions. She had been enjoying herself up until the point where her prey had taken on this annoying sidekick. It wasn't like the little mage could actually harm her, but the dryad preferred to have her prey alone and defenseless. It was far more amusing that way.

Of course, there was a very simple way to fix this problem. The dryad bent her hand into a rake-like claw and leaped at the problem in question. The mage stumbled backwards in surprise and extended a hand, but the dryad wasn't worried about any spells she could cast.

The dryad was actually airborne and just feet away from the mage when she felt something wrap around her ankle. With a shriek, the dryad stopped mid-flight and jerked backwards before impacting heavily with the ground. She looked back-- Garud was tugging on one end of his sword-chucks with all his might while the other was wrapped around her foot. A series of cracks ran up the dryad's front and across her arms as a result of the impact.

"Watera!" commanded the mage, and the dryad was instantly drenched. Water seeped into the cracks. "Now!!"

Garud's magic swirled around the dryad, and her face instantly contorted in shock as the water expanded with the cold, breaking the cracks open even further. Something that could be likened to horror spread over the dryad's features as the lower half of her right arm split with a sickening crack.

The creature tried to stand, but the ice slowed her movements. Some of the water even acted as an adhesive, freezing the dryad to the porous ground like cement. She was trapped, and was slowy falling apart. A bone-chilling scream left her mouth and was slowly stifled as ice formed all the way down her throat. Then, there was silence.


"Dunno if she's dead," panted the mage, leaning heavily against a tree trunk. "But that'll at least... hold her for a while..."

Her eyes went from the dryadcicle to Garud, who was slowly becoming a living statue.

"Dammit," she cursed. "Still gotta find... a way to stop this. Ideas?"

[PyrosNine]

The tree proved harder to burn/melt than thought, but there was some screaming from the Dryad, who suddenly found it a bit harder to get out. Pyros kept up the heat, and concentrated it to a smaller, hotter flame that was still large enough to cover the entire tree. This did entail getting closer, which Pyros found just as perilous if he had attempted to wrestle the thing to death like certain other people.

The Dryad could still lash out a free arm, and hack away at PYros, who did his best to remain in his position without letting go of the stream of heat. Pyros had to duck and swerve, and when none of that could aid him, he pulled out his sword with his free hand and parried. However, the flame weakened and Pyros had to get closer to keep up the heat neccesary.

The problem was is it was similar to performing open heart surgery while using one's other free hand to shoot six bullets in a bullseye 30 yards off.


"Dammit," she cursed. "Still gotta find... a way to stop this. Ideas?"

"I am not fully free with my hands, but-dodge- may I ask, do any of you know Earth Magic? I'm fairly -CLANG- sure there's a magic spell that gives animation to lifeless rock..."

[Tarrin]

Tarrin curled up into a ball on the ground, The preasure of his stone affliction becoming too much to bear.
Pain was shooting through Tarrins body, The stone was squeesing around his heart now, Making it hard to pump blood around his body, It wouldn't be long before either his heart was itself was stone or crushed by his other organs as they turned to stone as well.

[Darth SS]

Darth skidded back into the room.

"Sorry. I left the water running. At my house. Where I live. Had to go turn it off, cause I don't want to run up the bill...'cuz I'm not...rich...oh bother."

When his voice dropped off, he'd taken stock of the situation. Well, the tattered remains of it. Basically, as farm as he could see, they were screwed. His mind was actively searching for a way to unscrew the situation when it was, unfortunately, interuppted by one of the beasties that had screwed up the situation first. Damn dryads, couldn't they see he was busy?

Rapidly, he returned to reality as a stone claw arced towards his face. His arm snapped up, intercepted it, then he jumped and booted the dryad away. Unfortunately, his arm...felt funny. He looked. Stone. With a wince, he grabbed his knife and flayed the stony part off before it could spread.

Fucking ow.

After a bit, the skin regrew. After a bit, the dryad was coming back. She threw another claw at Darth, who was at an impasse on how to stop her. He blocked the strike again and prepared himself to hurt himself again. His arm wasn't turning to stone. Why would it? It wasn't actually there. It was his ghost arm that had taken the strike. Darth moved her hand aside and punched the dryad right in the nose. Since his arm was a product of his mind, he could make it as hard as he had to. Verilly he did just that. However, since he now had a way to defend against the dryad, he had to think of a way to kill it.

After another quick sock to the enemy nose, he set about doing just that.

[Bailey]

Syttulg felt his knees soften, and then his hands as well. The statue head slid off of his claws, and he dashed forwards. Slicing at the frozen Dryad, he slashed off half of its head.

"It helps if the culprit is dead." He panted, before collapsing to the ground.

"I need..." gasp "... a recharge." Gasp "Lightning, anybody?"

And with that, he fell unconscious.

[GARUD]

"The arena... that's it! This gives me an idea. Remember when you burnt that tree, and the light created both light and darker shadows. Well, if you have a fire or light spell, you can create more shadow, enough for me to make more potions."


Garud looked down at his legs. They were completely made of stone. So was one of his arms. He still had one arm free, but it didn't really help much. His neck was starting to grey.

"Umm... I don't mind a bit of chatter here or there, but would it be too much to ask for a little spell to generate some shadow? I don't really want to put you out or anything. No hurry though."

Garud always made sure to be polite when asking for things. Even for a cure for petrification.

[Mauve Mage]

"You got it," Mauve said. She took off her cape and threw it up into the branches of a tree, then extended a hand and engulfed it in flames with a single word. The fabric caught fire and burned, casting long, flickering shadows dancing around the room.

"All yours."

[GARUD]

Garud raised his one good arm, and the darkness swirled around him, culminating in one point. A vial appeared followed by it filling with a putrid smelling pitch black liquid. Success. The cape continued to burn, despite having no shadow now.

"We make a pretty good team, don't we?"

Garud prepared to douse himself with the acid, but it seems his arm would not respond. It seemed during his shadow creation, his arm had turned to stone. He felt really bad about it.

"Eh, I never thought I would be this dependant on someone until I got into a nursing home. Would you mind tipping the bottle. Pretty please?"

[Inbred Chocobo]

IC had taken on a dryad of his own. Every time it came at him, a block happened to stop the attack, but then when IC counterattacked, the damn thing always got away.

Then IC had a crazy idea. When the dryad went to hit him, IC reached out with his left hand. The claws sank into his palm, and IC squeezed his hand around the claws. The dryad ran away, but was suddenly jerked back. IC still had ahold of the claws, but not his hand was stone, so the dryad wasn't getting away. IC yanked the dryad in, and with his free hand swung the Wind Edge, smashing off the head of the dryad.

He would have to give his hand a minute to unstone itself, so he went off to help someone else.

[Arhra]

Arhra watched as Inbred leapt into the fray and pursued the dryad that had been attacking her. "Uh, little help?" she called at his retreating back. Sunk up to her waist in the mouth the rubble beast had opened on it's back was not a good place to be. She secretly suspected the dryad had deliberately run off to distract Inbred.

As the stony jaws closed on her, Arhra discovered there was one advantage to being half petrified at least. It had numbed and hardened her flesh. What would have been very painful was merely painful as she felt rock shards press into her flesh. One arm flailed and grabbed at the vine-like cords of magic threading the thing together.

Tugging at it experimentally and feeling the energy being to flow out of it, Arhra's expression turned devillish, "Well Mr Rock, it seems I have found your weakness!" Grabbing at a conduit that seemed to be articulating the jaw, Arhra pulled energy through it into herself and forced the mouth back open. Merrily tearing the magical vines animating the thing out by the roots and withering them as she balanced precariously on its back, Arhra quickly had the upper hand. When too damaged to sustain itself, the remainder of the spell disispated and Arhra fell in an undignified fashion as the monster collapsed back into a pile of rubble.

Arhra dusted herself off and took the moment to triumphantly pose on top of the heap. She kicked a rock and watched it tumble down the pile, "Not so tough now you can't move, are you Mr Rock?"

Arhra then found herself stabbed from behind. She gasped and arched back, losing her balance and tumbling down the mound, sprawling in an ungianly heap at the bottom. With the alarming sensation of blood in her throat and numbness where she'd been stabbed, Arhra coughed and looked at her attacker.

It was the same dryad as before. Walking daintly down the pile of rubble towards Arhra, the dryad smiled. It was almost flesh now, a picture of long legged grace as it stepped lightly from rock to rock, the sun shining on its lovely form. Bark garments snugly hugged its green skin, still paler and greyer in areas not quite flesh. It combed back it's deep green, leafy hair with its flinty, blood stained claws, one of the few parts of it that were still completely stone, and traced along one of the branches woven into its hair like ornaments. Deep green eyes were lit with evil joy.

Arhra felt quite certain this should be going the other way. She was also of the opinion that she didn't get enough long eloquent descriptions of how kickass and beautiful she looked.

"I am beginning to not like you!" Arhra decided to inform the dryad. She had briefly considered seduction, but seeing how she had used it before in a remarkably similiar situation, she doubted lightning would strike twice. Instead she ran through a mental inventory of her abilities and considered her options. Her best bet was probably a Cunning Plan. She inhaled.

When the dryad reached Arhra's supine form, it found its intended prey more than it had bargained for. Arhra sprang into action, breathing a gout of fire at its face, and lunging, stabbing one hardened hand through it's torso. Arhra was mentally congratulating herself on how smart she'd been to hunt down a dragon and steal its fiery breath when she felt unexpected pain. The dryad's two claws stabbed into her chest, burying right up to the digits.

In emergency panic mode, Arhra did not stop to consider why the dryad was still alive after having a hole punched through it. Instead she focused on making it more dead, free hand lunging for it's throat. She slumped as she felt the leaden weight of stone flow into her, along with the life force of the dryad. Almost completely stone, she felt the dryad collapse, Arhra's drain being just enough to kill it along with the injuries inflicted upon it. With the dryad dead, Arhra tried to move and found she couldn't. Her thoughts moved sluggishly as she realised just how close she'd come.

A mental inventory revealed that she had accquired some new abilities from the dryad, including the ability to transfer petrification. How typical of Blue Magic-esque abilities to be learned the moment after they become useful.

Feeling the petrification slowly beginning to abate, Arhra wished it would hurry up. It was embarassing being frozen in this tableau with the dead dryad.

OOC: Well, let's finish the mopping up and then we can continue.

[Bailey]

Syttulg looked around for anybody still in need of help, dashing forwards to slice at the Dryad's head once he found somebody.

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris lay on the battlefield, cradling his stump. He was practically in tears. Through blurry eyes, he saw what was left of his arm starting to turn to flesh. Fenris's eyes went wide. He knew by looking at the other half of the stony arm that his arm would start bleeding out the hole once it healed. Grabbing the stray arm, and locking it into place with the jagged fracture, he realized that his only hope was to find somebody, anybody, who could mend it.

"If anybody is not too busy, and would like to partake in saving my life, I need somebody to reattatch my arm over here!"

----
Elsewhere, the rubble monster that attacked Fenris had finished melting in its charge against Phoenix, and dissolved at the base of Rhiya,

[PhoenixFlame]

Phoenix cackled as the angered rubble-monster that had attacked Fenris was slowly eaten apart by the cobalt-blue plasma flames cutting through his softer vines and harder rocks. It collapsed with what rock might call a pained moan. Phoenix called it poetic justice.

She was just about to raise her weapon, when her weapon was suddenly grabbed from behind. One of the Dryads must have been a professional Dragon-Climber also. Phoenix was mildly unpreturbed, but disliked being stoned regardless if it were the Dryad's doing, or the result of illegal drugs.

Yes. It was her Dryad from the very beginning, behind her now, and looking much more fleshy and angry than her origional opponent.

"Um. Hello." Phoenix said, fighting the fae as her hand was wrenched skyward, gun shaking toward the glass ceiling as the two fought to control the only weapon within several feet.

*Krack!* *Vssrrrsh!* Phoenix's revolver discharged, firing another plasma bolt high into the air overhead, augering into the glass ceiling before detonating and spraying tiny bits of it's payload all over the field.

"Grzzr'argh!" Phoenix yelled, swinging her right, and stoned arm in a less-than-graceful punch at the Dryad's face. Ironically, it connected. The Dryad staggered backwards and released Phoenix's gun.

"Not so tough now that you're not stone, eh?" Phoenix taunts, raising her pistol, and hoping the thing would run away. Honestly, firing at this range would be suicide. The Dryad stared at her.

Phoenix sighed, "This is what we in the business refer to as a "Mexican Standoff." Theoretically, the only way a Mexican Standoff can end is if we both agree to stop fighting and go home, or... *click* We blow each other's brains out. The in-"

The Dryad wasn't interested. She lunged at Phoenix's chest, whom awkwardly attempted to pistol-whip the fae in return. Both succeeded, though the Dryad had claws. It was something like a bad episode of "The Shores of Hell" on "Nightmare Mode". The claws dug deeply into Phoenix's abdomen, while her pistol clanked against the Dryad's head, snapping it sideways.

"Ugh, this is awkward..." Phoenix groaned. The Dryad grinned. "If only I had..."

*Kzzzrrrrrrzzzrrr*

The Dryad drew Phoenix's PC-5 Vibrokatana from behind her back.

"My sword..." she said meekly.

[Inbred Chocobo]

The vibrokatana rose up as the dryad prepared to finish off Pheonix. A whistling sound suddenly filled both Pheonix's and the Dryad's ears. When they turned to look, they saw the Wind Edge hurtling towards the Dryad. The Dryad took off, doing its best to avoid the attack. Unfortunatly, the Wind Edge still struck, though this time in the rear, sending the dryad spinning, and causing the blade to go wild.

The dryad got up and moved it, because now it saw IC charging it. Off it went into a nearby tree, but instead of IC following, he went and retrieved Pheonix's blade.

IC tossed the blade, letting it stick into the ground near Pheonix, and turned for his Wind Edge. Just as IC turned for the Wind Edge, the dryad was back for more. This time, the dryad slammed into IC, and sunk both claws into IC, one in the back and one in the chest. IC set both feet on the ground and shoved back, trying to get the dryad off of him.

The dryad accepted the deal to get off of him, and backed off. Just as it turned around to get away, it felt its back leg catch on something. IC then yanked back and spun around. He spun around three or four times, then had the dryad go overhead and slammed it into the ground. IC backed off then, taking a breather over his wounds and to retrieve his weapon.

[Darth SS]

Darth was engaged in a high speed fight with his own dryad. Thankfully, his ghost arm was warding off petrification, but he found himself at a bit of an impasse. He couldn't hurt the dryad, and it couldn't hurt him. Nevertheless, Darth found himself running backwards along the wall, with the dryad chasing him across it, swinging furiously at it.

Rock was a solid. Solids were hard to break. When did rock break? When a fissure was in it. As long as Darth could crack the bitch, he could kill her. But how? Rock. Hard. His weapons would break, his bombs did nothing, and shooting could create difficult ricochets. What could he hit the dryad with? Rock.

Darth snagged her hand at the next swing, then stopped running. The two of them began to fall back to the ground. Darth bent her arm so her own claw was at her neck, then flipped around behind her. When they landed on the ground, Darth was standing on the Dryad's back, and the Dryad had cracked her own throat. Badly.

When the two flipped up into fighting positions, the Dryad was shifting to a softer form to heal. Darth's katana whirled out of its sheath, and into a bitching backhand. It was a perfect imitation of Mace Windu in Episode II when he killed Jango Fett. It also had the same effect, popping the dryad's head off.

"My thanks to the man who taught me that. Samuel L. Jackson. The L stands for 'bad motherfucker.'"

[POS Industries]

Meanwhile, someplace else....

"WALT!"

It was raining. Sayid ran full speed through the sheets of rain spilling down in the jungle, chasing after Shannon who herself was chasing and calling after the young boy who, by all accounts, should be miles away at sea.

"WALT!!"

Sayid could hear the girl screaming in the distance, but the downpour obscured her from his vision. He could only see her shadow through the sheets of falling water before the gunshot rang out. As she turned around, he could see the blood streaming from the wound in her stomach, and he could only cry out her name as she slumped dead into his arms. Cradling her in the jungle, Sayid looked up weakly to see Ana-Lucía standing before him, the gun used to slay his lover still trained on them, a look of shock and confusion--

"Pe-chan?"

Pedro O'Sullivan swiveled his chair away from the flat-screen television mounted on his wall as the credits began to roll and responded to the digitized female voice that came from seemingly everywhere and nowhere at once. "Yes, Rei, what is it?"

"Sorry, Pe-chan. I hope I wasn't interrupting," the Relatively Empathic Interface program continued in its usual sweet tone, "but we've taken some interesting readings from the comet. I thought that, seeing as your show should be over, you might like to take a look at them."

"Of course, of course," nodded POS, "I'll be right down. I needed to stretch my legs, anyway."

The AI was pleased. "Great! We'll see you in the astrometrics lab shortly. Also, I thought you might like to be updated on the status of our friends."

"Friends?" Pedro asked confusedly as he rose from his chair and stretched a bit, "I don't seem to recall having any--oh, right, those guys! How are they holding up? Dead yet?"

"No, they're still alive. They've run into a bit of trouble at the moment, but they seem to be handling it just fine. Well, overall anyway..."

"Ah," POS sighed blandly as he swiftly exited his office, "I guess that's okay. Maybe later, then..."

[Mauve Mage]

(Sorry if this post sounds messed-up; I am so very very tired right now it isn't even funny.)

"Eh, I never thought I would be this dependant on someone until I got into a nursing home. Would you mind tipping the bottle. Pretty please?"

"Since you said please..." Mauve pried the bottle out of his hand and dumped its contents on his petrified arm. She had originally planned on saying no, and then threatening to put him and the other petrified folks in the NPF Arts and Crafts museum as statues. She wouldn't really: It was just a joke, for kicks. But seeing as how fate loved to watch her suffer, she figured that even joking about it would probably cause her nothing but problems in the next battle. Karma and all that.

"There. Now with any luck, neither of us will need any more mobility assistance until we enter nursing homes." She stopped, thinking. Then she shuddered. "Because honestly, the thought of me as any kind of nurse or caretaker frightens even me."

Irony was obviously alive and well in this cave, because at that moment Fenris called out frantically for-- you guessed it-- medical assistance. Mauve looked over towards the sound, and her eyes went wide.

"Uh oh," she said. "Don't mean to abandon you, Garud, but we've got a hobo in distress." Thus saying, she approached the freaked-out Fenris, first making sure that Garud was indeed recovering.

"Fenris!" Mauve said, kneeling down to look at his arm. "Holy cow, man, what happened to you?!" Not waiting for reply, Mauve dug into her pockets and pulled out whatever she could. Among the items removed was a blue scrunchie. Mauve used her knife to cut the fabric and removed the thick band of elastic inside. This she tied very tightly around Fenris' upper arm. It was meant to slow the flow of blood, but with a wound this size, she wasn't certain how well it would work.

Both halves of his arm were recovering from the curse, although one half was decidedly faster than the other. Fenris was frantically trying to keep both halves pressed together. If he kept them there, Mauve could heal the wound as soon as both halves were mostly flesh on their contact surfaces. Unfortunately, that meant that most of the nerves would be back online before she could start. He probably wasn't going to like that.

"Don't move," Mauve warned him.

White magic swirled around the wound a moment later, joining the fully-unpetrified part of Fenris with the lost part. The lower half of his arm was still in the process of converting stone to flesh, but at least he had one whole arm again.

[FenrisWolf]

Fenris swore he could have kissed the mage right then and there. He didn't. He just stammered out a "Th-thank you," and looked at his arm. It was whole. Whole.

'You handled that well,' the voice in his head said sarcastically.

'Why are you such an ass?' the other voice asked the first voice.

Fenris stood up and waited for the rest of the curse to flow away from him. He felt ashamed, really. He knew the first voice was right. Fenris had panicked. This was just the first trial in the first temple. If he couldn't survive this, how was he going to be any use later on?

"Really, I couldn't thank you enough, Mauve."

He stared at the ground and waited for what little was left of the battle around him to end.

[GARUD]

Garud had regained movement, but his feet and arms were still stone. He stumbled over to his savior (what?) and Fenris.

"Mauve, you are an angel. An angel of pain maybe, but still an angel! I would hug you, but I fear that my stomach would get dirty if it ended up on the floor."

The demon slayer turned to Fenris and said,

"How's the arm buddy?"

[PhoenixFlame]

((Mop-up Slice and Dice))

Phoenix slipped her gun back into her coat, and calmly gripped the hilt of her vibroblade with her still-functioning left arm. A smile broke across her face as the weapon hummed to life.

"Thanks IC." She said, and lept off of Rhiya's stoned form and headed toward the tree the Dryad had fled into. It would not escape so easily this time.

*Vwrrrrr...* "Come out, come out, little one." Phoenix cackled.

For seconds, nothing happened. Then the creature lunged. It was faster than it had been before, but far less stony. Phoenix's vibrokatana bit deeply into the creature's torso as it attempted to claw at her. Green flesh and "blood" sprayed everywhere as the vibrokatana whined like a stressed chainsaw.

*ScresccheeeVwrrBzzzrrr!*

Soon, the dryad was two smaller dryads, and Phoenix continued to dice the creature up into smaller pieces with her weapon while accusing with sundry obscenities it of cutting off her fingers and ruining her right arm. By the time she finished, she was covered in dryad-guts, but felt much better.

"That took a little more effort, but *I* feel it was worth it." she said while whistle-walking back toward the group.

[Flarecobra]

I sighed, and got up. "Mes, you had better come back, cause I'm not carrying your ass all over." I said, picking up her body.

[FenrisWolf]

"How's the arm buddy?"
"Better, now. Thanks to Mauve. I dunno what we'd do without her," Fenris replied. "How about yourself?"

[Darth SS]

Darth came over and was chuckling. Not pridefully though. More in that "Oooh a butterfly" way. Nevertheless he chuckled, and even said "Dur." The source of Darth's amusement?

"You could've died, Fenris. Fenrissss...sssss....like a ssssnake...heh I'm so funny."

What Darth hadn't counted on was that his ghost arm was part of his mind. His mind was slowing down. Darth was going to be a bit stupid for a while.

[FenrisWolf]

"Thanks for that marvelous insight. I never could have figured it out myself," Fenris said curtly. He was already embarrassed enough at his lack of usefulness, he didn't need to be reminded.

[Flarecobra]

Just then, a chunk of rock hit Darth on the back of his head, and if one looked at the direction it came from, one would see me, looking a little ticked at the remark. "Darth, just remember, I am a lamia. That means part snake, so watch the snake cracks, ok?" I said as I walked by them.

[Premonitions]

Stuck in battle with the Dryad, Premo had never been happier. He dodged, he slid, he parried, he fought like a madman convinced he was Samurai Jack. The two had barely landed a blow when he saw it. The dryad swung a clawed hand around to catch his face, a broadly telegraphed move, Premo twitched and brought his glowing sword around, barely having time to notice the claw coming up from below. The warrior howled... and all was silent.. They stood there, frozen, Premonitions with his sword at the dryads head.The dryad with her claw poised to strike his exposed belly. The leafy creature snarled "so.. what's it gonna be?" Prem spoke through strained teeth as his mind raced.. "I don't know, but it ain't gonna be me."

[Tarrin]

His breaths came ragged now, The stone was pressing against his lungs.

Tarrin gulped in air trying to keep his calm, Trying to figure how to get out of his predicament, Unfortunatly he failed at both of these areas, Panic set in and with that his already compressed heart tried to beat faster.

This ofcourse was a bad bad thing, Pressure built up more and more untill Tarrin sank into the darkness without sleep, His grip on reality fading like the last rays of sunlight giving way to the darkness of the night.

Moments later Tarrin awoke, the pressure lifting from his chest, His breath coming easer and more controlled, Looking down at his chest it started to take on more of its normal flesh like appearance, "Thank the spirits" He whispered it's fading.

[PyrosNine]

Pyros wiped his brow. With a close proximity and a constant stream of concentrated flame, he'd torched the Petrified tree and the Dryad who had the base of her body inside it, until both were somewhat melted.

When it was visible that some of the more vulnerable parts were starting to liquefy on the outer shell, Pyros took that opportunity to let the flame down and hack at the warped creature's neck with precise fury, and within 5 vertical slashes, with the creature screeching with every blow, it's vile head was seperated from it's equally vile body.

The thing still lived however, due to it's own healing processes. The head's face contorted and began to grow a neck, and the remaining body spasmed as violently as it could as it was stuck in the slightly gelatinous premagma'd tree.

With a heavy left arm, he gave one more violent stab and plunged the sword down the base of the neck at an angle, and then gave his sword a quick fling to send the head off to the ground. With his light left hand, he wiped off the blade as well as he could, and then groped in his clothing for his softs.

There was a reason why he his hand was so heavy, for the dryad had managed to strike the midsection of his arm plus the base of his shoulder and they had begun to harden into stone. The spot on the base had grown as well, and now was starting to spread to his neck. Pyros knew that if the process were to completely transform his neck, he would die from lack of oxygen and blood to the head in a very short amount of time. It was the price one had to pay for a few blows to the arm instead of a safe, nigh instantaneous petrification.

Despite his mortal Peril, Pyros calmly rummaged past some antidotes and spare change in gold coins within his person, and drew out the two softs.

Pyros was fond of the more old fashioned ways of doing things, and didn't trust the sprays and lotions. What if he had been petrified in a strong gale, or in the rain? Instead, his softs were from the olden days, a liquified acid that was in a sharp, but thick needle that was stuck into the hardened flesh with precision, lest the affected body shatter.

With one hand, Pyros removed the wrapping and pinched the tip, squeezing out a small amount to allow for a safer penetration. Then, he stabbed it into his shoulder, near the neck. He aimed for saving his life first, then he'd deal with the arm. He could only hope he'd aimed the soft well, or else he'd soon be on the floor unconcious and dying.

[Mauve Mage]

(OOC: Fenris-- "Lack of usefulness?" You killed a dryad! There are those of us who couldn't even accomplish that!)

(Also-- I feel loved!)


"Thanks to Mauve. I dunno what we'd do without her," Fenris replied.

"Oh, you'd probably live longer, fuller lives," Mauve answered cheerfully.

Now that the coast was relatively clear, Mauve took a look at the gashes in her arm left over from her fight with the dryad. They weren't incredibly deep, but they did hurt now that the stone curse had been completely removed. Mauve used a bit of white magic and they were gone without a trace. Well, aside from her left sleeve being somewhat shredded, that is.

"So is everyone okay?"

[Bailey]

Syttulg managed to rise to consciousness just long enough to groan and then slipped back into sleep.

[PhoenixFlame]

"So, is everyone okay?"

"More or less." Phoenix said, examining her right arm with much interest. It hadn't been horribly stoned, and the effect already appeared to be wearing off shortly after the dryad's chainsaw-massacre demise. Several of the severed fingers had begun to reconstruct themselves, and the other damage she had suffered was already healed.

"Sure could go for something to eat, though." she coughed, while cradling her revolver in her right arm and reloading it with her left. "Damn stone monsters."

[FenrisWolf]

(OOC: Mauve, once Fenris starts emo-ing, there is nothing anybody can do to stop it. XD)

Fenris let out a laugh. "Yeah, I'm fine now. Thanks to you. I don't know where this whole goddess of pain and death and whatever started, but they're all wrong. 'Cause you're awesome. With awesome." Fenris said with a grin.

He turned to PhoenixFlame, "And thank you too. I'd have been a goner if it wasn't for that weapon you took out Rocky with."

[Darth SS]

Darth was standing there. People could watch his brain begin to accelerate.

"An apple can be called one apple...one, two, three, four, five...One plus one is two...one times one is one...two squared is four...root two is an unreal number...one plus one is three for extremely large values of one. What is one? It is a means to quantify matter. To say you have exactly one apple would mean that you have exact perfect parameters for one apple. Parameters do not always apply because they beg the question is reality and matter always the same, or is it a constant state of flux that our senses find the average to report?"

Darth stopped and looked around.

"Yah. I'm good."