From Out of a Dream [Quest]

[Ferryman]

Kickflip to standing.

Scatter these clowns with their own spears.

Throw spear at Joy, then switch to Reaching Fist. Two can play this game!

[semicasual]

You shake your head, trying to block out the pain and the growing feeling of dizziness. You can’t let yourself lose focus now…

You are already running forward as the throwing knife leaves your hand. The guard in front of you ducks down and to the left, avoiding the blade entirely but leaving himself open for your charge. Your now-free hand grabs his shortspear, pulling it behind you, pulling him forward. The keen point of Lefty punches through his chestplate into his ribs as you push into him. He chokes, mind broken by pain and shock, and lets go of the spear.

You leave the sword in the man as you spin around him, twirling your new spear. Gripping the shaft with both ends, you jam the blunt shaft into his spine and shove him at his grouped friends. They had been making a rush of their own, hoping to attack your exposed rear, but their charge is abruptly aborted as they halt or change direction to avoid their injured ally. You bend back and tilt your head up, looking for Joy, and find her floating downwards, trailing mist behind her. You hurl the spear skywards in her general direction and look away before you see if you hit.

Before they can regroup, you break off and sprint towards the house. The shouts of pursuing guards and Joy’s indignant shrieks echo around you as you bound up the steps. You tilt your left shoulder down, thinking to simply bash through the doors, but in the instant before you hit the doors splinter into hundreds of pieces.

An ungodly rattling comes from the building as scores of flying razors tear though it. Your heightened instincts know to toughen your flesh before you fully grasp the danger, or you would be in worse shape. As it is, you are forced to a complete stop as a wave of black blades washes over you. Locks of hair fly away, and your unarmored clothing is cut to ribbons by the onslaught. Shards of what feels like broken glass pierce through your brigandine and stick uncomfortably against your skin. The air roars around you until your ears are ringing.

Time seems to stand still as you stumble through the wreckage of the doors into the house, practically falling into the front parlor and hall. Ahead of you, Nuo is kneeling on the floor in her fish-form, facing away from you. She is covered in dozens of tiny cuts visible through her torn clothing and ruined hat. She holds the Stone of Making in front of her head with trembling hands, like a crude, tiny shield.

Some distance past Nuo, Himitsu stands tall with his hands outstretched. Lines of power flow through the air around him. The uncanny swirling energies around the magus illuminate the space with a pale blue-green light. Himitsu’s face is a practiced blank, emotionless with concentration, but a long cut over one eye gives him a savage expression. A dark stain on his robes suggests he is bleeding heavily from a wound in his side.

Nuo stands up, awkwardly climbing to her feet while Himitsu waves his hands about, mouthing words you cannot hear. She turns around, tucking the stone under one arm, and makes as if to run. Then she stops, seeing you as if for the first time. She, too, mouths words that you cannot hear before she bends back and makes launches the Stone at you with an overhand throw. The glowing rock sails through the air, neatly landing in your outstretched hands.

As you gaze into the Stone’s radiance, the ringing in your ears fades away. Snapping and crunching noises behind you tell you that the guards you left behind are closing in, running over broken razors and wooden splinters. Himitsu continues his chant, closing one eye as blood runs into it.

Ergh… You have to continue this fight, but it’s getting harder to think…

• Attack Himitsu. Another spell could be the end of you – you have to strike first. Something with reach. Vortex, maybe…
• Retreat. If you move now, you can be out the nearest window before anyone can launch an attack.
• Use the Stone. You need time to breathe… Walls. Walls keep people out. Walls made of stone. Stone stacked and held together with mortar or cut to fit each other…
• Something else?

[The MG]

Retreat. Hopefully, this will draw Himitsu's attention away from Nuo, allowing her to finish him off. Hopefully.

[wonderandawe]

Throw something at Himitsu (not the Stone of Making) to interrupt his casting. Retreat with Nuo afterwards.

[L'het'esh]

Throw something at Himetsu, alright; either end of Reaching Fist would be best, but it takes both hands and one has the Stone. One of the throwing daggers will do fine, as Himetsu has to remain motionless to cast his next spell, meaning a piece of pointy metal should be entering an eyeball about when you close on him....let Nuo handle the guards since she couldn't manage Himetsu.

[WarDragon]

Hit him with Vortex, and then charge to finish the bastard off.

[Erinys]

((Did we just tank Death of Obsidian Butterflies?))

Strike Vortex at Himitsu's face, then use the Stone to conjure a stone wall through his skull.

Or if it's too hard to concentrate, surround me and Nuo with the stone wall so we can take a breather.
Third option, a wall around Himitsu and a second wall to hold back the soliders.

[semicasual]

(Hey folks - I keep meaning to post an update, and I keep pushing it back due to RL stuff getting in the way. I hope to get the next bit written either tomorrow or saturday. )

[Zelbinnean]

I'll get an actual vote in today

[Ferryman]

Attack Himitsu with Vortex. The only safe sorcerer is a dead one.

[Zelbinnean]

Hit him with Vortex, and then charge to finish the bastard off.

I'm good with this.

[Caladon]

Use the stone to create a bubble of chaos around Himitsu. A smaller version of the one he used to kill Ayumu and trap us. It should kill him, and at the very least will make it so he can't perceive us to finish casting that spell at us.

[L'het'esh]

The Stone of Making is supposed to be unusable to the untrained (etc) per Himetsu.

If you think he was lying, do you think you can really get what you want on the first try faster than Himetsu can do a spell?

Let's stick to a tried and true method we are good at: violence.

[semicasual]

Rage, rage, rage drives the pain away. You focus your attention on the magus and flip Vortex into your free hand, lightly gripping it around the middle. Smoothly, almost casually, you swing the staff in Himitsu’s direction. Vortex extends tenfold in an instant, cracking the sorcerer’s forehead just beside his scar. Himitsu stumbles, steps back, and falls to one knee. Vortex clatters and retracts, snapping back to its normal size.

You turn around, expecting more attackers, and find four. Joy and the three guards are standing on the threshold. Joy is still airborne, hair and robes floating lightly around her inhuman, warped visage. The guards stand in front of her in a close formation, evidently expecting an attack.

The party hustles forward, but to your eyes it seems they are moving very slowly. You have time enough to react, but not enough to rest. Part of you thinks you should run, or drop the Stone so you have both hands free for weapons, but another impulse takes hold of you. You raise the Stone and hold it out towards them, gripping it tightly.

You want to make a wall - some kind of barrier to keep them back, if only long enough to give you time to breathe. You follow the same process as before, imagining the wall, remembering the characteristics of stone, envisioning how the completed object should look and what it should do. But something feels different – in the unraveled world, shaping the formless matter around you into anything was like stabbing someone in the guts – surprisingly easy, once you had the right angle for the least resistance. Using the Stone here, pulling the shapeless stuff from inside it and moving it into the shaped world, is more like chopping through bone – a hard structure resists your action, and overcoming that resistance requires more force. You try to push, but you feel something slip.

A large collection of greyish blobs appear in the air a few feet in front of the advancing guards, filling the parlor from floor to ceiling. They stop and tense up, confusion fighting with their training. The blobs start to change color and shape, melting into each other until they become a flat, semi-solid mass of unidenfiable, ever-shifting something. Struck with inspiration, you concentrate on moving the mass forward, pushing it into the war party. At once, the “wall” leaps forward, grinding up the floor and erasing hanging lamps as it goes. There are short cries of surprise, fear, and pain from the other side, suddenly falling into silence. The magical panel stops at the doorway and stays there, ominously glowing in every color.

Time resumes its normal pace. You let out a breath, then return your attention to Himitsu. As you turn around, you catch a glimpse of the magus, clumsily trying to stand, less than a second before Nuo tackles him. Wood creaks as she slams him down and holds him still, her knees on his arms. She makes as if to hit him with a right hook, but her fist does not connect with his face. Instead, the jagged spines on her forearm rake across his head, throwing blood onto the wall.
You look away, figuring that she has control of this fight, and assess your barrier. The chaotic-looking wall sits still, more or less, and you cannot hear anything from the other side. Satisfied that you are not in immediate danger, you collapse Vortex and put it away. Then you follow up by examining yourself.

There is blood on the back of your skull, matting your hair. Otherwise, you seem mostly uninjured – the shards stuck in your armor scratch at you, but you do not think you have any broken bones or large cuts. Your head aches very badly, though, and not just from the hits you took – holding back your Mark is getting to be very taxing. You can still fight, but you will want to rest soon. You also badly need a drink.

You let out a sigh and start walking down the hall, idly fishing out some of the bigger razors from your clothes as you go. While you are busy looking down at yourself, you suddenly realize that you have not heard the sounds of fighting for a while – you hear talking. Himitsu’s voice, occasionally interrupted by Nuo’s.

“…I had to, you understand?” The Magus’ voice is weak, slightly gurgling.

“I don’t care who he is. This is about you.” Nuo’s voice is harsh and icy.

“You must listen!” Himitsu almost shouts before he stops, breaking up his speech with a series of weak coughs. “He is one of them! The incarnate immortals who stole the gods’ fire! He-“

“I. DON’T. CARE!!” Nuo interrupts. She punctuates her yell by swiping both arms across Himitsu’s neck, twice. Blood sprays everywhere, and whatever else Himitsu might have said is lost as he chokes and passes out.

You passively watch as Nuo climbs off her victim. As she stands up, her legs shake, and she puts one hand on the wall for support. She falls back against that same wall as she attempts to turn around, shoulders heaving. Now that you can finally see her front, she does not look well. Many, many cuts cover her from top to bottom – only her head and neck were spared laceration. She seems to be bleeding something that is neither blood nor water in large amounts. It may be that adrenaline is the only thing keeping her on her feet.

There is a noise like a hundred tearing sheets of paper behind you. You wheel around and see Joy, coming through the barrier one inch at a time, drawing out the noise as she goes. She is only recognizable as Joy because of her white face and black teeth – all else about her has changed. She is taller, broader in the shoulders, and her flowing robes are gone, replaced with what looks like white leather that has been entirely covered in dried blood. Her hair, tied up in knots around bones, only goes down to her shoulders. But her face, and its expression of hate, are the same.

“I have tasted your essence, Nameless One,” she says, thrusting an arm out ahead of her through the wall. She is clutching Lefty, but the steel has turned a strange purplish color, and the edge is more saw-like, with barbs near the hilt. “The Joy of Killing, I know now, and so shall you!”

Joy completes her passage through the wall, pulling a red-stained hide buckler into view as she steps into the parlor. Meanwhile, you are preparing for the attack.

What do you do?

• Drop the Stone, draw Cleaver, and charge. Whatever she’s calling herself now, you’re sure that being cut to pieces will still kill her.
• Keep your distance. Getting on the business end of that warped short sword doesn’t sound good. Disarming or entangling her with Reaching Fist should do the trick.
• Get Nuo’s iron knife. Assuming she still has it, it’s your best hope to defeat Joy’s magic.
• Use the Stone again. If the Stone shaped Joy of Killing, then it can unshape her. (Open Player Challenge! If you could make anything to help in this situation… what would it be?)
• Something else?

[wonderandawe]

Get the iron knife. Or better yet, make a bunch of iron stakes rise from the ground and impale Joy with the stone of making. Can it do that?

Whatever you do, don't drop the stone.